Salesforce Regression Testing: Benefits and Best Practices

As businesses continue to rely on Salesforce to manage their day-to-day operations, it’s more important than ever to have a solid regression testing strategy in place. By performing regular Salesforce regression testing, you can ensure that your Salesforce applications continue to work as intended, even after a code change.

In this guide, we’ll discuss the challenges of Salesforce regression testing, best practices, and tools you need to know to get started. So, let’s dive right in.

What is Regression Testing?

Before we jump into Salesforce regression testing, let’s talk about regression testing first. Regression testing is a type of software testing that verifies whether changes or new features added to a software product have impacted its existing functionality. It involves re-running previously executed test cases to ensure that the software still behaves as expected and does not show any unexpected behavior or bugs after the changes have been made.

What is Salesforce Regression Testing?

Salesforce regression testing aims to verify that existing functionalities have not been broken due to any updates or code changes. It involves testing the entire system or high-risk areas to ensure that critical features and processes continue to work as expected.

Why Regression Test Your Salesforce Application?

You might be aware of the fact that Salesforce releases frequent updates and new features to its product. Reportedly, they have three seasonal releases yearly – Spring, Summer, and Winter. During every release or update, you must ensure your salesforce implementation is stable and working as expected. Regression testing in Salesforce helps identify bugs that may have been introduced due to code changes or updates and also ensures that it does not impact the existing functionalities. It helps maintain the overall quality and reliability and guarantees that your Salesforce application is stable, efficient, and works as expected.

Is There Automated Testing in Salesforce?

Yes, there is automated testing in Salesforce. Though Salesforce’s heavy DOM structure makes automation a challenge, there are robust automation tools like Testsigma that support Salesforce testing.

Start automating your salesforce regression tests with Testsigma

Automated testing is highly preferred as regression tests need to be executed frequently, and automating them can help save time, effort, and resources.

Benefits of Implementing Regression Test Automation in Salesforce DevOps

Salesforce automated regression testing offers multiple benefits to businesses, from cost savings to reducing testing time, thus boosting DevOps and faster deployment.

1. Faster Feedback Cycles

Automated testing provides rapid feedback to the developers. It allows them to fix bugs or glitches in the application quickly. Thus, it helps ship products faster.

2. Accelerated Regression Tests

By incorporating test automation into your DevOps pipelines, you can schedule test cases anytime, anywhere, leading to faster results with less effort and time spent on releases and deployments.

3. Fully Autonomous

The autonomous nature of test automation allows users to schedule and execute tests overnight. It avoids the need for human intervention, thus allowing you to test your product overnight and get the test reports by morning. This enables the QA team to focus more on critical tasks.

4. Cost-effective

Automation reduces the time and effort required for testing, leading to cost savings in the long run. Additionally, automation reduces the likelihood of defects making it into production, which can result in fewer costs to fix.

5. Improved Accuracy

Automated regression testing ensures that the test cases are executed accurately and consistently, leading to high-quality software. Also, they can test a large number of scenarios, thereby leading to broader test coverage in a shorter time. This means that you can identify bugs earlier in the development cycle, leading to improved overall quality.

Best Practices for Regression Testing Salesforce

The following are some of the best practices of regression testing that you can follow to ensure that your regression testing is fast, secure, and cost-efficient.

1. Define your approach to regression testing

You must create a clear testing strategy for your Salesforce regression testing. Before your testing, decide on certain factors, such as,

• What test cases to automate and what test cases to perform manually?
• How much test coverage are you planning for?
• What test environments are required for regression tests?
• How will you report the performance of the regression tests?

Also, the testing approach may differ based on the Salesforce interface you’re working with – Lightning or Classic.

Salesforce Lightning is the latest version that is easy to use and fast. Yet, most businesses still use the Classic version. However, Salesforce plans to move all its customers to its new version in the coming years.

Salesforce testing in Lightning and Classic differ in difficulty. For instance, creating a test script on the classic version is more straightforward since the elements are more easily defined. Conversely, scripting on lightning is more challenging due to the dynamic paths of CSS and XPATHS.

2. Select test cases

You must select the specific test cases to be executed during the regression testing process. It includes identifying the critical functionalities that need to be tested to ensure they are not affected by any new changes. Always test the core functionalities and the new feature updates.

3. Frequently update your regression suite

As the code changes, the test cases will change too. Keeping your regression tests up to date is part of the process.

When new functionalities are added to your Salesforce application, you need to add them to your regression suite as well. It will help to ensure that all functionalities are tested thoroughly during the regression testing process.

Since testers will have to edit the test cases frequently, it is best to choose an automation test tool that lets you edit or update tests easily.

4. Define testing frequency

You need to decide how often you will run regression tests. It depends on the frequency of changes to your Salesforce application. Typically, QAs perform regression testing whenever new functionality, feature, or element is added to the system.

Since testers have to perform this testing frequently, manual regression testing could be challenging and time-consuming. That is why automation is a perfect choice. Also, automated regression tests save time and effort. Testers can easily identify bugs in the system, and developers can quickly work on fixing them.

What to Look For in a Regression Testing Tool for Salesforce?

Although the requirements of each organization may vary, there are certain factors that are essential to consider when selecting a regression testing tool in order to optimize the effectiveness of your testing approach, such as,

• Full cross-technology support
• Easy to use
• Highly scalable
• Third-party integration
• Supports different types of testing

Let’s discuss this in detail below and the ideal tool for Salesforce testing that best fits your organization.

Full cross-technology support

Does the tool provide comprehensive support for the technologies the Salesforce application interacts with? The automation tool should work seamlessly across all operating systems and platforms that are needed for Salesforce to work.

Easy to use

Easy-to-use, simple, easy-to-learn, and low maintenance are the capabilities you should look for before investing in an automation testing tool. Also, using low-code automation tools makes automation easy and accessible for a large group of people because it requires low to no coding skills.

Highly scalable

As the regression test suite keeps growing, it is best advised to use a tool that can automate all such tests, providing more ROI. This way, you will not have to invest in multiple automation tools to manage your regression suite.

Third-party integration

A tool that integrates easily with your existing tools and supports third-party integrations is preferred.

Supports different types of testing

What if you can perform all your Salesforce testing in one place? Pick a tool that supports various types of testing, such as end-to-end testing, regression testing, visual testing, and API testing, in the same place.

Testsigma for Automating Salesforce Regression Testing

Testsigma is an ideal test automation platform for Salesforce regression testing. It offers tons of benefits to users and makes it a perfect choice for automating Salesforce.

• Testsigma lets you automate complex workflows in simple English as it supports NLP based testing.


• It supports Java for certain testing scenarios that might require coding.


• A robust platform that supports both code-based and codeless automation in one place.


• It is a cloud-based platform, so you don’t have to install multiple tools or frameworks to regression test your Salesforce application.


• Automate regression tests 5x faster for the web and desktop in one place.


• Allows Agile teams to deliver products at 8x faster rate than traditional test stacks


• It reduces your test maintenance time and costs by up to 70%.


• Also, it supports multiple devices, browsers, platforms, and versions to check if your Salesforce application is cross-compatible and portable.


• It easily integrates with bug tracking, CI/CD, collaboration, and product management tools.


• With Testsigma, you can achieve a great ROI in a short time.


• It supports multiple test labs like BrowserStack, LambdaTest, Sauce Labs, and Kobiton.


• It supports different types of Salesforce testing, like, cross-browser testing, regression testing, integration testing, end-to-end testing, API testing, visual Testing, and more. Testsigma is the one-stop solution for all your Salesforce testing needs.

Sign up for Testsigma Cloud to get ahead with your Salesforce regression testing.

Summary

Salesforce regression testing is an essential part of ensuring the quality and reliability of your Salesforce application. By automating the testing process, you can save time and effort while also improving the accuracy and coverage of your tests.

Also, by identifying and fixing issues early on, you can prevent bug-fixing costs and keep your business running smoothly. Automating your regression testing process with Testsigma will help reduce the risk of bugs and ensure that your applications meet your business requirements.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which tools are used in Salesforce testing?

There are several tools available for testing Salesforce, including,

• Testsigma
• Selenium
• ACCELQ
• Tricentis
• testRigor

How is Salesforce testing different from normal testing?

Salesforce testing is different from normal testing because Salesforce keeps constantly changing with frequent releases and updates. Meaning the test suite also has to be updated accordingly.

Also, it often involves testing customizations and integrations that are unique to each organization. This means that testing needs to be tailored to the specific requirements of each organization and its business processes.