Integrations & APIs
A practical guide to connecting Asana and Salesforce for teams where the handover from sales to delivery happens by copy and paste. Written by a team that is 100% Salesforce™ Certified.
A deal closes in Salesforce and the work starts in Asana. In most companies a person sits between those two moments, retyping what was already agreed. This page covers how to remove that person from the middle.
The Short Answer
A Salesforce Asana integration creates and updates Asana work from Salesforce records. The usual pattern is that reaching a defined point on an opportunity, most often Closed Won, creates an Asana project from a template, with fields from the deal filling in the brief, and project status finding its way back onto the Salesforce record.
Asana publishes an integration for Salesforce that supports this pattern without custom code, and automation platforms or a direct API build cover the cases it does not. The mechanics are not the interesting part. Choosing the trigger, the template and the field map is what makes the difference between a useful handover and an empty project shell.
The reason to build it is not the typing time saved. It is that the delivery team receives the same facts the deal was actually sold on, in a project that looks like every other onboarding, and the account owner can see whether work has started without asking anyone.
Inside the Handover
Three things decide whether the automated handover is better than the person it replaced.
Closed Won is the obvious choice and often the wrong one. Contract signed, deposit received or kick off scheduled may be the moment delivery can genuinely start. Pick the point where work should begin, not the point where the commission is booked.
The integration copies whatever template you point it at, including its gaps. Get the delivery team to agree one onboarding template with real task owners and durations first, then automate it. Automating a template nobody follows just creates projects people ignore.
Decide which opportunity and account fields the delivery team actually needs: scope, term, key contacts, promised dates, anything sold as an exception. That field map is the handover. Everything else in the integration is plumbing.
Two Ways To Get It
This integration sits between two teams that measure success differently, which is why it tends to be discussed for a year and built in a week.
| Consideration | Doing it in house | Fractional Admin Team |
|---|---|---|
| Time to useful work | Getting sales and delivery to agree a trigger and a template, before anyone touches the configuration. | We can begin immediately, with no lengthy onboarding. |
| Cost shape | A full time salary and benefits, carried whether the backlog is full or empty. | Monthly hour packages from $2,200, with a 10% discount on annual plans. |
| Range of skills | One person covering process design, the Salesforce automation and the delivery team's template. | Certified administrators plus a dedicated business analyst, project manager and trainer. |
| Continuity | Leave, illness and resignation all stop the work. | A dedicated team acting as an extension of your business, with a single point of contact. |
| Commitment | A permanent hire, decided before you know the size of the backlog. | No long term contracts. Change tier or stop as your needs change. |
Being Straight With You
Asana is licensed from Asana. If your delivery team runs a handful of projects a month and the handover already works, automating it will not repay the effort and we will say so.
Where we help is the Salesforce side: agreeing and configuring the trigger, making sure the fields delivery needs are captured during the sale rather than chased afterwards, building the automation, and reporting on what happens between closing and kick off. Our team is 100% Salesforce™ Certified with over 25 years of combined Salesforce™ expertise. Support visibility after go live is covered on our salesforce zendesk integration page, and salesforce devops center covers how we ship changes like this safely.
Get In TouchA discovery driven audit of your existing org: configuration, automation, user management and support. Outcome: a prioritized roadmap of improvements to drive faster ROI.
A scalable org built from scratch: objects, page layouts, flows, security, dashboards, Lightning apps and Field Service. Outcome: a fit for purpose Salesforce built to support the business from day one.
Adjusting an existing org as the business changes: new features, interface changes, better automation, role updates and advanced training. Outcome: a refined Salesforce that scales with the business.
Ongoing administration on flexible monthly hour packages: reports and dashboards, quick fixes, Flow edits, user support and training. Outcome: continuous improvement and uptime without full time cost.
How It Works
1
Pick the monthly hour package that matches the size of your backlog. Move up or down later as the work changes.
2
Discovery, an org review, then a prioritized backlog and roadmap so you can see what is being fixed and in what order.
3
Build, test and launch in short predictable cycles, with enablement, documentation and post go live support.
Fractional Admin Team Plans
Monthly rates below. Annual plans carry a 10% discount, shown in brackets. Platform Assessment, New Implementation and Platform Enhancement are quoted custom.
10 hrs, $2,200/mo ($2,000/mo annual)
Perfect for small businesses getting started with Salesforce.
20 hrs, $3,850/mo ($3,500/mo annual)
Ideal for expanding businesses with more Salesforce needs.
40 hrs, $6,600/mo ($6,000/mo annual)
For established businesses with advanced Salesforce requirements.
60 hrs, $8,250/mo ($7,500/mo annual)
For larger organizations with complex Salesforce needs.
Questions
Asana publishes an integration for Salesforce that you install and authorise against both accounts, then configure to create Asana work from Salesforce records. Automation platforms and a direct API build are the alternatives when you need conditions the packaged integration does not cover. Check Asana's current documentation for the capabilities it supports today.
Yes. That is the most common use of this integration: an opportunity reaching a defined stage creates a project from a template, with details from the deal filling in the brief. Build it so that creation is idempotent, meaning a record that flips back and forth between stages does not spawn three projects for the same customer.
Whichever point means delivery can genuinely begin. Closed Won is convenient but sometimes premature, because a signed contract, a received deposit or a scheduled kick off is what actually unblocks the work. Ask the delivery team what they wait for today, and use that.
Depending on the integration, project or task status can be surfaced against the Salesforce record so the account owner can see progress without an Asana seat. Decide what level of detail is useful. A single status and a link is usually more use to a sales team than a full task list they will not read.
Yes, on the Salesforce side. Defining the trigger, capturing the fields delivery needs during the sales process, building the automation and reporting on the gap between close and kick off all sit inside Platform Enhancement, or inside our Fractional Admin Team when you want it maintained month to month.
Tell us what happens in the week after a deal closes and we will tell you honestly which part is worth automating.
We Make Salesforce™ Simple. Ask us anything about running your org, including the questions you think are too small to ask.
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