Salesforce–Azure Active Directory Integration to Enable Enterprise Single Sign-On

Client

The Client is an IT company providing development and migration services for SharePoint and Office 365.

Challenge

The end Client used an Office 365 portal for sending corporate emails, storing user credentials, and managing corporate devices and Salesforce Sales Cloud for managing their sales. Users had to enter their credentials separately in Salesforce and Office 365, which was rather inconvenient and hampered a smooth workflow. As a result, the end Client was in need of an easier way of working with these systems for their employees.

The Client commissioned ScienceSoft as a subcontractor to set up single sign-on (SSO) for their client to access both the Salesforce solution and the Office 365 portal via one set of login credentials.

Solution

To provide SSO for the Salesforce solution and Office 365 portal, ScienceSoft’s team performed the integration of Salesforce with Azure Active Directory (AD), a cloud-based user authentication service used to sign in and access resources in Office 365. For that, ScienceSoft’s Salesforce developers made the following steps in Salesforce and Azure AD settings:

1. They registered the end Client’s Salesforce solution in Azure AD. For that, they created the authentication certificate within Azure AD. The certificate enabled setting up an encrypted connection for transferring security tokens, which allowed users to log in both systems (Salesforce and Office 365).

2. They registered the users who needed SSO to the Salesforce solution and the Office 365 portal within Azure AD and provided permission settings to them.

3. They performed the same activities – creating the authentication certificate, registering users and providing permission settings – within the Salesforce solution.

Results

The end Client got the possibility to access both their Salesforce solution and the Office 365 portal with one login and password due to enabling SSO. It significantly improved user convenience and simplified the process of working with both systems.

Technologies and Tools

Azure AD, Salesforce Sales Cloud, PowerShell.