Definition
Follow is a Chatter feature in Salesforce that allows users to subscribe to updates about records, people, or topics. When you follow an item, relevant changes such as field updates, posts, comments, and activities appear in your Chatter feed. Each user can follow up to 500 combined items (people, records, and topics) by default.
Real-World Example
When a business analyst at Clearwater Inc. needs to streamline operations, they turn to Follow to improve how the organization tracks relationships and interactions. By setting up Follow properly, the team gains better visibility into their customer base, which leads to more informed decisions and stronger customer relationships across the board.
Why Follow Matters
Follow is a Chatter feature in Salesforce that allows users to subscribe to updates about records, people, or topics. When you follow an item, relevant changes appear in your Chatter feed: field updates on records, posts from followed users, activity on followed topics. This creates a personalized activity stream where users see the updates that matter to them without having to navigate to each item individually. Each user can follow up to 500 combined items (people, records, and topics) by default.
Follow is the foundation of Chatter's activity feed model, turning Salesforce into something closer to a social platform where relevant updates come to you rather than requiring active searching. Users typically follow their key accounts, important contacts, active opportunities, teammates, and relevant topics. For managers, following team members' accounts can provide visibility into team activity. Some orgs configure auto-follow on record creation so users automatically follow records they own, ensuring they see updates without having to remember to click Follow.
How Organizations Use Follow
- •Cobalt Ventures — Sales reps follow their key accounts so any activity shows up in their Chatter feed automatically, keeping them informed without manual checking.
- •NovaScale — Enabled auto-follow on Opportunity creation so owners automatically follow their opportunities, eliminating the risk of missing updates.
- •Vertex Global — Account managers follow their top customers' key contacts, so they see updates and activity involving those contacts across the org.