Getting Started with Custom Machine Learning Models in Salesforce: Integrating with Heroku

In this guide, we will walk you through the steps to develop and integrate a custom machine learning model with Salesforce using the Heroku platform. By following these instructions, you’ll be able to leverage the power of custom machine learning in your Salesforce CRM.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have the following prerequisites in place:

1. Salesforce Developer Account: Sign up for a Salesforce developer account if you don’t have one already.

2. Heroku Account: Create a Heroku account at https://www.heroku.com/ if you haven’t done so.

3. Data Science Framework: Install a data science framework such as scikit-learn, TensorFlow, or PyTorch in your development environment.

4. Salesforce REST API Access: Obtain Salesforce REST API credentials to connect with Salesforce from your custom machine learning model.

Step 1: Model Development

1. Develop your custom machine learning model using the data science framework of your choice. For example, let’s create a simple model using scikit-learn for sentiment analysis:

# Import the required libraries
from sklearn.feature_extraction.text import TfidfVectorizer
from sklearn.naive_bayes import MultinomialNB

# Sample data for sentiment analysis
documents = ["I love Salesforce!", "Salesforce is amazing!", "I'm not happy with the service.", "Salesforce needs improvement."]
labels = ["positive", "positive", "negative", "negative"]

# Create a TF-IDF vectorizer and train the model
vectorizer = TfidfVectorizer()
X_train = vectorizer.fit_transform(documents)
model = MultinomialNB()
model.fit(X_train, labels)

Step 2: API Development

1. Develop an API endpoint that will receive input data and return predictions from your custom machine learning model. You can use Flask to create a simple API:

from flask import Flask, request, jsonify

app = Flask(__name__)

# API endpoint to handle predictions
@app.route('/predict', methods=['POST'])
def predict_sentiment():
    data = request.get_json()
    input_data = data['data']
    input_vector = vectorizer.transform(input_data)
    predictions = model.predict(input_vector)
    return jsonify(predictions.tolist())

if __name__ == '__main__':
    app.run(debug=True)

Step 3: Deployment on Heroku

1. Deploy your API to Heroku using Git. Make sure you have the Heroku CLI installed and authenticated.

$ heroku login
$ git init
$ heroku create your-app-name
$ git add .
$ git commit -m "Initial commit"
$ git push heroku master

Step 4: Integration with Salesforce

1. Obtain your Heroku API URL and key after deploying the API on Heroku.

2. In your Salesforce developer account, create a custom Apex class to interact with the Heroku API using Salesforce REST API:

public class HerokuAPIIntegration {
    private static String apiUrl = 'https://your-app-name.herokuapp.com/predict'; // Replace with your Heroku API URL
    private static String apiKey = 'YOUR_API_KEY'; // Replace with your Heroku API key

    public static String getSentimentPrediction(String data) {
        HttpRequest req = new HttpRequest();
        req.setEndpoint(apiUrl);
        req.setMethod('POST');
        req.setHeader('Content-Type', 'application/json');
        req.setHeader('Authorization', 'Bearer ' + apiKey);
        req.setBody('{"data": ["' + data + '"]}');
        
        Http http = new Http();
        HttpResponse res = http.send(req);
        
        if (res.getStatusCode() == 200) {
            return res.getBody();
        } else {
            return null;
        }
    }
}

3. Utilize the custom Apex class in your Salesforce workflow or trigger to make predictions using your custom machine learning model:

String inputText = 'I am thrilled with the new product!';
String sentimentPrediction = HerokuAPIIntegration.getSentimentPrediction(inputText);
System.debug(sentimentPrediction); // Output: ["positive"]

By following these steps, you have successfully developed and integrated a custom machine learning model with Salesforce using the Heroku platform. You can now leverage the power of data science to make advanced predictions and recommendations within your Salesforce CRM.