How to Quickly Sync Salesforce and Jira with Automated 2-Way Updates

How to Quickly Sync Salesforce and Jira with Automated 2-Way Updates

Published in Customer Support on , last updated .

Let’s say there’s a service desk team in Salesforce that receives information about customer issues, then dispatches work to another team in Jira or Jira Service Management. How do they collaborate and stay aligned so the service desk can keep the customer informed? Maybe there’s a project manager jumping between tools, maybe you’ve got automation figured out with a couple of triggers and actions to share work 1-way, or perhaps everyone is just sharing context in Slack and updating their own tasks ad hoc. None of these is a perfect solution, and that’s why Unito exists with a 2-way integration to save you hours of manual effort or from needing to hire a custom implementation consultant to modify your Salesforce instance.

Instead, you can simply sign up for Unito and create a flow yourself in 15 minutes that will create new issues in Jira or Jira Service Management automatically whenever someone manually creates a task in Salesforce. This same integration solution can also be adapted to Salesforce opportunities, contacts, and cases are coming later in 2024.

Here’s a how to set up a 2-way flow in Unito

In this article:

Use case overview

You’ll be connecting Jira (or Jira Service Management) and Salesforce with Unito’s flow builder.

A flow represents the connection between your Salesforce organization and a single Jira project. While there are countless ways to sync data, feel free to adapt these steps to your specific use case and address common issues, such as streamlining customer request intake, triaging and prioritizing issues, and tracking resolution progress.

By following these steps, you’ll be able to seamlessly integrate Jira (or Jira Service Management) and Salesforce, creating a more efficient and responsive customer support process.

Optimizing your service desk with Unito

The challenge: customer data in silos

  • The customer support team uses Salesforce Service Cloud to manage customer requests and cases.
  • The development or IT team uses Jira (or Jira Service Management) to track and resolve bugs. This separation often leads to communication breakdowns, delays in issue resolution, and frustrated customers.

The solution: break down silos with 2-way sync

  1. Connect Accounts and Projects: Link Salesforce Service Cloud cases to Jira (or Jira Service Management) issues. This allows the support team to see the progress on bug fixes or feature requests associated with customer cases.
  2. Automate task creation and dispatching: When a new case is created in Salesforce, automatically generate a corresponding issue in Jira (or Jira Service Management). Include relevant case details like customer information, issue description, and priority. When a bug is reported in Jira (or Jira Service Management), create a corresponding case in Salesforce. This ensures the customer support team is aware of the issue and can proactively communicate with the affected customers.
  3. Real-time updates: By linking fields with Unito, changes made in either system are automatically synced. When the development team updates an issue’s status in Jira, it automatically updates the linked case in Salesforce, keeping the support team informed in real-time.

Setup in Jira

If you’re connecting Jira to Unito via OAuth2, then simply follow the on-screen instructions when adding your account for the first time:

Unito OAuth screen for connecting Jira with 3 options: OAuth 2, an API token or OAuth 1.0

Here’s a separate guide on how to connect a local Jira Server on-premise to Unito. You can also connect your server via ngrok.

If you’re connecting to Jira Cloud without OAuth2, you’ll need to set your Jira contact email visibility to anyone from your Jira profile page. Then, set up an application link in Jira so that your issues can sync to Smartsheet.

Step 1. Connect Salesforce and Jira to Unito

  1. Navigate to the Unito App and +Create Flow.
  2. Click Start Here to connect your Jira project and Salesforce organization.
  3. Choose the accounts you want to connect.
  4. When you connect each tool for the first time, make sure to authorize both in Unito in order for your tasks, opportunities, or contacts to sync properly.

Here are two examples of completed tool connection screens. The first is for a flow between Jira Service Management issues and Salesforce tasks:

Connecting Jira Service Management to Salesforce with Unito to sync issues and tasks

The second is a flow between Jira Cloud issues and Salesforce opportunities:

Connecting a Jira project and Salesforce organization to Unito for bi-directional syncing

If we need to connect more projects, we can simply duplicate this Unito flow when we’re done, and modify accordingly.

Step 2. Set a flow direction between Jira and Salesforce

Flow direction tells Unito where to automatically create work items (tasks, opportunities, or contacts) based on your manual activity: in Jira, Salesforce or both.

If you only want to send work from one tool to another, you should select a one-way flow direction. If you want to be able to dispatch work from either tool then select a two-way flow direction.

Flow direction example between Salesforce and Jira Service Management

Later, we can tell Unito to keep those work items in a 2-way, real-time sync.

Step 3. Set rules to sync specific Jira issues and Salesforce tasks or opportunities

Now we can set up rules to sync specific Jira issues or Salesforce tasks between tools. This step basically filters out unrelated information from the Unito flow. Select Add a new rule to get started, or continue with the default rules.

NOTE: The default rules will sync all items from the source tool to the destination that are created after you launch the flow. If you want to sync historical data, just click the trash icon beside the creation date rule.

Rules in Unito to sync Salesforce tasks and Jira issues

In this example, any Salesforce task with the status “Jira Feature Request” will sync to Jira Service Management in our Service Desk project. You can also tell Unito what issue type to create in Jira: a bug, epic, story or task.

More about rules and conditions: You can add filters based on most fields, although fields with single or multi-select choices (e.g., Salesforce stages) are especially effective.

You can also apply custom labels to your tasks or tasks to be even more precise about what kind of data is shared.

Find out more about setting rules.

When you first open this screen, you’ll be presented with two options. If you select Auto-map, Unito will pre-populate a list of suggested field mappings which you can then adjust.

Now, select + Add mapping to sync additional fields. Then, click Select a field. Unito will suggest compatible matches in the second after you click on the drop-down menu. Here’s an example of a basic field mapping table between Jira Service Management and Salesforce:

Linked fields between Jira Service Management and Salesforce

Gear or cog icons indicate customizable field pairs that can be further modified (i.e., you can link specific statuses between apps on a 1:1 level).

Here’s how custom fields enhance the power of Unito’s 2-way Salesforce integration:

Every field with a blue question mark indicates a custom field that was created in each respective tool. This is how Unito can help users optimize their workflows and do what no other integration or automation solution can. By easily enabling you to keep custom fields in sync, you can personalize your integration quickly and effectively.

Here’s a more comprehensive set of field mappings in a flow between Jira Cloud and Salesforce opportunities:

Complex field mappings between Salesforce and Jira with Unito's 2-way flow builder

Find out more about setting field mappings.

Step 5. Launch Salesforce Jira Service Management integration

And that’s it! That’s all you need to connect Salesforce with Jira to sync tasks, opportunities or contacts with Unito. Congratulations! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to our team by clicking the little chat box in the lower-right corner of your screen.

What’s next after you sync Jira and Salesforce with Unito?

Streamlining Your Software Development Projects

Unito supports various versions of Jira software, including Jira server, as well as:

This broad support ensures that teams can collaborate effectively, regardless of the Jira implementation they use. This versatility makes Unito a valuable tool for any software development project.