How to Build a Salesforce Account Hierarchy
(Updated and Expanded)
The Salesforce Account Hierarchy is an out of the box feature that allows you to create relationships between Account records, giving you a clear view of parent companies, subsidiaries, and the entire organizational structure of your customers and prospects.
For many businesses, understanding who owns whom, how divisions roll up, and where influence sits is essential for territory planning, forecasting, customer success, channel alignment, partner management, and strategic selling. The Account Hierarchy in Salesforce makes this possible without requiring custom objects or complex configuration.
Whether you are a new Salesforce Admin or an experienced RevOps professional, Account Hierarchies are something you will interact with regularly. And while the feature is simple on the surface, it raises a lot of common questions. This guide explains why Account Hierarchies are powerful, how to build them, and how to use them strategically in your organization.
Why Salesforce Account Hierarchies Matter
A properly built Account Hierarchy provides critical visibility across your business. Here are some of the key benefits:
Clear Organizational Insight
The hierarchy exposes how accounts relate to each other at the corporate level. It becomes easy to see who the global parent is, which regional entities roll up to it, and how different divisions or brands fit together.
Better Territory and Segmentation Planning
Knowing which accounts are part of the same family ensures you do not double assign or overlap territories. It also helps you determine which entity should be counted toward rep quotas or team book splits.
Improved Forecasting and Reporting
When child accounts roll up to a parent, leaders get a more accurate picture of the entire relationship. You can forecast by enterprise group rather than by individual account.
Stronger Account-Based Selling
Enterprise sellers, SDRs, and customer success managers gain context that informs their outreach strategy. It becomes easier to identify influence, purchasing power, and white space across related entities.
Reduced Duplication and Confusion
In large orgs, the same logo can appear multiple times due to acquisitions, regional divisions, or historical data entry. The hierarchy helps unify these under one corporate umbrella.
Before You Build: Understanding Key Hierarchy Concepts
Before creating an Account Hierarchy, it is important to understand four core pieces of Salesforce functionality:
1. The Parent Account Field
The Parent Account field on the Account object connects an Account to another Account that sits above it. This is what creates the relationship that Salesforce uses to build the hierarchy.
2. The View Hierarchy Action
Every Account record includes a “View Hierarchy” link that displays the tree of related accounts. This visualization shows parents, children, siblings, and the full family structure.
3. The Indirect Relationship
Salesforce does not restrict the number of levels you can create. An account can have a parent, a grandparent, and so on. This allows complex corporate structures to be represented.
4. Custom Fields That Enhance Hierarchy Strategy
While the Parent Account field builds the hierarchy, many orgs add fields like:
Global Ultimate Parent
Hierarchy Tier
Relationship Owner
Franchise or Division Type
Regional Rollup
These help you categorize, analyze, and report on accounts more effectively.
How to Build a Salesforce Account Hierarchy
Follow these steps to create a clean, scalable Account Hierarchy in your org.
Step 1: Identify the Parent Company
Start by determining which entity is the global parent. This is typically the topmost legal entity in the corporate structure and often owns or controls the subsidiaries.
Step 2: Locate or Create Child Accounts
Next, identify the regional branches, subsidiaries, holding companies, or brands that should roll up to the parent. If these accounts already exist, confirm the data is accurate. If they do not, create new account records.
Step 3: Populate the Parent Account Field
On each child account:
Go to the Account record
Locate the Parent Account lookup field
Search for and select the appropriate parent
Repeat this for each subsidiary or related entity.
Step 4: Validate the Hierarchy
On any account in the structure, click “View Hierarchy.” Confirm:
The parent sits at the correct level
Child accounts appear under the correct parent
No duplicates appear
No incorrect accounts are attached
The hierarchy looks clean and logical
If something appears out of place, adjust the parent fields accordingly.
Step 5: Document Your Hierarchy Standards
To ensure future accuracy, clearly define rules for:
What counts as a parent
What counts as a subsidiary
How acquisitions are handled
How franchises or independent divisions should be linked
Who is responsible for maintaining the hierarchy
Without documentation, users create inconsistent relationships.
Best Practices for Maintaining Account Hierarchies
Standardize Naming Conventions
Consistent naming helps identify related accounts and prevents duplicates.
Use Validation Rules When Needed
Some organizations prevent reps from assigning parent accounts outside of designated rules.
Train Users Across Teams
Sales, CSM, and Support teams should understand the hierarchy so they categorize accounts correctly.
Review Hierarchies During Quarterly Business Reviews
Acquisitions, rebrands, and restructuring happen often. Build hierarchy cleanup into your QBR process.
Consider Automation
Flow or other automation tools can help:
Flag potential duplicates
Suggest parent accounts
Enforce rules
Sync global ultimate parent fields
Extend the Hierarchy with Relationship Mapping Tools
Native Salesforce hierarchy views are helpful but limited. Tools like Squivr provide enhanced visual Org Charts, Relationship Maps, influence lines, and cross functional visibility, allowing you to go beyond corporate hierarchy and map the real buying structure.
Beyond the Basics: Modern Uses for Account Hierarchies
Modern revenue teams use hierarchies for far more than simple parent child tracking. Some advanced use cases include:
Strategic account planning
Identifying whitespace across business units
Mapping executive influence
Tracking global contract coverage
Coordinating multi region sales efforts
Partner and channel hierarchy alignment
Upsell and cross sell prioritization
The more complete your hierarchy, the more powerful your analytics and planning become.
How Squivr Enhances Your Salesforce Account Hierarchy
While Salesforce provides a functional hierarchy view, Squivr brings it to life. Squivr gives teams a native Salesforce solution for building:
Visual Org Charts
Account Relationship Maps
Detailed Influence Paths
Playbooks tied to hierarchy insights
Cross team collaboration inside the system of record
This enables true account planning and removes the need for off platform spreadsheets, diagrams, or external tools. Your entire account strategy stays inside Salesforce where it is secure, reportable, and actionable.
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