Unanet CRM by Cosential Erfahrungen

Makes my 1-man marketing department feel like 3

Vorteile:

1 year after purchase: This has easily been one of the wisest investments our firm has made. The ability to track customer information (CRM), their experience, past performance data, and leads/opportunities all from one simple application and dashboard makes my 1-man marketing team feel like 3. The capability to routinely pull data from our accounting software reduces duplication in both content and time. I no longer spend hours "looking for *stuff*" (put politely) during proposal preparation due to the full featured project and ‘knowledge’ database paired up with the advanced reporting functionality. I still have only scrapped the tip of the metaphorical iceberg of features that are included with the package including the ability to automatically survey clients, a built in email marketing tool, card scanner, countless plug-ins, a customizable RESTful API, Outlook and Exchange server plugins, and soon a full blown Zapier integration. Additionally, the support both during install and throughout my journey have been absolutely wonderful. They have made the ins and outs of using the software a simple, and surprisingly enjoyable, experience!

Nachteile:

There are some issues with the knowledge base section that I would improve on. I have a lot of issues it the mobile application on my Android device.

Excellent CRM for Sub-Contractor

Kommentare: Overall, the software was very straight forward to deploy and they have excellent support during start-up. This is a very good CRM for construction-based business and they bring their industry knowledge to the table during configuration, implementation and deployment.

Vorteile:

As a sub-contractor a key feature that was needed in a CRM was to be able to quote different GC's for the same project and not have each quote for the same project show up in our pipeline. We need to have a Master Opportunity with multiple sub-opportunities. Cosential is able to handle this very well (unlike most other CRM packages). In addition, the ability to create individualized dashboards per individual was very beneficial for my business development team. These individualized dashboards allow my team to display their goals, quotes and activities on this dashboard.

Nachteile:

Cosential needs to improve two areas: Handling documents better and working with Outlook Calendar Cosential has document management, but you have to deal with one file at a time...both uploading and downloading. For large construction files (prints and specifications) it takes a while for these files to be uploaded or downloaded and does not effectively allow for other computer tasks to be done. As a CRM, they need to have an interface with Outlook calendar (or Google Calendar) that is seamless to effectively leverage their tasks and activities within Cosential

Cosential Three Years In

Kommentare: Customer service and support have been challenging. We've been told that improvements were going to happen that just never went anywhere. The "improvements" that have been implemented for us turned out to be less useful than the previous state of the system. And I've had account reps just not return my calls or respond to my emails regarding issues we've had between what was promised and described during the sales pitch and how a particular module actually functions (most notably photo management).

Vorteile:

Cosential is a detailed and robust database and CRM system. The information organization is well-thought out and the information relationships function reasonably well. Integrations with other firm systems are generally useful. The application is also a good value for our size firm.

Nachteile:

Photo management is just about useless--keyword search should be reductive, not expanding, and should really be a simple case of AND vs OR Boolean search. Customized fields aren't reflected in reports at all, which limits their usefulness in data analysis. Some data areas are designed more for construction firms than architecture firms, and the dissonance in data capture has required some workarounds and means we can't actually search on that data. Several areas are a little too narrowly focused--there are more sustainability measures than just LEED--and require more workarounds to capture the kind of data we're tracking on our projects. There's a certain level of flexibility promoted and the reality is a superficial flexibility.

Adding a CRM to our firm has helped us keep track of prospect projects as well as client information

Vorteile:

We now have one central data depository for all of our offices contacts, project info, personnel, resumes etc. The ability to create custom reports, update project data and track prospects across many users has improved our communication and reporting tremendously. The ability to update personnel, project, contact information in one spot and have it populate throughout any report or resume is a big plus. The Widgets are great for a graphical representation to management that accurately represents current pursuits, hit rates, wins by market, etc. The ability to turn on and off modules for user groups is huge! It keeps people from being overwhelmed when they first start to use the CRM, especially if they never have used one in the past or are skeptical. Integrations with other programs continue to be developed and improved by Cosential - this is a huge plus! Business Development/Marketing people are mobile - the iPad is a tool, just like a laptop. Being able to enter client info in Cosential and add it to an individuals Outlook contacts with just a few clicks makes it easy to have centralized client data. We will be implementing an integrations with Vista later this year. I am excited for the potential that will bring live project and personnel data to our CRM!

Nachteile:

It's still a little 'techy' and driven by IT/Developers from the end-user perspective. But it's getting better every month we use it! When a bug is identified, or an issue occurs, for the most part Cosential Support is responsive. Sometimes, however it seems like it takes months to fix an issue. This is especially frustrating when a function (say a mailing list) was working correctly and then stops working. Because Cosential manages literally mountains of company, contact, personnel and project data, it can feel overwhelming to new users. Customizing the training and 'easing new users into' the program based on their needs is the only way to get good buy-in from apprehensive or skeptical users. The mobile app has it's limitations on the iPad and as all of our Business Developers use iPads, they would like to see the app developed further. Right now, it's better than nothing when they are on the road!

FINALLY, a tool for marketers in the AEC industry!!!!

Kommentare: Fantastic. It's like nothing I've ever used before, and it's so great to have all my information in one convenient place. Also, the Unanet CRM by Cosential team is great--I've gotten to know several people over there, and they're all extremely helpful and knowledgeable. I feel like I'm easily able to reach out to someone I know with a question, rather than sending my questions off into an abyss and never know who will respond to them and when, like most software companies.

Vorteile:

I love that it's got so many fields and places to store all the information I need. It covers everything from project specifics, to team member experience, and everything in between. It's customizeable, so I can alter fields I don't use, and make them into something else more helpful to me. The Publishing tool, though it needs some updates/improvements, is still a huge timesaver, especially with resumes. This software is my one-stop-shop for all information I need!

Nachteile:

It feels a little outdated, both in terms of appearance and capabilities. There are some things, like the ability to rearrange tabs, that seem like they should be obvious, yet are not yet implemented. Another feature I struggle with is building resumes---it would be really helpful if we could see how many hours a person spent on a project BEFORE selecting it for the resume. Too often, I end up selecting all the project, and then having to painstakingly remove each one that they only spent a couple hours on...and it's a slow process. If it weren't for this, I'd be able to get resumes done much more quickly.

Best CRM for the AEC Industry

Vorteile:

Cosential was created and designed by people from our industry, so they understand what information is important to us. The system is easy to navigate and provides more components than other platforms we have used in this arena, such as document automation, surveys, a knowledge library, email marketing and superior search functions. Cosential invests in product development and rolls out new features, functions and improvements on a regular basis.

Nachteile:

The user interface needs a refresh. We have been hearing about interface updates since we started using the product, but progress on that initiative has been slow. The report module is challenging for the average user due to the large quantity of fields and inconsistent field naming. However, I appreciate that we do not need to write a query or depend on code to develop a report, unlike other platforms we use.

Hoping to be able to upgrade this review at a later date

Kommentare: Cosential has streamlined our processes and has the potential to help us streamline even more. The company needs to evolve it's development staff to be able to address bugs in a timely manner.

Vorteile:

Cosential has streamlined many of our processes, and has the potential to help us automate our proposal process even more. The potential is amazing.

Nachteile:

Glitches! We seem to be always taking three steps forward, two steps back. Cosential isn't easy to set up or implement. There is a ton of up front work and training to be done. After overcoming all of that to be faced with modules that stop working and aren't fixed timely we are left hanging. Two years in, as we are ready to deep-dive into more of the Cosential functionality we are being besieged by glitches that are impeding our use of the system, which is extremely frustrating. The big weakness is in fixing bugs in the system. The customer service team passes glitches on to the developers and nobody can, or will, tell you when to expect the problem to be resolved. We have been waiting for 3+ months now on one issue, which is unacceptable. We are so far in at this point that it doesn't make sense to change systems now, but the thought has crossed our minds.

Cosential keeps company wide proposal pieces accessible and up-to-date with minimal fuss/effort.

Kommentare: Labor hours saved is huge. Access to information from one portal extremely helpful.

Vorteile:

My favorite feature is the resume generation tool. The ability to produce multiple resumes tailored for specific pursuit types automatically updated each time they are created is beyond wonderful. Coupled with their availability to all team members 24/7 at the push of a button from any internet enabled device makes the resume generation tool peerless. Another great feature is the opportunity tracking, once again keeping all the pieces of a pursuit in one handy place and available 24/7 is brilliant!!!!

Nachteile:

Although a minor issue I do wish that users other than administrators could upload templates for use in the publisher module as administrators may be busy/unavailable for periods of time making updating the templates a longer process then it should be.

The support from Cosential cannot be beat.

Vorteile:

Completely transparency of our customer opportunities and interactions between all our divisions for all customers. We have robust reporting where we can understand our pipeline, hit rate, and more data than we ever had in the past. The process is simple and we have the power as the admins to make changes/updates without having to wait for the resources at Cosential. We feel very empowered!

Nachteile:

The time between request (issue or bug with system/enhancement suggestion) to the sprint where the improvement may occur. At times you are waiting for the developers or the request sits in the queue between submitting the suggestion and update for quite some time. We have learned the process of a bug or enhancement but at times we wish we could influence more of the speed to updates.

Cosential has helped standardize our information across the company.

Vorteile:

Cosential helps us standardize the information we track, being able to output reports in a consistent format.

Nachteile:

We use InDesign for our publications. The Publisher module currently forces us to export resumes and projects one by one, vs. being able to select projects we want to use and exporting all into a single file.

The ONLY database in the AEC industry that makes my job easier!

Kommentare: I was first introduced to Cosential in 2010 and began to research and push for the software at my previous company. After a long inside sales process, the company decided not to move forward with my recommendation which was a major factor in my leaving that organization. One of the main goals of my coming onboard to my current company was to implement Cosential as our marketing database software, and see what other tools are available that we can utilize in other parts of the company. We are full-service real estate company that provided construction (at the time), development, financing, tax credit syndication, facilities maintenance, and property, asset, and investment management services. We ended up implementing across all marketing groups in the business in the construction, development, investment, asset and property management, and in our justice division. Different groups adopted it more quickly than others, and some we ended up just removing entirely as they were not utilizing the system. Currently our marketing groups across the business still utilize Cosential for business development tracking, current project and property data collection and maintenance, and personnel resume maintenance.

Vorteile:

Because Cosential was designed by marketers in our industry, they know what information is important to collect, track, and analyze. The organization of the information and ease of use of the system is unparalleled to other CRMs/databases. Cosential is constantly updating and enhancing the system, so there are new, and improved, features being released to its users constantly, and I always hear what's going on - I know it's the top of the line database for information junkies like me. The reporting and template publishing tools are also incredibly helpful. Tracking our proposals and showing our win/loss ratios to senior leadership has been crucial. Also, the ability to store less-than-popular data for possible future use is highly beneficial.

Nachteile:

I wish the reporting module was a little more user friendly - it can be daunting to new and novice users causing it to go unused and frequently used incorrectly causing frustrations. I am now in the Commercial Real Estate industry (more so than what would be termed AEC), I would love LOVE to have more information/modules relating to development of projects, property and asset management - understanding the high-level of property and information turnover for these types of services.

Get to know Cosential

Kommentare: My company had implemented Cosential about 3 years before I joined, and they did a good job of inputting the bulk of project, personnel, and contact info into the data base. By the time I came on board the staff that had implemented had left, so I received minimal training on administration of the system, and how all the pieces fit together. That being said, it has not been difficult to learn the basics, and I am currently in the process of "re-implementation" to establish standard work flows and systems to manage the data input, user training, report management, etc. The biggest challenge is carving out the time for data input and cleanup, not to mention bringing new modules (surveys, marketing, etc.) on line without having a full time data base manager.

Vorteile:

I like that Cosential has implemented upgrades in speed and search functions. It is tailored to the A/E/C industry, and we have the ability to customize fields. We use Adobe InDesign for proposals, so the ability to generate resumes and project profiles directly into InDesign templates is a big plus (it can also be done in MS Word). The dashboard widgets are really helpful for our business development team. There is a phone app available. I am getting good service regarding support for re-implementation.

Nachteile:

The report module is always a challenge, the interface is cumbersome and it usually takes multiple attempts to generate the data I am looking for. It is not forgiving for variances in naming conventions. Customer support relies on just pointing you to a video. I have put in tickets for fixing issues and never hear back.

Service!

Kommentare: Overall, their customer support is second to none. I have worked with a few different team members and they have always been responsive and helpful. Every once in awhile, I'll do a refresher training with them, since there are certain areas I don't use often, so I forget how to use them. They do a great job of taking care of me, for which I am grateful!

Vorteile:

The software is very user-friendly and robust. The fact that I can access the data from anywhere (app, website) is very useful! We use Ajera for our timesheet and billing software, and the transition is seamless. There is a pretty robust FAQ area if you have any questions, and their staff is very helpful. We are about to start producing our resumes out of Cosential, which will help with our efficiency. All-in-all, this is a great program.

Nachteile:

Sometimes it's a little too robust (because it has to cover different markets) and you can't always pair down the information. There are also places we wish we could customize a little more for us, but it's not a deal-breaker. The biggest downfall, we transitioned to the cloud-based platform earlier this year (our accounting team moved our Ajera to the cloud), and unfortunately lost some of the functionality of the On-Prem (mostly when it came to staff team information, which Ajera cloud blocks the transfer, so it has to be done manually). But, again, their customer service is exceptional, and they found a work-around for us while they are researching how to get those connected again.

Cosential makes us better marketing team

Kommentare: KCI has been with Cosential since 2007 and have watched the system expand to meet the needs of industry. While we do not use every function the system offers, we rely heavily on it for proposal tracking, proposal generation, customer information (hit rates, history, contacts) and firm qualifications (projects and personnel). The Cosential team has never lost sight of what it is that makes them successful which is involving industry in their roadmap for enhancements and functionality. These folks listen to what we need and respond.

Vorteile:

Cosential gives us quick access to all our past proposal information. Our marketing team is quickly and easily able to access past proposals for guidance, develop intel about our history with clients and understand our experience in a region or with a certain service. As a firm with over 25 offices across the country, this information is vital to our team.

Nachteile:

While Publisher has come leaps and bounds from where it was originally, we would like the ability to create several resumes at the same time. For example, I'd like to select several employees, choose a template and have the system walk me through each employee to choose his or her projects.

Cosential CRM

Kommentare: Cosential is a great repository for all of our CRM data. It has a lot of functionality with regard to exporting reports, both formatted and unformatted

Vorteile:

As with all databases, everything is linked together. The system has a lot of capability and is able to be customized which is very helpful to us. We are able to capture all information needed and if there isn't a specific place then we can always create a "description" and put the info there.

Nachteile:

Search feature doesn't always work that well. When I search for certain things, I know they are in the database but they don't come up. I have to either refine my search or find what I'm looking for a different way.

KFW Engineers - Word Processor's Review

Kommentare: Lots of benefits once you figure out the reporting and have employees who are DILIGENT about completing each & every form to it's fullest extent - with that you could capture any data set imaginable. I like it overall.

Vorteile:

Your reporting capabilities make all of this seemingly random information we input from different departments come together to yield a clear picture of our firm, our clients, and our project standings.

Nachteile:

It's a little difficult to navigate as the Administrator, there's a lot of clicks to get to where I need to go. Some custom options would be nice, for example when I open an opportunity if it could automatically be in the "edit" screen instead of the "view" screen - I hardly click on something I was to simply view, so cutting to the chase on some steps would make things go faster - though I understand that's individual-specific and infeasible to engineer for one person.

From Near the Beginning

Kommentare: Overall, terrific. customer support has improved a lot. Thanks to customer representative. May he live long and prosper.

Vorteile:

Cosential is one of those programs that I refer to every day. It is a clearinghouse for almost everything the company does. It is our mind and our memory. In the beginning over ten years ago I tried to find someone to design such a program for us. spent months and thousands. then i found out it already existed. I like that it exists.

Nachteile:

I am frequently looking for add company. i spend entirely too long trying to figure out how to add a company. I owuld also like it better if, when i am adding team members to a project I didn't have to go back and start a new company for them. I dont always need a separate file for every team member, but I want to note who is on our team. some disciplines are not relevant to us.

Cosential Review

Kommentare: Our main goal for using Cosential was to provide our leadership with our customized sales report that contained real-time information as opposed to waiting on weekly, monthly or quarterly reports. As a byproduct, we also wanted to provide our sales teams and service managers with tools that could measure productivity based on activities. Cosential has, or will very soon, provide the sales report information we need and our sales team/service managers have dashboards to measure productivity.

Vorteile:

I've used a lot of software over my career and Cosential is by far one of the most flexible and user-friendly applications I've used. Although it is a CRM, which implies many steps and being data intensive, Cosential is structured so you can use as much or as little as you need and has a minimal learning curve for users to become productive almost immediately. The configuration is simple and straightforward and the webcast training is very helpful.

Nachteile:

As we started our implementation, we had a few very specific requirements for our customized sales report that Cosential could not handle. However, though working with their team we are close to being able to produce this electronic sales report dashboard and do away with the paper copy.

One Stop Shop

Kommentare: Overall I am happy with the database however, there are so many features we are not yet using. So many of our users are casual users so its difficult to achieve buy-in and explore all the features when you are working individually.

Vorteile:

This database is geared for the A/E/C industry. The Cosential team comes from our industry so they are very knowledgeable about the type of data we are dealing with and what we need from our database software. There are so many features of the database that can improve job efficiency and streamline processes across multiple offices.

Nachteile:

Proper set up is imperative (example: Firm Orgs). Our database wasn't set up properly to begin with so much of my early days using the system was cleaning up data and setting up firm orgs so we could make sense of the data going into the database.

General Contractor's review of Cosential

Kommentare: Our overall experience with Cosential has been very positive.

Vorteile:

Cosential has already thought through the multitude of interconnections between Contacts, Companies, Opportunities and Projects. It provides us a projection tool to better understand our pipeline so that we can plan our man power. It also helps us project cash flow. Cosential provides an easy way to archive our projects and easily pull them into RFP requests to help us secure new business. Recently they have released an 2 new interfaces: One allows us to push the data directly from an opportunity into Procore, our project management software. The second one is an interface that allows Cosential to work with Outlook while recognizing that people live in an Outlook world. Cosential has made us a more efficient organization.

Nachteile:

Generally their customer support is good, however sometimes their response time is longer than I would like.

Use this every day. several times a days.

Kommentare: This software provides a snapshot of our company, our projects, our employees past and present and of course our work, and teams we have worked with.

Vorteile:

easy access. online. quick. It is a thirll when i am looking for information about a project, or a person's title and the info is there. Linkedin is good, as a back-up, but my database is better for me.

Nachteile:

the reports creation can be tricky. sometimes i pull in inactive or unknown and sometimes people seem to disappear and need to be pput back. sometime hard to find where to add a company.

Marketing Coordinator

Kommentare: I use Cosential literally every single day...and that's not just because I'm the OFA but because it's so easy to upload information and documents. I use the personnel, projects and opportunities modules almost daily. Being able to reference so much information for a project we may be mentioning in a proposal is very helpful and makes my job a lot easier.

Vorteile:

It's incredibly user friendly and is getting more and more user friendly with each and every update

Nachteile:

It has a tendency to run really slow at times

Great Product,

Kommentare: Cosential provides a clean way for us to track project leads, pursuits, and potential backlog, all in one place.

Vorteile:

Cosential is very flexible and there are many ways to customize it with the right direction and creativity. There are a lot of powerful features if you take the time to understand how to best utilize them. The ability to link Cosential with financial software through the Financial Data Connector is really powerful and convenient. The reporting is great.

Nachteile:

We did not do a very good job of providing clean data for import, which complicated our implementation (completely our fault). While there are a lot of ways to customize the software, they are not always obvious and require some creativity.

One stop shop for all of our project and pursuit data.

Kommentare: I love how easy it is to access and analyze our information. Cosential has a home for every data point you can imagine -- and the flexibility add new ones as needed -- so you can store and recall information about all of your pursuits and projects.
Our biggest problem prior to using Cosential was that knowledge about our projects, clients, past pursuits, etc. lived primarily in the heads of our people. That's fine as long as no one leaves and no one forgets...but that clearly isn't reality. Cosential is a robust, interconnected database that allows us to have literally everything in one place, and we can view that information from multiple perspectives.

Vorteile:

A place for everything.

Nachteile:

Load time has been a factor, but it has improved significantly over the past 6 months and I know their developers are actively pursuing even greater speed.

Dynamic tool

Vorteile:

This is a great and dynamic tool. By aligning it with Viewpoint, I have facts that would have taken a number of emails and calls prior. In fact, we are using just about every module in our marketing department to improve our ability to talk about pursuits, projects and people our firm has build relationships with.

Nachteile:

I think my biggest issue with the software is the customer support. I had to reach out to see who is supposed to be managing the account, but that person has not reached back out to me. It has taken awhile with little communication (unless I keep checking in) to resolve some issues, primarily with the Work Flow.