Appointment Setting & Prospect Management for the professional

Pros

Responsive and knowledgeable internal customer support and top notch staff interactions. Google calendar integration allows you to set appointments with confidence that the representative (external agent) will be available for them! Automatic timezone allocation for prospect records which allows appointments to be set for representatives who operate nationwide with no manual accounting for timezone needed; the software is nearly goof proof in calendaring considerations. Unlimited projects allowed and robust customization ensures that every project/marketing campaign is uniquely set up to meet your company or client's needs. I really appreciate the ability to customize result codes and the fact that you are not regulated to rigid categories or outcome processes. Each result can trigger multiple functions and this gives the administrator the power to control and maintain appropriate routing of prospects with minimal user effort. A decent dashboard system and intuitive reporting creation.

Cons

My top complaint has to be with the WYSIWYG editor for scripts and email templates, it is sufficient. However, in the NEW VS interface pasting text with from Google Docs or Word invariably produces an error (complete hang on selecting that script, only fixable by reverting to previous version interface) if the document was over a page long, unless pasted as plain text. Even if the original document has all formatting removed prior to copying. I would greatly appreciate a fix for this and support for pasting simple formatting options without errors.

VanillaSoft Pro CRM robust and easy to administrate

Pros

The company is extremely responsive to customer needs and support requests. When I started my company I needed a scalable CRM with a calendar solution for outside sales reps. Vanillasoft fit the bill in all respects for our niche utilization and blew all other options out of the water in terms of ease of configuration and use. Initially there wasn't an option to auto sync calendars with outside software. About six months after I submitted this as a suggestion, we had a working gmail synchronization capability at no development cost to us.

Cons

I am going to ignore the obvious inconvenience that is inherent to hosted services infrequent but nevertheless frustrating slowdowns or communication errors with the hosted server. The only actual disappointment I've had is also something I am sure this is a common problem across all vendors of SAAS solutions: updates and changes. While I love the constant effort at increasing functionality and streamlining usability, I simultaneously hate updates because my user base finds learning new procedures on the fly very challenging. There were several updates that affected my users which came as a surprise with no warning before or change log notification after. We had a few frantic hours of complete chaos. Also due to our company structure Vanillasoft is our sole avenue of completing work and we use the majority of its features quite intensely, so naturally if there is a bug in the new features... I will be the one to find it. There is however an upside at the end of this which supports what I said earlier about responsiveness. After requesting some kind of upgrade notes, all future upgrades have been well documented in advance. The most recent large scale remodel has the ability to switch back and forth between new and old versions and this has given me the ability to prepare my users for the inevitable permanent change over to the newest iteration.

Best B2B CRM for Outbound Lead Generation

VanillaSoft is my secret weapon! My teams are significantly more productive than they were on any other CRM software, and VanillaSoft is absolutely intuitive, requiring less than 15 minutes of training for new reps.

Pros

I have used several CRMs, but VanillaSoft is exactly the software I would create if I made B2B CRMs for a living! It allows my reps to see both the prospect they are calling, and the other contacts in the company, simultaneously, so that they can easily ask for another prospect if they are unable to reach the original target. It gives my reps powerful insight into the company they are calling, and allows them to make independent decisions about who to call next. Of course, these features can be limited if your lead generation model is different. The software is easy to set-up (less than two hours), takes about five minutes to train callers, and then you are up and running with very little investment in time. I highly recommend that any company looking at B2B CRMs take advantage of the free trial and explore how VanillaSoft can enhance your business processes. You will marvel at how simple it is to use compared to any of its competitors!

Cons

The software could use a bit more power in its integration capabilities and reporting, but I appreciate that they stay focused on the core objective of keeping my reps productive!

Good dialer solution but needs a database backend

Business problems solved: How to cost effectively and easily create, manage and execute outbound programs Benefits: Competitive pricing, simple functionality

Pros

Easy to set up new campaigns and easy for callers to make dials. VOIP is decent quality and VS doesn't charge anything for the calls regardless if they are domestic or international. Recording feature is a huge benefit but they are only saved for a limited amount of time and there have been times when a call was not recorded despite the fact that recording was enabled for that campaign and that disposition.

Cons

When a call has a positive result, VS should have a database on the back end that allows positive results to flow automatically into a specific client location or folder for client management purposes. Reporting is extremely difficult to customize and exporting lists from VS results in nearly 100 unneeded columns being added. Recording feature is a huge benefit but they are only saved for a limited amount of time and there have been times when a call was not recorded despite the fact that recording was enabled for that campaign and that disposition

Easy to use and many features to serve all of my needs

I know it may seem silly, but I am not a huge computer person even though my job is working on the computer, so I am really grateful that VanillaSoft is so clear to follow. Learning something new doesn't take long, and that's not because I'm a savant. It's because the software is so very user-friendly. There are many features that make my work easier, and make things easier for the company. I rarely have any problems, but on the occasion that I have had to contact customer support, they respond solve the problem swiftly, even if the problem is my own fault.

Pros

I use the admin side more than the user side, but both are easy. I work with the contact management, deduping, intellective routing/filters, and email features the most.

Cons

The deduping feature can be irritating because the quick select is lacking in options, so often I have thousands of duplicates and I have to go through and select the ones I want deleted one at a time. It takes FOREVER.

VanillaSoft is Essential to our Success

Our Lead Management team of 13 reps uses VanillaSoft as our primary CRM in setting appointments for a sales team of over 100 located throughout the United States. The following VanillaSoft features are keys to our success: Auto dialing with VOIP – allows us to make over 65,000 dials each month with minimal loss of production time from our reps. Quality and connection of calls are excellent. Branch Scripting- provides easy transition for our new hires to feel comfortable and prepared to handle objections. Google Calendar (appointment setting) – This is one of the most valuable features to our team because it allow us to view our external sales agent’s calendar in real time reducing the chance for double booking appointments. Salesforce Integration – Using VanillaSoft’s Salesforce integration our Marketing department has pushed over 400,000 leads to VanillaSoft and continues to update VanillaSoft with new web leads daily. All activities (calls, appointments, emails, etc..) generated in VanillaSoft are instantly uploaded into our Salesforce platform for lead tracking and reporting to our Sales team and Sr. Management. Support – There is NO better support team. This team works tireless to insure they respond to your my support ticket with a one call resolution. Their engineers were instrumental in the VanillaSoft - Salesforce integration by demonstrating their extensive working knowledge of both VanillaSoft and Salesforce with our Salesforce Dev team. This experience and willingness to get and stay engaged made for a smooth and fast integration.

Support unlike any other of its kind!

All our information is available in one place. I can see every time a client has been contacted, by who, how long the conversation was, any notes; I can call, set appointment, import leads, and have multiple scripts for everything. There's nothing as comprehensive as this system.

Pros

It would be easy to list 100 reasons why VanillaSoft is such a wonderful system and there's truly not another that compares - but the biggest pro is absolutely in the support team. I am on a first name basis with all of them; I have called more times than I can count and not once have I had a poor experience. They are always there to help me wrap my head around the problems and truly utilize VanillaSoft to do everything my company needs! I can't thank them enough for everything they do.

Cons

It's hard to think of something to list in the cons. It would be nice if I could set things for less than 15 minutes apart - maybe choose any time, but it's so inconsequential it's hardly worth listing

High value product for higher ed call center

Overall, very reliable software that allows us to run our call center completely paperless. Tools available for supervisors to monitor caller productivity are really important to running an efficient call center. Minimal training allows callers to feel comfortable with the software soon after calling. Focus is then on securing gifts from donors.

Pros

Really easy for student callers to use. New layout is very functional and straightforward; doesn't require much training to learn. Provides the right features without cluttering the dashboard. Call scripting is simple and effective, reporting functionality is robust, workflow/routing allows for segmentation and efficiency.

Cons

Email client is a bit difficult to use and doesn't have a very modern look to it. Occasional service outages hamper productivity, but this is not often.

Very easy to use. Love the routing options.

It makes my job easier every day. I can track production on accounts, I can track sales prospecting. Can run various reports which I do both weekly and monthly. I love Vanilla Soft.

Pros

routing options, dashboard layout, able to customize. We can send out information on behalf of our clients which is awesome, but then it will also route that record to the front when the email gets opened. This is a great benefit we sell to our clients.

Cons

I would like to be able to note a record with having to terminate it. There are times when a client has synced their calendar to ours and this will sometimes block us from being able to terminate a record and I have to go in on the admin side and add a note that way. Too time consuming.

Get's the job done with ease

with the ability to integrate with our existing systems and auto-generated email and SMS messages, we feel we are more effective at reaching every lead by their preferred communication method.

Pros

Vanillasoft allows us the ability to customize our experience to meet any need that might arise. It's easy to configure auto-updates and auto web-leads and that keeps our info up-to-date and allows us to reach our interested lead very quickly.

Cons

Auto-dialing configuration if you don't use their phone system can be tricky. We are using internet explorer since Chrome doesn't have TAPI support. We are, however, hoping to switch to VS provided phone system which would further improve our experience.