GoldMine Premium Edition Software

This is a complete and comprehensive CRM. It does it all. Must use outside email blasting program.

Pros

Expensive, but can be configured the way you want it. Lots of great addons, like synch with office365.

Cons

You need one of their VARs to get Max. Benefits. A little difficult to learn. You will need training.

Pros

It is very complete (it has many or demaciated characteristics and functions), the workflow is simplistic, pleasant. Good customization options, facilitates and is very versatile in centralized search of customer data. You can set aside several types of business / project, without problem, good management of graphics / management information.

Cons

Adaptation and implementation take time and require technical expertise, integration with other tools (Marketing) is not simple, the presentation and form of reports should be improved, the general management of emails (Configuration and integration) is deficient, it is a little heavy and slow, the management of the history of an account is not friendly (especially if you have these migrating from other software). poor handling of documents or attachments

Pros

We were able to take this marketing product and make it our own for student recruitment. It is very adaptable.

Cons

The only thing that could be better is better reporting capabilities within Goldmine. The price could be a bit better as well.

Pros

Very powerful CMR software, at one point this software was on track to become the default standard. Also easy to use.

Cons

Goldmine where did you go. It is a very good very affordable software but now very few people use it.

Pros

I love how easy goldmine makes it to keep track of the who what when and where of all our clients and vendors

Cons

Customer support is very overpriced for small business, especially if you are a specialized niche company (which means u are running on very tight profit margins)

User should double check their work before moving forward

Pros

Information is tabbed out for organization. Making things easy to sort through and enter information. You can also Import info and export fairly easy

Cons

For some reason, information from accounts can easily become detached and reattached to different accounts. This causes many issues when sending emails or exporting data from particular accounts.

Cons

Terrible support for customers. We have used this product for many years. Now under the new owners they acknowledge that the current version has a serious defect but refuse to resolve that defect unless you pay the annual update charge. A little over a year back we paid a lot of money to upgrade our GM, and server to support it. I now regret that, the new version has this major defect that we did not have before. What I should have done is move away from Goldmine to another CRM. Would have cost less and we would have had a better product.

Pros

I use Goldmine on a daily basis at work. And it's extremely easy to use. If you need to search for something its not hard and it doesn't ever have errors.

Cons

If I had to say something was a con about Goldmine, i would say it looks outdated. I wish it was Customizable (color scheme wise) don't really have anything bad to say about it.

While Goldmine did get the job done for the most part, my university's admissions department eventually upgraded to another software due to Goldmine's limited integration capabilities. Since we were using the program to manage our prospective students, we really needed a software that could not only store information about those students, but also enable us to communicate with them through the software and schedule their visits to the university through it.

Pros

For the most part, Goldmine did what it needed us to do. In my university's admissions department, we were able to keep adequate profiles on all of our prospective students, including our history of communication with them. I also liked that on the left hand side of the program, you could see a running list of the student profiles you were previously viewing, so it was easy to jump back to their page if need be.

Cons

Goldmine is not the most intuitive program, nor does it have a very modern interface. It's also significantly limited in its integration capabilities, as it would not let us communicate with prospective students directly from the program, and it would not let us schedule their visits to campus. This meant that cut down on the efficiency of our office's work.

Pros

Ease of use and full featured. Many features that helped in selling process. Original product was amazing

for the price I feel it is a great solution

Pros

Very easy to use, Keeps a lot of data. Multi user calendar is nice. and the Calendar reports print our very nice!

Cons

Does not cross over with my outlook calendar. Cannot be viewed online. Requires SQL server environment.

There are plenty more practical solutions for the modern world today. They need some major updates.

Pros

Can store a lot of information on specific accounts; multiple contacts, notes, details, etc. It is also secure.

Cons

You cannot search any of the notes you enter. For example, if you have an account you have been entering notes in for 10 years.. there is no way to search and find the details of a conversation/email/side note you made. You have to scroll through pages and pages of notes carefully examining each one to find what you are looking for. It is also NOT recommended to use the Mobile version of GoldMine as it reduces its security and poses a threat to the information. This makes it difficult to access information when at a meeting/out of the office at all.

Stay far away from this badware.

Pros

Not much to like about this nightmare software. I have to use it because someone picked it and they have invested a bunch of money in it.

Cons

The list of problems is endless. Try to do anything and you are faced with filling out boxes and checking them. This style of software died years ago.
It runs like a glorified DOS program.

Likes Best

Goldmine keeps our lead and customer database organized and accessible, almost 24/7/365 for close to 15 years. We're still running on Standard 6.7 server/client and cannot find a decent alternative to match it's capabilities. I like their licensing model, as there are no recurring monthlies, like SalesForce, and other cloud based CRM's. We have few issues with the email client. The WebImport is almost rock solid, once set up. Our initial database customization still models our business perfectly, with relatively few field additions. Understand that in 2001, there was nothing close in function or price. It is robust, and we have used around 25% of it's capabilities. It is wonderful software.

Likes Least

As others have said, their licensing, upgrading, and company support leave much to be desired. We run a 5 license office, that current only has two active seats. Any upgrades require purchasing a 5 seater, plus 5-seat annual maintenance plan. There are issues with synch, and with more modern web access, that are solvable at a relatively high add-on price. There is a significant learning curve (though once learned, it's a breeze) especially for administrators. Setting up user-defined fields and custom user screens is tedious, and takes much more than basic understanding of systems and data. Maintenance fees are excessive. Read the other comments.

Recommendations

I've looked at the alternatives. If you can find either a cloud or system based CRM that works for you "out of the box", whether it's GM or another package, double check them, makes sure it will function for you day to day, and compare initial and long term costs. If you need a CRM, and your business or office thrives, you will continue to use it for years and years. Add in the extended monthly, vs. software update costs. Make sure there are no hidden locks on your data, that would prevent you from accessing it. Make sure you can interface it in some fashion with your web sites, so you can automatically get leads into the system. Evaluate the ability of the CRM to model your business processes. Evaluate the training time. Layout all the fields of data, and types of data you will need. Pre-design your screens. Check all documentation prior to adding any user-defined fields, and make sure, specially with GM, that you understand the rules, including the rules for any "indexed" fields. Layout any automation and triggers you want the system to provide for you. Make sure that any system has the data types you need, and that any field can be added with those types. I'm thinking here of Jon Ferrarra's Nimble. Ferrarra started Goldmine and sold it. His Nimble is a decent cloud based, socially aware package... but he did not port the best of GM over. Things like the custom field types, and auto processes. You'll find different strokes for different folks out there. RedHorse is a licensed CRM. Salesforce, Sugar, Zoho, and others are "per seat - per month". Some have free and low cost trials. Your CRM is the structural backbone of your enterprise. Check them out. We still use a GM 6.7 Standard. Can't find a better solution at a decent price.

Likes Best

Goldmine offers the ability to record potential sales opportunities and progress them from intial lead to the close of the sale. These Opportunities can be analysed and reported on to provide sales targets and focus future efforts for marketing and sales. The greatest strengths are probably maintaining a useful and comprehensive list of companies and employees

Likes Least

Expensive licensing model. I think it was about 3x of some of the other options i was looking at. uses the inefficient client-server model and data synchronisation for remote users.

Recommendations

If you are looking for a non web based software, I think you can really find much cheaper software that do the same or better job as goldmine

Likes Best

Organized, easy to access information quickly, and is connected to Outlook so all sources of communication can be tracked.

Likes Least

Would love a way to connect Gold Mine contacts to the telephone, so a call can be made directly from Gold Mine.

Recommendations

Once you learn how to use Gold Mine properly, it is a very efficient program to utilize that will link all forms of communication to outside sources in one location.

Likes Best

Once I learned the process of what I was to be doing I found this product is very easy to use once you get use to it. The fields are self explanitory and information was easy to access.

Likes Least

When you are in the middle of doing data entry and it crashes unexpectantly. Also when you are using two screens when manuvering from one screen to another you tend to loose some of the data and have to start over with what you are doing. Mainly adress entering.

Recommendations

Just to be honest with how you evaluate this software

Likes Best

All-in-one piece to it, records can include a variety of info.

Likes Least

Tends to crash a lot. We struggle when a lot of people are on it, tends to slow down and we have had problems with it kicking us out when we add records to the system

Recommendations

Could use an update but overall a functional software for storing data.

Likes Best

Easy to use with minimal training. I use this product for 30-60 minutes per day, and it's very easy to use. I like that it tracks the history (emails, etc.) so I can easily see what is happening with each prospect.

Likes Least

We have a limited number of licenses; after an hour of inactivity, I have to re-enter my password. However, this is just a minor inconvenience.

Recommendations

This is my first experience with admissions software. This system is easy to learn and I can always go to a few power users with questions.

Likes Best

I like that I can see the history of emails between admissions and students.

Likes Least

I feel it is too easy to slip between student records--if I use the roller on the mouse, it causes me to end up in another student's record. I wish there was a way to open up (maybe in another window?) just the student I want to review.

Recommendations

Use the software on a trial basis before purchasing.