Coremetrics / IBM Digital Analytics (discontinued) vs. Pendula

IBM analytics has continued to improve upon the days of being the original core metrics. After using the updated version for quite some time, it has been great at providing the needed analytics to measure ROI and goal performance for our quarterly KPI's. It has resulted in a great increase in web engagements although we are a midsize company, smaller outfits may not need such an expensive option.

Incentivized

We used Pendula as part of our re-engagement program. This was valuable, as we were able to connect with 40,000 or more names. Knowing that either a significant telesales team effort--too expensive and not enough people--would be implausible. We designed an interactive SMS journey that allowed us to begin the process of taking the 40.000 and discovering those who were willing to shop with us again automatically. We also found that promotions and blasts worked really well, were very easy to set up and run, and then the automation on the back to create the Salesforce opportunity. We have also engaged with custom objects and were able to trigger events on internal activities and sales status, such as shipping notifications.

• IBM CXA comprises an acquisition called Tealeaf. This tool has deep heritage and this is evident in its present-day capabilities.
• The Universal Behaviour Exchange or UBX puts the concept of personalisation at the forefront. The ability to combine physical (analog) and digital transactions to create the complete picture of a customer journey, is a stand out benefit.
• The solution does not have to involve the purchase of software. IBM CXA can be sold as a service bundled with analytics as a service. This not only lowers the cost of ownership, it gets around one of the principal issues. Strong staff with design and analytical capability to drive the solution and deliver tangible benefits.
• The seamless integration of Watson AI services to help with the heavy lifiting. Watson reinforces the analytical focus this solution has and can learn to recognise situations specific to a company.

Incentivized

• EOFY campaigns that drove limited time, limited release offers. We could segment our targets and engage those most likely to respond well.
• Limited release wine offers, again targeting the right buyers, and then designing a series of interactions with them. This enabled sales reps to speak to those most warm.
• Customer re-engagement. We have very many historical customers. We were able to reach 30,000 or so people and then lead them through several steps towards re-engagement.
• Targeting smaller customer segments was made easy due to the deep integration with Salesforce. We could create campaigns to account owners of contacts that met criteria--which provided a deeply personal experience.

• The user interface is in Flash, which can be very frustrating and slow at times. Apparently, this is to be transitioned in a future release.
• Can only segment the last 93 days of data. Any historical segmentation beyond the 93 days must be run in Explore (which is credit based, and has its own limitations with the number of credits per month, based on the initial contract with IBM).
• Reports can only display 93 days of data at a given time for custom date ranges. There are pre-programmed date ranges setup with IBM during implementation (last week, last month, last quarter etc.), but are not flexible enough to answer more specific questions.
• Certain reports cannot have segments applied, making answering some simple questions a bit more tricky. For example, I can create a segment around mobile devices and apply it to the marketing channels report, but I can't create a marketing channel segment and apply it to the mobile reports.
• Built in API calls allows for nice report design and automation.

• Navigating a variety of journeys can get tricky. They have been steadily improving the interface here.
• Managing launch times and turning campaigns on and off can be cumbersome.
• Naming, tagging, and cross-journey reporting would be great.

IBM Digital Analytics is a great solution for our clients and I believe they offer the best solution for the retail space. We have access to IBM support via email or live chat and they can answer many of the reporting questions that come up. IBM is receptive to our feedback of the product so I am confident they will continue making improvements

Very easy to implement and use.

Never had any issues

As reports are templated, the system is pretty quick. Sometimes you have to wait a bit for a report to render. Or you might have to re-load the page. But there is no real issue here and the system is on par with other similar systems.

Overall, the level of support is very good and I would say it is a strong asset of the solution. However, you can sometimes feel that there is a difference of level among the support team.

Online training is really great. One of the best assets that they have. Lots of great videos, pop quizzes at the end of each module. Fantastic. Other tools have similar features, but not as good.

See previous comment: reading and understanding the encyclopedic implementation guide is a must.

Much of the work we did in IBM Digital Analytics could have been answered through Google Analytics, a much simpler, agile and FREE solution set. Not mention, given the vast number of Google Analytics USERS, free and actionable support is simply a click away ... this compared to IBM Digital Analytics fractured and often absent support service.

We found the user interface, the customer service, and the feature sets worked very well for us. Pricing was also affordable.

This solution can support large amount of data and transaction. The way that user management features are built, it shows it is meant for large organizations.

• We spend too much time trying to work around bugs on the new UI.
• We spend too much time trying to figure out how to make certain segments work because support and the knowledge center are lackluster.
• Our sales rep is very unresponsive and leaves us searching for a lot of answers on our own, including what other products we may benefit from that IBM offers.

Incentivized

• We were able to activate a large number of old customers
• We generated significant revenues and fast sales
• We have been able to run multichannel campaigns to great effect