Act! CRM vs. TempWorks Software

Swiftpage ACT! would be well suited if you are using a desktop computing environment. ACT! is an old product and they were on the desktop for many years (and still are). Also, ACT! would also be well suited if you are not as concerned about implementing a CRM product that might require a little more training (e.g. if you had employees/salespeople that needed to be trained). Also, ACT! seems to be more generic than some of the industry focused products you see nowadays. For example, MethodCRM works well with non-profits that are on the cloud.

Incentivized

TempWorks is a really great tool overall, especially in tracking the recruitment process. Managing candidate info is easy with TW, and the messages feature helps to notate any and all candidate interactions. On my end I don't use the other functionalities of the software, but I do enjoy being able to pull up a variety of reports in order to track my own set goals in regard to my performance.

Incentivized

• Integrated Email Marketing: For a small business, you can have a strong method to handle email marketing in an integrated non-disparate solution.
• Tailoring: There are no limits on what data you can store in the system and the ease of making changes can be done by a nontechnical person.
• User Interface: The tool is easy to get around in both the desktop (fat client) and (webclient) which both are quite similar in functionality.
• Integration: The tool integrates with Word, Excel, and Outlook nicely. And, it integrates with Google Mail and Contacts. There is a nice selection of third party tools available for various needs like AddressGrabber which allows for easy input of contacts from various sources such as email signatures, webpages, etc.
• Templates: I have enjoyed being able to store tons of various templates for letters which we use over and over for various communications like sales proposals, quotes, and nudging clients along the funnel and sales process.
• Automation: SwiftPage ACT! has a small business automation engine which allows for reminders and workflow to be administered by the system. It's not as sophisticated as some enterprise workflow automation solutions but for the price it's an awesome addition.
• Maintenance: Very rarely have a problem which needs to be dealt with and costs to upgrade are minimal at best. We hosted the system internally for the web client and implemented it ourselves initially but had upgrades subsequently done by a local partner simply due to time/cost scenario. In other words, less to have someone else do it.

• Helps keep candidate information and documentation organized
• Assists in tracking progress of candidates during the hiring process
• Easily allows access to client information for recruiters

Incentivized

• The auto saving function is not great. It means a simple slip or mistype can change an entire record easily.
• The reports are clunky and if you've changed the field names, that doesn't get reflected in the reports.
• The interface is still clunky. It is hard to see all the information for a contact all in one place. It gets broken up too much.

Incentivized

• [I believe] Customer Service is terrible.
• [In my experience,] responsiveness is terrible.
• [I feel] ease of use isn't great.
• [In my opinion,] processes take too long, too many steps.

Incentivized

Once our current subscription expires, we no longer plan to use ACT. We are moving to a more complete CRM system that allows us, as a project based service company, to track projects, contacts, time and employees all with one software program. ACT has very limited modules to integrate these functions and therefore is no longer a good fit for us.

Incentivized

ACT follows the basic rules you would expect for this type of software, but actually doing anything sophisticated with it is near impossible without assistance or training. Unless you use it regularly it is difficult to use. I wouldn't recommend it unless you have internal IT support and it will be used regularly.

It works well enough

Incentivized

There has been an ongoing problem with Google synchronisation which no one seems to be bothered about fixing, even though it clearly states on the website that the software synchronises with Google. When the customer-facing support team are on the phone, they are brilliant, it's the back-end development support which is severely lacking.

I give this a zero on all fronts. In fact, I tried to reach out to the CEO multiple times to help me resolve challenges we were having and he did not respond to me once. Had he responded we probably would still be with them today.

Incentivized

Delay your upgrades! ACT appears to ship out new software with virtually no checking and no concern about bad installs do to their customers.

ACT! CRM is more cost effective than like a Salesforce, but that is for a reason, it lacks a lot of the functionality that a Salesforce has. Pipedrive is actually another cost effective platform I've been evaluating as a potential ACT! CRM replacement. I like it's modern day look and feel versus ACT!.

Incentivized

The way in which I utilize TW now is a bit antiquated compared to the online portals that I used with Bullhorn and Crelate. I think the simplicity of the funtionality of TW is much easier to navigate than Bullhorn and Crelate, however I think it really depends on your permissions of use, flexibility in customization, etc. I feel as though Bullhorn did a great job of search functionality, as it was easier to search for candidates on the online platform with a search bar up top that you could literally type anything into and the candidate would automatically populate under the search bar. Ex. If I were looking up a candidate by their phone number, I would start typing it in any format (3176541277 or 317-654-1277 or (317) 654-1277) and no matter what the corresponding candidate would pop up as I typed. Same with email, first or last name, etc.

Incentivized

• It's been easy to keep track of progress of goals with the software. This provides the opportunity to know what is working and what is not.
• We have had to adjust a lot of things since the Virus issue took a foothold, but it is providing invaluable to make those adjustments.
• Our ROI has increased at least 30%.

Incentivized

• It is not good at notifications
• It does not send paystubs out regularly
• The search engine does not search the whole system

Incentivized