BQE CORE vs. IRIS CRM

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BQE CORE
Score 8.5 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
BQE CORE is a business management solution built specifically for professional service firms. BQE CORE is a combination of a billing assistant, project management, and accounting solution. CORE is designed to do the hard work of delivering actionable insights directly to the user's dashboards or inbox. BQE CORE replaces the products Engineeroffice, Archioffice, and BillQuick; the functionality of these applications is now found in BQE CORE.N/A
IRIS CRM
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
IRIS CRM is a customer relationship management (CRM) software focused on lead management, marketing automation, and business process automation.N/A
Pricing
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Features
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Project Management
Comparison of Project Management features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
8.1
55 Ratings
8% above category average
IRIS CRM
-
Ratings
Task Management8.537 Ratings00 Ratings
Resource Management9.138 Ratings00 Ratings
Gantt Charts6.716 Ratings00 Ratings
Scheduling8.226 Ratings00 Ratings
Workflow Automation7.627 Ratings00 Ratings
Team Collaboration8.031 Ratings00 Ratings
Support for Agile Methodology8.712 Ratings00 Ratings
Support for Waterfall Methodology8.312 Ratings00 Ratings
Document Management7.230 Ratings00 Ratings
Email integration7.225 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile Access8.532 Ratings00 Ratings
Timesheet Tracking9.355 Ratings00 Ratings
Change request and Case Management8.521 Ratings00 Ratings
Budget and Expense Management7.343 Ratings00 Ratings
Professional Services Automation
Comparison of Professional Services Automation features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
8.4
38 Ratings
13% above category average
IRIS CRM
-
Ratings
Quotes/estimates7.820 Ratings00 Ratings
Invoicing8.833 Ratings00 Ratings
Project & financial reporting8.737 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with accounting software8.424 Ratings00 Ratings
Sales Force Automation
Comparison of Sales Force Automation features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.2
2 Ratings
18% above category average
Customer data management / contact management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Workflow management00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Territory management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Opportunity management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Integration with email client (e.g., Outlook or Gmail)00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Contract management00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Quote & order management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Interaction tracking00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Channel / partner relationship management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Customer Service & Support
Comparison of Customer Service & Support features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.3
2 Ratings
21% above category average
Case management00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Call center management00 Ratings9.01 Ratings
Help desk management00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Marketing Automation
Comparison of Marketing Automation features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.5
2 Ratings
23% above category average
Lead management00 Ratings9.92 Ratings
Email marketing00 Ratings9.01 Ratings
CRM Project Management
Comparison of CRM Project Management features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.0
2 Ratings
17% above category average
Task management00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Billing and invoicing management00 Ratings8.12 Ratings
Reporting00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
CRM Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of CRM Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
8.7
2 Ratings
13% above category average
Forecasting00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Pipeline visualization00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Customizable reports00 Ratings8.02 Ratings
Customization
Comparison of Customization features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.2
2 Ratings
20% above category average
Custom fields00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Custom objects00 Ratings9.92 Ratings
Scripting environment00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
API for custom integration00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Security
Comparison of Security features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.5
2 Ratings
13% above category average
Single sign-on capability00 Ratings10.02 Ratings
Role-based user permissions00 Ratings9.02 Ratings
Social CRM
Comparison of Social CRM features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.5
1 Ratings
27% above category average
Social data00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
Social engagement00 Ratings9.01 Ratings
Integrations with 3rd-party Software
Comparison of Integrations with 3rd-party Software features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
9.5
1 Ratings
28% above category average
Marketing automation00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
Compensation management00 Ratings9.01 Ratings
Platform
Comparison of Platform features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
-
Ratings
IRIS CRM
8.0
2 Ratings
6% above category average
Mobile access00 Ratings8.02 Ratings
Best Alternatives
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Small Businesses
FunctionFox
FunctionFox
Score 8.2 out of 10
Salesmate
Salesmate
Score 9.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
SAP Ruum
SAP Ruum
Score 9.0 out of 10
Creatio
Creatio
Score 9.1 out of 10
Enterprises
Quickbase
Quickbase
Score 9.2 out of 10
Creatio
Creatio
Score 9.1 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Likelihood to Recommend
8.6
(148 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.2
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.1
(100 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Availability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
7.3
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.9
(90 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
6.4
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
2.9
(6 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
4.5
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
BQE COREIRIS CRM
Likelihood to Recommend
BQE Software Inc.
BQE CORE is well suited for a firm trying to get a better understanding of their project performance as a whole as well as better manage time and project resources. It is not the greatest for client management through a project or through invoicing, but it is do-able within the system.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
It’s been 2 years since IRIS CRM is supporting me by supporting my business and I have seen enormous progress in my business so far which is a really good sign and is enough for me to be satisfied with it. According to me and as I have observed it is fully loaded with many useful tools that can help in uplifting a business. Removes the manual cycle from me entering every people's hours exclusively. We really evaluated Bullhorn cover and tab it was not awful by any means.
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Pros
BQE Software Inc.
  • Invoice Collections within Billing is a great tool because of the ability to take notes and track contact.
  • Invoices are professional looking and easy for our clients to understand the overall progress within each phase of their project.
  • Dashboards are the best tool EVER!
  • The Contact List feature within Clients setup is the perfect way to track multiple project managers within a large company that also has multiple contracts with us.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
  • Grouping is done very effectively. For a company with a wide product portfolio, it is greatly beneficial to customize product families.
  • Streamlines the life cycle of merchant services very well. E-signatures, workflows, and help tickets are well integrated to maximize efficiency.
  • Processing stats and reporting tools are intuitive, useful, and aesthetically pleasing. The software allows you to quickly generate sales reports for specific product families and time periods.
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Cons
BQE Software Inc.
  • Customizable Reporting
  • Linking Project to Payment all together
  • Assigning contacts to particular roles - such as Invoicing, Contracts, etc.
  • Accounting Functionality - they are basically a project management accounting software, so in my opinion, they could learn some things from other accounting software such as QuickBooks etc.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
  • It needs a solid visual invigorate to stay aware of the occasions.
  • I have found it as a little pricey.
  • The execution timetable took longer than we had arranged.
  • The framework has a solid utility and usefulness, yet it looks somewhat dated.
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Likelihood to Renew
BQE Software Inc.
We have been using Core for a few years now, and honestly started to look at other software systems to see what was out there. What we chose was a nightmare for migration so we never left Core. Now we have added invoicing and payments from Core instead of double entry with QBO. Still only a few cycles in but looks like it will be up to speed soon and working smoothly.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Usability
BQE Software Inc.
The foundation is awesome, like I have said before, however the house being built on it, the educational resources being provided to us (more of sales pitches that don't work), and flexible workflow opportunities, is making us look elsewhere for how much we will be spending on per user. It's crazy to think how flexible they are not when it comes to user settings. Lack of integration with other sources is awful.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
It is a wonderful software with an automated messaging service. It has helped us in having a better knowledge of our customer’s needs, preferences, and habits, and by knowing all these we have improved our business. Security is my basic concern and the fact that it has a disabled human element from the business equation are the things that I don’t really like in it.
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Reliability and Availability
BQE Software Inc.
I can only remember a couple of times in 4 years that Core has been unavailable.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Performance
BQE Software Inc.
This is one area that does need some improvement. It can be slow at time, so we had our IT look at it from our side and we had no issues, so it has to be some slowness on their side.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
BQE Software Inc.
As a new employee and CORE user, I talk to support on a weekly basis. I have never had to wait for more than 3 min to get connect with a support rep, and all my questions have been answered. The support representatives are polite and eager to help no matter how simple your question is.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
It has enabled us to keep a record of the demographics of our clients and eventually we can develop a better understanding of our clients that will lead us to uplift our business. With its amazing sales tool, we have developed a strong relationship with our clients, and helped us in creating a good brand image. We really adore the convenience of managing and reporting data. It is quite easy to handle and all our business is depended on it and it helped us in gaining more loyal customers.
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Online Training
BQE Software Inc.
Make sure you have someone training you that fits your style of learning.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
BQE Software Inc.
It does take some time to understand the options and to find the best invoice template.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
BQE Software Inc.
Deltek Vision is far more advanced, more encompassing and offers more flexibility with what you want to do. However, it's also quite difficult to use, whereas BQE CORE is intuitive and user friendly. The trade off is worth it in some arenas but overall it's not suited for a larger fast paced company. Great for smaller companies.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
By using IRIS CRM we had a wonderful experience with the automated workflow process as compare to other alternatives. Now we are better able to keep a track of the performance and hence we can enhance productivity and eventually can get more profit.it has made automated messaging so convenient and simple. We believe that by understanding our customers we can make our business better and IRIS helped us in having a better knowledge of our customer’s needs, preferences, and habits, and by knowing all these we have improved our business a lot. We have found it very convenient to navigate and now we can better spread our business database. It helped us in having active and strong customer service and now we can better manage our relationship with our customers.
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Scalability
BQE Software Inc.
This software works on a small and large scale.
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
BQE Software Inc.
  • Quick setup of new tasks under a parent project, with immediate hourly billing to it.
  • Monitoring of details of non-chargeable efforts in appropriate detail
  • Validation of hourly cost, billing cost, benefit cost, profitability by person and role
  • Company tracking of write-off's included in corporate and project reporting, no data is "lost"
  • Can track excessive work time as +PTO in lieu of pay for use as future vacation
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Integrated Reporting Is Simple, LLC.
  • The cost is a bit higher than other options (~$1300/mo), which can be seen as a negative in an absolute sense.
  • The improvement in workflow management has been significant, and has saved at least 50 man-hours per week across our organization.
  • Accurate rolling sales data reporting has been critical in defining quality metrics. This benefit is more indirect, but it has allowed us to better respond to changes in customer complaint trending.
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ScreenShots

BQE CORE Screenshots

Screenshot of Core powered by BQE SoftwareScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Dashboard ViewScreenshot of BQE CORE 360* Firm Performance ViewScreenshot of BQE CORE Reporting & AnalyticsScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Time EntryScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Expense Tracking