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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Critical Mention

    Score8 out of 10
    N/ACritical Mention headquartered in New York offers their eponymous media monitoring platform for public relations and crisis management.N/A

    Meltwater

    Score7.6 out of 10
    N/AMeltwater Media Intelligence platform is a set of public relations software tools for media monitoring, social media monitoring, and collecting brand insights. The four areas of functionality are Monitor, Analyze, Distribute, and Engage. (Note that this product combines features from the vendor Meltwater's former Buzz, Press, and News products.)N/A
    Pricing
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Considered Both Products
    Critical Mention
    Chose Critical Mention
    TV Eyes seems to be the biggest competitor to Critical Mention, but we've found that it's just not quite as intuitive or simple to track specific media hits. We keep going back to Critical Mention year after year because it does the job we need it to do to track broadcast TV …
    Incentivized
    Chose Critical Mention
    Both Cision and Meltwater are over price and undervalued in our opinion. They both cost more and provide less. If Critical Mention makes a few changes to their software and expands its online offer and social media tracking both of these software companies would be obsolete. …
    Incentivized
    Chose Critical Mention
    Critical mention has a more extensive list and the customer service is great.
    Incentivized
    Meltwater
    Chose Meltwater
    [In my opinion,] Meltwater [Media Intelligence Platform]'s media database simply doesn't stack up to what Cision offers. It doesn't matter how nice the interface is if the data included in the database you're pulling from isn't complete or well organized. Cision can be clunky, …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    71%
    Would buy again
    5 Answers
    63%
    Would buy again
    20 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    57%
    Delivers good value for the price
    4 Answers
    62%
    Delivers good value for the price
    16 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    71%
    Happy with the feature set
    5 Answers
    69%
    Happy with the feature set
    22 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    86%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    63%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    15 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    83%
    Implementation went as expected
    5 Answers
    81%
    Implementation went as expected
    22 Answers
    Best Alternatives
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Small Businesses
    Help a Reporter Out (HARO)
    Score5 out of 10
    Help a Reporter Out (HARO)
    Score5 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Cision Communications Cloud
    Score8 out of 10
    Cision Communications Cloud
    Score8 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Meltwater
    Score7.6 out of 10
    Cision Communications Cloud
    Score8 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Likelihood to Recommend
    1.6
    (21 ratings)
    7.2
    (73 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    10.0
    (7 ratings)
    10.0
    (10 ratings)
    Usability
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    5.6
    (5 ratings)
    Availability
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    10.0
    (29 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    6.1
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    1.0
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Critical MentionMeltwater
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Critical Mention
    Critical Mention is great for schools/businesses/etc. that want to know when they are in the news. Sometimes a brand's reputation can suffer greatly if you are not aware of an issue that was posted by a competitor or media outlet If you are not in the news a lot, there is no need for this product.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    Meltwater is well-suited for agencies that have an engagement team who is looking to service a variety of client needs such as social media reporting, public relations outreach, and community management. If you're looking to have a platform serve just one need, you can still use Meltwater but will get more bang for your buck if you are needing a variety of tools.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Critical Mention
    • Critical Mention's customer service is excellent. Any time we've had a challenge finding a clip or anything, they are on top of it and go above and beyond to make sure we have what we are looking for quickly.
    • The ability to create tailored clips of each mention and quickly share them is unparalleled.
    • The reporting feature is fantastic. It makes it very simple to pull detailed reports and share them with interested parties.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    • Media research - you can search for relevant publications and journalists to add to your media list.
    • Earned media coverage - you can search for coverage of your brand and find news stories that also include data that may be useful (how many people did the story reach for example).
    • Building media lists - if you have no current existing list, you can build and export one in Excel for example.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Critical Mention
    • I believe the one frustration I have with searching in general that if the closed captioning is not correct on the broadcast end Critical Mention will miss that data. Which is not a Critical Mention issue and does overcome depending on the search. Also, it would be great if you wanted to capture a complete 30 minutes newscast, it could be done by using the search. The clips need to be about to handle 30-minute programs.
    • One nagging issue when using Critical Mention is that it does not save e-mail addresses when sending a report and this requires a waste of time having to type in e-mails that should be able to be pulled from the customers' contacts.
    • Also, it would be great if you wanted to capture a complete 30 minutes newscast, it could be done by using the search. The clips need to be able to handle 30-minute programs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    • The dashboards are not user-friendly, customizable (color, font size, etc.), or worthy of presenting to a client. All of the insights from a dashboard get pulled from the platform and placed into a more client-friendly presentation.
    • Paywalls for certain publications connected to who-knows-what. DowJones racket limits media monitoring capabilities and results in manual searches for a growing number of publications.
    • TVeyes, the broadcast monitoring arm of the media monitoring capabilities, just needs TLC and to become more client-facing. Currently, the links produced to share clips look sketchy, and they have a relatively short shelf life.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Critical Mention
    I gave this a 5 only because I do not make the decisions to renew. When I used this at my previous company, I also recommended to the decision maker to renew this tool as it was a crucial piece to the overall client objective
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    Meltwater works well for our organization and has allowed us to meet our internal goals. We are always open to new products and services that may be able to provide similar or better features; however, our experience has been that many of Meltwater's competitors are not up to the task.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Critical Mention
    It's great for quickly looking up a specific clip, but this platform makes it difficult to select and accurately report on a high volume of clips
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    Once you get some basic training it's pretty easy to use. I would like to see training manuals, or instructional videos to help me explore features I'm not currently using.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Critical Mention
    Look, Critical Mention follows up on an or phone call immediately or in the AM the following business day. I have called them after hours and get a live person to work through any issues that may have come up. Support seems to be job one with Critical Mention.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    Our account rep at Meltwater went dark for a long time. Then, a couple of weeks ago, our new account manager reached out to set up a meeting. Apparently, they had a big shakeup in the company, and there were some personnel changes. Our new account rep was great in discussing the platform's capabilities that were available to us and even offered to schedule a follow-up meeting with his technical team to introduce our new social media team members to the platform and how it could help them with their jobs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Critical Mention
    No answers on this topic
    Meltwater
    Again, really in-depth and helpful for a program that is really easy to use.
    Read full review
    Online Training
    Critical Mention
    No answers on this topic
    Meltwater
    Walked step by step through program. Very informative on a program that doesn't require much training.
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Critical Mention
    Critical Mention implementation was easy and fast. Their support and training were awesome.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    You are only allowed 15 users, so make sure you've identified who will have access to use the tool.
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Critical Mention
    Burrelles is confusing and outdated. Critical Mention works on the side of the account team and understands our needs better. I was able to share hundreds of outlets that I wanted to be included in my online search and Critical Mention added all of them in less than a day I was seeing better results in my searches. The possibilities with Burrelles seem limited while Critical Mention's online monitoring service really lets me craft reports the way I want to
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    I was looking for a full-service option. I did some research. What really sold me was the presentation. They offered products that were helpful, and I wasn’t even aware of them. It is more expensive than the other products that are out there, but you get more. The other companies are good, but Meltwater Media Intelligence is more full service.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Critical Mention
    • Every week the department I am a part does dozens of searches on Critical Mention. We use it as our primary search engine for all things broadcast.
    • One negative aspect is that we do not know where Critical Mention gets their audience viewing numbers from so we just have to take it as their word.
    • Another negative aspect is that we are limited on the amount of time that one clip can be so we have to share several clips of the same show with our clients.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Meltwater
    • As a PR firm, we rely on the media databases that [Meltwater Media Intelligence Platform] supplies to deliver the media exposure that they expect from us.
    • We utilize their tracking of media hits for our overall reporting to our clients.
    • Both of these are advantageous in helping us to not only keep our existing clients happy but also to gain new clients (and, in turn - revenue), as well.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
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