Likelihood to Recommend It makes creating queries very easy for end users so not only research or technicians can do it. The availability for creating Live reports that are accessible via Excel on the network has given many of our users the ability to get the information they need in a format they can use without needing someone to translate the raw data
Read full review Targit is very strong when the data is presented to the system. Because of this, we are able to report on almost all of the information that is valuable to us. When we have questions or ideas on how to better leverage Targit, they are great to work with. We track our sales progress/process in Targit and AP tracks things such as outstanding invoices, open invoices, etc
Read full review Pros Simple user-interface: Informer is relatively easy to learn and end users can begin running reports and creating new reports quickly. Email "burst" functionality: This feature allows emails to be sent out based on data in the report. So for example, a report could be scheduled that would email all student employment managers listing out the specific employees that report to them that haven't submitted their time sheets. Each manager would only see the rows that correspond to their email address. Analytics and grouping: Users can quickly drag columns to group and sub-total, and can use the analytics tab to get deeper insights into the data. Read full review Quick start-up and report turnaround time. Easy drag and drop capabilities as well as user friendly command options. Ability to share reports among other users making it easy to use an already created report and simply changing the criteria to suit your own needs. Ability to save a base report that can be modified as needed repeatedly, instead of recreating from scratch. Easy visual for final layout. Ability to run multiple reports within one screen without jumping around. Read full review Cons There are a lot of reports that we have in Informer that say they have never been run, even though I know they have been run. So that makes it really difficult to determine which reports can be deleted to keep a tidy report list. The only other complaint I have about Informer is that there doesn't seem to be a properly detailed error code/message when the student information system can't be accessed. For example, I am currently trying to move Informer to its own standalone server and I get an error message saying that our license isn't valid. Informer Support sent a new license, which prompted the same message, and the only explanation they have given me is that Informer can't reach the student information system. I would think that if that were the case, the error message would say that instead of an invalid license. Read full review Probably one of our biggest complaints from the user community is the inability for the user to see the details behind the data. I know with the tool you can write reporting services reports that would allow users to see the detail by right clicking on a measure and selecting Actions, but for a very lean IT shop there simply has not been time to build these Actions for every possible scenario a user might want to see detailed reporting on. Another complaint I've heard is the inability for the user to know exactly what the data represents from the source. If Targit had maybe some type of capability to hover over a measure or dimension and see a pop up of a more detailed description this might help resolve that issue. The most difficult concepts to teach our users is how and when to use comparisons and the syntax for calculations. Creating comparisons has become much simpler with the 2k11 release but it is still difficult for my users. Sue Feneck Business Intelligence Developer/Reporting Analyst
Read full review Likelihood to Renew Informer has been handily meeting most of our reporting needs, and we've created a library of hundreds of reports that are used every day. They have a terrific support service to help when you have questions, and I've found them to be great at listening to what customers would like and adding new features. They are a small company that really listens and really cares, and I've been very pleased over the past few years getting to know them.
Read full review It is very easy to use and I am proficient at this point to be able to figure out how to run most of the reports I need. I have had the time to "play around" in TARGIT and really teach myself about the visibility settings and other aspects - though other users have needed help with some of these aspects - but once you conceptually understand how to build the reports, it is very simple from a power user perspective.
Read full review Usability From the perspective of the new user and a seasoned user I would say eight would represent both parties. It presents a 'familiar' interface and easy to navigate display. Tagging is quite nice and allows for organization of reports based on those tags. These have to be monitored like anything else to keep them consistent but provides a better than average means of organizing reports.
Read full review Everything on the back end needs to be correct, which sometimes it may not be set up or missing some variables. Some of the more difficult parts of Targit require a lot more attention and object creation to work properly
Read full review Reliability and Availability We have 10 concurrent licenses and we average between 6-8 at any given time during the day; and we host the application.
Read full review Support Rating I would have given 10 but no one and no system is perfect. The only issue with support is not the staff nor the response but the support Wiki and support pages in general run very slow at times. I believe this has been addressed by the company but the technical speed of the pages have been an issue.
Read full review Everyone I've dealt with at Targit genuinely cares about me and my success, and they respond to questions quickly and accurately. There is literally nothing more I could ask for from their support.
Read full review Implementation Rating We bought the product on a Thursday morning, and we were writing reports on Friday afternoon. We did take about a month to manage the Mapping, Linking and Security to allow us to open it up across campus. We are now mapping from as many third-party vendors as we can to enable the creation of more ad-hoc reporting.
Read full review Make sure all of the back end work is done prior to getting Targit set up. Every variable you may need for calculations needs to be correct and every item needs to be uniform so it is read properly.
Read full review Alternatives Considered I have experience with Advizor AnalystX, and it was just awful. It is advertised as an interactive reporting tool, in which you can use your mouse to select and segment constituents by where they live (by clicking on a map), how much they've given to your institution, when they last gave, etc. In practice, their map feature was unusable; it's a static map image (imagine a paper map hung on your wall), rather than draggable and zoomable Google Maps, and it required hours of work to configure one map region. As far as computing constituents' giving statistics, it required way too much back-end work to build simple giving totals.
Read full review It really met our business requirements when we were searching for a reporting/Bi tool and the flexible business model of being able to introduce additional functionally as your organization grows and requires it made the investment decision the right one for us. The functionality available in comparison to the investment is well worth it.
Read full review Return on Investment We have definitely improved customer service due to better reporting using Informer. All departments are better empowered to help our students in a more timely and accurate manner. Using Informer has given us the ability to eliminate functionality within our ERP system and offload reporting to a data store instead of the transactional system. This has resulted in successfully upgrading our core systems and improved response times. Read full review We have been looking at our Product Hit Rate by Customer instead of just looking into Customer hit rate and adjusted our offerings accordingly. Giving people the ability to run their own ad-hoc reports rather than to request them from IT is a great benefit to my department. Read full review ScreenShots Entrinsik Informer Screenshots