IBM Cognos is a full-featured business intelligence suite by IBM, designed for larger deployments. It comprises Query Studio, Reporting Studio, Analysis Studio and Event Studio, and Cognos Administration along with tools for Microsoft Office integration, full-text search, and dashboards.
$11.25
per month per user
Xactly
Score8.6 out of 10
N/A
The Xactly Intelligent Revenue Platform unifies the full revenue lifecycle into a single system of action to orchestrate and optimize revenue outcomes. Powered by 21+ years of data, the platform’s AI automates workflows and connects data across an existing ecosystem.
Sales Compensation Systems in Sales at Samsara (Transportation/Trucking/Railroad, 1001-5000 employees)
Chose Xactly
Xactly is able to handle all of our business needs. They have a great community of users where Xactly is involved and listening. The support is great and less effort needed in being fully self sustainable with Xactly at your company.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Manager, Worldwide Operational Reporting in Finance and Accounting at Commvault (Computer Software, 1001-5000 employees)
Chose Xactly
At the time we looked into it, Xactly was very much ahead of the curve compared to Varicent and how it functioned. We specifically wanted something that had a robust reporting engine and also integrated into Salesforce.com so our field teams could have a single point of entry …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Director Sales Systems and Compensation in Corporate at Hyatt Hotels Corporation (Hospitality, 10,001+ employees)
Chose Xactly
We originally reviewed Callidus, Centive and Varicent and at that time we went with Callidus because of the customization we thought we needed. Unfortunately, the system was built in such a way, that it was so laborious for us to manage and we needed to know how to read and …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Xactly
Xactly is much more user-friendly and less complex. At my previous company where we used Callidus, we had to hire outside consultants to implement the new sales comp plans every year. With Xactly, analysts can be trained to add new rules, formulas, etc. to modify the comp plans …
Verified User
Chose Xactly
Varicent - horrendous customer service and far more expensive
Oracle Incent - literally had our compensation administrators in tears
For Transaction monitoring, we build reports for executive management, providing insights into the number of alerts, the types or categories of detection scenarios, the risk profile, and a snapshot of high- or urgent-priority cases to be reported to AUSTRAC. Congos helps to build the report by ingesting alert data exported from SAS datasets. It joins with other data from Teradata and Customer Hub (Oracle).
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
The software is well-suited when it comes to tracking and monitoring your commission estimates. It's an easy, user-friendly way to understand what sales went through, and what sales disappeared. I think it could also be improved by showing what changed. So if I log in one day and I have a sale and the next day that's gone. I think an updated running log on what changed is important, even what's been added, like if I log in, show me like plus, you know, 5,000 in sales or something like that.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Enterprise reporting - Create, customise, and run reports on sales trends, consumer sentiment, etc.
Dashboard creation and data exploration & analysis - Using drag and drop feature to create ad-hoc visualisation. Additionally, using AI powered natural language query feature for data analysis and dashboard input (formation of pie, bar, line charts). It's useful for no-technical person to put queries around the spreadsheet data to get quick answers.
Building insights for accurate decision making - Package reports with data backed insights for stakeholders in pdf, and Excel format to support business ad-hoc cases, forecasting and strategic recommendations on relevant asks.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
IBM Cognos Analytics enables customer data segmentation, which is essential for marketing, improving and streamlining purchasing behavior and preferences. This helps companies create more targeted and effective marketing campaigns.
Our clients Through data analysis, we can identify and observe trends in the behavior of other clients, allowing us to anticipate needs and adjust strategies to avoid consequences.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
For an existing solution, renewing licenses does provide a good return on investment. Additionally, while rolling out scorecards and dashboards with little adhoc capabilities, to end users, cognos is very easily scalable. It also allows to create a solution that has a mix of OLAP and relational data-sources, which is a limitation with other tools. Synchronizing with existing security setup is easy too.
We have been using Xactly as a primary application to calculate the commissions payout on a daily basis and would continue the same as Xactly Incent meets our requirement. It keeps the process automated and reduces the manual effort to calculate commissions.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
We have a strong user base (3500 users) that are highly utilizing this tool. Basic users are able to consume content within the applied security model. We have a set of advanced users that really push the limits of Cognos with Report and Query Studio. These users have created a lot of personal content and stored it in 'My Reports'. Users enjoy this flexibility.
From an admin perspective, the software's usability is high. The different components are organized in a way that is easy to figure out, for example, all elements of a plan are under the Plan Design section. There are some areas where searching within the system is a bit cumbersome because after clicking into a result and back out it clears your filter. I found the software easy to navigate when I first started and the amount of documentation and helpful videos they have on the community and within the University make the system even easier to learn.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
Reports can typically be viewed through any browser that can access the server, so the availability is ultimately up to what the company utilizing it is comfortable with allowing, though report development tends to be more picky about browsers and settings as mentioned above. It also has an optional iPad app and general mobile browsing support, but dashboards lack the mobile compatibility. What keeps it from getting a higher score is the desktop tools that are vital to the development process. The compatibility with only Windows when the server has a wide range of compatibility can be a real sore point for a company that outfits its employees exclusively with Mac or Linux machines. Of course, if they are planning on outsourcing the development anyways, it's a rather moot point
In general the system is nearly always available. But the daily achievement calculation takes a hugh amount of time. therefore it was in the past month sometimes only from midday onwards completely updated and usable for Sales employees. Xactly support was and still is working hard to get it available early mornings. Availablility time has increased a lot. It's now down to around 10 am in the moring
Overall no major complaints but it doesn't handle DMR (Dimensionally Modeled for Relational) very well. DMR modelling is a capability that IBM Cognos Framework Manager provides allowing you to specify dimensional information for relational metadata and allows for OLAP-style queries. However, the capability is not very efficient and, for example, if I'm using only 2 columns on a 20-column model, the software is not smart enough to exclude 18 columns and the query side gets progressively larger and larger until it's effectively unusable.
Xactly Incent performs extremely well. I have not experienced it "slowing down" when usage is heavy. This is particularly true when it comes to the regular recalculation of credits and commissions. It is not uncommon for Xactly to be dealing with hundreds of thousands of orders/credits in a pay period, but the system handles it well. Xactly recently changed their calculation engine and the speed for regular refreshes increased significantly.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
Why is their web application not working as fast as you think it should? They never know, and it is always a a bunch of shots in the dark to find out. Trying to download software from them is like trying to find a book at the library before computers were invented.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
They take the time to understand the system. They keep us updated on the status of our cases. Finally, their continued follow up ensuring the initial issue was resolved is very nice. They will not close the case out until they have confirmed that our issue has been completely resolved and fixed.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
Onsite training provided by IBM Cognos was effective and as expected. They did not perform training with our data which was a bit difficult for our end-users.
Awesome product, easy to use during daily activities. Reporting and user experience are very well organised. The sales team also likes this tool for reviewing their commissions at any time, which provides real-time updates. For new hires or mid-hires, the commission calculation is working very efficiently. Every sales-side organisation must have this tool.Awesome product, easy to use during daily activities. Reporting and user experience are very well organised. The sales team also likes this tool for reviewing their commissions at any time, which provides real-time updates. For new hires or mid-hires, the commission calculation is working very efficiently. Every sales-side organisation must have this tool.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
The online courses they offer are thorough and presented in such a way that someone who isn't already familiar with the general design methodologies used in this field will be capable of making a good design. The training environments are provided as a fully self contained virtual machine with everything needed already to create the environments. We've had some persisting issues with the environments becoming unavailable, but support has been responsive when these issues arise and straightening them out for us
Xactly offers training on new releases on a monthly basis and training on basic principles regularly via registration. My experience with both is that they do not provide the in-depth knowledge necessary to truly master the system and advanced courses still do not go to the level needed to autonomously manage the system and plans. Professional services are a large part of any cloud based service such as Xactly and I feel a reliance on such paid consulting services is a great money-maker for Xactly.
Make sure that any custom tables that you have, are built into your metadata packages. You can still access them via SQL queries in Cognos, but it is much easier to have them as a part of the available metadata packages.
Go into implementation knowing how you will handle churn, if there are claw backs, treatment for every type of commission payment (i.e. new business, renewals, etc.) and know your average customer life. You'll also want details by customer for as far back as you can go (within reason).
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Power BI is stronger for quick ad-hoc analysis and dashboards, but IBM Cognos Analytics is better when consistency, precision, and mass distribution matter. Tableau is best for interactive analysis, while IBM Cognos Analytics is better for standardized, repeatable enterprise reporting. Sigma shines for customizable dashboards and drill-down analysis while IBM Cognos Analytics holds an edge in data discovery and visualization.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
Ignoring the contractual issues that we had, Optymyze is very different from Xactly Incent. I would say that both offer high degrees of flexibility, but Xactly requires greater technical knowledge to customize. Optymyze allows administrators to manipulate data in a way similar to Domo or Tableau, allowing someone who is less technical to customize it. Xactly's connect module, on the other hand, requires strong knowledge of SQL to be able to manipulate data. I've been looking to take the training for Connect, so I can't comment on the limitations or flexibility beyond that.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
We rate IBM Cognos Analytics a 9 out of 10 for overall scalability. The platform handles large numbers of users, reports, and analytical workloads very reliably. We have experienced strong performance even in demanding enterprise environments with substantial data volumes. Its architecture provides sufficient flexibility to scale resources according to demand, making it well suited for large, business-critical deployments.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
It's very flexible. In most cases it can be adapted to your needs by programming which may cost extra money. We have a lot of different complans and close to 1.000 employees using Xactly in EMEA. It's mainly used by Sales and Finance
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
I am not aware of the company investment, but the overall result is fantastic. Employees visibility to commissions and components of their commissions is great. They have much more accessibility to their numbers and better understanding of how commissions are calculated. They can also review commissions at their convince on the application.
There seems to be more employee engagement and satisfaction with the overall commission process and reporting with Xactly Incent.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
