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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Jenzabar SONIS

    Score9.1 out of 10
    N/AJenzabar now offers SONIS, a student information system (SIS) oriented around the needs of smaller higher education institutions. Jenzabar supports the former SONISWEB product since its acquisition of original developer RJM Systems in 2015.N/A

    Microsoft Dynamics 365

    Score8 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft Dynamics 365 is a CRM providing sales, marketing, and service functionality. It is offered as SaaS and on-premise. Dynamics 365 is part of the larger Dynamics suite of business intelligence and ERP products.

    $44

    per month

    Pricing
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Considered Both Products
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answer on this topic
    Microsoft
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    88%
    Would buy again
    23 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    87%
    Delivers good value for the price
    20 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    88%
    Happy with the feature set
    23 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    86%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    12 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    82%
    Implementation went as expected
    18 Answers
    Features
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Student and Faculty Administration
    Comparison of Student and Faculty Administration features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    8.8
    2 Ratings
    6% above category average
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    -
    Ratings
    Integrations with 3rd-Party Education Technology7.32 Ratings00 Ratings
    Online Registration Management9.12 Ratings00 Ratings
    District Communications, such as messaging and alerting4.52 Ratings00 Ratings
    Roster Management7.32 Ratings00 Ratings
    Platform Customization8.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Teacher Self-Service10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Student Data Security10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Community Support9.12 Ratings00 Ratings
    Class Scheduling10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    State and National-level Reporting10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Compliance Support10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Teacher and Parent Mobile Application10.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Sales Force Automation
    Comparison of Sales Force Automation features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.7
    84 Ratings
    2% below category average
    Customer data management / contact management00 Ratings7.981 Ratings
    Workflow management00 Ratings7.980 Ratings
    Territory management00 Ratings7.160 Ratings
    Opportunity management00 Ratings7.672 Ratings
    Integration with email client (e.g., Outlook or Gmail)00 Ratings7.879 Ratings
    Contract management00 Ratings7.961 Ratings
    Quote & order management00 Ratings7.258 Ratings
    Interaction tracking00 Ratings8.171 Ratings
    Channel / partner relationship management00 Ratings7.362 Ratings
    Customer Service & Support
    Comparison of Customer Service & Support features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    8.0
    68 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Case management00 Ratings7.863 Ratings
    Call center management00 Ratings7.950 Ratings
    Help desk management00 Ratings8.557 Ratings
    Marketing Automation
    Comparison of Marketing Automation features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.9
    78 Ratings
    2% above category average
    Lead management00 Ratings7.672 Ratings
    Email marketing00 Ratings8.171 Ratings
    CRM Project Management
    Comparison of CRM Project Management features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    8.0
    76 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Task management00 Ratings8.171 Ratings
    Billing and invoicing management00 Ratings8.054 Ratings
    Reporting00 Ratings8.065 Ratings
    CRM Reporting & Analytics
    Comparison of CRM Reporting & Analytics features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.6
    77 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Forecasting00 Ratings7.667 Ratings
    Pipeline visualization00 Ratings7.873 Ratings
    Customizable reports00 Ratings7.476 Ratings
    Customization
    Comparison of Customization features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.7
    80 Ratings
    1% above category average
    Custom fields00 Ratings7.678 Ratings
    Custom objects00 Ratings7.572 Ratings
    Scripting environment00 Ratings7.956 Ratings
    API for custom integration00 Ratings7.861 Ratings
    Security
    Comparison of Security features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    8.8
    75 Ratings
    5% above category average
    Single sign-on capability00 Ratings8.869 Ratings
    Role-based user permissions00 Ratings8.770 Ratings
    Social CRM
    Comparison of Social CRM features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.7
    44 Ratings
    2% above category average
    Social data00 Ratings7.843 Ratings
    Social engagement00 Ratings7.643 Ratings
    Integrations with 3rd-party Software
    Comparison of Integrations with 3rd-party Software features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    7.2
    65 Ratings
    5% below category average
    Marketing automation00 Ratings7.665 Ratings
    Compensation management00 Ratings6.834 Ratings
    Platform
    Comparison of Platform features of Jenzabar SONIS and Microsoft Dynamics 365
    Feature
    Jenzabar SONIS
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Dynamics 365
    6.8
    56 Ratings
    11% below category average
    Mobile access00 Ratings6.856 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    Salesflare
    Score10 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Schoolmint Hero
    Score9.7 out of 10
    Kintone
    Score9.7 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Schoolmint Hero
    Score9.7 out of 10
    Oracle Sales
    Score8.9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.1
    (4 ratings)
    7.9
    (104 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (20 ratings)
    Usability
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    7.8
    (34 ratings)
    Support Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (11 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.5
    (2 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.2
    (4 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    -
    (0 ratings)
    3.8
    (3 ratings)
    Professional Services
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Jenzabar SONISMicrosoft Dynamics 365
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    We often had students who came and took a class or completed a program, left, and then came back for something else at a later time. It was nice to be able to have someone in Jenzabar SONIS with multiple statuses. They could be in as a Student for the current class while still being in as an Alumni for the program they had graduated from. Most of our programs are set up so the students within that program are all taking the same courses at the same time. The bulk registration feature made it easy to enroll one student and then use that student's enrollment to quickly enroll all of the others in the program. That was a huge time saver. We had letters and emails that we wanted to send out at specific times in the application process. The Activity tool in Jenzabar SONIS made it easy for us to have some things that were automatically added to a person's record and others that we could add as needed. We could then run timed letters or emails and get our communication sent out. We had some challenges with Jenzabar SONIS because we have a number of certificate programs that are only one semester in length. We often had students who would complete one certificate (program) in the fall and then complete another one in the spring. Many of the reports pulled data only for the active enrollment so we had to go back and manually pull the data for the enrollment from the other semester if we needed something for the full school year.
    Incentivized
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    Microsoft
    Provides our company access to manage and customize the folds tailored to our needs. We needed to have certain paragraphs on certain paperwork per customer. MD 365 has those options to customize where needed and remove when not. The system is easy to navigate, and training can be done in a matter of days, even without prior knowledge of the system or similar systems.
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    • Great value
    • Built in reports are great, but it also has add on reporting that is fantastic.
    • Hosting they offer is phenomenal nearly no downtime, ever!
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • Best to use for AP - like in our organization, there are plenty of AP bills, so with Dynamics, we can quickly enter the same into the Excel utility, which means CSV-based upload, and then we can easily upload the same to the software. It's a time saver.
    • Best for Bank reconciliation - MS Dynamics makes Bank reconciliation easy. Banks can easily sync with software and easily get reconciled.
    • Generating invoices to customers and directly sending them to their inbox is easy with this software.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    • SONIS sorts my advisees by class and then by name. This is NOT useful. There should be an option for sorting by name only. I advise almost fifty students. It wastes my time looking for them in the sophomore listing, then the junior listing......
    • When registration of a student for semester courses is complete, there should be an option to print out only the courses scheduled, NOT the entire page which shows available courses at the bottom.
    • SONIS sometimes kicks me out for no reason.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • Small learning curve, obviously. You won't figure this out in a day, a week, or even a month. But given time, you can learn to be an expert. Or you can always get a consultant or hire in somebody. But learning the tool isn't out of the questions by any means.
    • Licensing can be confusing at times and isn't cheap, but it is cheaper than Salesforce. Plus no additional fees for data calls to better integrate your D365 CE data with other systems.
    • The Classic user interface left a bit to be desired, but now with the much-improved Unified Interface, the web client and the mobile client look the same, much more modern, and have more flexibility and power behind them for customizers as well.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    CRM has allowed us to keep all of our data in one place that is easy for all users within the company to view. I came into the company after they had been using CRM for about 4 years. They have all said that since we have used this it has helped us control work processes better, it has allowed us to be able to track things so much better, and has been something that has helped unite many processes that used to be all over the place. We are currently using CRM 4.0 and are planning on upgrading in the next 18 months to the 2011 version. Support for 4.0 is almost all but dried up. Understandably so. Some of the customization we have done, and a plugins we use, are now contained within the 2011 version so we are looking forward to that upgrade. We use an email marketing company as well, and they primarily support the 2011 version, but their product connects and is integrated within CRM. This is a great benefit as well so that all of our marketing information can be contained in one location.
    Read full review
    Usability
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    It's Easy to use and navigate through. It gets the job done for daily tasks. Sometimes it may require a small amount of manual work. You can handle student records, housing, and check-ins without needing multiple systems. After staff are trained, they can move through tasks pretty quickly, which saves lots of time.
    Incentivized
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    Microsoft
    The usability is easily adopted for users familiar with other Microsoft products. Dynamics 365 has several interfaces that cross over browsers and tablets. These multiple interfaces will be phased out and updated to a single unified interface eventually to provide the same usability across all devices. The backend configurations is slowly improving with the introduction of PowerApps compared to pre-D365 Online versions
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    Our partner, Ledgeview Partners has been FANTASTIC to work with. They are always timely in their response and have taken time to understand our business and our specific needs. We've made a lot of advanced customizations and they have been a great help in making those updates.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    We used a data warehouse to house our data, and our IT team and implementation vendor worked diligently ahead of time to construct idea implementation plans. Out of millions of records- we had less than a dozen errors, which is remarkable. My major insight is simply having a group of completely devoted individuals working towards your goal who fully understand the desired outcome. Focused resources for implementation season are critical to success.
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    Alternatives Considered
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    We changed databases in 2011 because the company we were with was going to quit supporting our software. We evaluated a number of different SISs available at the time and felt Jenzabar SONIS provided the best tools for our school. Most of the others were either geared more for adult education, individual course offerings or for schools that primarily had degree-seeking students. We needed something that could address both needs.We felt Jenzabar SONIS did that best of the ones we reviewed.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    Microsoft Dynamics was part of a system overhaul for a local school, and we looked at many products. If we had used it for a company with low turnover, then it might have been more feasible. They needed something a new person could learn quickly, someone who might also be learning marketing terms at the same time - especially if there is nobody to train the individual now expected to know the system. Similar issues occurred with all of these programs (we called it being too big for their britches), and one of the bigger things we liked was that it is more compatible with MS Office products in both technical and visual appeal. If you have a steady employees who use a CRM consistently, low turnover, and those who are very familiar with Office products, Dynamics would be the smartest option for you. Unfortunately, this was just not true for the school environment
    Incentivized
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    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    On our purchase, I'd been interrogated about our usage. Our needs are met by Microsoft Dynamics 365, which is simple to use. With so much data and information available, we must ensure that it is presented correctly to managers. Due to a lack of use, we don't have to spend as much money on Salesforce.
    Read full review
    Professional Services
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    My company's preferred program right now is Microsoft Dynamics 365. We use it to keep track of customers and important sales metrics in a streamlined manner. Anyone familiar with CRMs will find the tool extremely useful. Considering that we have a good turnover, this product will be used for its basic segments. As a result, there are few chances of error with Microsoft dynamics because it is so easy to use. Many options for recording data on these leads are available. It meets our needs and pays off.
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    Return on Investment
    Jenzabar, Inc.
    • Facilitates grade input by faculty.
    • Facilitates course enrollment by students.
    • Facilitates viewing student records and determining progress to program completion.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • For those without a centralized, all in one solution for major HR, Finance and other departments, Microsoft Dynamics 365 has vastly improved employee time utilization and profit.
    • Migrating clients from on-premise to the cloud has reaped benefits including better security, no unscheduled downtime and frequent updates to functionality.
    • Those transferring from cheaper solutions have lost money in the aim to be better integrated with other Microsoft products and AI they don't really utilize.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
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