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Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board vs. Zoom Workplace

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board

    Score9.1 out of 10
    Enterprise companies (1,001+ employees)
    Social Squared is a SharePoint Discussion Board App that can be deployed across SharePoint Online and Microsoft Teams. Social Squared improves productivity and efficiency by providing structured discussion forums for employee and student discussions. For Microsoft SharePoint Social Squared is a SharePoint discussion board application where users can post questions within relevant forums and receive answers to their questions from subject matter experts. The…

    $2,200

    per year per installation

    Zoom Workplace

    Score8.6 out of 10
    N/AZoom Workplace, Zoom’s open collaboration platform with an AI Companion, empowers teams to be more productive, and strengthen customer relationships throughout the customer lifecycle with Zoom’s Business Services for sales, marketing, and customer experience teams, including Zoom Contact Center.

    $16.99

    per month per user

    Pricing
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Editions & Modules
    Social Squared Discussion Board
    From $2200
    per year per installation
    Social Squared Discussion Board Enterprise Edition
    POA
    per year per installation
    Add-On Zoom Translated Captions
    $5
    per month per license
    Pro
    $16.99
    per month per user
    Business
    $21.99
    per month per user
    Add-On - Conference Room Connector
    $499
    per year
    Basic
    Free
    Enterprise
    Custom
    Add-On - Zoom Whiteboard
    starting at $2.49
    per month per user
    Add-On - Large Meetings
    starting at $600
    per year
    Add-On - Cloud Storage
    starting at $120
    per year
    Add-On Audio Conferencing
    starting at $1200
    per year
    Add-On Zoom Phone Power Pack
    Starting at $300
    per year per user
    Add-On - Quality of Service Subscription
    Contact Sales
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsPrices stated are minimum per installation for "stock" products. $2.20 per user/year on top of base price. Enterprise editions can be amended to suit business needs if deemed necessary, additional costs incurred and TBD. All packages include free technical support. Free upgrades available to latest versions of tool as they are released.Discount available for annual billing.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Considered Both Products
    Lightning Tools
    No answer on this topic
    Zoom
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    92%
    Would buy again
    416 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    93%
    Delivers good value for the price
    389 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    95%
    Happy with the feature set
    441 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    92%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    290 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    95%
    Implementation went as expected
    330 Answers
    Features
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Project Management
    Comparison of Project Management features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    9.1
    1 Ratings
    17% above category average
    Zoom Workplace
    -
    Ratings
    Mobile Access9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Search9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Communication
    Comparison of Communication features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    9.1
    1 Ratings
    14% above category average
    Zoom Workplace
    -
    Ratings
    Chat9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Notifications9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Discussions9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Internal knowledgebase9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    File Sharing & Management
    Comparison of File Sharing & Management features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    9.1
    1 Ratings
    13% above category average
    Zoom Workplace
    -
    Ratings
    Versioning9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Video files9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Audio files9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Document collaboration9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Access control9.11 Ratings00 Ratings
    Performance & Compatibility of Online Events Software
    Comparison of Performance & Compatibility of Online Events Software features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.5
    1006 Ratings
    1% above category average
    High quality audio00 Ratings8.9998 Ratings
    High quality video00 Ratings8.9998 Ratings
    Screen Sharing
    Comparison of Screen Sharing features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.7
    1006 Ratings
    2% above category average
    Desktop sharing00 Ratings9.31005 Ratings
    Online Meetings / Events
    Comparison of Online Meetings / Events features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.7
    1012 Ratings
    1% above category average
    Calendar integration00 Ratings9.0923 Ratings
    Meeting initiation00 Ratings9.1986 Ratings
    Record meetings / events00 Ratings9.2961 Ratings
    Online Events Collaboration
    Comparison of Online Events Collaboration features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.5
    874 Ratings
    2% above category average
    Live chat00 Ratings9.1856 Ratings
    Online Events Security
    Comparison of Online Events Security features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.9
    864 Ratings
    11% above category average
    User authentication00 Ratings8.9755 Ratings
    Participant roles & permissions00 Ratings8.7829 Ratings
    Cloud PBX
    Comparison of Cloud PBX features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.1
    236 Ratings
    5% below category average
    Hosted PBX00 Ratings8.3112 Ratings
    Multi-level Interactive Voice Response (IVR)00 Ratings7.8141 Ratings
    Directory of employee names00 Ratings8.3218 Ratings
    Call Management
    Comparison of Call Management features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.2
    264 Ratings
    6% below category average
    Answering rules00 Ratings8.5192 Ratings
    Call recording00 Ratings8.7240 Ratings
    Call park00 Ratings7.8147 Ratings
    Call screening00 Ratings8.0165 Ratings
    Message alerts00 Ratings8.2210 Ratings
    Business SMS/External Messaging00 Ratings7.9135 Ratings
    Voicemail Transcription00 Ratings7.9183 Ratings
    Mobile apps
    Comparison of Mobile apps features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.8
    297 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Mobile app for iOS00 Ratings8.8263 Ratings
    Mobile app for Android00 Ratings8.9181 Ratings
    Unified Communications Platform and Collaboration
    Comparison of Unified Communications Platform and Collaboration features of Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board and Zoom Workplace
    Feature
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board
    -
    Ratings
    Zoom Workplace
    8.7
    249 Ratings
    2% above category average
    Centralized communications management00 Ratings8.9199 Ratings
    Team messaging00 Ratings8.9214 Ratings
    Team document sharing00 Ratings8.6193 Ratings
    Call and meeting analytics00 Ratings8.5202 Ratings
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    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
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    Enterprises
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    Score8.8 out of 10
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    User Ratings
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    8.8
    (1070 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.4
    (27 ratings)
    Usability
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    9.5
    (46 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Support Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    6.4
    (46 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    6.4
    (11 ratings)
    Configurability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (13 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.3
    (2 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.8
    (3 ratings)
    Professional Services
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.2
    (8 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.3
    (2 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion BoardZoom Workplace
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Lightning Tools
    Their customer service it top notch and always responsive. I struggled in the beginning a little bit because I'm not tech savvy and we had to add it to our SharePoint site but they helped me along the way and even had share screen meetings with me to assist!!
    Read full review
    Zoom
    In most cases, and I mean almost all, Zoom is vastly superior to Teams in terms of functionality and ease of use. Case in point: I recently tried to join a Teams meeting in the web browser, and it took me multiple attempts to access it. This NEVER happens with a Zoom link.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Lightning Tools
    • Organizing Data
    • Opens up discussion, whether publicly or anonymously
    • Easy to setup
    Read full review
    Zoom
    • Audio quality of phone calls is spot on. Calls are clear and crisp.
    • Video quality of video meetings are clear and there aren't any pixelization artifacts that some systems can have.
    • Having AI summaries have been life changing for us. We no longer have to concentrate on note taking, like we did in the past. The summaries are accurate and enable us to put our efforts in the meeting or conversation. Plus, we can save them into our practice management system as required.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Lightning Tools
    • I would love to be able to assign various people as administrators of different topics (this may be an option now but a couple years ago it wasn't)
    Read full review
    Zoom
    • Love notes - allow insertion of table or grid
    • Allow admin to turn off DND
    • Allow a way to group individual people chats - not channels just individual peeps into groups for ease of finding - like how you can group shared calendars into sections in Outlook
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    We're sticking with Zoom for the foreseeable future--given its compelling feature set, ease of use, and advanced technology, there's just no other competition to be excited about. Plus it's a Gartner-recognized industry leader, so it's a rather easy choice.
    Read full review
    Usability
    Lightning Tools
    Our employees really like the fact that they can find things easily with the search feature and add questions and comments as they see fit.
    Read full review
    Zoom
    Zoom is made for the non tech office. It has features that can be made to do what you need to run things on a day to day basis. Immediately we we able to get meetings going with remote employees. The ability to be able to add smartphone connected people was a big plus. Zoom met our needs at the time.
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    There have been less than a handful of outages during our two years with Zoom, and whenever there was one, an email informing us of the outage went out immediately, and they had the issue resolved shortly thereafter.
    Read full review
    Performance
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    Zoom has among the best performance of any video conference platform, as I've mentioned several times. Besides that, their Chat platform works great, and their back end always runs smooth. It's unfortunate that reporting can now only be done by one month at a time, but nonetheless, it only takes a second to run any kind of Zoom report, whether it's an attendee report, Poll results, a user report, a list of meetings from the past month, etc.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    Because I got a response right away, and was assigned one specific individual to work with me from the beginning to the resolution. I had an actual email address and direct contact with this person without having to start over and over every time I contacted Zoom - this singular individual remained attentive and was well informed on the subject matter and quite able to resolve my needs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    If you receive any pushback from higher ups, point to any of the various positive reviews like this one. Or show Zoom's excellent Gartner report, or articles describing Zoom's partnership with Sequoia capital. It's not difficult to show how Zoom is a trustworthy industry leader with best-in-class technology.
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    Zoom Workplace is typically on the more expensive end against other options, but it's the industry leader for a reason. It has the most brand credibility by far, but that doesn't mean it's perfect. There are limitations when it comes to technical performance, customization and video/audio quality. I prefer Slack myself for communication apps, but Zoom Workplace is a good alternative.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    The billing and price model is really fair for so many functions that they offer, our remote work requires each of the features that Zoom offers, so accepting payment for a tool like this is the least we can do. I like that billing arrives on time and that they offer opportunities and payment times.
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    Because the Basic licenses are completely free, and because it's very easy to configure and install Zoom, and because anyone can join Zoom from a link without needing an account, scaling is a Breeze. There are absolutely no roadblocks. My company keeps adding more Zoom Pro license every week since it's so in demand. We were able to convert users from several different platforms onto Zoom with no trouble at all.
    Read full review
    Professional Services
    Lightning Tools
    No answers on this topic
    Zoom
    Zoom is perfect for our business. We use it to video chat with prospective clients. The name recognition alone gives us credibility and it is very easy to screen share and send content out.
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Lightning Tools
    • We signed up for a 3 year contract and hope to do another 3yr contract when this one is up. :)
    Read full review
    Zoom
    • We have not lost much productivity in our teamwork during the pandemic because of the ability to have Zoom video calls and keep everyone in touch. This is definitely a positive.
    • We are able to have more people participate in coaching sessions (described earlier) because we don't have room space limitations. This is a big positive.
    • Being able to start a meeting instantly is great when we are doing support and/or training with a client over the phone and need to be able to share a visible
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Lightning Tools Social Squared Discussion Board Screenshots

    Screenshot of MODERN, RESPONSIVE SHAREPOINT DISCUSSION BOARD
Discussion Forums can be created for a variety of different reasons. This example is a Forum Group for the Microsoft 365 technologies such as Teams, Planner, and SharePoint. Forums are then created within the Forum Groups for more specific discussions. Under the SharePoint Forum Group, there is a Forum for SharePoint On-Premises and SharePoint Online. Anyone looking to ask a question regarding SharePoint 2019 for example would be able to post their question under SharePoint On-Premises rather than SharePoint Online. This also allows subject matter experts to focus more on the questions that they can respond to and provide value.Screenshot of SHAREPOINT DISCUSS BOARD – TOPICS VIEW
When navigating into a forum, the topics and discussions that are taking place are shown. Any new topics that not yet read will be highlighted. It also displays whether topics have been answered, their average ratings, how many views and posts are within the topic, and also provides the ability to subscribe to the forum to be notified of new posts within it.Screenshot of READING DISCUSSIONS AND PROVIDING FEEDBACK
Social Squared offers a threaded discussion view with the ability to provide feedback to other users.

Posts can be rated, voted upon, or liked by users in order to give feedback to the user creating or responding to a post. Additionally, replies can be marked as answered or marked as featured, which gives readers of forums assurance that the response they are reading is validated to be the correct answer.

Users also receive feedback through the earning of badges. The more users post or mark posts as answered, the more points are rewarded. This makes it easy to spot subject matter experts.Screenshot of SUGGESTED TAGS
Social Squared provides a rich text editor for creating and replying to topics. The Rich Text toolbar provides functionality such as inserting images, YouTube videos, Stream Videos, Formatted Code Inserts, as well as font formatting.

While typing, suggestions on how to tag a post appear. Selecting an existing tag will provide consistency in the tags used making it easier for other users to discover the post.Screenshot of SOCIAL SQUARED TAG CLOUD VIEW
The Social Squared Tag Cloud view makes it easy to navigate to posts within a specific category even if they span multiple forums. The more a tag appears in different posts, the more prominent it will be in the tag cloud. Users can navigate to posts with the tag in one click.Screenshot of DISCUSSION BOARD WITHIN MICROSOFT TEAMS TAB
Social Squared is a Discussion Board App for Microsoft Teams Tab’s and Microsoft Teams Personal Apps. Social Squared provides information workers the ability to post questions within relevant forums, and receive answers from their team. The Discussion Board layout for posts makes it easier to find answers to questions that may have already been asked before. Through features such as “Mark as Answered”, “Forum Moderation”, “Post Rating”, “Post Likes”, “Post Voting”, users will be assured that the answers they are reading are validated.

    Zoom Workplace Screenshots

    Screenshot of an example collaboration feature. These are used to:
Transcribe, summarize, and capture action items with AI Companion from your in-person meetings.
Improve visibility and alignment by sharing emails to chats
Elevate a chat to a meeting or phone call to get to resolution faster. 
Continue meeting conversations and easily access shared information in Team Chat.Screenshot of an example of Zoom's productivity features. These features are used to:
Improve productivity across teams, locations, and time zones.
Organize project deliverables and assets in a centralized, collaborative doc.
Collaborate and map out projects visually on a whiteboard.
Jumpstart brainstorming sessions using AI and templates.
Gather valuable team input for well-informed decision-making with surveys and polls.
Stay on top of action items surfaced from across Zoom Workplace.Screenshot of some additional collaboration features. These are used to:
Optimize office experiences and in-person time.
Make sure remote participants feel connected with what is going on in the room.
Collaborate across remote and in-person teams on a virtual whiteboard.
Easily know and identify who is in the room and who is speaking in a Zoom Room with smart name tags and smart speaker tags.Screenshot of an example of Zoom's AI companion. This feature is used to streamline communications, improve productivity, increase employee engagement, and optimize flexible work.Screenshot of additional AI Companion features. The tools is also used to:
Launch internal campaigns.
Deliver visually rich updates with live streams, billboards, and videos.
Ensure critical comms are never missed with read receipts.
Send updates to deskless workers with Workvivo TV and Chat.