Opal vs. SAS 360 Plan vs. Zerys

I honestly cannot recommend this tool enough. Opal is such a valuable tool for brand content creators and there is nothing like it available. If you're serious about content marketing and have a need to find ways to collaborate, plan and provide more visibility among teams, then Opal really is the only way to go. One more thing that's not being mentioned: The tool is simply amazing but it's only as amazing is the team behind the tool. Their customer support and willingness to quickly be in touch when needed is a key feature within itself. Seriously, such a good team of people.

Incentivized

I sold a few inbound marketing contracts with the expectation that I could find writers for the project on Zerys. We were looking for good writers that can understand the tone and branding of our business and after a few trials with some of the writers at Zerys, I finally found the one that understood us and then created amazing content in no time.

Incentivized

• Content planning: you can look at one asset and see how it is being used across multiple channels by multiple teams.
• Content collaboration: it is really easy to see what other people and teams are contributing to an asset, or how they are using it. We can also duplicate content that was created by another team to use as a starting point in our own content collaboration.
• High level/big picture overview: Opal allows us to see content that is being created, planned and scheduled very easily; it goes beyond social content (which we can also see in Sprinklr) to show us content created across multiple channels.

Incentivized

• Create and manage a detailed plan for a marketing campaign: when you create detailed project plans and then task and role levels, SAS Marketing Operations Management (SAS MOM) makes it easier to coordinate between projects with very little, if any, issues.
• Share, reuse and leverage existing marketing assets: Like some marketing tools, SAS MOM allows you to create and reuse assets across various channels.
• Manage project collaboration and execution: You are allowed to set up a workflow that helps move processes along without having to manage each step of the project.

Incentivized

• The customization options for the written pieces you can request are endless and thorough.
• Some writers are very fast and effective, making our link-building process quicker.
• It provides notifications along every step of the writing process so that you always know where in the pipeline your content is.

Incentivized

• No publishing capabilities, for the most part.
• No analytics tie-ins.
• Rather pricey.
• Requires someone to really manage the structure in order to keep the tool organized and use it effectively. When this is done right, though, it's worthwhile.

Incentivized

• It would be good to have a Storyboard feature to summarize and tie together some of the dashboard metrics.
• Missing feature: Hubspot CRM integration.

Incentivized

• There are instances where the writers don't understand the article to be written and don't give you the content you are looking for.
• The auto reporting feature needs some work. Too many email alerts and no option to change that.
• Hard to find good writers. Often writers only loosely follow directions so you end up reworking their content anyway.

Incentivized

You get for what you paid for. Opal has more features

Incentivized

Access to many freelancer writers covering a wide range of topics and the relative ease with which you can manage the writing and editing process with a freelancer writer is good. I believe Zerys has acquired a talented group of writers that are well-versed in a diverse number of topics. Zerys is reliable, and the customer service response is fast, which I greatly appreciate. I do not believe Zerys' interface is as simple as it could be, however.

Incentivized

• Opal allows for more discipline in marketing as teams are better aligned on messaging and big moments.
• Opal cuts down on communication breakdowns and mistakes, which in the end leads to more happy customers.
• I think Opal provides the team with more confidence as everyone is on the same page. With everything in one place rather than communications being lost in emails, etc., everyone is more efficient and can work knowing that there is one source of truth.

Incentivized

• Zerys has allowed us to grow our linkbuilding campaigns much more quickly than we would if we tried to create all of the content in-house.
• We save so much time hiring outside writers to write content rather than writing it ourselves.
• We are able to take on more projects than ever because we can rely on Zerys' writers to get things done on time.

Incentivized