SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence vs. Zendesk Explore

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
The SAP® BusinessObjects™ Business Intelligence Platform provides users with ad hoc queries, reporting, data visualizations, and analysis tools. Its integrated, unified infrastructure aims to offer scalability from one-to-many tools and interfaces on-premise, in the cloud, or as a hybrid approach.N/A
Zendesk Explore
Score 7.8 out of 10
N/A
Zendesk offers Explore, a business intelligence and customer analytics tool which integrates with the Zendesk suite featuring ticket analytics, custom fields, dashboards, and other features. Zendesk is migrating customers of the BIME analytics product, which is approaching end of support, to Zendesk Explore in 2019.N/A
Pricing
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
7.7
49 Ratings
6% below category average
Zendesk Explore
9.0
9 Ratings
10% above category average
Pixel Perfect reports7.444 Ratings7.15 Ratings
Customizable dashboards8.145 Ratings10.09 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates7.645 Ratings9.97 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8.2
46 Ratings
2% above category average
Zendesk Explore
8.5
9 Ratings
5% above category average
Drill-down analysis9.045 Ratings9.59 Ratings
Formatting capabilities8.345 Ratings9.09 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages7.531 Ratings5.65 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration8.245 Ratings10.09 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8.7
46 Ratings
4% above category average
Zendesk Explore
8.6
9 Ratings
3% above category average
Publish to Web8.338 Ratings7.86 Ratings
Publish to PDF7.944 Ratings9.07 Ratings
Report Versioning9.140 Ratings9.03 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling9.145 Ratings8.97 Ratings
Delivery to Remote Servers9.224 Ratings8.54 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8.3
41 Ratings
3% above category average
Zendesk Explore
7.7
7 Ratings
4% below category average
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)8.339 Ratings7.46 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization7.737 Ratings7.66 Ratings
Predictive Analytics8.936 Ratings6.45 Ratings
Pattern Recognition and Data Mining00 Ratings9.43 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
9.4
46 Ratings
10% above category average
Zendesk Explore
9.2
9 Ratings
8% above category average
Multi-User Support (named login)9.046 Ratings9.58 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model9.144 Ratings9.59 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)9.943 Ratings8.07 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)9.927 Ratings10.07 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control00 Ratings9.04 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8.8
32 Ratings
10% above category average
Zendesk Explore
8.0
7 Ratings
1% above category average
Responsive Design for Web Access8.331 Ratings6.85 Ratings
Mobile Application9.026 Ratings8.42 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile9.128 Ratings8.96 Ratings
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Product A and Product B
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
7.4
22 Ratings
6% below category average
Zendesk Explore
6.3
4 Ratings
22% below category average
REST API7.319 Ratings6.14 Ratings
Javascript API7.217 Ratings6.33 Ratings
iFrames8.116 Ratings6.03 Ratings
Java API7.520 Ratings5.93 Ratings
Themeable User Interface (UI)7.319 Ratings6.63 Ratings
Customizable Platform (Open Source)7.318 Ratings7.02 Ratings
Best Alternatives
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Small Businesses
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Score 8.9 out of 10
BrightGauge
BrightGauge
Score 8.9 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Reveal
Reveal
Score 9.9 out of 10
Reveal
Reveal
Score 9.9 out of 10
Enterprises
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Jaspersoft Community Edition
Score 9.7 out of 10
Jaspersoft Community Edition
Jaspersoft Community Edition
Score 9.7 out of 10
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User Ratings
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Likelihood to Recommend
7.7
(71 ratings)
9.3
(9 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.3
(24 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(14 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
9.0
(10 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.6
(16 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
In-Person Training
10.0
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
9.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
9.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
9.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
SAP BusinessObjects Business IntelligenceZendesk Explore
Likelihood to Recommend
SAP
The proper management of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards requires an expert on the team to manage and build reports. If an organization does not have the proper expertise on board to build and deploy reports it will fail. Data analytics, dropping into excel, and broadcasting of information are major bonuses for the use of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards.
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Zendesk
Compared to other analytics functions of other Ticket Management System, Zendesk Explore is the easiest to learn. Moreover, the learning curve is high. Once you pick up the fundamentals, you will be able to create all types of analytic reports. In addition, if you know basic coding or SQL, you can create your own metrics and attributes to capture extremely specific elements such as the tickets that contain a certain word or etc.
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Pros
SAP
  • This software is easy to initially learn, and very powerful in producing reusable reports.
  • It is much faster than my company's internal manual queries. The ability to build off of a saved query and share queries to other users is a great positive.
  • My favorite part is that you can run queries in the background and it does not interfere with your current work or slow your computer down.
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Zendesk
  • As with most "suite" products, if you already use other Zendesk features (Chat, Talk, etc), then Zendesk Explore adds an extra facet to the customer experience. The more we know about our clientele, the better we can understand/anticipate their needs.
  • I like that we can get as in-depth as we feel is necessary. For example, is just one customer having an issue? Or are many experiencing a similar problem? We can better rack this type of trend using Explore.
  • Our team can dive deep into the data based on exactly what we're looking for. If the marketing team wants a certain kind of segment, we can give them that info. If we want to sort by date or another set of parameters, we can do that as well.
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Cons
SAP
  • The installation can be very complex and time-consuming, it requires a lot of planning and foresight as to what role the software will play in the organization.
  • The software has a relatively large learning curve that takes dedicated users months to get comfortable with, the UI is a bit intimidating for new users.
  • SAP could organize their help better, it can be difficult to find dependable solutions to issues via their website and support channels.
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Zendesk
  • Flexibility: the platform is somewhat limited for the creation of "non-standard" metrics
  • It is complicated to create dashboards with no previous Zendesk Explore knowledge
  • The reliability of Zendesk Explore has not been great: we had at least 5 situations when the dashboard was not showing data and had to approach Customer service for support
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Likelihood to Renew
SAP
The institution has decided to move in a different direction, and will be using MSBI for reporting. I have been very happy with the Business Objects suite of tools, and will continue to use them heavily until we make the transition.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Usability
SAP
From a server and client side perspective. the Business Intelligence Platform provides a foundation for all aspects of content development, distribution, analysis, collaboration and self service. Ease of use from targeted content delivery through controlled accessibility. Content exporting in the format of the users choice. Scheduling for internal or external delivery. Public and private folders for secure content access when requied. Web based for viewing on the users device of choice without the need to download additional applications.
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Zendesk
As previously mentioned, Zendesk Explore is easy to use. There are lots of materials in Zendesk Community. In addition, the live support will also help a lot in learning Zendesk Explore, especially for beginners. Zendesk Explore might be difficult at first to learn, but anyone could learn it in just 7 days. Once the fundamentals are locked in, moving from that place to becoming an amateur at Zendesk Explore is extremely easy. Lastly, if you know basic coding and SQL, you can be a pro at it already.
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Reliability and Availability
SAP
When we implemented 3.1, we had a tough time managing the system: It took almost a year to stabilize.

With 4.0, we want to roll out to more users, and are holding back because of fears about the performance issue
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Performance
SAP
Overall, the tool (Web Intelligence 4.2) is fast and solid. One issue is a dependability on JAVA for a full feature report creation/edit capabilities (as opposed to limited HTML option). Second, planned end of JAVA support by major browsers (Chrome is already not supporting JAVA applet).
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
SAP
SAP has released various versions of SAP BO BI. starting from 3.1 and going to 4.0,4.1,4.2 and latest being 4.3. SAP provides support to these new versions. As new versions keep on coming, support for the very old software goes out of scope from SAP. it is when the different organization plans to get their BO content migrated from a lower version to a newer version. The newer version had definitely added functionality and features which ease the work of users.
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Zendesk
Support for all of Zendesk has exceeding my expectations. This company will always get a 10 out of 10 in my book. Any question you have they make sure you have the answer plus a step-by-step guide on how to do each step so you are set up for success!
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In-Person Training
SAP
SAP authorized training is best, Please go ahead with it. Even lot of online training options/videos available for self learning
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Online Training
SAP
I haven't used it or got feedback from the end user.

Content looks to be pretty detailed. Focused on SQL but not BW.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
SAP
Hire specialists and experienced staff. Mix some beginners so that everyone is not a leader but a learner too. Plan well; architect well; break down implementation in small steps and move towards larger steps. Create a centralized and authorized SAP Business Objects implementation team.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
SAP
We selected SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence (BI) based on price. It can stack up against others in terms of price and honestly, that's about it. Salesforce Commerce does a hell of a better job at handling it. However, in the space of Business Intelligence, SAP can do more, and that's why at the end we went with it
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Zendesk
Zendesk Explore is more user friendly and the software plus maintenance cost is less. The report section is more detailed and no lag while creating report for a large data source. The report segments and formats are editable which make it more convenient to make a report according to a requirement for an individual.
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Scalability
SAP
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence (BI) Platform supports SOA Service Oriented Architecture. You can start/restart/enable/disable all the servers. You can seamless do load balancing and clustering. It supports all leading application and web server. Supports LDAP SSO integration. People who can work on excel with training they can work on SAP Business Objects Web Intelligence, dashboard, Lumira, Information design tool product suite. Tool is very user friendly and easy to learn and implement
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
SAP
  • By generating and distributing reports in a timely manner, we were able to save millions of dollars for the company which otherwise would not have been visible.
  • Almost realtime dashboard, saved the company a huge amount by showing the outages and kept the company from buying a tool to do just that.
  • It showed the customers who were not paying the bills and were missing in the system due to some loophole. This was visible by doing reporting on the theft usage of electricity.
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Zendesk
  • Money saved due to proper staffing.
  • Happier Staff- proper staffing ensures no one is overworked.
  • Ability to quickly pinpoint where issues are and why.
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