QuickBase - Custom End-to-End Business Platform
Updated May 12, 2021

QuickBase - Custom End-to-End Business Platform

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Quickbase

Being a construction company, there is a plethora of available software out there, but they all are specialized to one area, not the entire business. This resulted in us using various types of software across the business and managing users and licensing was not efficient. We had CRM software, accounting software, marketing software, production software and the list goes on. Not to mention insane costs to use so many types of software. We tried all sorts of different platforms, each with their own benefits but ultimately we needed something that was a single-source solution for us. Something that could run our business end-to-end and allow to manage one system. That is when we found Quickbase. Quickbase is an amazing platform that has allowed us to eliminate of all the different software we were using and stick to one platform across the business. Quickbase is full featured and has all of the tools needed to create any type of business application out there and the learning curve for development is low. So low, that anyone in the business can create their own applications as well. Quickbase has not only saved our business money but it has streamlined processes and eliminated a lot of wasted office time that would have been spent using other platforms.
  • Data analysis and business reporting: Being able to create detailed reports and charts in a matter of minutes is such a useful tool for a business. Having all business data in one place and being able to see it quickly is very important to us.
  • Custom Application Building: Like I said before, the development learning curve is so low that it allows "citizen developers" to take part in the development of business applications.
  • Simplicity: The user interface is not tainted by fancy views, it is simple and straight to the point.
  • Mobile: Quickbase Mobile is currently not the best interface to use on a mobile device and having this would allow us to integrate Quickbase in more areas of our business, like field services.
  • Developer programs. It would be nice if quickbase offered developer licenses as the system cost is rather high for an individual to use to become a developer of the platform. Having a developer license could greatly increase exposure and functionality of the platform by reducing adoption barriers.
  • Field categories. When a table has a lot of fields, it can be hard to manage. It would be nice if the admin could categorize fields for better management.
Absolutely. Quickbase is a low-code platform so anyone can sink their teeth in and get to building applications. It is not like the old days where you needed expensive developers to create static applications that are costly to maintain. Really anyone can create their own apps with only a bit of database design knowledge. Imagine that, what system out there allows everyone in the business to participate in building dynamic apps that progressively get better.
Again, all the alternatives out there are specialized to basically suit one aspect of the business. There are a couple platforms out there that are similar to Quickbase but we chose Quickbase for its simple design and because it was from a trusted company like Intuit so we knew our data was safe and system uptime would be better than anyone else.
  • Building and deploying business applications faster
  • Improving our ability to drive insights from our data
  • Improving collaboration across one or more teams
  • Solving a specific business challenge
  • Building and deploying an application (or multiple applications) that meets our exact needs
QuickBase has allowed us to achieve most of our business system goals. We use the system for many areas of the business including Sales CRM, HR Management, Sales and Project Management, Compliance Management and more. It has allowed us to implement new ideas quickly and it is competitive advantage to us.
Really the only thing needed to create fabulous applications is some database design knowledge and how relationships between fields/tables work. Other than that, Quickbase has a very nice library of webinars and support areas to quickly learn the basics of the system. The QuickBase University is an excellent resource for beginners. Like anything it takes time and one just needs to invest a little bit of time to learn the fundamentals and you're off building apps.
Updating and modifying current applications in Quickbase is an easy workflow. One example would be with our Sales CRM application. We joined as a vendor for a large local event and wanted to track the visitors to our booth for future marketing campaigns. In a day, we were able to modify the CRM back-end and integrate it with our website's front-end form and easily track these leads. That is just one example of how quickly you can implement new ideas into current systems.
For us, Quickbase is an end-to-end software with limitless possibilities. We are able to create applications that suit our business, rather than some construction software that tries to treat all businesses the same. Every business has different processes and procedures and having a platform that can adapt to this is key. Quickbase is an enterprise platform which is great but it does not suit smaller businesses (1-10 users) as the cost could outweigh the benefits.

Quickbase Feature Ratings

Integrations and Governance

  • Mailchimp
  • Mailgun
  • Wordpress
  • QuickBooks Online
A lot of times, you want things to happen in other applications when a record is created in Quickbase and vice versa. For example, we have a Prospects list in our app and when someone unsubscribes from our email list, we wanted it to unsubscribe in both MailChimp and Quickbase. Programming knowledge was an important aspect of integrating the two systems using both APIs and custom scripting.
Wow, pipelines are truly amazing. It is like having Zapier built right in. I was skeptical at first, but after attending a virtual seminar, I was quickly intrigued by all the opportunities Pipelines was opening. With Pipelines, I was able to syncronize Mailchimp list unsubscribes with my Prospects database easily, quickly and with no code.
We trust that Quick Base is managing our data with the highest level of security. The system has many security features like IP whitelisting that help the user focus on the business and not about keeping up with security methods and trends, quick base does that for you.

Evaluating Quickbase and Competitors

Yes - We replaced quite a few products by using Quickbase. Before that, we were in a silo-system where we had all these products that served one business application and didn't talk well with each other. We even tried developing our own software in-house.
  • Price
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
  • Product Reputation
  • Vendor Reputation
Single source system. Having one software, one payment, one system to manage for the business end-to-end
Doing it again, I think we would have come up with the same conclusion, even if we reviewed more products because Quickbase is a unicorn, there is nothing like it out there that allows you to add or modify business practices and deploy them so quickly and easily. business agility.

Using Quickbase

on the desktop end, quickbase does a really good job keeping the interface simple and easy to use and understand.
ProsCons
Like to use
Technical support not required
Well integrated
Consistent
Quick to learn
Convenient
Feel confident using
Lots to learn
  • data relationships
  • formula functions
  • data entry
  • mobile friendly use
  • data access for different roles
  • webhooks
Yes - in my opinion, not very well compared to alternative solutions. I love quickbase but I wish a bit more emphasis was put on a mobile friendly interface as I can use this software in other locations of the business but the mobile end is limited and not usable at the moment for my applications