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Anaplan - the planning solution you need
Updated November 16, 2023

Anaplan - the planning solution you need

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

Overall Satisfaction with Anaplan

We implement solutions with the Anaplan tool for enterprise customers on a wide range of use cases that their line of work requires. The most common problems we aim to resolve are outdated processes using robust tools that are very time-consuming for the end user, as well as creating a stable connected planning experience for every branch of the organization. Our scope are multiple CBP implementations that are currently live, and have been helping our users make better decisions faster and easier. To update our portfolio, we've been working on several FP&A process models and their respective integrations with our customers' extensive environment.
  • Simulation planning (FP&A, S&OP, etc)
  • Compensation planning
  • Constantly enhancing and evolving UI
  • Intuitive and easy to understand platform
  • Fast and early adoption among users
  • CoE planning
  • Process optimization
  • API integrations
  • The way LISS works and can interact with other components
  • Can have more visualization (chart) options
  • The way the engine reacts to syntax errors (sometimes can take several minutes depending on model size and complexity)
  • Pages flexibility (in terms of possible and available functionalities as compared to old UX)
  • Flexibility
  • Ease of reporting
  • Availability to even non-trained personnel
  • UI/UX strength
  • ROI > 200%
  • Lowering multiple process' time for completion significantly (half, in other instances more)
Anaplan to me is far easier to understand, more intuitive to use, the interface is quite more appealing and the overall experience is more pleasant, so to say. With HFM I feel like using a tool that was created ~20 years ago, and no matter how easy it is to use in some aspects, or how well it performs with large data sets, I would prefer and recommend Anaplan.

Do you think Anaplan delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Anaplan's feature set?

Yes

Did Anaplan live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Anaplan go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Anaplan again?

Yes

The tool is amazing for implementations in the areas of Incentive compensation planning, S&OP planning and analysis, FP&A; We also had several very successful implementations of statistical forecasting for AOP creation. These are all areas that the platform [that] provides very flexible capabilities to react to the user stories that need to be resolved. There aren't many areas in which Anaplan cannot be useful, in my experience the only business case that was hard to implement via Anaplan was a Rebates calculation solution - it had its difficulties due to the need of the tool to hoard large amounts of data and historization. That way the client wasn't utilizing the calculation engine capabilities of the tool, but rather storing data, which is not the primary key benefit of Anaplan.

Anaplan Feature Ratings

9.4
Long-term financial planning
9
Financial budgeting
10
Forecasting
10
Scenario modeling
9
Management reporting
9
8.3
Financial data consolidation
9
Journal entries and reports
8
Local and consolidated reporting
8
Detailed Audit Trails
8
9.3
Financial Statement Reporting
9
Management Reporting
9
Excel-based Reporting
10
9.0
Personalized dashboards
9
Color-coded scorecards
9
Cost and profitability analysis
9
Key Performance Indicator setting
9
9.0
Flat file integration
10
Excel data integration
9
Direct links to 3rd-party data sources
8
9.0
Customizable dashboards
9
Ad-hoc Reporting ()
Not Rated
9.5
Publish to PDF
10
Report Versioning
9
Data Discovery and Visualization ()
Not Rated
10.0
Role-Based Security Model
10
Report-Level Access Control
Not Rated
8.3
Responsive Design for Web Access
9
Mobile Application
8
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile
8

Using Anaplan

25 - Sales, Marketing, Accounting, Technical - almost all areas of our line of work meet their needs satisfied to a good extent in Anaplan. Depending on the business case, there can be an entire model, or just a section of it for the users to work with and it brings significant value to their day-to-day work.
9 - The beauty of Anaplan is that (even though our case is not exact) there are not many specific significant skills required to understand and even develop in Anaplan. Basic understanding of Excel-like structure and syntax is more than enough, as model building is made easy to understand and work with once you roll into the matter.
  • Sales compensation
  • AOP creation
  • Statistical Forecast
  • Demand Management
  • FP&A
  • UAT tracking and easing the process for end users to test and confirm new rollouts
  • Project and capacity planning
  • Holiday and sick leave planning (overall HR assistance)
  • Project and capacity planning
In any line of work, a tool that is flexible and would allow different departments of your company to easily interact and exchange valuable insights, is highly anticipated and needed. For me, what Anaplan provides to a business, be it a smaller one or an enterprise customer, is an easily scaling, agile planning and modeling platform that can meet almost any need and give a high-end solution to the problems any company faces on a daily basis.

Evaluating Anaplan and Competitors

  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
  • Product Reputation
  • Prior Experience with the Product
The main reason is the ease of work with the tool, the implementation that requires a reasonable amount of technical understanding, but still can be done on a larger scale with non-technical personnel due to the learning path that the platform provides. The user experience has been tremendously improving in the past years and now the reporting is on par with some exceptional reporting platforms but at a less complex implementation curve.
I would focus on a more detailed analysis of the pros and cons of selecting the platform.

Anaplan Support

I've had a fair share of reaching out to the support personnel, and they are really helpful every time, reaching out in a timely manner, providing materials and information that might help me solve my issue; and if that does not suffice, they always refer me to the proper escalation personnel for the next steps in solving my problems. Sometimes they tend to be a bit slow in the response, but that is not often.
ProsCons
Quick Resolution
Good followup
Knowledgeable team
Problems get solved
No escalation required
Support cares about my success
None
We did not, no specific reason to "why not", besides cost tracking.
One time i had an issue with a filtration of some items in a drop-down list on a UX page that was defaulting the scroll to the top every time i scroll down, and when i reported the issue, initially i was told that this is scheduled for a release as a bug; a day later i got reached out to by the support telling me the issue was fixed, and it was. Exceptional reaction and resolve time.