TOP 10 FORUM & COMMUNITY PRLATFORMS REPORT 2014

2014 EDITION

TOP 10 FORUM AND COMMUNITY PLATFORMS REPORT Comparison of the Leading Forum and Community Platform Vendors

Overview of Forum and Community Platforms

Online communities and forums can be excellent assets for companies looking to provide their customers with a better user experience. Strong communities increase the quality of resources available to users, and can even decrease the amount of time customer support teams spend answering common questions by empowering users to troubleshoot independently. Communities and forums also generate valuable feedback for companies, letting them better gauge customer satisfaction and identify pain points early on. The information gathered in forums can help companies develop better products and services in the future.

Unfortunately, community management can be challenging and time consuming, so opting for a community platform software solution can be a great way to get the benefits of an online community while minimizing the hassle. Software solutions can help companies develop organized, user-friendly forums, allowing everyone from new customers to brand advocates and employees to interact with each other coherently. Moderation tools let administrators monitor posts and keep inappropriate comments and spam in check, as well as create groups and topic threads to organize the flow of discussion more naturally. The latest generation of customer community solutions offer features like social integration, which allows users to access and comment in the forum using social media login information, streamlining the process and increasing user engagement.

Selecting a powerful, flexible customer community platform can make a huge difference in the success of your community, whether you want to gather user feedback, empower knowledgable employees to interact with customers, or simply provide a public space for learning and discussion.

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Top 10 Forum and Community Platforms Comparison Invisionpower

Bloomfire

vBulletin 5 Connect

www.getsatisfaction.com

www.bloomfire.com

www.vbulletin.com

www.invisionpower.com

$$

$$

$$$

$$$$

Get Satisfaction

DNN Evoq Social

Community Suite

www.dnnsoftware.com

$$

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

Flipboard, Intuit, Kellogg’s,

Etsy, Re/Max, esurance,

Zynga, EA, Sony Pictures,

EMI, Live Nation, Atlanta

Department of Defense,

Procter & Gamble, Sonos

Comcast, HealthSmart

Steam, NASA, Denver

Falcons, O’Reilly, NHL,

Time Warner Cable,

Broncos

Evernote

Dannon, Little Caesars

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Get Satisfaction is a SaaS

Bloomfire is a SaaS

vBulletin is licensed

Invisionpower is available

Evoq can be licensed as a

solution and requires no

solution and requires no

software installed on the

as both licensed and

cloud/hosted solution or an

additional hardware for

additional hardware for

server.

hosted models.

on-premise solution.

installation.

installation.

Key Features • Community management platform • Unlimited employee users • Community-based support • User moderation • Social Knowledge base • Federated search • Idea voting • Mobile & Facebook apps • Embed anywhere on

Key Features • Community tool focused on sharing content and asking & answering questions • Receive relevant content with a customized ‘Your Feed’ designed to reduce information overload • Native content creation tools including text, HD video and the ability to

Key Features • Built-in discussion forum, polls, groups, and blog • Search engine optimization • Control panels for every user role, as well as user/member management • User profile pages, private messaging, friends list, etc.

Key Features • Administrator Control Panel to manage, customize, and configure the community environment • Complete user moderation from a central dashboard • Built-in site skins for mobile devices • Social sign-in and user content sharing

Key Features • Seamlessly integrate your community into your web site • Users can customize look and feel, module placement, custom branding, and rolebased access • Fully functional game mechanics rewards users with reputation points, privileges, and

your website • Full customization & branding • Open APIs for integration • Moderation, curation tools • Community analytics and dashboards • Private community • Integration with CRM, marketing automation, and ticketing systems • Integration with all social channels via Hootsuite • 11 languages available • Single sign-on • SEO optimized

upload any file type • Find and follow experts and identify collaboration partners • Analytics to gauge community use and measure business gains • Gamification and recognition elements • Intelligent search with type ahead and checkbox filters • iOS and Android apps • Moderation available • Integrates with Salesforce, Google Apps and more • Accessible API + SEO

• Users and usergroup management • Admin and board maintenance • Proprietary template engine, full CSS layout and design • Blog control panel

• Content notifications, RSS syndication, user group promotions, and account customization • Supports PHP, MySQL, PrototypeJS, Minify, reCaptcha, CKEditor, and Sphinx • Extensibility through extensive APIs and IPS Marketplace apps • Advanced site template and CSS editor • Integrate with IPS Applications: IP.Board, IP.Nexus, IP.Content, IP.Gallery, IP.Blog, IP.Chat, IP.Downloads

recognition • Custom badges, rewards and privileges • Interactive dashboards • Analytics provide details on top users, content, and activities • Social API enables developers to customize the community, query data, and build custom modules • Crowdsource ideas from your community and track the most popular • Identify your community’s influential users

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Top 10 Forum and Community Platforms Comparison Socious Online

Lithium Social Customer

Community Software

Experience Platform

SocialCore Network

Zimbra Community

www.socious.com

www.lithium.com

www.zimbra.com

$$

$$$

$$$

Platform

www.socialcore.com

$$

Jivex

www.jivesoftware.com

$$$

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

Select Customers

VMware User Group,

Autodesk, TomTom,

TI InfoLink, Titleist, Dell

Simon & Schuster, CCS,

BUPA, Charles Schwab,

Roche, Infor, Lamaze

The Home Depot, AT&T,

TechCenter

Marlboro, Marvel, PR

National Instruments,

International

Verizon, Sephora

Newswire

Nike, Swiss RE

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Technology Model

Socious is a SaaS solution

Lithium is a SaaS solution

Telligent is a SaaS solution

SocialCore is a SaaS

Jive is a SaaS solution

and requires no additional

and requires no additional

and requires no additional

solution and requires no

and requires no additional

hardware for installation.

hardware for installation.

hardware for installation.

additional hardware for

hardware for installation.

installation.

Key Features • All-in-one customer community platform with integrated community, events, CMS, email, membership management, etc.

• Online groups, forums and private social network • CMS features search engine, wikis, calendars, member profiles and directory

Key Features • Capture insights from peer-to-peer conversations • Tagging & commenting refines content for better organization and faster access • Tribal Knowledge feature converts discussions into wellorganized and attributed articles

Key Features • Easy brand customization • Idea Management lets participants share feedback throughout idea lifecycle • Built-in analytics dashboard and reporting • Customizable points system to encourage participation with Rewards and

Key Features • Custom forums with real-time option • Activity feed • Articles • Blog posts • Live chat • Content poster • Document manager • Drag-and-drop layout • Bookmarks • Calendars and events • Extensible profiles

Key Features • Support forums with built-in intelligence to route users to best responses before they create a case • Convert support discussions into editable articles to build up a wiki-style knowledgebase • Out-of-the-box Salesforce.com and

• Survey and polls • Event and conference management • Secure document sharing and media libraries • Online store to sell physical items, virtual goods and access to the community • Social analytics, CRM integration and product management tools

• Moderation features to discourage negative behavior quickly and efficiently • Intregration with Salesforce.com and other CRM systems • Mobile optimized format for on-the-go access can be integrated into mobile apps • Lithium Social Web integration to route support requests from Facebook and Twitter

Recognition feature • Prepackaged, predesigned social experiences save time in generating content • Complete set of social applications for customer communication • Integration with Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc.

• Integration with Microsoft SharePoint

• • • •

CRM integration • Dashboards and reporting tools for insightful analytics • Automatic SEO for community pages • Social media monitoring application • Built-in game mechanics and rewards to encourage participation

• • • • • • • • •

Friending and following Photo galleries User setup wizard Status and mood updates Videos Threaded discussions and commenting Forums Group chat Polls, surveys and petitions Questions and answers Tagging Rating and reviews Moderation and permissions tools

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