Cision Communications Cloud vs. TapClicks

For a small start-up, the cost-benefit to add lift to press releases [and] particular milestone accomplishments is definitely there with the Cision [Communications] Cloud. Much of what we do, by necessity, is done internally without the benefit of outsourced press folks, so the Cision [Communications] Cloud ease of use and reporting is very important.

Incentivized

When you have multiple platforms you are pulling data from, TapClicks is perfect for you. If you don't have many platforms, or you don't have many clients who need to see their data in real time it might not be needed.

Incentivized

• Influencer research: I am able to quickly find the right reporter or editor for my pitch because Cision lets me know what they write about, their communications preferences, past articles, etc.
• Distribution: I appreciate a template to help streamline my pitch and press release distribution that allows me to send my news to a targeted list of contacts without having to send individual emails. I can send out communications with just a few steps, in just a few minutes.
• News search: I use Cision to scan for news and monitor for mentions of my clients. I also use this feature to keep tabs on topics and key terms of interest to me and my clients to stay ahead of emerging trends and stay on top of emerging discussions in my clients' industries.

Incentivized

• Customizable dashboards: these are easy to set-up and manage and tell a powerful story. We appreciate that they can be exported.
• Import Wizard: it's very important that we are able to include custom data points in our reports through the Import Wizard. After a short learning curve, we are not importing data on a weekly basis for a comprehensive report that not only shows marketing trends, but the business results too.
• Groups and Clusters: The ability to manage client groups and clusters has been vital to how we report out to the client.

Incentivized

• The social component could be upgraded to more accurately collect metrics on ephemeral content.
• Social listening is done in a completely different program than the media monitoring - combining the two would make report creation much easier and allow for a fuller picture of an incident across traditional and social media on the built-in dashboard section.
• Social listening only tracks Twitter. Public Facebook comments would be key in seeing a fuller picture of how an incident or campaign is playing out on social media.

Incentivized

• Missing some configuration of metrics, timelines, reporting.
• Bugs happen regularly, though this is offset by quick patches and lots of new features all the time.
• Ability to hide reporting sources and widgets when they don't have any data. This should be automatic.

Incentivized

For all of the reasons I had mentioned before, I haven't found a product that surpasses what they offer. I will maintain renewing with them for a few years and then reexamine the market to see if any new competitors arise. Until then, I have no reason to leave them for someone else.

TapClicks is a must have for our agency clients

Incentivized

The flexibility and customization of Cision Communications Cloud (TrendKite)* is among its most important features. Changing the dashboards, using keywords in the saved searches to pull out the best stories and the integration with marketing automation tools gives me confidence that I will able to continue using this tool well into the future. The future implementation and integration of the media contact database will complete the suite, making list management and email marketing programs much smoother. *This review was written before Cision acquired TrendKite. TrendKite is now part of Cision Communications Cloud.

Incentivized

TapClicks provides an array of on-demand training videos coupled with account management support to help your organization get up and running. That being said, TapClicks integrates with hundreds of marketing, advertising, CRM, and website analytics third-party platforms, so depending on how many integrations you want to activate, it can be a steep learning curve. Overall, we like the usability of the product.

Incentivized

Easily accessible 24/7.

Incentivized

Generally, Cision performs well day to day, but it's got some annoying bugs that slow down usage/require user workarounds which is inefficient. More seriously, a few months ago, as a result of a major system upgrade, certain critical functionality was not working and I was unable to use the service for more than a day when I had time-sensitive work to execute

For Cision TrendKite in particilar, support always responded, but it was sometimes slow. For some of our booleans and search queries, we would need help refining and excluding terms/phrases that weren't relevant to our client or campaign. This sometimes took 1-2 days just to get a response back, which sometimes was too late when a last-minute report was due. This was only with the support staff, not necessarily our customer success manager or sales rep.

Incentivized

Our organization experienced a very thorough onboarding process that helped us get up and running with TapClicks. It's pretty easy to integrate or "connect" with other platforms. We have developed a long-term relationship with our Account Manager at TapClicks and we really value her support. In today's world, most technology companies change your Account Manager seemingly almost every year, but that has not been the case with TapClicks.

Incentivized

The online training sessions available for the Cision Communications Cloud are helpful and informative. There's more than one option - initially, I signed up for the live webinar classes on basic functions and that is what I recommend other new users do as well. If I have specific questions or something I want to learn more about, I can search the online database and find article or online training videos to get the information I need.

Incentivized

There is no implementation at the customer's end so this doesn't really apply to my instance of Cision (possibly to all instances of it).

I found Cision [Communications Cloud] to be much more simple to use, and it offers the ability to track [a] wider array of media placements without additional fees attached to it. Now that it has incorporated TVEyes, it can offer print, online, radio, and TV tracking nationwide. This is [crucial] because very often your institution or company could be referenced in a variety of ways, nationally or briefly, on local TV/radio, and you would have no way of knowing about it.

Incentivized

After thoroughly evaluating multiple reporting and analytics platforms on the market like AdStage, Funnel.io, and Domo, our team felt that TapClicks integrated with the most third-party marketing, advertising, and website analytics platforms while providing very customizable and visually pleasing reporting modules, graphs, and charts. We also were impressed by the TapClicks services offering. We are very pleased with our decision and have no plans to switch providers. By utilizing TapClicks, our agency has been able to close more business, provide better reporting, increase revenue, and scale.

Incentivized

Easy to use, but still room for improvement.

Incentivized

• It seems as though media pickups have overall been down this year, perhaps related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Cision Communications Cloud has enabled us to develop numerous localized media lists for press releases, especially on grant recipients. These localized press releases have generated the best pickups that go beyond our KPIs (key performance indicators).
• The ability to save media lists provide a great starting point for developing future lists. The "talking about" helps to see what media contacts are talking about, and whether they might potentially be interested in our news release.

Incentivized

• Greater efficiencies in providing reports to our clients
• Great reporting features to sell when we're trying to close new business as an agency
• Ability to resell and add margin to our investment
• Automated reporting for our clients which saves our team time

Incentivized