SchoolMessenger vs. UUKI

SchoolMessenger used to be a good product for home to school communication. However, if it can't properly integrate with big name, run of the mill student information systems, they really have no business being recommended or used by school districts. Allowing data to be released to parents about other students and parents is what every school district needs to protect against. Would not recommend them for any communication that needs to integrate with any other systems. There are plenty of other competitors out there who provide more responsive customer service and support.

If you're looking for an affordable alternative to platforms like Circle, UUKI could be a perfect fit. It offers similar functionality for a much more affordable price. No member limit, no storage limits, while still being able to white label your own community. However, be aware that it's still in development. There are certainly some bugs to be fixed and a few updates required to truly compete with the others.

• Email access.
• Attachments.
• Notifications to parents regarding important information.

Incentivized

• Spaces, where we set the topis for people to engage in an organized manner
• Easy to use, it has everything you need, no fluff, very intuitive
• Great Support, the development team behind really listens to their users, and nurture their own community

• Cost is significant. Not unreasonable, to lower price would be great.
• Support is very, very slow to respond. Unless you call in it takes several days to receive a response. I've had tickets open for over a week to resolve the issue.

Incentivized

• Some tweaks on UI/UX to make it more polished
• I would appreciate a better roadmap (instead of a trello board)
• Allowing translating the string to change the language style to meet the community's style (like Ay mate! for Pirate of the Caribbean fan's community)

No reason not to continue using UUKI and expand upon it.

Incentivized

SchoolMessenger serves our main purpose of sending out emergency notifications and notices to parents. It is great to cut down on the paper use and the ability to attach documents to our notes. We have used this to send home notifications from our Parent-Teacher Organization. Parents have thanked us for sending a back ups due to papers being misplaced and knowing that they have a backup through email.

Incentivized

Anyone can use it, and having HTML knowledge is not necessary.

Incentivized

Overall, this is a good, effective, and cost-efficient product. It is missing some key functionality we had with a previous program which limits my total score, but I still think a lot of school districts can get a lot out of SchoolMessenger. The features and functions they do include work well.

Incentivized

The support is fantastic. I have never had such complete support from a technology service. Every issue has been resolved while I was on the phone. I never had to wait for a callback or an advanced support tech. Their people are very well trained in their product and how to meet their customer's needs.

Incentivized

They provide almost constant support if needed. Their team considers all feedback and implements solutions when needed.

Incentivized

UUKI is extremely easy to implement but requires a brief period of time to understand where all of its controls are. (not a real issue)

Incentivized

We went from Final Site to SchoolMessenger. Final Site had a lot of customization with so much functionality and a real professional look and feel. Unfortunately, the cost set us on a new path, which led us to SchoolMessenger. SchoolMessenger packages a lot of the services we need in one, but it is missing core elements of design that Final Site offered us.

Incentivized

UUKI is moving a lot faster than other platforms. Plus the fact that they are building with the community makes it easier to learn from others who have implemented it for their respective use cases. We selected it because of the value proposition and its affordability which make it a failsafe investment. Plus the founders have experience in building products which is always assuring

• SchoolMessenger is an excellent tool that links the school admin with the parents directly, which avoids the risks of students not delivering the message.
• Saves money and time not being held hostage by the US postal service.

Incentivized

• I like the fact that Ankur and his team really listen to their early users. They just keep on improving UUKI and it's really not that hard to transfer your community from FB to UUKI. There are just so many features and it keeps on improving.
• UUKI really helps you build your community. You can transfer your audience from Facebook that has a lot of restrictions to your own exclusive community