Anaplan Reviews

Anaplan can be used for many types of planning, such as finance, supply chain, sales, and workforce.

My organization has benefited from the solution providing us with very good forecasting models. Additionally, there is a tool where users can go through different dashboards,  a feature called Dimension where you can use multiple dimensions, and the granularity is very good for us.

Anaplan provides 130 GB of cloud storage for organizations to use as part of their license. 

It is easier to implement for the developer teams and client users who are using it. For example, if a client is using thousands of Excel documents, it becomes very easy for Anaplan to do all of the calculations and move things around inside.

The flexibility is very good, it is easy to make new changes to the deployments.

The solution can improve by providing an easier form of integration to different platforms, such as receiving data from different Salesforce. There is a process to do it through the use of APIs but it could be made much easier. This would be a large help to us.

I have been using Anaplan for approximately three years.

The solution is very stable.

Anaplan has been scalable, there are a least 40 domains where this solution can be used, such as OPEX and financial planning

In my organization, we have approximately 10 clients using this solution.

We are extensively using this solution in the project we are currently involved in.

We provide the implementation and the after the support of the solution.

The installation is not difficult but I would put it in the easy to medium level of difficulty.

The amount of technical staff required for the implementation and maintenance completely depends on the requirements of clients. There is some flexibility that comes after the first deployment, we can do enhancement for the same deployment instead of creating a new one.

We follow the Sprint method of implementation and it can take approximately two weeks. However, as previously mentioned the time is dependant on the client's requirements. For example, we are doing an update to enhance a previous implementation that will take approximately two months.

We are not the end-user to know if the clients are receiving a return on investment. However, I would conclude they have been receiving a good return on their investment because we are having an increasing number of clients and we are doing enhancements to previous deployments.

I would strongly recommend this solution to others.

I rate Anaplan an eight out of ten.

Anaplan's most valuable features are that it's a no-coding platform, everything can be scaled to your other functions, and it's easy to learn and use (especially because Anaplan provides excellent interactive training).

Anaplan should come up with flexible options to connect to a data warehouse rather than an Anaplan hub, like a data decoupling layer with an option for customers to maintain their data on their own cloud. They could also continue to improve their UX and provide more features on the reporting side, including more options for charts and graphs.

Anaplan is quite stable.

The initial setup is straightforward and rarely takes more than twelve weeks.

Anaplan gives a good ROI.

So long as Anaplan fits your requirements, it's quite affordable. It's a value-for-money product and a very reasonable price compared to competitors like SAP or IBM. There are multiple pricing models, and you only need the costlier license if you use the model builder.

I would advise those implementing Anaplan to go through the L1-L3 training program. I rate Anaplan as eight out of ten.

My main use of Anaplan is for financial planning and budgeting forecasts.

Anaplan's strongest feature is that its GUI is very modern and user-friendly.

Anaplan could be improved with a stronger consolidation module. In the next release, Anaplan should include out-of-the-box integration with software systems. Currently, they don't have a connector, so you have to work with an API or directly with a company to build connections, whereas their competitors already include native connectors.

I've been using Anaplan for seven years.

Anaplan is a bit pricier compared to its competitors - the license costs about $4,000 per user annually.

Anaplan's technical support is very good.

Positive

The initial setup is very easy, though it can vary based on users' needs. Depending on the scope of the user's requirements, it can take anywhere between two and twelve months to deploy everything.

Anaplan is a great product for large organizations with multiple locations that want to do FP&A. I would give Anaplan a score of eight out of ten.

My primary use case of this solution is to solve business scenarios, including sales and operations planning and compensation management for top FMCG clients and service provider clients.

Anaplan has eased a major pain point in mapping multidimensional data by combining all the necessary dimensions into a single tool. This makes it much easier for managers to understand the data coming in from their reps.

This product has a very good modeling feature, and its graphical representation of visualizations has also been valuable.

The visualization tools in the product are limited in comparison to other reporting tools.

I have been using this solution for about three years.

My impression is that this is a reliable solution that gets very good feedback at the management level. 

We have something called Anaplan Connect, which is like an in-built Anaplan connector, where we can connect with our third-party data sources, and we don't have any issues, especially when we do an integration perspective.

My experience with customer support has been great, they are very responsive to any issues.

Before using this solution, I used to develop using Excel macro dashboards. I switched because while Excel is a bigger environment compared to Anaplan, this product is a tool created to achieve something, not like an enterprise package.

With Anaplan, setup is almost like solving a Rubik's cube - there are no book rules for the product. So the complexity varies depending on the business scenario and how well the people involved understand the logical requirements. However, the product's architecture is very simple, so the sync process happens in a matter of seconds.

Anaplan sell their licenses on a storage basis, which they call a bucket. 

I would personally recommend Anaplan, especially for anyone who is having issues dealing with bulk loads of Excel data or is experiencing pain in allocation or planning. Anaplan is a one-stop solution and does not require knowledge of a programming language - if you're familiar with Excel functions, that will be sufficient. I would rate this product as eight out of ten.

It can be used for FPNA, forecasting, and planning. It can also be used from a tax point of view and an allocation point of view.

It's highly flexible. If you've got a complex environment with complex calculations, you can build that out. So that's a really good positive.

Because of that flexibility and ability to build models in the way you want to build it, it means you can tailor it to the company's requirements. You can really tailor it, which is the big positive with Anaplan, and the fact that you can track what everybody does. There are more constraints within SAP and Oracle than in this kind of product.

It's like Excel but with a mix of VBA, and it's a bit more controlled. So you have, from a client's point of view, an internal/external audit trail. The audit trail logs absolutely everything you do. That's really useful when people build out these models for it because you want to know what people are doing. It's very difficult to do that in Excel. So it's like Excel, but a more controlled version of it. You are using formulas and you build it out with formulas.

Anaplan can be easily deployed and scaled.

The negative is that the higher the flexibility, the higher is the complexity. That can act against you as a negative because it does require a model builder or a coder/developer.

It's not something that can be easily learned. It's a full-time job for someone who's a kind of specialist. Once you've learned it, it's great, but it does take a few years to build that knowledge up.

Any integration or interfaces into it and out of it can be hard, depending on the client and the tools available.

As additional features wise, if it could be more intuitive, it might be helpful.

We're in the midst of implementing it.

It's very easy to scale. It's not that hard. However, the cost can go up depending on the volume.

The client's previous software was less flexible, more clunky, and didn't give them what they wanted. Anaplan has been more flexible, more streamlined, and gives them what they want. If they want X, they get X, and they don't get Y instead.

It can be deployed quite quickly. It would take about three to six months.

You can have both external support or internally trained support, and the maintenance can be either. The software itself, because it's cloud-based, will get automatically upgraded. It's software as a service.

Staff wise, you would need a PM. Depending on the number of models being built, you will need one or two model builders. One model builder per model is probably the expectation. You need to have a subject matter expert and an architect involved. You will probably need four staff members at minimum for deployment.

You can have both external support or internally trained support. So the maintenance can be either, but the software itself, because it's cloud-based, will get automatically upgraded. It's software as a service.

It's going to give the clients what they want, so the return on investment will be pretty rapid. They could expect a return on investment within the first year.

We evaluated PCM.

It's a good product, but you need to consider whether you need a center of excellence in-house. You need to consider process mapping, the standard operating procedures that you would produce with it, and the integrations or ETLs, and your interfaces, inwards and outwards. You need to be very clear about your business requirements and know exactly what you need, in terms of your inputs, the calculations you need to run it through, the outputs, and the end results that you would provide to the client, along with the master data/static data.

If you're not clear, then you can't implement it, and you'll just waste money with the developers, the model builders, and the consultants that you're dealing with. However, if you're clear about it and you can provide clear examples of what you need, then it works like a dream.

It takes a long time for a beginner to understand what's going on. You need to make sure that the developers that you use or the model builder you use puts copious notes on everything, especially at the back-end from a technical point of view.

Then at the front-end, with dashboards, you need to make sure that there are lots of good quality instructions, operating procedures, and process maps.

On a scale from one to ten, I would rate Anaplan at eight.

We use Anaplan for organizing and planning the data in a supply concept.

Anaplan is a three-dimensional cloud platform that is good for analyzing data, visualization, integration, terrific for visibility. Additionally, it is continually being updated and allows collaboration. When comparing it to Microsoft Excel, in Anaplan when you make a change to a sheet you do not need to make the same change to all the sheets as you do in Excel. 

The solution could improve by better dashboards and while entering the form loss and project implementation the ability to use graphical shapes more effectively.

I have been using Anaplan for one and a half years.

Anaplan is highly stable.

The scalability is very good.

We have 15 model builders using this solution in my organization.

Anaplan has an online community group and if we have any technical problems they can provide us support answers within 15 to 20 minutes. Their technical support is very good.

I have used Microsoft Excel previously.

The initial setup was straightforward. it took us approximately 24 hours.

There is maintenance being conducted every month by Anaplan.

We are currently using a free workspace license for 90 days. We are satisfied with the price of the solution. There are additional costs if you want more storage, the default limit is 250 GB.

I have evaluated other solutions and Anaplan is better than other competitors out there.

I rate Anaplan a ten out of ten.

• Serves as a platform: You can design your solutions on top of it
• Allows you to do “what-if” analysis on the go
• Allows collaboration across the organization: This is most essential for security

We use Anaplan across multiple functional areas. I will elaborate a few features that have had the most impact on our organization:

• The forecasting/planning cycles: This used to take months to collaborate. It now only takes a week to finish and be worked upon.
• The commission payment systems: Have been automated in Anaplan. The commission payments are highly transparent and efficient now.
• The Bookings and Revenue Forecasting model: Allows us to predict the Salesforce requirements and to budget for them beforehand.

• A better presentation layer would certainly take it a notch higher.
• As compared to other BI tools, such as QlikView, the presentation layer is not as user-friendly.
• It still does a fairly good job on the look and feel of the dashboards. But this is the only area in which there is scope for improvement.

I have used this solution for more than four years.

There were no stability issues.

This product is super scalable and efficient.

Mostly there is no need for any support. Anaplan is very supportive in case you need to contact the technical support.

Being a business analyst, we use multiple tools.

We were the early adaptors of Anaplan. Because of the customizability that it offers and the ease of various “what-if” scenarios, you can build on this tool.

None of the other tools in the market offer that level of flexibility. Hence, it is pretty unique in that sense.

There is no setup required. It is a cloud platform.

Go for a bigger deal initially. Once you start using it, you will certainly want more of it.

We had evaluated Tableau and QlikView. Even though a lot of the other tools do a good job, only Anaplan allows flexibility and customizability to design solutions and do real-time “what-if” analysis.

Have a core team dedicated only to Anaplan and you will realize the true potential of this tool.

The tool is very good and customizable.

• Multi-dimensional
• Easy to restructure
• Cloud compatible

The capacity projection of certain lines helped to identify where the utilization is falling beyond a limit. It helped certain category planners to plan for long term investments (shift patterns).

I would like to see more flexible graphs. That is, more varieties of graphs, more customization (like choosing colors, gradients, etc.) and more conditional formatting options (format sharply or gradient).

Anaplan gave us some limitations in terms of these aspects. There might be scope for experimenting around the formatting, if not the types, of graphs!

I have used the product for one year.

Very rarely. The tool slows down around once every two months.

There were no scalability issues.

I would give technical support a rating of 8/10.

I used a different solution. I switched to expand my exposure to a budding tool in planning.

The initial setup was straightforward.

It might cost more compared to some decent tools in the market. But one should be mindful about the capabilities of Anaplan, which justify the cost.

I haven't done this, as it was already selected by my organization. However, I did some market research to see how other options are flourishing, and found Anaplan to be a worthwhile option.

There are fewer experts in the Indian market, but there seems to be a lot of scope in global markets. Anaplan is a worthwhile investment for a top performing planning solution in any sector, Finance, Capacity, or Budgeting, etc.