Market Perspectives

We are happy to share insights about Anaplan drawn from our latest research, the Revenue Performance Management Value Index, which assesses how well vendors’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements.

In all our Value Indexes, we utilize a structured research methodology that includes evaluation categories designed to reflect real-world criteria incorporated in a request for proposal and vendor selection process for analytics and business intelligence. We evaluated Anaplan and 11 other vendors in seven categories, five relevant to the product (Adaptability, Capability, Manageability, Reliability and Usability) and two related to the vendor (Total Cost of Ownership/Return on Investment and Vendor Validation). To arrive at the Value Index rating for a given vendor, we weighted each category to reflect its relative importance in an RFP process, with the weightings based on our experience and on data derived from our Benchmark Research on Revenue Performance Management.

Anaplan was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking fourth overall in this Value Index assessment. It ranked third in Product Experience, where it was designated as a Value Index Leader in Usability, Adaptability and Manageability. It ranked fourth in Customer Experience, where it placed fourth in TCO/ROI and seventh in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower ranking in Capability, which represents 20% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Anaplan could perform better by examining its placement as seventh in Validation, which resulted in being ranked fourth in overall Customer Experience. That placement reflects a lack of depth in communicating support for RPM. The company placed fourth in Capability, where it has some minor areas for improvement to address the full scope of dedicated requirements for RPM. Organizations evaluating Anaplan should examine the vendor’s approach to providing planning, incentive and insights in sales performance management.

Anaplan actively participated in the evaluation process and request for information for this Value Index. This assessment was based on Anaplan’s products that support RPM available in November 2021. Anaplan released February and March updates comprised of various improvements to the user interface/user experience as well as improvements to the modeling, collaboration and extensibility experience.

Prospective customers should look at their organization’s evolution in moving from a sales focus to a revenue focus and better understand whether existing processes and technology are a strong enough foundation for where the organization is today as well as where it is going. The added complexity of adopting multiple selling channels and a broader number of roles directly linked to revenue prompts a reassessment of whether existing processes and technology support the necessary balance of resources, incentives, and performance tracking to align all the teams involved.

This research-based index is the most comprehensive assessment of the value of Revenue Performance Management software in the industry. Technology buyers can learn more about how to use our Value Index by clicking here, and included vendors that wish to learn more can click here. Read the report here.