Executive Summary

• This is the Brightwork Research & Analysis software rating series.
• We rate both the software and estimate the risk of implementing each application.

MUFI Rating & Risk for FinancialForce

MUFI: Maintainability, Usability, Functionality, Implement ability

Vendor: FinancialForce (Select For Vendor Profile)

This software category is blessed to have two of the top scoring software vendors of all the software categories that we cover. This should easily defeat the flawed logic that one must purchase a complete ERP system rather than combining best of breed applications. Interestingly we have presented this argument frequently, and it is by people that have never compared the functionality in Intacct and FinancialForce to other uses. They are simply lazily relying upon the conventional wisdom that all companies must have ERP systems.

Application Detail

FinancialForce, like Rootstock (which we cover in our section on Software Selection Package for Small to Medium ERP), benefits from being part of the Force.com platform by Salesforce, which makes accessing and integrating to other Force.com applications extremely smooth. This means that FinancialForce can be brought up more quickly than almost any other stand-alone financial system of equivalent scope (FinancialForce is, of course, part of the Force.com platform, so calling it stand alone may seem to be an oxymoron. However, FinancialForce can be purchased separately from ERP modules.).

FinancialForce is very well regarded among accounting users. It is quite competent at managing sales as well as banking – the latter being a rarity in enterprise software.  FinancialForce develops a strong word of mouth within companies, and as is the hallmark of a good application, once it comes into a company, it will frequently grow in usage. Unlike the financial applications in ERP systems, people that use FinancialForce finds that it makes their jobs much more comfortable – making user adoption straightforward.

FinancialForce is easy to use application, with reporting being a strong point. FinancialForce requires little user training. Support is also excellent. As with all Force.com platform products, FinancialForce is a cloud-based solution. Some companies are reticent to use cloud-based financial applications, however, with the excellent customer feedback on both FinancialForce and Intacct, and the general frustration with the financial systems provided by many ERP systems, many companies, should at least evaluate these applications to see what they are missing.

We grade FinancialForce as more appropriate for mid-sized companies – and of course is an excellent fit for companies seeking to use any other applications in the Force.com platform. FinancialForce is entirely built on the Salesforce platform, so while it could be used for companies that do not use any other Force.com applications its value would decline. A natural choice for FinancialForce customers would be Rootstock – our number one choice for mid-market non-process industry companies — and together this would provide a complete ERP solution, and at one of the lowest TCO values. If a company were to combine FinancialForce, Salesforce, and Rootstock, this would take care of many of the requirements of a company and could be brought up quickly.

As should be obvious we are very high on both Intacct and FinancialForce, and it’s difficult to go wrong with either one of the applications. Many companies that could benefit from switching to Intacct and FinancialForce are stuck using dated ERP financial systems because of their legacy ERP investments.

MUFI Scores

All scores out of a possible 10.

Vendor and Application Risk

Buyers of FinancialForce have every possible advantage working their direction. FinancialForce is one of the highest rated applications we have ever rated. It is a rare situation where a buyer has the opportunity to purchase software that is both the functionality leader in its category, along with being highly implementable and user-friendly.

Likelihood of Implementation Success

Risk Definition

See this link for more on our categorizations of risk. We also offer a Buyer Specific Risk Estimation as a service for those that want a comprehensive analysis.

Risk Management Approach

The only implementation issues that a buyer of FinancialForce can expect to the fact are the traditional issues that face financial/accounting projects. FinancialForce has tended to be implemented by smaller companies – the only reason being they do not have the brand recognition of being associated with a major software vendor. As such they have become acclimated to having their software implemented in clients with quite limited resources. We predict FinancialForce will eventually be more widely recognized for its excellent software and will become a significantly more prominent company and will be implemented by larger buyers, buyers with much more resources. A FinancialForce implementation is one that any project manager should look forward to, as it has a high likelihood of adding significant value to the buyer.

Finished With Your Analysis?

To go back to the Software Selection Package page for the Finance & Accounting software category. Or goto this link to see other analytical products for FinancialForce.