*Sourced from independent G2 reviews.
1. Introduction
A long time app on the AppExchange, TaskRay is a popular choice for many organizations looking to onboard customers and manage projects as an add on to their Salesforce CRM. Similar solutions built on Salesforce that you might want to consider are Inspire Planner and Precursive OBX.
Read on to see our side by side comparison between the Cloud Coach and TaskRay (Note as both Cloud Coach and TaskRay have multiple tiers, this comparison is written in terms of Cloud Coach Team tier vs TaskRay Premium tier).
Starter
TaskRay
Enterprise
Ultimate
2. Plays Nice With Salesforce
Cloud Coach
Cloud Coach is built 100% natively on the Salesforce platform and offers seamless connection to Salesforce Sales and Service Clouds, meaning you can:
- Links to accounts, opportunities & cases
- Ability to add custom fields
- Configure your page layouts & displays
- Create your own custom reports and dashboards
- Implement point and click custom Workflows & Approvals
Importantly with Cloud Coach your data is stored and managed 100% on Salesforce, so you don’t need to worry about data security issues.
TaskRay
TaskRay is also built natively on the Salesforce platform, so you get access to all the same capabilities as described to the left with Cloud Coach, including:
- Links to accounts, opportunities & cases
- Ability to add custom fields
- Configure your page layouts & displays
- Create your own custom reports and dashboards
- Implement point and click custom Workflows & Approvals
Cloud Coach 1 v 1 TaskRay
Plays Nice With Salesforce - Opinion
Result: Tie
If you want a solution that works seamlessly on Salesforce, there’s not a lot to separate between these two solutions. One difference is that Cloud Coach requires your Salesforce Org to be Enterprise edition or above, while TaskRay will run on Salesforce Professional edition favoured by many smaller businesses.
3. Project Management
Cloud Coach
Cloud Coach has a strong set of feature support for project management including:
- Waterfall Projects
- Agile (Kanban) Projects
- Water-Scrum-Fall
- Project Templates
- Project Health Views
TaskRay
TaskRay has a broad set of project management feature support that will satisfy most the needs of most SMB’s including:
- Gantt or Agile Board views
- Project Templates
Cloud Coach 2 v 1 TaskRay
Project Management - Opinion
Result: Cloud Coach
If you’re currently looking for, or might need in the future more flexible project management functionality, there’s more project management capability available to your team with Cloud Coach than with TaskRay.
4. Resource Management
Cloud Coach
Managing people, resources and skills is key to the success of any organization, and a key piece of functionality in any professional services automation (PSA) solution, here Cloud Coach has extensive capabilities including:
- Capacity Planning
- Project Assignments by Work Type / Skill
- Soft & Hard bookings
- PTO & Out of Office Handling
TaskRay
TaskRay has recently entered into a relationship with a third party provider called Flux Capacity to resell their resource management as part of a TaskRay sale. Flux Capacity has support for:
- Project Assignments by Work Type
- PTO & Out of Office Handling
- Dashboard visibility of resource availability
Cloud Coach 3 v 1 TaskRay
Resource Management - Opinion
Result: Cloud Coach
While the Flux Capacity functionality is a nice addition for the TaskRay solution, dealing with two teams is always tougher than one. Which vendor is driving the roadmap, who will supply support, and how will development across two different organizations continue to stay aligned, are all questions you should consider.
5. Time Tracking
Cloud Coach
Tracking time is probably one of your team’s least favorite parts of their workday, but it’s important for your business to track performance against KPIs, here Cloud Coach has support for:
- Multiple ways for users to enter time
- Estimated vs Actuals
- Track time on any Salesforce record
- Time entry and timesheet approval
TaskRay
TaskRay introduced time tracking in 2018, including support for the following:
- Track time on any project task
- Estimated vs Actuals
- Time entry and timesheet approval
Cloud Coach 4 v 2 TaskRay
Time Tracking - Opinion
Result: Tie
Both solutions will let you track time against all your project tasks, in a relatively quick and easy manner. It is worth noting however that while time tracking is available in Cloud Coach Starter, which is free for the first 10 users, you will need the TaskRay Standard tier to get access to time tracking capabilities.
6. Meetings & Documents
Cloud Coach
Managing documents and meetings are integral to any successful onboarding project, Cloud Coach excels in this space with.
- Meeting agenda templates
- Coaching notes
- Meeting automation
- File storage against on projects
TaskRay
Managing documents and meetings are integral to any successful onboarding project, TaskRay provides:
- File storage against on projects
Cloud Coach 5 v 2 TaskRay
Meeting & Documents - Opinion
Result: Cloud Coach
For any project, you are likely to have any number of meetings, from kick-off meetings, to client updates, and testing reviews. Cloud Coach’s meeting module gives it the clear edge here.
7. Reporting & Dashboards
Cloud Coach
As a Salesforce partner Cloud Coach get to leverage all the great reporting and dashboarding capabilities of Salesforce including:
- Out of the box reports & dashboards
- Reports available in real time
- Reports available on any device
- Customize reports to your needs
- Tableau CRM Analytics
TaskRay
As a Salesforce ISV partner TaskRay also get to leverage all the great reporting and dashboarding capabilities of Salesforce including:
- Out of the box reports & dashboards
- Reports available in real time
- Reports available on any device
- Customize reports to your needs
Cloud Coach 6 v 3 TaskRay
Reporting & Dashboards - Opinion
Result: Tie
When it comes to the core underlying reporting technology, there’s not a lot to separate between these two solutions, however due to its more extensive overall functionality / capabilities you will have more data to report on and act on, with Cloud Coach.
8. Implementation & Tailoring
Cloud Coach
Implementing a PSA solution in your business is something that you’re going to want to do by engaging a professional consulting team. Cloud Coach or one of its certified partners can help with this.
TaskRay
In contrast, organizations can implement TaskRay themselves, or can leverage one of TaskRay’s partners for implementation assistance.
Cloud Coach 6 v 4 TaskRay
Implementation & Tailoring - Opinion
Result: TaskRay
If you’re looking for a self implementation solution, then TaskRay is your winner here, however professional implementations often deliver far more in long term value than they cost up front, so make sure you carefully consider what is right for your business.
9. Overall Opinion
Despite Cloud Coach Team tier getting the overall win, TaskRay Premium tier provides a competitive solution for organizations looking to manage projects and onboard customers using the Salesforce platform.
For smaller teams with simpler needs and smaller budgets, TaskRay may often be the more appealing option, however for larger teams and organizations Cloud Coach has the clear benefit of both more capabilities along with additional product tiers that you can move up to seamlessly as your needs evolve.
10. Other AppEx Apps to Consider
Learn about similar solutions to TaskRay and discover more about the capabilities and benefits of the Salesforce platform for PSA, Onboarding & Project Management for your business.
Information contained herein is based on the companies’ posted Salesforce AppExchange listings and other publicly available websites as of the date of this publication.
