User Experience Remains the Biggest Gap
Higher Logic is the biggest vendor in this space for associations, and it has a lot of strengths, including:
1. Data integration is first rate. Unless you're running a home-grown AMS, you will not have to worry about the quality of the data exchange between this system and your AMS.
2. It connects your members with each other as effectively as you could ever want. It is a critical feature of several national associations I know.
3. It is continually innovating and evolving. It's a lot deeper and richer than it was a few years ago. With its big equity investment, this should continue.
4. They are quite responsive to their clients. When one of my former associations needed to give its communities a reboot, their customer success team was very supportive.
5. Organization strength: Thanks to its big equity investment, Higher Logic will be around for the long term (as much as any company is these days...). The people who run the company are good people, and true professionals.
Challenges:
1. Their user experience remains less than excellent. Many new users struggle to quickly grasp how the platform works.
2. The content management system is better, but not nearly as easy to use as some of the market leaders.
3. Analytics: It is often difficult to get the data out of the system that you need to make decisions.
