When searching for the right Customer Success platform, one thing becomes clear quickly—it’s not easy to find a solution that ticks all the boxes. Whether you're prioritizing intuitive dashboards, seamless integrations, or a pricing model that fits your budget, the sheer variety of options can feel overwhelming. For Customer Success teams, the stakes are high. You need a platform that empowers you to drive customer retention, improve onboarding, and manage customer health without breaking your workflow or budget.
For those who feel Planhat might not be the best fit for their needs, exploring alternatives can open up opportunities to find a solution better suited to your specific goals. Whether you’re a small startup or a large enterprise, understanding what other platforms have to offer will help you make an informed decision.
In this guide, we’ll look at six standout alternatives to Planhat, highlighting their strengths, weaknesses, and ideal use cases. From platforms focused on analytics to those excelling at automation, there’s a variety of tools to consider. Let’s dive into the options and explore which one might work best for you.
1. Velaris
Velaris is a flexible Customer Success platform that is a powerful alternative for those looking to scale their Customer Success operations with minimal hassle. It stands out for its ability to fit unique workflows and provide a high level of service, with a dedicated services team handling the technical details so you don’t have to.
Key features
- Data and visibility: Velaris offers a customizable data structure, letting you manage contacts, accounts, organizations, partnerships, and more. It enables tracking of key metrics like customer health, NRR, product usage, and expansion revenues to keep your team on top of customer trends.
- Efficiency and automation: Its visual drag-and-drop automation builder makes it easy to create workflows. You can send automated emails for tech-touch engagement, trigger playbooks to streamline repetitive tasks and set up automatic data entry flows.
- Project management and collaboration: Velaris includes an embeddable customer portal for direct collaboration with customers. Its Success Plans feature tracks key metrics automatically, keeping your team aligned with customer goals.
- AI-powered analytics: Velaris’ AI tools monitor customer sentiment, analyze communications, identify trending topics, and generate actionable predictions to help your team stay proactive.
Strengths
Advanced analytics: The platform provides AI-powered insights to help identify patterns, predict customer behavior, and highlight potential risks. These features give teams more clarity and confidence in decision-making, especially when managing a growing customer base.
Fast implementation: Most teams are up and running within four weeks, thanks to Velaris’ hands-on implementation approach. The team takes care of integrations and setup, which can save you time and reduce onboarding headaches.
Automation and efficiency: With features like the drag-and-drop automation builder and pre-designed playbooks, Velaris helps teams reduce manual work. This means you can focus more on strategic initiatives and less on repetitive admin tasks.
Comprehensive integration services: Velaris handles all integrations for you, including custom ones, ensuring seamless connectivity with your existing tools and tech stack without requiring additional resources from your team.
Personalized support: Velaris doesn’t just hand over the tools and leave you to figure it out. The team supports you throughout the setup process, handles integrations, and even creates custom solutions if needed. It’s a practical approach that minimizes disruptions and ensures the platform works for your specific needs.
Weaknesses
Learning curve: While Velaris is flexible and packed with features, it can take some time for teams to become fully comfortable with its interface and functionality. This may require additional training, especially for teams transitioning from simpler tools.
Pricing: Velaris falls into the mid-to-upper pricing range, which might not work for small businesses with limited budgets. It’s worth evaluating whether the features justify the investment based on your specific needs.
Limited self-service reporting: While Velaris provides custom dashboards during implementation, teams can’t directly modify these reports themselves. Any updates or changes need to be requested from Velaris’ team, though they are typically responsive and deliver updates within a few hours.
Complexity for smaller teams: For organizations with straightforward workflows or smaller customer bases, some of Velaris’ more advanced features might feel unnecessary or underutilized.
Best suited for
Velaris is a strong fit for SaaS companies with complex, fast-growing customer bases that need a solution implemented quickly and customized to their workflow.
2. Gainsight
Gainsight is a well-known Customer Success platform designed for larger teams and enterprises that need a robust solution for managing customer health, automating workflows, and driving retention. Its extensive feature set makes it a popular choice for organizations that prioritize robust feature sets and customizability. However, its complexity and implementation process can be challenging for leaner teams or those looking for quicker adoption.
Strengths
Comprehensive feature set: Gainsight provides a wide array of tools, from health score tracking to success plans to customer communities, that cover nearly all aspects of Customer Success management.
Enterprise-ready: It’s well-suited for large organizations with dedicated resources to manage its setup and maintenance, offering scalability and flexibility at an enterprise level.
Wide variety of integrations: Gainsight integrates with many systems, making it easier to consolidate customer data from various tools.
Established reputation: As one of the leaders in the Customer Success space, Gainsight is often the benchmark for comprehensive CS solutions.
Weaknesses
Cost considerations: Gainsight’s pricing structure may be prohibitive for mid-market companies and small businesses with limited budgets.
Complex setup and maintenance: Gainsight’s implementation process is lengthy and resource-intensive, often requiring months before teams can go live. Maintenance typically requires a dedicated CS operations resource.
Steep learning curve: Due to its complexity, Gainsight can be difficult to navigate for teams without prior experience with similar platforms.
Automation limitations: Some Customer Success teams have found its automation features less intuitive and harder to set up compared to alternatives.
Best for
Gainsight is best suited for large enterprises with the resources to manage its complexity and a need for a comprehensive, all-in-one Customer Success solution. It’s particularly valuable for organizations that prioritize deep reporting capabilities and extensive integrations to align cross-functional teams.
While Gainsight offers a robust suite of tools, its complexity and resource requirements might not be ideal for everyone.
3. ChurnZero
ChurnZero is a Customer Success platform focused on helping teams identify and mitigate churn risks effectively. It offers a wide array of tools designed to improve engagement, track customer health, and automate workflows. While ChurnZero excels in providing functionality for churn management, some teams may find its interface and setup less intuitive compared to other platforms.
Strengths
Churn management focus: ChurnZero is specifically designed to help teams identify at-risk accounts and take proactive steps to retain customers.
Customer engagement tools: Features like in-app messaging and email capabilities allow teams to interact with customers directly, keeping engagement high throughout the customer lifecycle.
Reporting and analytics: ChurnZero provides detailed analytics and health scores to give teams insight into customer behavior and engagement trends.
Integrations: It integrates with many tools, allowing for better visibility and consolidation of customer data.
Weaknesses
Limited flexibility for complex data hierarchies: ChurnZero primarily supports user and account-level views, which may not suit organizations with more complex customer relationships or data structures.
Customer portal adoption: The separate login required for ChurnZero’s customer portal can discourage adoption, limiting its usefulness for collaboration with customers.
Complex automation setup: While automations are available, they can be challenging to configure, which may deter smaller teams or those without dedicated technical support.
Learning curve: Like other feature-rich platforms, ChurnZero can be difficult for new users to navigate without additional training.
Best for
ChurnZero is well-suited for organizations that are heavily focused on reducing churn and improving customer retention.If you’re a team that needs churn-specific tools and are willing to invest time in learning its system, it may be a good option for you.
3. Vitally
Vitally is a Customer Success platform built with simplicity and speed in mind. It offers an intuitive interface and core features designed to help teams manage customer health and streamline their workflows. However, Vitally’s limitations in customization and advanced functionality may not meet the needs of scaling or enterprise-level organizations.
Strengths
User-friendly interface: Many users highlight Vitally’s intuitive design, making it easy for teams to adopt and navigate.
Customizable health scores: Vitally allows businesses to define health scores using custom metrics, offering clear insights into customer status and enabling proactive action.
Collaborative workspaces: Dedicated tools like collaborative docs ensure alignment between CSMs and customers during critical processes such as onboarding and QBRs.
Revenue tracking: The platform provides robust tools for monitoring recurring revenue, churn, and other financial metrics, making it easier to measure success and identify growth opportunities.
Weaknesses
Technical customer support: Some users have found customer support interactions overly technical, which may pose challenges for non-technical teams.
Slight learning curve: While the interface is generally intuitive, setting up the platform can take longer than expected for some users.
Feature updates: A few users have noted that feature rollouts and updates could be more frequent, though recent feedback suggests this is improving.
Limited advanced features: Compared to some competitors, Vitally may lack certain advanced tools, such as AI-driven analytics, which could benefit more complex workflows.
Best for
Vitally is best suited for startups or small businesses with simple workflows and a primary focus on managing customer health and engagement. It’s a great starting point for teams that don’t require the advanced features or customization options of enterprise-level platforms.
While Vitally offers simplicity and core functionality, it may not be the right fit for teams looking to scale or manage more complex customer relationships.
5. Totango
Totango is a Customer Success platform that provides a broad range of tools to help businesses manage their customer relationships, drive retention, and achieve growth. Its features focus on customer health, workflow automation, and performance tracking, making it a robust choice for teams looking to scale their operations. However, some organizations may find the platform’s setup and usability challenging, particularly for complex workflows or integrations.
Strengths
Comprehensive feature set: Totango offers a suite of tools for tracking customer health, automating workflows, and creating success plans, providing a solid foundation for Customer Success management.
Scalability: The platform supports growing teams with features tailored to scaling businesses, including its modular approach, which allows teams to start small and expand functionality over time.
Customer health tracking: Totango’s health score system provides a clear view of customer status, helping teams focus on at-risk accounts and opportunities for growth.
Integrations: The platform integrates with multiple tools, enabling teams to centralize data and improve cross-functional collaboration.
Weaknesses
Lengthy implementation: Totango’s setup process can be time-consuming and resource-heavy, often requiring months to go live and see value.
Usability challenges: Some teams have reported difficulties using Totango’s automation builder, particularly for complex workflows.
Limited custom data hierarchy: Totango’s structure is primarily focused on users and accounts, which may not provide sufficient visibility for organizations with more intricate customer relationships.
Modular pricing complexity: Totango’s modular pricing structure can become complex and lead to ballooning costs, with certain key functionalities requiring additional purchases, potentially limiting access for budget-conscious teams.
Best for
Totango is best suited for mid-sized to large organizations that prioritize customer retention and are looking for a platform with scalable capabilities. It’s particularly effective for teams that are willing to invest time in implementation and prefer a modular approach to expanding their Customer Success operations.
Totango provides a robust platform for managing Customer Success, but its complexity and setup requirements might not be ideal for teams seeking quicker adoption or greater flexibility.
6. Hubspot
HubSpot is widely recognized as a powerful CRM platform designed primarily for sales and marketing teams. Recently, it has begun introducing Customer Success features, making it an affordable and accessible option for businesses looking to extend their use of HubSpot into post-sales workflows. While it’s easy to use and integrates seamlessly with sales data, its Customer Success functionality is still in development, which might limit its appeal for teams with more complex needs.
Strengths
Affordable option: HubSpot offers budget-friendly pricing, making it accessible for smaller businesses or those just getting started with Customer Success.
Sales data integration: Because HubSpot is built as a CRM, it easily connects customer success efforts with sales data, creating an easy handoff process between CS and Sales.
Simplicity: HubSpot’s intuitive interface makes it simple to use, and the addition of basic health scores soon will enhance its utility for Customer Success teams.
DIY reporting: Teams can create reports easily, allowing for quick insights without relying on external support.
Weaknesses
Sales-focused design: As a CRM built for sales, HubSpot is not optimized for post-sales workflows, which can limit its usefulness for dedicated Customer Success teams.
Limited data for decision-making: The platform may lack the depth of data and analytics needed to make informed decisions about customer retention or growth.
Incomplete Customer Success features: Many features specific to Customer Success are still under development, making it less robust compared to platforms designed specifically for post-sales teams.
Best for
HubSpot is best suited for companies just starting their Customer Success function and needing a simple, affordable solution that integrates well with sales data. It’s ideal for teams looking for basic functionality to get started without the need for a more specialized platform.
While HubSpot offers an affordable entry point for Customer Success, its limitations in post-sales workflows and advanced features might make it less appealing for teams looking to scale or manage complex customer relationships.
Conclusion
Choosing the right Customer Success platform depends on your team’s specific needs, workflows, and growth plans. Each of the platforms discussed offers distinct advantages and trade-offs, making them suitable for different scenarios:
- Velaris stands out for its flexibility, AI-powered insights, and dedicated support, making it ideal for scaling SaaS teams with complex data needs and fast implementation timelines.
- Gainsight offers a robust, enterprise-ready solution with a comprehensive feature set, but its complexity and higher resource requirements may not work for smaller or leaner teams.
- ChurnZero excels at churn prevention and engagement but may fall short for teams needing more flexibility or simpler automation setups.
- Vitally is a straightforward platform with a strong focus on collaboration and tracking customer health, but it may lack the advanced features needed for more complex use cases.
- Totango provides scalable capabilities and a wide range of features but has a lengthy implementation process and limitations in customization.
- HubSpot is an affordable and simple choice for companies just starting their Customer Success function, but its CS features remain in development, limiting its appeal for more mature teams.
Ultimately, the best Planhat alternative for your business will depend on your priorities—whether you value ease of use, advanced analytics, scalability, or affordability. Take the time to evaluate these platforms based on your team’s goals, and don’t hesitate to explore demos to see how well each option fits your specific needs.
