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Community Software

Last updated: November 2024

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276 software options

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Mighty Networks logo
Category Leaders

Build a different kind of community on a Mighty Network.

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Mighty is where creators, entrepreneurs, and brands build digital communities with cultural software. Be a part of something different #OnMighty.

With Mighty, you can bring your courses, memberships, and offers together in a powerful community under your own brand on iOS, Android, and the web.

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Circle logo

The all-in-one platform for world-class community builders

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Circle’s all-in-one platform brings together your community, courses, and content in one beautiful, user-friendly tool.

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Hivebrite logo

Most powerful, all-in-one solution for community engagement.

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Hivebrite is an all-in-one community management and engagement platform that helps you build brand engagement and opportunities for your private community. It is easy to set up and fully branded to match your colors.

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Invision Community logo

Community, forum, and digital store management platform

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Invision Community is a cloud-based software designed to help businesses of all sizes create, launch and manage communities, forums, and stores, enabling members to ask questions, sell items, and collaborate on a unified portal. The platform enables organizations to add custom forums, promote trending topics, handle access to private or public forums, edit content using a WYSIWYG editor, and receive alerts for new topics or replies.

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GrowthZone Community Platform logo

Enhancing Membership via Engagement & Connection

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GrowthZone Community Platform boosts member engagement with personalized networking, dynamic learning, and interactive communication.

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Slack logo
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A single place for team communication and workflows

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Slack is a single workspace that connects users with the people and tools they work with everyday, no matter where they are or what they do

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Instagram logo

Capture, edit, and share photos, videos, and messages

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Instagram is a social networking app which lets users share photos & videos from their mobile phones, like posts, comment, send private messages, and more

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Webex Suite logo

One app for everything. And everyone.

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Webex brings together Calling, Meeting and Messaging modes of collaboration into a seamless, engaging, inclusive and intelligent experience.

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Squarespace logo

A website makes it real.

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Squarespace is the all-in-one platform to build a beautiful website, online store, or portfolio. Drive traffic to your Squarespace website and measure your success with powerful marketing and analytics tools.

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Zendesk Suite logo

Service-first CRM company that builds support & sales tools

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Zendesk's fully customizable help desk solution makes things easy on your customers, sets your teams up for success, and keeps your business in sync. Reach customers on any channel and equip your agents with a full history of all interactions, including those tracked from 700+ app integrations.

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Brilliant Directories logo
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All-in-one directory & member management software

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Brilliant Directories is a cloud-based directory software for creating directory websites, with built-in themes, member management, payment processing, and more

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Workplace from Meta logo

A simple and secure way to connect your organization.

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Workplace from Facebook is a simple and secure way for people to share knowledge, work together and build connected communities.

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QuestionPro logo

Best SaaS survey solutions

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QuestionPro is an advanced research suite of tools to let you conduct surveys and research securely and seamlessly. We offer SaaS software to collect feedback and perform data analytics to help you make smarter decisions.

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Discord logo
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Online platform for audio, text, and video communication

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Discord is a complete communication tool that makes it possible to exchange text and audio messages, and individual or group video calls. This interaction takes place on public or private servers, which are only accessible to users who have received an invitation.

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Vaave logo

Cloud-based alumni management solution for all alumni needs

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Vaave is a cloud-based alumni management solution that helps organizations of all sizes build and manage their exclusive alumni network. The platform offers a range of features, including an alumni database, engagement & fundraising tools, custom branding, job posting, re-hiring, referrals and more.

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Connecteam logo

Enhance employee management with the only all-in-one app

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An all-in-one employee app that's both powerful, affordable and easy to use, especially for the mobile workforce.

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Microsoft Viva Engage logo

Enterprise Social Network (ESN) to connect and communicate

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Microsoft Viva Engage is a private enterprise social networking solution that enables employees to collaborate securely across time and distance. Microsoft Viva Engage provides a single, secure platform on which companies can share information, resources and business applications

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Yotpo logo

Yotpo, the leading eCommerce marketing platform.

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Yotpo, the leading eCommerce marketing platform, helps thousands of brands accelerate direct-to-consumer growth. Our single-platform approach integrates data-driven solutions for reviews, loyalty, SMS marketing, and more, empowering brands to create smarter, higher-converting customer experiences.

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Flock logo
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Influitive logo
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Customer-Powered Growth

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The Influitive platform helps B2B companies discover, nurture, and mobilize their customers, developers, partners, and employees to shorten sales cycles, amplify marketing, increase retention and drive product innovation.

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ToucanTech logo
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Smart software to power community engagement

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ToucanTech is a smart software that powers community engagement. Choose a public website or private portal, combined with a powerful database, email engine & events management system. Manage all donor & community relations in one place to save time, increase efficiency & boost engagement.

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uuki logo
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Community Platform for Web3 creators, brands, and products

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UUKI is a white labelled creator community platform that brings together discussions, memberships and content. With Power your community with management & moderation tools, spaces(subforums), analytics, and monetisation.

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Bloomfire logo

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Preferred Patron Loyalty logo

Innovative Loyalty Programs, Customer Engagement & Gift Card

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Here's what we'll cover:

Buyers Guide

Community Software

What is community software?

Community software enables businesses to create online communities where they can connect, communicate, and collaborate with their customers and clients. The software helps foster interaction among customers and clients by providing features such as discussion forums, chat rooms, file sharing, and event planning calendars.

Using a community platform in organizational or group settings, such as clubs or professional associations, can help ensure effective communication while fostering strong relationships between community members. The software also offers valuable insights into community activity trends, helping community leaders make informed decisions on how to best serve the needs of their community members.

What are the core features of community software?

  • Group management: Organize community members into multiple groups based on shared interests, roles, or other criteria. Group management simplifies community communication and collaboration by facilitating discussions and file sharing among group members. Additionally, it offers customizable settings for managing privacy levels, notifications preferences, and membership applications to ensure an engaging user experience tailored to each specific group's needs.

  • Discussion boards/forums: Facilitate conversations among community members through topic-based discussion boards and forums. This feature allows businesses to create, participate in, or moderate discussions while providing tools for managing content, user permissions, and notifications. Additionally, it promotes collaboration and knowledge sharing within online communities by encouraging open dialogue between participants with diverse perspectives or interests.

  • Moderation: Monitor and maintain a healthy online community by enforcing guidelines, addressing inappropriate content or behavior, and managing user-generated content. Moderation helps a community manager ensure a safe space for community members to engage in discussions while promoting positive interactions within the platform. The feature also includes customizable rules for posting content, automation tools to remove or flag inappropriate items, alerts on flagged items, and comprehensive reporting capabilities for administrators.

What is community software used for?

The main aim of a community platform is to facilitate and support online communities. It provides a platform for individuals with shared goals or characteristics to connect, communicate, and collaborate. We analyzed reviews from users of community software on GetApp to identify a few common use cases:

  • Communication: Community software can be used to enhance communication within teams through live audio and video calls, particularly in remote work setups. The software supports real-time messaging, voice calls, and video calls, making it a suitable communication platform for geographically dispersed teams. Additionally, this functionality optimizes productivity by enabling real-time file-sharing and issue resolution among team members.

  • Customer service: Community software can be used to gather valuable customer experience data and feedback, enabling customer success teams to optimize their processes. It simplifies communication within service teams via built-in chat and helps manage customer inquiries from a centralized platform. By offering comprehensive customer service capabilities and an intuitive user interface, community software can reduce miscommunication and clutter, improving customer satisfaction and engagement.

  • Content sharing and team collaboration: Community software can be used to connect with team members and share project updates and various types of files, such as documents, images, and videos. Businesses can create dedicated channels and workspaces to efficiently organize and manage team tasks. They can share real-time team updates, daily checklists, and news bulletins to improve overall productivity within teams.

What are the benefits of using community software?

  • Enhances communication and collaboration: Community software fosters enhanced communication and collaboration by providing a centralized platform for sharing ideas, resources, and updates. It allows community members to engage in discussions, offer support or feedback, and work together on projects or initiatives. This streamlined interaction promotes stronger relationships within the community while accelerating problem-solving and driving innovation through collective knowledge-sharing.

  • Centralizes information-sharing and knowledge exchange: Community software fosters a seamless flow of information and knowledge exchange among members by providing an organized platform for sharing ideas, resources, and updates while enabling users to access relevant content. This centralized communication enhances collaboration, boosts productivity, and allows the community to grow cohesively by leveraging collective wisdom.

  • Facilitates better organization and management of resources: Community software allows members to efficiently share information, coordinate tasks, and allocate resources through a centralized dashboard. It also centralizes communication channels for better collaboration while offering tools such as calendars and file storage systems that improve accessibility. These processes contribute to more effective decision-making within the community by ensuring everyone gets informed of available assets, knowledge base, or upcoming events promptly.

  • Encourages innovation and problem-solving through collective brainstorming: An online community platform allows community members to share knowledge, ideas, and experiences via a centralized platform. This collaborative environment promotes creative thinking and discussions among members while enabling them to tackle challenges more effectively. Consequently, the combined expertise of community participants allows for quicker resolutions of community challenges.

What are the potential issues with community software?

  • Privacy concerns: Privacy concerns could be a potential issue with online community software, as community users may not feel their personal information is adequately protected. Such concerns can lead to hesitance in sharing valuable insights or engaging within the platform. Furthermore, data breaches and unauthorized access could damage trust between members and create legal liabilities for businesses utilizing these software tools. Therefore, businesses should adopt adequate privacy protection features when using a community management tool.

  • Cyberbullying: Another potential issue of using community software is cyberbullying, which can lead to emotional distress or harm for targeted individuals. This toxic behavior undermines the sense of safety and belonging within online communities, discouraging participation from members. To maintain a healthy environment, community software developers must prioritize measures that address cyberbullying prevention and support for victims.

  • Unmoderated content: Unmoderated content can be a significant issue in online community software, as it may lead to misinformation, offensive materials, or harassment. Such type of content could damage the platform's reputation. Ensuring appropriate moderation is essential for maintaining a safe and inclusive environment that fosters productive collaboration within online communities.

How much does community software cost?

Most community software solutions on the market are priced on a "per month" basis, and their entry-level pricing plans range from $3 to $125+* per month. An enterprise product that's priced higher may include additional features such as conversion cards, payment integrations, and custom avatars and icons for community members.

*The pricing included is for the entry-level/lowest-priced offerings found on vendor websites as of June 1, 2023.

Which tools can integrate with community software?

Online community software benefits from the integration of various tools and applications that streamline team productivity and improve workflow management. We looked across thousands of reviews on GetApp from users of community software to identify products that users frequently mention integrating with their community tools:

  • Google Drive: Google Drive is a file sharing and storage solution that integrates with community software to help store important community information in a centralized location and provide role-based access to community members.

  • Jira: Jira is an IT service management solution that integrates with community software to allow development teams to create and assign tickets to track issues and bugs, centralize communication, and ensure efficient communication between stakeholders during bug fixes.

  • Microsoft 365: Microsoft 365 is a cloud collaboration suite that integrates with community software to provide a unified and comprehensive communication platform for community users. This integration allows easy access to important meetings, reminders, and file sharing across the community.

  • Zoom: Third-party video conferencing application Zoom integrates with community management software to enable quick and effective communication through video calls and online meetings.

  • Google Calendar: Google Calendar is an appointment management solution that integrates with community software to help set meetings between community members, create schedules for community events, and avoid event overlaps by maintaining a centralized community calendar.

*We identified the five integrations mentioned most often in verified reviews of community software published on GetApp within the past two years.

Considerations when purchasing community software

  • Evaluate customization options for community engagement features. Evaluating customization options for community engagement features is crucial to ensure a tailored experience, encourage member participation, and foster positive community interactions. Custom member profiles as well as discussion and interaction features, such as forums, threads, and voting systems, allow the platform to adapt to evolving needs while providing flexibility to manage diverse communities and nurture long-lasting relationships among community members.

  • Check the availability of community moderation capabilities. Moderation tools and capabilities are necessary for maintaining a safe and inclusive community environment. Effective moderation fosters positive engagement, prevents harmful content or behavior from escalating, and ensures all members feel welcome. Adequate moderation features, such as comment and thread moderation, contribute to building trust within the community while upholding its core values and purpose.

  • Assess the quality of customer support and resources. Timely customer support and quality onboarding resources ensure a smooth transition to the software, minimizing disruptions in community operations while fostering member engagement. Additionally, reliable support helps address technical issues promptly and guides to maximize the platform's potential throughout its lifecycle.

  • Review the analytics and reporting features for tracking community engagement and growth. Analytics and reporting features help track engagement, monitor growth patterns, and identify areas for improvement. Insights related to views and impressions on posts, threads, and discussions; member acquisition; and churn rates enable businesses to make data-driven decisions to foster a thriving online community while also providing opportunities for targeted marketing strategies or product development based on user interests.


Sources

Products evaluated for the pricing calculation were taken from GetApp's community software directory. The pricing ranges exclude freemium versions of the products. The features highlighted were identified based on their relevance and the percentage of products in GetApp's directory that offer them.

Note: This community software buyers guide was authored by GetApp's content team. We develop our guides using the author’s expertise, insights from 2M+ unique user reviews, and our proprietary data science algorithms to identify trends in user sentiment, preferences, and priorities. Some text was generated with assistance from AI tools.