
About OpenWater
OpenWater is a secure cloud-based platform for virtual events and application and review programs such as awards, abstracts, scholarships, and more. We are your home for both a virtual conference and the abstract collection process.
Deliver attendees an easy to navigate home for your virtual conference or annual meeting. Accelerate deep niche based networking through our chat tools, and sell more sponsorship revenue with the help of our platform's sponsorship prospectus.
Pricing starting from:
N/A
- Free Version
- Free Trial
- Subscription
Top 5 alternatives to OpenWater
Key benefits of OpenWater
Devices
Business size
Markets
Canada, United States
Supported Languages
English
Pricing starting from:
N/A
- Free Version
- Free Trial
- Subscription
Top 5 alternatives to OpenWater
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Features
Total features of OpenWater: 101
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Reviews
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- Industry: Publishing
- Company size: 51-200 Employees
- Used Daily for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
Great service and even better support.
Reviewed on 2018/05/02
It reduces the amount of time and effort it takes to run a program and extract the data collected.
It reduces the amount of time and effort it takes to run a program and extract the data collected.
Pros
It is extremely configurable and the company is very responsive to the needs of the customer. They have added features and functionalities that were not available so that they could suit our needs.
Cons
Some of the native reporting features could use improvement but were created for us at our request. It would be nice to be able to duplicate entries from a 2 step program into a 1 step program.
- Industry: Computer Software
- Company size: 201-500 Employees
- Used for 1+ year
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 9.0 /10
A very adaptable solution.
Reviewed on 2019/10/04
Pros
We weren't actively looking for a contest management solution but a Sales representative reached out to gauge our interest in OpenWater, after hearing about our Construction Intern Awards scholarship program. Up until that point we had been using Wordpress to manage this competition, which included a lot of manual maintenance, popular voting plugins, a bulky media gathering process, entry content display delays, and several other headaches.
On top of that, we had to use other solutions to manage the judging portion of the contest, which involved either rigging survey products or creating a mess of spreadsheets but both caused confusion for the judges.
What we liked most about OpenWater is that it addressed all of the above problems we were facing and allowed us the freedom to customize almost everything. Every other contest management software that we looked at wouldn't let us use our own CSS/HTML to style the site, relying on some sort of WYSIWIG instead.
After the initial setup, OpenWater was a huge timesaver. We have also had outstanding support reps since the beginning of implementation. We've asked for a lot during our time using OpenWater and they definitely come through for us.
Cons
Our contest is set up in a pretty unconventional way (weekly popular vote-based contests combined with a separate traditional scholarship application), and OpenWater has done a good job of keeping up with our requests. There are several smaller, nit-picky things about the popular vote functionality that could be improved but it's still better than what we were doing before. Another factor that we've had to work around is the fact that the contest dashboard looks the same for everyone who visits the dashboard, regardless of user type (applicant/judge/voter), which can be confusing for some users.
Reasons for Switching to OpenWater
We decided to choose OpenWater over alternative solutions because of the customization options. We wanted more options than just being able to select our brand colors and upload a logo to a standard form (which is the case with most solutions we came across). OpenWater gave us the freedom to adapt the application portal to match are website CSS as well as other customization options, like SMTP for emailing.- Industry: Nonprofit Organization Management
- Company size: 51-200 Employees
- Used Daily for 1-5 months
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 7.0 /10
Working Well with Multiple Departments
Reviewed on 2019/05/16
My company is using OpenWater to accept grant application submissions from individual faculty....
My company is using OpenWater to accept grant application submissions from individual faculty. Other departments also use the platform to accept student fellowship and volunteer applications. Overall we are able to do what we need, however there is no easy way to reveal blinded submissions for judging rounds. We're still in the building stages- and we like that we can build one round at a time instead of needing to have the judging settings set up before accepting applications.
Pros
In our organization the greatest asset for this software is the ability to host multiple sites. We're able to put application opportunities on separate secure platforms, each for different audiences.
Cons
The round options and judging settings are not automatically user-friendly. Another staff member had to spend some time explaining the features in detail before anyone from my team could use the product. For instance it isn't clear that the open round automatically has judging set up based on which program type is selected. And there is no testing feature- in order to test the application portal you must open the submission round. We also had to switch which staff would have super-user status since only two are allowed.
- Industry: Nonprofit Organization Management
- Company size: 11-50 Employees
- Used Weekly for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 9.0 /10
Best of the Best
Reviewed on 2021/07/08
We've been with OpenWater for about 7 years now. We haven't considered looking elsewhere for our...
We've been with OpenWater for about 7 years now. We haven't considered looking elsewhere for our Awards needs. The program has the functionality we need, the price is extremely reasonable, and the customer support is above reproach.
Pros
OpenWater is very easy to use. The training videos and knowledge base are extensive and easy to use. The support team is superb - always available and willing to help. I have a dedicated support member, so there is excellent consistency. She knows our organization, she knows our program, and she knows our needs.
Cons
I would like more user-friendly reports. It would be nice to create my own custom reports a bit more easily. But this is not a deal-breaker. It likely has more to do with the kinds of complex reports I'm looking for than OpenWater's ability to provide good reporting.
Alternatives Considered
Award ForceReasons for Switching to OpenWater
The price was right. The sales team didn't harass us (as the others did for years). The implementation and roll-out processes were very easy.- Industry: Publishing
- Company size: 5 001-10 000 Employees
- Used Daily for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
OpenWater contests
Reviewed on 2019/06/27
We use the software to operate two photo contests. Most (not all) of our members understand the...
We use the software to operate two photo contests. Most (not all) of our members understand the entry interface. We are able to do back-end management that would be immeasurably more difficult if we had to do it by hand.
Being able to offer these contests is a nice benefit for our members and gives us another way to interact with them.
Pros
We are probably not using it to its fullest extent, but it's very powerful and is constantly being improved. Our contest typically has around 3,000 entrants and we could not manage it manually.
Database aspects make management a breeze with easy access to judging results and entrant information. We pride ourselves on customer service and being able to answer user queries quickly adds to that initiative ... participants often express surprise at how quickly I am able to resolve their issues.
My supervisor once observed as I used the system to answer one of her questions and was also very impressed by the ease with which I could do so. The new search function works very well.
Cons
It's not intuitive to a new user. That said, learning how to use it and training others has not been difficult and superb customer service is always available when questions arise.
I recommend paying extra to have OpenWater set up the system. I had neither the time or the knowledge to create the first iteration although it appears that plenty of help would have been available. Now that we are up and running, it's a simple matter to clone the contest from year to year.
OpenWater FAQs
Below are some frequently asked questions for OpenWater.Q. What type of pricing plans does OpenWater offer?
OpenWater offers the following pricing plans:
- Starting from:
- Pricing model: Subscription
- Free Trial: Not Available
Contact OpenWater for detailed pricing information.
Q. Who are the typical users of OpenWater?
OpenWater has the following typical customers:
2-10, 11-50, 51-200, 201-500, 501-1 000, 1 001-5 000
Q. What languages does OpenWater support?
OpenWater supports the following languages:
English
Q. Does OpenWater support mobile devices?
OpenWater supports the following devices:
Q. What other apps does OpenWater integrate with?
OpenWater integrates with the following applications:
Airtable, Association Anywhere, Auth0, Authorize.Net, Azure Active Directory, BluePay, Braintree, ClearVantage, Fonteva Events, Fonteva for Associations, Google Analytics, GrowthZone, GuideSTAR, HubSpot CRM, Mailchimp, MemberClicks, Microsoft Dynamics GP, NetForum Enterprise, PayPal, Salesforce Sales Cloud, Stripe, Wild Apricot, Xero, iMIS
Q. What level of support does OpenWater offer?
OpenWater offers the following support options:
Email/Help Desk, FAQs/Forum, Knowledge Base, Phone Support, Chat
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