7 Best Dovetail Alternatives & Competitors

Imagine unlocking the full potential of your business with insights gleaned directly from your users' experiences. In the ever-evolving world of product development and customer satisfaction, the tools we use to gather and analyze user research are not just helpful; they're essential. Dovetail has long been a beacon for those in pursuit of understanding their customers at a deeper level, offering a suite of powerful tools designed to make sense of complex user feedback. But what if I told you that the realm of user research tools is vast and varied, with treasures still to be uncovered? As exceptional as Dovetail might be, it's just the beginning of what's possible. 

Let's embark on a journey to discover the top 7 Dovetail alternatives that could revolutionize how you connect with your customers and refine your product to meet their needs more precisely.

In this blog post, we'll look at 7 top alternatives to Dovetail for user research. These tools stand out because they offer something extra or different, like easier data handling or better pricing. We'll cover:

Features: What makes each tool special?

Alternative Motivations: Why might this tool be a better fit for you than Dovetail?

Free Trial Option: Can you try before you buy?

Pricing: How much does it cost, and is it worth it?

Finding the right tool can help you better understand your users and make smarter business decisions. Let's dive in and find the perfect tool for your needs.

What is Dovetail?

Dovetail is a customer insights platform designed to help businesses gather and analyze user research data. It enables teams to collect data from various sources, like customer interviews and support tickets, and use powerful analysis tools to uncover trends and insights. Dovetail's features include a collaborative workspace, intuitive interface, integration capabilities, and rich data visualization.

Dovetail Pricing

• Free trial
• Professional- 29$ / 7-day free trial
• Enterprise: Dovetail offers custom pricing for organizations looking to scale product research with full support and security.

Why you need an alternative to Dovetail for Qualitative Research?

The search for alternatives to Dovetail is driven by its shortcomings in usability, data management, and AI capabilities. Users face a clunky and unintuitive interface, coupled with unhelpful error messages and complex processes for simple tasks. The platform's limitations in text formatting and layout options restrict effective presentation of insights. Additionally, Dovetail's cluttered data repository and basic people management features hamper efficient data organization and access. The inadequate AI functionalities and often inaccurate transcripts necessitate manual editing, adding to the workload. Businesses seek alternatives that offer a smoother user experience, better data organization, and more robust AI integration to streamline their user research processes.

Dovetail's Disadvantages

• Limited Text Formatting and Page Layout Options: The platform lacks the rich text formatting and page layout options available in stories, particularly on data and insights pages. This limitation complicates the integration of quantitative research and visualizations.
• Unstructured Presentation of Search Results: Despite powerful search functionality, the results are presented in an unstructured manner, lacking sufficient filtering options to quickly narrow down the information sought.
• Cluttered Repository: As more research projects are added by various members of your organization, the repository becomes increasingly cluttered and disorganized, making it less accessible to non-researchers.
• Basic People Management: The people management features are quite basic, focusing mainly on locating pages and clips linked to individuals. It lacks advanced reporting features to provide insights into research participation frequency or to organize individuals by persona type.
• Lack of a Dedicated Space for UX Playbooks: The absence of a dedicated space to embed documents like UX Playbooks for both researchers and non-researchers hinders the sharing of vital information.
• Insufficient AI Capabilities: The AI functionalities are not yet up to expectations, and constantly switching between ChatGPT and Dovetail can become tedious. The integration seems present but underperforms.
• Inaccurate Transcripts: The issue of often inaccurate transcripts necessitates manual editing, requiring additional time and effort.
• Overall Lack of Organization: The platform's tendency to present information in a flat view, without the aid of folders and tags unless manually added, contributes to a lack of organization. A desire for more columns to better organize projects reflects a need for enhanced structuring capabilities.

These limitations underscore the necessity for alternatives that offer a more holistic and cost-effective solution for user research.

If you think that it’s time to find an alternative to DOVETAIL, I can assure you that you’re in the best hands. Let's start with the list; 

Top 7 Dovetail Alternatives 

1- Kimola Cognitive (sign up free, no credit cards required!)

2- Kraftful

3- User Evaluation

4- Maze

5- Monterey AI

6- Condens

7- EnjoyHQ

1- Dovetail vs. Kimola Cognitive 

Kimola Cognitive is a robust artificial intelligence platform designed for research professionals. It automatically analyzes customer feedback to provide insights such as Net Promoter Score (NPS), sentiment analysis, content classifications, and summaries. Trusted by businesses ranging from small and medium-sized enterprises to powerful organizations in over 80 countries, it offers instant data analysis without requiring any training. It can analyze data in over 25 languages and collect reviews from more than 30 sources. Additionally, it allows for the classification of customer feedback with multiple labels, accurate sentiment analysis, and the utilization of pre-built or custom machine learning models.

Here is a list of what you can achieve with Kimola Cognitive:

• Scrape reviews using the free browser extension
• Analyze user review without training, simply drag and drop 
• Analyze user reviews with multi-labels 
• Classify and analyze customer feedback using pre-built classifiers (there is a large gallery for each business!)
• Conduct sentiment analysis
• View the NPS score
• Create customer journey reports
• Extract popular terms and topics from reviews
• Search through customer reviews
• Create marketing materials based on customer reviews with GPT integration
• Create custom models by dragging and dropping and train AI

Kimola Cognitive Pricing

• 7-day free trial (no credit card required)
• Basic plan: $199 / month
• Standard plan: $399 / month,
• Professional plan: $999 / month
• Custom plans available for Larger Companies

See all plans & features of Kimola Cognitive

Great, now let's compare Dovetail and Kimola Cognitive!

1.Instant Data Analysis vs. Steep Learning Curve: Kimola Cognitive sets itself apart with its ability to perform instant data analysis without any training. This feature is particularly beneficial for businesses and research teams looking for quick insights from their data. On the contrary, Dovetail, while powerful, comes with a steep learning curve, requiring numerous training sessions to grasp its full capabilities. This distinction makes Kimola not only more accessible to a broader audience but also significantly more efficient in environments where time and ease of use are of the essence.

2.Language and Source Flexibility: With the capability to analyze data in over 25 languages and scrape reviews from more than 30 sources, Kimola Cognitive demonstrates exceptional flexibility and global reach. This contrasts with Dovetail's focus on qualitative research from specific sources like interviews and customer feedback. Kimola's ability to handle multi-language data and aggregate content from a wide array of platforms without requiring additional tools for recording or speaker recognition marks it as a more versatile and globally applicable tool.

3.Pre-built and Custom Models: Kimola Cognitive offers an array of ready-to-use AI models for various industries and needs, including sentiment and hate speech analysis. This pre-built model approach, combined with the option for custom ML models, provides users with a tailored experience that can significantly enhance the accuracy and relevance of insights. Dovetail, while offering robust data analysis tools, does not emphasize the customizable and industry-specific model offerings that can be crucial for businesses aiming for targeted analytics.

4.Integration and Scalability: Kimola Cognitive's seamless integration with tools like Zendesk, Intercom, and Google Sheets, combined with its dynamic classification and the ability to generate executive summaries and marketing materials using GPT, showcase its adaptability and scalability for businesses. Dovetail's integration capabilities are strong, but its focus on qualitative research and the absence of features like automatic speaker recognition and meeting recording might limit its applicability for teams requiring comprehensive analytical tools that support synchronous and asynchronous collaboration.

6.Deep Data Analysis: Combining Multi-Label and Dynamic Classification technologies, Kimola Cognitive sets a new benchmark in the analysis of complex customer feedback, surpassing tools like Dovetail in both depth and efficiency of data interpretation. This dual approach enables Kimola to accurately categorize feedback into multiple, dynamically generated labels without predefined categories, capturing nuanced customer sentiments and diverse opinions within a single response. Unlike Dovetail, which focuses more on qualitative data from specific sources, Kimola's innovative blend offers a more flexible, instant analysis across various languages and sources, making it a superior choice for businesses seeking comprehensive insights from their customer feedback data.

For those who want to analyze customer feedback, Kimola offers a free trial period of 7 days. Moreover, in case you don't have any customer reviews available, Kimola's Github provides sample reviews that you can use as free datasets.

Schedule a demo with one of Kimola Cognitive’s experts, or start your free trial right away

2- Dovetail vs. Kraftful

Kraftful is an AI-powered platform designed specifically for product developers and focuses on analyzing user feedback to provide actionable insights for product improvement. Kraftful emphasizes three main areas:

• ChatGPT for Feedback Analysis: Utilizing GPT-4, it automates the analysis of user feedback from various sources, turning hours of manual work into seconds. This helps you understand user needs, pain points, and preferences efficiently.
• User Sentiment Tracking: Measures the real-time impact of your product on users over time. This feature is crucial for evaluating the effectiveness of product iterations and identifying improvement areas.
• Competitive Analysis: Offers insights by learning from your competitors' users, providing a strategic edge in the market. This helps in identifying differentiation and innovation opportunities for your product.

Kraftful Pricing

• Starter: Free - Save 8 hrs /yr of manual review
• Pro: $15 - Save 59 hrs /yr of manual review
• Team: $300 - Save 1,261 hrs /yr of manual review

Why is Kraftful a good alternative to Dovetail? 

• AI-Powered In-depth Analysis: Kraftful uses GPT-4 to automatically analyze user feedback, significantly reducing the manual effort required. This is especially beneficial for teams dealing with large datasets, offering a time-efficient solution.
• Measuring User Sentiment: Kraftful's sentiment analysis feature allows you to gauge the real-time impact of your product on users, helping you understand your product's market position and guide concrete improvement steps.
• Beta Access and Innovative Approach: Being in beta, Kraftful provides the opportunity to directly contribute to the platform's development and influence its adaptation to your needs. Plus, you get the chance to be among the first users to explore new features and integrations.

Despite Kraftful's ability to automatically analyze user feedback using GPT-4 technology, there are also disadvantages:

• Kraftful relies on user feedback as the main source of data, which may not capture the full picture of user behavior and preferences.

3- Dovetail vs. User Evaluation

User Evaluation is an innovative and powerful solution designed for businesses and organizations to extract valuable insights from customer conversations, support tickets, sales talks, and other customer interactions. By utilizing state-of-the-art AI technology, it analyzes customer conversations to deliver comprehensive insights for individual sessions and aggregated reports for all analyzed sessions. These clear and concise summaries can be easily shared with your teams, enabling informed decisions based on real-time data.

User Evaluation Pricing

• Free
• Personal - $39 / month
• Plus - $209 / month

Why User Evaluation Could Be an Alternative

Dovetail is known for its user-friendly interface, powerful data analysis tools, and a collaborative workspace designed to enhance user research management. However, the distinctive features of User Evaluation, such as its versatile data analysis capabilities, dynamic visualization tools, and AI chat assistant, position it as a potentially more suitable option for certain use cases.

• Versatile Data Analysis and Visualization: User Evaluation offers broader tools for in-depth analysis and visualization of data derived from user interactions, setting it apart from Dovetail.
• AI-Powered Insights: The inclusion of an AI chat assistant enables dynamic interaction with data sets, offering instant additional insights.
• Multilingual Support: The extensive language support makes User Evaluation more adaptable for international use.

4- Dovetail vs. Maze

Maze stands out as a comprehensive user research platform tailored for the intricate demands of enterprise-level teams. It boasts an array of features designed for swift testing, obtaining practical insights, and enhancing teamwork. With Maze, the experience of executing user research on a grand scale is made smooth and straightforward, thanks to its capabilities in collecting user feedback and analyzing detailed data sets. Essentially, it serves as an all-in-one tool that makes the user research journey more efficient and less complex for sizable organizations.

• Comprehensive Testing Capabilities: Maze provides a wide range of user testing options, including A/B testing, prototype testing, and usability testing, which are crucial for in-depth enterprise research.
• Actionable Insights and Analytics: The platform offers detailed analytics and insights, aiding teams in making data-driven decisions and effectively understanding user behavior.
• High Scalability: Designed to scale with the growing needs of enterprise teams, Maze can handle large volumes of data and users without sacrificing performance.
• Integration with Design and Development Tools: Maze seamlessly integrates with popular design and prototyping tools, facilitating a smoother workflow between designers, developers, and researchers.

Maze Pricing

• The Organization plan offers custom pricing tailored for large organizations seeking to scale their product research with comprehensive support and security.
• The Team plan, priced at $1,250 USD/month (paid yearly), is designed for teams focusing on democratizing research and building user-centric products.
• The Starter plan, at $99 USD/month, is ideal for small teams starting in product research.
  Maze Free Plan: Lastly, the Free plan is perfect for individuals just beginning with usability testing, offering essential features at no cost:
  
   - 1 study per month

         - 5 seats

         - Pay-per-use panel credits

         - Up to 7 blocks

Reasons Why Maze is an Alternative to Dovetail

• Focus on User Testing: Maze's emphasis on user testing and prototype evaluations offers in-depth support for this critical aspect of the product development process.
• Team Collaboration and Scalability: Being specifically designed for large-scale teams and organizations makes Maze a more suitable option for extensive projects and complex user research.
• Integration and Workflow: Maze's integration with design and prototyping tools ensures a seamless transition between different stages of product development and more effective collaboration.

5- Dovetail vs. Monterey AI

Monterey AI is a powerful AI-based insights platform designed to generate rich insights from user feedback, support tickets, customer conversations, surveys, and transcripts, and to analyze these data to present businesses with opportunities for growth.

• Multichannel Feedback Integration: Monterey AI has the capability to easily capture, search, monitor, and analyze real-time customer feedback and behaviors from hundreds of sources and channels in one place. This offers the most comprehensive view of what customers are thinking and feeling.
• Predictive Intelligence and Analytics: Utilizing predictive intelligence and analytics, Monterey AI identifies trends, patterns, and loyalty drivers. This provides instant access to actionable insights, helping to focus resources on areas that have the greatest impact.
• Automated Alerts and Flexible Workflows: Monterey AI features automated, flexible workflows and alerts that instantly deliver the latest insights to the right people in your teams, enabling them to take the right steps to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.
• Driving Organizational Growth Through Employee Experiences: Monterey AI recognizes that the success of an organization is not only dependent on the product or service it sells but also on the people who are part of it. With Monterey AI EX, businesses can measure and improve employee experiences to drive business growth with valued employees.

Reasons Why Monterey AI is an Alternative to Dovetail

• Comprehensive Feedback Integration: Monterey AI aggregates customer feedback across multiple channels, providing a more holistic view than Dovetail, which focuses more on organizing user research data.
• Predictive Intelligence: It uses AI for predictive insights and analytics, offering foresight into customer behaviors and preferences beyond the reactive analysis typically associated with Dovetail.
• Automated Workflows: Monterey AI automates alerts and integrates with organizational workflows for timely responses to customer feedback, enhancing efficiency and customer satisfaction.
• Employee Experience Focus: Unlike Dovetail, Monterey AI emphasizes improving employee experiences to drive business growth, recognizing the link between engaged employees and customer satisfaction.

6- Dovetail vs. Condense

Condens is a UX research and analysis tool that helps teams store, structure, and analyze user research data and share findings across organizations. It also has a participant management system to track who you have engaged with for research and analysis.

• Intuitive Data Analysis: Condens facilitates clear pattern recognition by enabling users to structure data and connect evidence. Supported by a visual way of working, it ensures everything is kept in view.
• Made for Collaboration: Designed to ease collaboration in research, it allows team members to work on projects simultaneously and see changes in real-time.
• All Your Research Data in One Place: It offers the ability to store all research data, whether notes, images, recordings, or consent forms, in a tidy repository.
• Automatic Transcription for Video and Audio: Transforms recordings of research sessions into text automatically, taking data analysis on video to the next level.
• Fast AI-assisted Tagging and Flexible Tag Management: Structures data by attaching tags to notes and files, with AI-based suggestions facilitating smooth workflow.
• Powerful, yet Easy-to-Use Segmentation: Offers powerful segmentation features that allow easy drilling down into data that matters.
• Affinity Cluster as You Go: Enables users to make sense of data in a familiar way, serving as a digital post-it wall.
• GDPR Compliance for Data Security: Helps maintain GDPR compliance, ensuring sensitive data is handled responsibly.

Condense Pricing

• Individual: 15€ /month or 165€/year (1 month free)
• Team: 170€ /month or 1.870€/year (1 month free)
• Business: 400€ /month paid yearly (4.800€/year)
• Enterprise: 1.000€ /month paid yearly (12.000€/year)

Why Condense Could Be an Alternative

• Tailored for UX Research: Designed specifically for user experience research, providing tools and features that closely align with the needs of UX professionals.
• Collaborative and Real-Time Updates: Facilitates teamwork with features that allow for simultaneous project work and immediate sharing of changes, enhancing team efficiency.
• Automatic Transcription with AI Assistance: Offers automatic transcription of audio and video recordings, coupled with AI-assisted tagging for efficient data analysis and organization.
• Centralized Data Management: A single repository for all research data types, ensuring easy access and streamlined management of notes, images, recordings, and consent forms.
• User-Friendly Data Analysis: Simplifies qualitative data analysis with intuitive structuring, visualization, and segmentation tools, reducing the need for extensive training or technical expertise.

7- Dovetail vs. EnjoyHQ

EnjoyHQ is specifically designed to tackle the complexities of customer feedback. In the world of user research and customer experience, feedback can often be scattered across various systems, making it a challenge to form a cohesive understanding. EnjoyHQ acts as a centralized customer knowledge base, consolidating all user research to provide clarity on customer sentiments. It streamlines the process of searching, organizing, and sharing customer feedback within teams.

• Exceptional Customer Service: EnjoyHQ prides itself on offering top-tier customer support.
• Powerful Search Engine with Flexible Filters: Its search capabilities allow user researchers to sift through feedback efficiently.
• Centralized Research Data: All user research data is accessible in one unified location.

EnjoyHQ Pricing:

• Starting from: $200.00/month
• Pricing model: Subscription
• Free Trial: Available

Why EnjoyHQ Could Be an Alternative

• Centralized Research Data: EnjoyHQ offers a unified location for all user research data, which is particularly beneficial for teams looking to consolidate various data sources into one comprehensive knowledge base. This centralization helps in simplifying the access and analysis of customer feedback and insights.
• Powerful Search Engine with Flexible Filters: The platform's robust search capabilities enable researchers to efficiently sift through vast amounts of feedback, making it easier to find relevant insights. This is especially useful in environments where quick access to specific data points is crucial.
• Comprehensive Free Plan: Unlike Dovetail, which has a basic free tier and then jumps to a paid model, EnjoyHQ's comprehensive free plan offers a wide array of features that can outperform many competitors, including Dovetail. This includes 2 admin seats, unlimited read-only users, unlimited research projects, and more, providing significant value for organizations at the start or those with limited budgets.

WHICH Dovetail ALTERNATIVE IS RIGHT FOR YOU to analyze User Reviews with multi-labels?

After examining various Dovetail alternatives, it's important to select the one that aligns best with your unique business needs, taking into account factors like budget, team size, and desired features.

Why Choose Kimola Cognitive?

By combining Multi-Label and Dynamic Classification technologies, Kimola Cognitive sets a new benchmark in the analysis of complex customer feedback, surpassing tools like Dovetail in both depth and efficiency of data interpretation. This dual approach enables Kimola to accurately categorize feedback into multiple, dynamically generated labels without predefined categories, capturing nuanced customer sentiments and diverse opinions within a single response.

For these reasons, choosing Kimola for customer feedback analysis could be logical as it provides businesses with a comprehensive, fast, and flexible solution.