Effectory

Effectory is a survey product, not an HR system. It gives group scores for groups of five or more. It compares them with other employers and tracks follow-up next to the results. Its pages describe individual answers two ways, and they describe its turnover tool two ways. Effectory gives a custom price after a conversation. It takes payment in advance and limits its liability. Data is deleted on exit unless a legal or contractual duty requires keeping it. Staff without email, raw data and deeper analysis each need extra steps.

By Ashish Manchanda Published 28 Oct 2026 Last updated 28 Oct 2026

Effectory is a survey platform with strict group rules and a quoted price

In one line

Effectory runs employee surveys and reports results for groups. It is not an HR management system or a payroll platform.

Buy it if

You want floors for small groups. You want access set by role. You are happy to get a price through a conversation.

Do not buy it if

You want one system for people records and surveys. You want a price before you talk to anyone. You need each person’s answers tied to a name without contract work.

Price

Effectory gives a custom price after a conversation. It sells three packages, Starter, Professional and Expert.

It runs the surveys, hides small groups and tracks the follow-up

Effectory gives HR one place to run surveys, read the results against other employers and track the follow-up. It is a software platform. It collects employee feedback through surveys and turns it into people analytics. One platform covers the work from collecting answers to building a report in one click. Effectory also helps the customer choose the survey type and how often to run it.

It covers a full survey, short pulses and the moments when people join and leave. The Smart Organization Scan starts with a 32-question baseline survey. Quarterly pulses of 9 questions then go to everyone or to chosen groups. The scan covers eNPS, retention risk, wellbeing and open-ended questions. eNPS asks whether people would recommend the employer as a place to work. Pulse surveys can be managed centrally or by teams themselves. Results follow within a week of a pulse.

The joiner and leaver surveys run apart from the main survey. The onboarding survey is a short questionnaire sent between day 10 and day 25, and it is anonymous. HR receives a monthly onboarding report. New employees receive a personal report of their own responses. The exit survey asks departing employees for feedback and their reasons for leaving. Results for both are generally published per quarter.

Benchmarks let you read a score against other employers. Results compare with industry and global benchmarks. The benchmarks are simple averages of real customer responses, not AI or machine learning. The Effectory Index is the average score of all organisations running surveys with Effectory. It updates monthly. The Global Employee Engagement Index updates every two years. Each project can select up to two benchmarks, depending on the subscription. Customers in a benchmark cannot be identified by name, so you compare against numbers, not named employers.

Follow-up sits next to the results, in the Action Planner. Coordinators pin scores, set goals and manage actions there. Each action can have a deadline and an assigned person or team. The planner tracks progress and exports to Excel. Everyone with access to the group or team can see its actions. Since August 2026, each focus area comes with suggested actions and a way to add them to the planner.

Effectory keeps its employee data current from the customer’s HR system. It connects to HR systems including AFAS, Alexis HR, BambooHR, Breathe HR, Cezanne HR, Charlie HR, Factorial HR and HiBob. The data updates every 24 hours, or hourly when it is set up that way. Employers typically provide each person’s name, birth date, gender and tenure. Salary scale is another example of data an employer provides.

Effectory helps import employee data and set up user permissions. It supports the customer until the first survey is sent. Depending on the plan, later support may include consulting, training or coaching for managers or HR.

The AI Summary has rules of its own. It analyses scores across survey themes. It compares them with previous surveys and benchmarks. It then writes strengths, opportunities and recommended actions. It carries a notice that it is AI-generated and should be reviewed before acting on it. Effectory runs its own deployment of a summary tool built on OpenAI GPT models. It writes the summary of open answers. It needs at least five comments and goes only to users who can already read the open answers. A topic raised by one or two people may still appear when the summary covers few comments. The AI Summary help page promises that data is never shared with external AI services. Effectory’s Security Center adds “without customer permission”. It also commits that customer data is never used to train Effectory’s AI models or its suppliers’ models. Ask what customer permission covers.

Our guide to employee engagement software helps you pick the kind of survey product that fits. Read it before you shortlist Effectory.

Group floors, access roles and where data sits

Group scores need five or more participants, and roles decide who sees results. These cards cover each protection and where the data sits.

Groups under five stay hidden

Effectory sets two floors before it reports on a group. Group scores need five or more participants. Each group also needs a minimum number of respondents, never below five. The customer may raise both, typically to between five and ten for scores. A group with at least three respondents still gets limited insights without scores. Under three respondents, nothing appears. Open answers from a group under five skip the direct parent group. They first appear one level above it.

HR controls access by role

Effectory separates who sees results from who handles employee data. Results access coordinators view results only for the teams linked to them, once results are released. Employee coordinators handle employee data but have no access to results by that role alone. New surveys release results to selected users in phases by default.

Employees get something back

After a survey, a participant is invited to view their own results in Your Feedback. Since April 2026, a participant can also edit a submitted response there while the survey is open. The Starter package also includes an employee view where employees see their team’s results.

Security and where data sits

Effectory holds outside certificates and gives a data location. It is ISO 27001 certified. It holds ISAE 3000 and SOC 2 Type 2 badges. Both are outside audits of how a provider runs its controls. Its security pages put all data in the European Economic Area. Its privacy policy says hosting and processing are mainly in the EU. The policy adds a rule for processing outside the EU. It uses only providers in countries the European Commission rates as adequate. Microsoft hosts and stores the data in the EU and EEA.

Its named customers run from over 120 to over 20,000 employees

Customer stories tell a buyer who else has run Effectory and in what setting. Effectory reports being trusted by 1,200+ organisations. These are the customers it has written up. Each result belongs to the customer named, not to every Effectory buyer.

Customers who stay for years

Some customers have run surveys with Effectory for a long time. Angel Trains has been a customer for more than 15 years. ROC Da Vinci College has about 700 employees and has surveyed with Effectory since 2012.

Workforces from over 120 to over 20,000

Named customers cover very different workforce sizes. Quoniam has a workforce of over 120 employees, by its own account. Grupo Catalana Occidente has more than 7,300. De Heus has over 10,000 in 20 countries. The Dürr Group has over 20,000 across 139 locations.

Frontline work and sampled pulses

Effectory surveys reach beyond office staff and beyond everyone at once. Jumbo uses Effectory across stores, logistics and offices. Icelandair has about 4,500 employees. It reports an 85 to 87 percent response rate on its annual company-wide survey. It sends monthly pulse surveys to a random sample of employees. A cabin crew pulse fulfils a union agreement.

Employee representatives involved early

Some customers bring employee representatives in before a survey. The Royal Netherlands Sea Rescue Institution involved its works council before its survey. Where applicable, the works council or employee representatives may receive access to a team’s results.

Results customers report

Customers report both changes and response rates. At Wij zijn JONG, 42 percent said workload was too high in 2023. By 2025 this was 34 percent. In 2025, 81 percent said they want to stay. Grupo Catalana Occidente reports a 76 percent response rate. Protime reached a 100 percent response rate on a custom-made engagement survey. Effectory reports that users have reached response rates of up to 70 percent.

Staff without email, raw data and comment text each need a decision

Most of Effectory’s limits are decisions to make before the first survey goes out. Each card below is one of them.

Staff without email need an add-on

Non-desk workers is an add-on feature. It shares the survey and results with employees who have no email address. Those employees can receive a printed invitation. It carries a personal access code and a QR code that links to the survey. Participants invited without an email address may not see the Edit response option.

Deeper analysis comes by package, contract or cost

Key Driver Analysis finds the themes that most influence another theme. It needs a group of at least 100 respondents and returns the top three themes. It is available on request in the Expert package, or if stated in the contract. Advanced analyses can also be requested at a cost. The Expert package also adds customised benchmarking, themes and group anonymity settings. A custom benchmark is an additional service made with the Customer Success Manager. It needs at least seven organisations.

Raw data needs lead time

Raw data variants B and C need set-up at least two weeks before the survey. Variant B is pseudonymous, so answers carry a code instead of a name. It can include details such as gender, age and tenure. Variant C allows employee IDs and other personal data. A raw data clause in the data processing agreement is part of that set-up. Effectory suggests involving the works council or the data privacy officer.

Individual answers have two wordings

Effectory shares no individual response with anyone. That includes employers. Its engagement survey product page offers insights “at an individual, team or organizational level”. The exit survey sends a report to the employee and to the HR manager.

Comment text reaches managers unchanged

Open-ended answers appear exactly as written, not linked to a name. Managers can read the text. Anything an employee types, such as a colleague’s name, stays in it. The system translates open comments in another language into the survey’s default language for reports, with no manual step.

Can the turnover tool name a person?

Flight Risk Screening uses surveys and machine learning. In Effectory’s help centre, it pinpoints specific teams or departments where employees are most likely to leave. The algorithm joins survey answers to employee demographic data. It predicts turnover risk across parts of the organisation. Effectory’s product page promises to spot high-risk teams or groups. The same page promises to “Accurately predict employees at risk of leaving”. Step 1 is the Retention Scan, a six-question survey.

The Public API gives results, not individuals

The Public API lets a customer’s systems pull survey results. Customers contact their Customer Success Manager to get it. It returns results at the lowest level possible, not at individual level. Open answer questions are not supported. Historical data is not guaranteed. A team that wants survey results in its own reporting should check these limits first.

A custom price, payment in advance, and data deleted on exit unless a duty applies

Effectory gives a custom price after a conversation. Three packages decide what you get for it, and extras change the total.

Each package changes what you can do. Starter covers online results and downloadable reports. It also covers the Action Planner, benchmarks and HR system integration. Starter lets the customer select up to 3 of 36 languages. Plans allow up to 5 of 36. The Professional package adds single sign-on, so staff log in with the company account.

The Expert package adds group anonymity settings, customised benchmarking and themes. It also adds correlation analysis and group differences. It adds Key Driver Analysis too. It covers about 500 coordinators across the role types, with unlimited access to the employee view. Of the 36 languages, the 14 most used are human-proofread and 22 others are machine-translated. Larger plans can add 24 more questionnaire languages.

Extras change the total. Advanced analyses can be requested at a cost, with pricing and packaging from the Helpdesk. The org.mapper is an add-on with additional costs. DEI advice and support is available at additional costs. Non-desk workers is an add-on feature. De Heus estimates about 30 percent less time spent organising employee data with the org.mapper.

One public tender notice gives a contract value. Effectory B.V. was chosen as the winner of the lot on 19 June 2026. The buyer’s estimate for the order was between EUR 339,000 and EUR 420,000 including VAT. The notice, published on 28 August 2026, puts all contracts awarded at EUR 415,584. The period runs from 1 September 2026 to 1 September 2028, with two one-year options to 2030. That is one public buyer’s order and not a price list.

These terms in Effectory’s general terms weigh most when you sign. Payment is made in advance, without discount or set-off. Effectory may also invoice interim costs at any time for work performed or costs incurred. The first invoice may not be the only one. Effectory is never liable for indirect loss or damage. Liability for failures is limited to direct loss up to the insurance cover, or else the price of the services. That is one year of fees where the term exceeds a year. It sets the ceiling on what you can recover. The client loses claims not reported in writing within one year after discovering the circumstance. Dutch law applies, and disputes go to the District Court of Amsterdam.

Effectory’s service-level page sets a separate promise. Web applications are available at least 99.50 percent per year. Scheduled downtime announced two weeks ahead is excluded. The promise leaves room for about 44 hours of other downtime a year.

At the end, your data is deleted unless a legal or contractual duty requires keeping it. The customer decides how long respondent data is kept. This is generally as long as the contract runs. The system removes data on its own when the retention time ends. Results can be downloaded in PowerPoint and Excel, not Word. The Excel report Standard group results includes all open answers. Archiving a survey hides it and does not delete it or its data. If you remove a participant who has already responded, their responses are deleted for good.

You could also run survey steps with agents built on your own systems. We have mapped what that looks like. The HR Agent Map

Open points to put in writing with Effectory

Is the setting that raises the group minimum part of the package we are buying? Good answer: Yes, and the minimum we want is written into the order form.
Given the privacy rules you give participants, what insights on single people does an employer get? Good answer: A written list that matches what participants are told.
What do Non-desk workers, the org.mapper and advanced analyses cost? Good answer: A written price for each add-on, before we sign.
What will the first year cost, split by package, set-up and add-ons? Good answer: One written figure for the year, with each add-on on its own line.
Does any step remove a person’s name or phone number from comments before managers read them? Good answer: A named step, and a setting our own team controls.
What does customer permission cover when data goes to an outside AI service? Good answer: A written definition, and the list of suppliers with the country of each.
Does any processing happen outside the EU and EEA, and with which providers? Good answer: A named list of providers and countries, or a written statement that there is none.
What does Flight Risk Screening report for our company, a group or a named employee? Good answer: A group report, with the smallest group size written down.
Do we need a raw data clause, and how early must we sign it? Good answer: A draft clause in our data processing agreement and a date at least two weeks before the survey.
How long after the contract ends can we export our results, and in which files? Good answer: A written number of days, with Excel files that include all open answers.
Will you raise the liability limit above the insurance cover or one year’s fees? Good answer: A higher limit, written into the order form.
What response rate do customers with a workforce like ours reach? Good answer: Two named customers, with their response rates.

Alternatives to Effectory, including buying nothing

Each alternative below answers one point where Effectory stops. Look at Eletive and WorkBuzz. A survey inside your HR system and buying nothing are the other two routes.

Effectory sells survey access for staff without email as an add-on. Eletive is designed to reach frontline and deskless workers, including those without a work computer or phone. Ask Eletive how it does that before you compare the two.

Effectory surveys are answered on desktop, mobile or tablet. Theme surveys can also be completed on paper. WorkBuzz Dialogue lets leaders ask 20 to 20,000 colleagues a question and get video, voice or text answers. Ask WorkBuzz what leaders see for each answer.

Effectory is not an HR system. To get the survey inside the system that holds people records, read the guide for HR system owners.

Buying nothing means giving up what Effectory runs for you. You would set the group minimum yourself. You would go without its comparison against industry and global benchmarks. You would also go without the Action Planner. In it, each action can have a deadline and an assigned person or team. Our market guide explains which jobs need a dedicated product.

More in this guide

The Employee engagement guide
Compare the 40 researched products how each asks staff, who sees the answers, what it costs and the contract terms.
Mid-market companies which engagement products suit 200 to 2,000 people, what they cost and what to ask.
Enterprise companies which engagement products suit 2,000 people or more, what they cost, how contracts run and what to ask.
Companies whose HR or performance system already runs surveys what the survey part of an HR or performance system covers, what it costs and what else exists.