Marketo vs Salesforce Marketing Cloud (Pardot)

Written by Marcus Taylor - CEO
Updated 27/07/2023

5 minute read

Who is this software for?

Marketo is a marketing automation software designed for businesses of all sizes. It provides tools for lead management, email marketing, social media, and analytics to help businesses increase revenue and improve customer engagement. Marketo is suitable for companies that want to streamline their marketing efforts, automate repetitive tasks, and gain insights on their target audience.

Pros

  • Powerful attribution modelling
  • Deep integration with Salesforce

Cons

  • Users often report needing external support and consultants to manage
  • Expensive pricing increases exponentially
  • Poor landing page and form builder

Screenshots

Pricing

For 2.5k contacts
Contact sales
For 10k contacts
Contact sales
For 25k contacts
Contact sales
For 100k contacts
Contact sales
Full feature pricing
$3,195 / month
Starting price
$895 / month
Setup fee
$895
Starting # of users
10 Users
Cost per extra user
Yes
Refund policy
No refunds
Free demo

Ratings

Overall rating
Ease of use
Value for money
Form templates
Customer support

Features

Lead scoring
Lead segmentation
Web activity tracking
SMS marketing
Personalize web content
Predictive analytics
Bi-directional CRM syncing
Event management
Create invoices
Create quotes
Split testing
Create membership sites
Bulk social media posting
Sales reports
Real-time sales alerts
Mobile app
Social CRM

Integrations

Outlook integration
Gmail integration
Salesforce integration
SAP integration
Oracle integration
Netsuite integration
SugarCRM integration
Microsoft Dynamics integration
Zapier integration

General Info

HQ Location
San Mateo, United States
Founded in
2006

About Marketo

Marketo was founded in 2006 by B2C marketing software executives who previously helped transform marketing at Epiphany. They started Marketo with a mission to change the way marketing and sales teams collaborate throughout the revenue cycle by realigning the impact of B2B marketing automation and sales effectiveness solutions on revenue growth. Marketo provides marketing and lead management software solutions that help marketing and sales teams to collaborate at every stage of a revenue cycle from the earliest stages of demand generation and lead management to the pursuit of revenue and customer loyalty. Privately held and around $100 million in venture funding from venture firms including InterWest, Storm Ventures and the Mayfield Fund. As of november 2012, Marketo counted over 2,000 customers and 22,000 user subscribers in B2B industries such as software technology, financial services, business services, healthcare and communications. Marquee customers include BT, Cisco, Dell Boomi, Jigsaw (part of Salesforce.com), Kelly Services, McKesson, PayPal, Rackspace, Sharp and Thomson Reuters.

Who is this software for?

Pardot is ideal for Salesforce users looking for a marketing automation solution

Pros

  • Customizable marketing automation tool
  • Great integration with Salesforce
  • Lead Deck lets you send send perspectives on your service pages with one-click

Cons

  • Accounts starts with only 1 user
  • API access only available for PRO users starting at $2,000 / month
  • One of the more expensive solutions

Screenshots

1 of 4

Pricing

For 2.5k contacts
$1250 / month
For 10k contacts
$1250 / month
For 25k contacts
$15000 / month
For 100k contacts
Contact sales
Full feature pricing
$3,000 / month
Starting price
$1,000 / month
Setup fee
$1,000
Starting # of users
1 User
Cost per extra user
$50
Refund policy
Yes
Free demo

Ratings

Overall rating
Ease of use
Value for money
Form templates
Customer support

Features

Lead scoring
Lead segmentation
Web activity tracking
SMS marketing
Personalize web content
Predictive analytics
Bi-directional CRM syncing
Event management
Create invoices
Create quotes
Split testing
Create membership sites
Bulk social media posting
Sales reports
Real-time sales alerts
Mobile app
Social CRM

Integrations

Outlook integration
Gmail integration
Salesforce integration
SAP integration
Oracle integration
Netsuite integration
SugarCRM integration
Microsoft Dynamics integration
Zapier integration

General Info

HQ Location
United States
Founded in
2006

About Salesforce Marketing Cloud (Pardot)

Pardot, B2B marketing automation by Salesforce, offers an easy-to-use marketing automation solution that allows marketing and sales departments to create, deploy, and manage online marketing campaigns from one central platform. Together, Pardot and Salesforce empower every rep to act in the moment of engagement, and every marketer to drive greater results from campaigns. As an integral part of the Salesforce family, Pardot is committed to staying on the front lines of innovation, helping companies to exceed their revenue goals, better align their sales and marketing teams, and do more with the resources they already have. Pardot is dedicated to supporting the needs of growing B2B organizations, and can help marketers and sales reps at any size organization work together and win together. Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, Pardot has a growing client base ranging from small and mid-sized businesses to divisions of large enterprise organizations. Additional Pardot offices can be found in cities across the globe.

ActiveCampaign

Who is this software for?

ActiveCampaign is suitable for businesses of all sizes looking for a powerful, easy-to-use marketing automation platform that's reasonably priced.

Pros

  • Easy to build powerful automated workflows
  • Very affordable and no setup fees
  • A/B testing automation sequences & campaigns

Cons

  • Limited dashboard customization options
  • The CRM isn't ideal for large sales teams or complex use cases.

Screenshots

1 of 7

Pricing

For 2.5k contacts
$49 / month
For 10k contacts
$139 / month
For 25k contacts
$229 / month
For 100k contacts
Contact sales
Full feature pricing
$129 / month
Starting price
$9 / month
Setup fee
None
Starting # of users
3 Users
Cost per extra user
Yes
Refund policy
No refunds
Free demo

Ratings

Overall rating
Ease of use
Value for money
Form templates
Customer support

Features

Lead scoring
Lead segmentation
Web activity tracking
SMS marketing
Personalize web content
Predictive analytics
Bi-directional CRM syncing
Event management
Create invoices
Create quotes
Split testing
Create membership sites
Bulk social media posting
Sales reports
Real-time sales alerts
Mobile app
Social CRM

Integrations

Outlook integration
Gmail integration
Salesforce integration
SAP integration
Oracle integration
Netsuite integration
SugarCRM integration
Microsoft Dynamics integration
Zapier integration

General Info

HQ Location
Chicago, United States
Founded in
2003

About ActiveCampaign

ActiveCampaign is one of the most user friendly all-in-one marketing platforms for small to mid sized businesses. ActiveCampaign combines email marketing, marketing automation and sales CRM software in a simple to use visual platform to help businesses like yours acquire, retain and engage your customers. Ultimately helping you save time and grow your business. ActiveCampaign lets you easily create eye catching email campaigns to help you stay in touch with your contacts and customers. Their visual campaign builder lets you easily create automated marketing campaigns and send out targeted emails to your potential customers based on their personal interactions with your business and their integrated CRM lets you keep track of your leads and close more deals to grow your business.ActiveCampaign plays nice with others and integrates with over 700 apps and services. From accounting to CMS and analytics applications, all the way to services that are focused on sales, support and lead generation. Visit their website and try out their platform for free to find out if ActiveCampaign is the right solution to help grow your business.