Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement Erfahrungen

Vorteile

The number one thing that I love about Pardot is how easy it is to use. If you're on a small marketing team, one person can easily handle the system. If you have a larger team, the functionality scales extremely well - and you can bring in as many users as you need into the system without needing to pay for any additional seats.

The software is extremely consistent and reliable. Pages load quickly and properly. The WYSIWYG editor for emails is awesome! The amount of automation you can do in Pardot is fantastic - especially with their more recent addition of repeating automations and drip programs.

Awesome update releases thanks to being a Salesforce product.

Nachteile

The positioning of all of the various functionality can be a little confusing at times. There are a LOT of menu items that lead to the various different features. Some cleanup/re-organization of these might help new users.

The out-of-the-box Marketing templates, while serviceable, could use a reboot. For a startup they're likely sufficient, but if you're running a lot of email campaigns you might want to invest in having a developer custom-build a modular email template for your ongoing use.

The built-in mail testing using Litmus is terrible. Often half of the renderings fail to load, and a number of the renderings included are not super relevant any more. I actually never use this feature any more as I prefer to send test emails to an actual mail client rather than trust the renderings.

Vorteile

We love engagement studio and how easy it is to build out automated campaigns and dynamic lists. The ease of automation has meant less time spent uploading csv’s and more time developing great content.

Nachteile

We wish it had a drag and drop editor. Not everyone on our team can code and it makes it difficult when we have a heavy season for deploys. The good news is, they’ve announced a beautiful drag and drop editor for the 20 winter release.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Campaign Monitor by Marigold, Mailchimp und Marketo Engage

Warum Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement gewählt wurde

The direct integration with Salesforce and wanting more ability with automation responding to individuals engagement with us online.

Zuvor genutzte Software

Campaign Monitor by Marigold

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

The direct integration with Salesforce and the sheer quantity of things that Pardot can do in making a unique experience for each of our donors.

Vorteile

Perhaps "simplicity" is one way to put a positive spin on this review. For any Marketing Ops professional who wants to build anything above and beyond Pardot's pre-built functionality -- Good luck. Maybe the simplicity is good for a very small organization, but in that same vein the price point would be nowhere near worth it.

Nachteile

Filter logic is absolutely miserable. There is no Boolean logic in the tool (going back to my point on "simplicity"), which is horrific for building out any type of complex filters for segments. There are even character limits on how much you can enter in one argument field. So, think about if you have to build out a segment to compile all leads from Europe and write out each country.... you would need to split the arguments into 15 or more "or" statements to account for each value. Also, everything is a drop down -- no free text entries for search -- so good luck sifting through 400 different values for a single Salesforce field. This is one seemingly minor example but is a great representation of how overly limited the tool is as a whole. Also their proclaimed "one-to-one" sync with Salesforce is a joke. There is always mismatched or missing data that doesn't align when boiled down into a report.

Vorteile

Pardot is unmatched in its ability to automate your marketing activities. The Engagement Program features it offers is probably the best in the market and allows you to design Customer journeys with customization based on the customer attributes as well as engagement. The WYSIWYG builder allows you to build beautiful email templates and Landing pages for Lead generation and Lead nurturing. It also integrates seamlessly with Salesforce CRM and a wide variety of 3rd party applications.

Nachteile

Pardot allows you to create multiple leads with the same email address. This is a compulsory feature and causes issues with duplicate and bad data. You need to make sure the data is cleansed regularly.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

HubSpot Marketing Hub und Mailchimp

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

We were already using Salesforce CRM so it made sense to use Pardot as it would be easier to integrate with our CRM. Also, Pardot had many features that Mailchimp and Hubspot lacked (Engagement Studio, Grading etc.)

Vorteile

We get real time activity updates of our prospects from the lead deck functionality

Awesome customer support

Ease of usage, is highly customisable

As it's a Salesforce product now the ease of integration with the CRM is mind blowing

Nachteile

I would say the makers of this product are a little money minded.

A lot of functionalities are only available for the PRO users like API access and A/B testing

Also, not many integrations are possible using this product

Vorteile

Pardot makes automating marketing activities simple, whether you're setting up lead gen forms and responder emails or just creating email campaigns. It connects with Salesforce and helps keep lead owners and other information updated that prior to had been a pain.

Nachteile

Its campaign tracking really only tracks . It can only track social if the posts are scheduled in Pardot. Email and landing page editors aren't as full-featured for simple design edits.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Salesforce Marketing Cloud und Marketo Engage

Warum Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement gewählt wurde

Strategy shift, cost and contact list size

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Using Salesforce CRM in conjunction with Pardot was the main reason we went with Pardot

Vorteile

We use pardot primarily for our email marketing, but also for inbound lead gen as well. I love how well pardot integrates into salesforce. That is key for our business. You can change anything at the field level using pardot based on activity etc, and segment based on any field.

Nachteile

There are features such as advanced analytics that are more advanced on the higher levels of pardot, however the cost increase is significant.

Vorteile

It integrates with Salesforce very easily which, I assume, is the only reason why anybody might ever consider using it.

Nachteile

It offers very limited set of features, which don't work quite as expected, the support is terribly lazy, and all that comes at a price much higher than that of the competition.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Because of its integration with Salesforce but later we found out that other products integrate just as well.

Vorteile

The integration with Salesforce and the options included are very helpful.

Nachteile

Creating a landing page in Pardot is a nightmare. You must know coding and Pardot makes it very complicated from start to finish. The form creation is also very difficult to create and hectic to embed.

Vorteile

Pardot is the most integration-friendly marketing software to use with Salesforce's Sales Cloud. We are able to use custom objects in our segmentation.

Nachteile

Pardot doesn't have advanced automation like process builder or flow in Sales Cloud. Other than engagement programs, automation is not a key aspect of the software.

Vorteile

Pardot is one of the better marketing automation/nurturing product aimed at mid-sized businesses. It's greatest strength is its integration with Salesforce (which will be discussed more in "cons"). With relative simplicity, it can be connected to the CRM, so that contacts can easily sync two-ways, and even custom objects can be brought through for segmentation purposes with just a couple of clicks.

Tracking and automation is very well thought out and easy to use. The product has a straightforward method of tracking campaign results and attribution, all of which can then be pushed into Salesforce for comprehensive reporting on prospect-to-purchase management and measurement.

Pardot's greatest strength lies in its ease of use. No marketing automation software is going to be SIMPLE, but Pardot shines in the consistency between its many functions. Nothing feels tacked-on or different from other tools. If you can create a campaign, you can create a complex segmentation rule, and you can manage your social media posts, as it all works identically.

The marketing automation function, Engagement Studio, has gone through substantial recent updates and I consider it best-in-class for ease of use and functionality. If true automation is your #1 concern, this is a great choice.

Lastly, support is excellent. Salesforce Trailblazer is fantastic for self-guided-training, the documentation is up-to-date and accurate, and support tickets are answered promptly and knowledgeably. If you are experienced in systems of these sorts, you will quite likely not need to take advantage of any external training (or SF's accelerator options).

Nachteile

Pardot is a Salesforce product, and its integration is excellent, but it is just that - an integration. Pardot works like a third party service connected with Salesforce, as opposed to a native extension. Lists are synchronized, along with the sort of bugs and frustrations that come with bi-directional synchronization, and some Salesforce functions (notably custom objects) are not as fully fleshed out as one might hope. In some ways, other solutions do a better job synchronizing with Salesforce. That said, Pardot's setup is the simplest I've used, and having unified support for CRM and marketing automation is also a tremendous advantage when I do run into any hang-ups.

Also, while Pardot's feature set is great, some of its tools are in need of substantial upgrades to keep up with the competition. Its WYSIWYG email and landing page tools aren't responsive and are far outclassed in ease of use by Mailchimp and other lower cost options (although if you're comfortable with HTML and developing your own templates, it's not bad at all). It is progressively being updated and modernized, but it obviously takes time, and there can be minor frustrations when you see other tools that are smoother or more approachable. But I have never found this to set a limit on what's possible, only an opportunity for things to be faster and easier for less-expert users.

Vorteile

Pardot allows us to get insight at a per-contact level into their activity, interests, and profile. We've made it even more useful by adding on additional integrations like Clearbit and Zoom. We track more than 12k new incoming leads annually and we automate outreach to those leads every single day.

Nachteile

Many decisions that you make at the beginning of the implementation will dog you after you've made them (how do we organize our campaigns? what tags should we use? when automations do we want to build off of those tags? how do we segment our lists). Pardot/Salesforce has offered strategic support and even configuration services, however, we find that these often lack the depth of knowledge to tell us if we're making the right call/they are too expensive for a small firm like ours.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Marketo Engage und HubSpot CRM

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Salesforce alignment.

Vorteile

One of the things I liked most about Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement was its comprehensive set of tools and features for managing customer engagement and marketing campaigns. The platform provided robust customer segmentation capabilities, allowing me to target specific audiences with personalized messaging. The automation features, such as email workflows and journey builders, made it easy to create and automate multi-channel marketing campaigns. The real-time tracking and reporting functionality provided valuable insights into campaign performance, allowing me to optimize my marketing efforts effectively.

Nachteile

While Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement had many positive aspects, one thing I liked least was the complexity of the platform. As a beginner, it took some time to familiarize myself with the various features and functionalities. The learning curve was steep, and I would have appreciated more comprehensive onboarding resources and tutorials to help me navigate and utilize the platform more efficiently. Additionally, the pricing structure of Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement could be quite expensive, especially for small businesses or startups with limited budgets.

Vorteile

The best part of Pardot is the integration with SalesForce and being able to push and pull a variety of information into and from both systems.

Nachteile

The UI is pretty poor and there are some key features such as in-depth reporting that the system is still lacking

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

HubSpot Marketing Hub und Marketo Engage

Zuvor genutzte Software

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Vorteile

1) it's a really robust marketing automation platform with lots of capabilities but wrapped around a super easy UI
2) deep integration within the salesforce CRM and echo system (you can also use 3rd party salesforce tools from the app exchange to trigger things such as SMS via the SFDC campaign function )
3) slick customer journey canvas that is highly visual
4) fairly priced (in comparison with the other MA vendors)

Nachteile

1) only works with Salesforce (professional edition and above ) so if you're using a different CRM that wont really work for you, or rather be a standalone
2) it would be great if there were more native connectors to it.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

HubSpot Marketing Hub und Marketo Engage

Vorteile

Pardot is great for companies whose sales teams also use Salesforce due to the tight integration between the two products. Prospect and campaign tracking data can sync easily between the two systems and keep track of all campaign touch points across sales and marketing teams. Engagement studios are super easy to set up and allow for easy engagement-driven campaigns that help avoid "spammy" campaigns that help you stay off the blacklists of ISPs.

Nachteile

My major complaint with Pardot really has been with the UI/UX. The user experience is not great. It's not intuitive AT ALL. There are many instances where the interface breaks standard functionality conventions, leaving you in the dark trying to figure out how to do even simple tasks. That being said, the Engagement Studio has completely different UI than the rest of the app, and is actually quite a good experience. I guess Salseforce is taking their time redoing the rest of the app, but I'm sure they'll get around to it soon enough.

Vorteile

Powerful marketing automation tool that integrates extremely well with the Salesforce platform. Easy to learn, hard to master.

Nachteile

Things have improved, but considering it's under the same roof as Salesforce, the integration is clearly an afterthought. I think it does it better than other tools, but not as well as it could have been.

Vorteile

User friendly interfaceMultiple lead management optionsReports were easily generated and saved without any issues

Nachteile

If the information was captured wrong due to some reason, debugging took timeInitially learning curve difficult

Vorteile

This can be a good tool to use for automation as you can import contacts and add them to lists and drips fairly easily. It's also good for integrating with custom forms and landing pages and you can create custom campaigns, links etc. High level, it really helps connect everything together from the first visit (including the pages they viewed) and every subsequent touchpoint from then on (but reporting on this falls into the "Cons").

Nachteile

Pardot is a difficult tool to set up and manage and their support through the process is quite limited. Their chat seems to fill up by 9 am, and although they offer courses to train you how to use their product, they charge for it. Although it is a powerful tool, their reporting capabilities are very behind, and while they capture every touchpoint, there is no way to roll up that data to gather insights or report on it.

Vorteile

Wonderful tracking for leads and creation of drip campaigns. Any company who’s expanding their lead generation efforts and looking to hasten the velocity of closing prospects will definitely find this useful, especially since it is connected to Salesforce.

Nachteile

Interface and usability needs a lot of improvement. Functionalities for creatives and marketers can become too time-consuming and limiting, especially in terms of customisation of drip emails.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Intercom

Warum Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement gewählt wurde

Administrative decision.

Zuvor genutzte Software

Mailchimp

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Administrative decision.

Vorteile

- Once you have solid templates built, creating new emails and landing pages is very fast
- Integration with Salesforce is solid, no issues with data sync in either direction
- Automation rules (especially b/t Salesforce and Pardot) can take care of a lot of mundane tasks without needing to remember to do them

Nachteile

- Getting started with the Program can be tough because there is so much it can do
- Reporting on data can be difficult to figure out. Not on a per-email basis, but rather on Campaign-level performance. There seem to be multiple places to get information and they don't always match up.
- Landing page templates are not responsive. Seriously! You have to have a web designer built and import them to be useful

Vorteile

For a company that communicates with clients and leads primarily via email this platform has changed the game for productivity and delivering personalized emails

Nachteile

Always a learning curve when adapting to new software programs but saleforce team was hands on to smooth the transition

Vorteile

I like that they have a landing page builder but their user interface for building landing pages should be more competitive with what's in the market.

I like their email campaign builder interface and the drip marketing tool.

Nachteile

Their reporting is lacking because you can't customize it. It's hard to really know track leads through the pipeline and recycle them when they aren't ready to buy. The tagging and folder structure isn't intuitive and takes a bit to get used to.

Vorteile

Easy to set up and use. Many customization options and high quality.

Nachteile

Suppot is a bit cumbersome and takes too long.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Gründe für den Wechsel zu Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Better Salesforce integration

Vorteile

The automation and contact management is of the best I've worked with. Not turn is unturned in regards to what you can do to optimize your communications and lead management especially if you're using Salesforce.

Nachteile

Costs. I've only had one client that could afford this investment. It's really an enterprise solution.