Act-On vs Constant Contact | TrustRadius

What users are saying about

Score 7.5 out of 10

Based on 361 reviews and ratings

Score 7.5 out of 10

Based on 444 reviews and ratings

Likelihood to Recommend

Act-On is great for companies who have multiple people managing marketing and sales programs. Each person will get their own log in and access to certain (or all) areas of the software. Alerts can be created when prospects reach certain stages of programs which means marketers don't need to constantly monitor lead scores or anything like that. Also, designers can log in and create landing pages, copywriters can login in and upload content and managers can login and build programs. There's no stepping on each other's work either. Team management is very good. Act-On is also great if you have multiple customer profiles. Act-On allows you to create programs designed to capture many leads across your customer profile. Act-On would be overkill for the small B2C client. A small business that uses email to manage newsletters and product announcements will find Act-On to be much, much more than they need. Act-On can certainly do these things but so can MailChimp at a much lower price point. There would be many features in Act-On that this client simply would never use. If your company uses a custom CRM, Act-On won't be the best fit. I imagine you would need to hire a developer (or commit an in-house developer) to a large project of integrating your CRM with Act-On. Otherwise, you'll be importing and exporting list data on a regular basis.

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Digital Marketing Manager

Access Marketing CompanyMarketing and Advertising, 1-10 employees

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A startup or SMB can benefit from Constant Contact, as it has all the features to get going and scale. It is important to keep customers new and prospective engaged with the brand, and also to drive sales from it. CC can help achieve this using their robust simple platform - this is why I recommend it to everyone.

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Digital Marketing Strategist, Founder

California SEO ProfessionalsMarketing and Advertising, 1-10 employees

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Feature Rating Comparison

Act-On

7.7

Constant Contact

8.1

WYSIWYG email editor

7.5

8.7

Dynamic content

7.2

7.9

Ability to test dynamic content

7.2

8.4

Landing pages

7.4

7.6

A/B testing

7.2

7.5

Mobile optimization

7.9

8.2

Email deliverability

7.9

8.4

List management

8.2

8.1

Triggered drip sequences

8.4

7.7

Act-On

7.7

Constant Contact

—

Lead nurturing

8.1

—

Lead scoring and grading

8.0

—

Data quality management

7.0

—

Automated sales alerts and tasks

7.6

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Act-On

7.5

Constant Contact

—

Calendaring

6.8

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Event/webinar marketing

8.3

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Act-On

6.6

Constant Contact

—

Social sharing and campaigns

6.7

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Social profile integration

6.4

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Act-On

6.7

Constant Contact

7.7

Dashboards

6.8

8.1

Standard reports

7.0

8.5

Custom reports

6.2

6.5

Act-On

7.7

Constant Contact

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API

7.1

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Role-based workflow & approvals

7.5

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Customizability

7.0

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Integration with Salesforce.com

8.2

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Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM

7.8

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Integration with SugarCRM

8.6

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Pros

Digital marketing campaign integrations, like Google Adwords, email tracking, other tools that track audiences, and website integrations like WordPress or Square Space.
The customer support, from what I've heard, is very good.
Integrations with other CRM systems make this really easy to add to a company's workflow.

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Co-Founder/CEO

aspace, Inc.Computer Software, 1-10 employees

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Great templates for use on multiple types of emails.
Ease of uploading email lists for sending.
Sorting emails into lists post-upload is a breeze as well.

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Digital Marketing Manager

A.J. WalkleyEvents Services, 201-500 employees

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Cons

It is one of the most expensive tools on the market, the price, compared to other similar tools, is very high.
It's a little difficult to get accustomed to this software, it looks like it's designed for people that already have experience in the marketing and campaigns space.
There are some necessary features, like contacts and sales users limitations, that are only available at higher pricing tiers, despite being already expensive for some of the lower tiers.

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Co-Founder/CEO

aspace, Inc.Computer Software, 1-10 employees

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When uploading additional contacts, CC wants to see how they actively subscribed. This can be problematic when uploading an older email list (i.e. you may just have a spreadsheet of the list and they want to see more evidence).
It is a little pricey compared to competitors such as MailChimp.
It would be great to be able to export email campaigns as HTML.

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

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Likelihood to Renew

Act-On 8.9

Based on 112 answers

Great product, easy to use, promising roadmap and amazing customer success team.

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Digital Marketing Manager

Cobweb SolutionsInformation Technology and Services, 51-200 employees

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Constant Contact 8.0

Based on 19 answers

With the renewal of the contract, you have the option to keep the historical emails and this has been proved invaluable

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Verified User

Manager in Corporate

Hospital & Health Care Company, 51-200 employees

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Usability

Act-On 7.2

Based on 31 answers

This has been my experience since Day 1

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Vice President, Sales - Exhibits & Events and Enterprise Sales Operations

Moss, Inc.Design, 201-500 employees

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Constant Contact 8.9

Based on 8 answers

Overall great, but the templates and formatting options could be improved

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

View all 8 answers on this topic

Reliability and Availability

Act-On 9.1

Based on 14 answers

This product has never been down when I needed it

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Sr. Online Marketing Manager

Adaptive Computing51-200 employees

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Constant Contact 9.0

Based on 2 answers

No major problems in sending out the email campaigns and accessing the analytics

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

View all 2 answers on this topic

Performance

Act-On 8.2

Based on 13 answers

Act-On just keeps improving.

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Angie J Anderson

Practice Lead | Managing Consultant (Demand)

StarshotMarketing and Advertising, 11-50 employees

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Constant Contact 10.0

Based on 2 answers

Reports complete very quickly and you can see email opens in real-time

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

View all 2 answers on this topic

Support

Act-On 8.8

Based on 38 answers

Always available with professional personnel who care about getting it right the first time

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Vice President, Sales - Exhibits & Events and Enterprise Sales Operations

Moss, Inc.Design, 201-500 employees

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Constant Contact 3.0

Based on 8 answers

The support staff seems to have no idea of why/how files are uploaded into segmented lists. They don't seem to have ever actually used the software and it is very difficult to resolve any problems

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

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In-Person Training

Act-On 8.7

Based on 4 answers

My Account Manager has led me through countless amounts of training on the product as a whole and through some of my integrations.

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Digital Marketing Manager

Salsa Labs, Inc.Internet, 51-200 employees

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No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

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Online Training

Act-On 9.3

Based on 16 answers

Act-On had a lot of resources, and their staff was great at answering any questions I had to make sure we got started on the right foot. Looking back, I would have preferred some additional training sessions since we didn't have any previous experience with Marketing Automation and best practices.

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Tradeshow & Event Specialist

Quanex Building Products Corporation1001-5000 employees

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Constant Contact 10.0

Based on 1 answer

No answer on this topic is available.

Implementation

Act-On 8.6

Based on 22 answers

I had a dedicated integration/setup person who was excellent. And they brought on specialized people as needed to help with certain things (DKIM setup, lead scoring setup, etc).

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David Wank, DMD

Web Developer, Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Consultant

Short Hills Design, LLCInternet, 1-10 employees

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Constant Contact 8.0

Based on 4 answers

Implementation is very easy for someone who wants to send out the “batch and blast” type newsletters. If you want to use their templates with no customizations, the product works fine. However, the more customizations you get into involving link color, etc, that’s where things can get tricky for someone who may not be familiar with coding

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Verified User

Employee in Marketing

Retail Company, 51-200 employees

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Alternatives Considered

I'm sure our team went through the whole vetting process. I was not involved in that part so I am unable to really say how Act-On compares to other solutions in the market. I can say that my experience has been nothing less than excellent and that I think my team made the right decision

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Melodie Pierson

Regional Team Lead

Project InsightComputer Software, 51-200 employees

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Much better in managing your contact database and ensuring that the same email is not sent to the same contact more than one time. Also gives a more thorough report of open rates, times, etc. than MailChimp. Allows for more formatting options than MailChimpp and other competitors. A bit more pricey, but worth it for the analytics.

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

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Scalability

Act-On 9.1

Based on 1 answer

No answer on this topic is available.

Constant Contact 10.0

Based on 1 answer

Very reliable in sending email campaigns and controlling the recipients so that no contact is sent the same email more than once, even if they are on a resent list

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Verified User

Manager in Research & Development

Public Policy Company, 11-50 employees

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Return on Investment

Increased lead conversion efficiency
Increased output of marketing e-mails
Flawless integration with sales CRM; no mis-matched information or confusing leads for our Sales team

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Marketing Manager

American Safety Council, IncE-Learning, 51-200 employees

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Good deliverability rates (versus company mail servers) is the number one benefit.

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Peter Muiznieks

Marketing Consultant

Contrecoup CreativeMarketing and Advertising, 1-10 employees

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Screenshots

Activity History - Easily view the online actions and behaviors taken by your buyers and customers

See All (6) Act-On Screenshots

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Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Yes

Entry-level set up fee?

Required

Act-On Editions & Modules

Act-On

Edition

Professional

$9001

Enterprise

$2,0002

1. per month (starts at 2,500 active contacts)

2. per month ( starts at 2,500 active contacts)

Additional Pricing Details

The Professional package starts at 2,500 active contacts, 3 marketing users, 50 sales users and 30,000 API calls per day. The Enterprise package starts at 2,500 active contacts, 6 marketing users, 100 sales users and 30,000 API calls per day. Annual contract required.

General

Free Trial

—

Free/Freemium Version

Yes

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

—

Entry-level set up fee?

No

Constant Contact Editions & Modules

Constant Contact

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Additional Pricing Details

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Rating Summary

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