ActiveCampaign vs. Sugar Market

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
ActiveCampaign
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
ActiveCampaign helps small teams power big businesses with a platform for intelligent marketing automation. It provides email marketing, marketing automation, and CRM tools that help businesses to create incredible customer experiences.
$19
per month
Sugar Market
Score 2.2 out of 10
Mid-Size Companies (51-1,000 employees)
Sugar Market (formerly Salesfusion) is a marketing automation solution built to work for the user. With a curated toolset that includes intuitive campaign builders, automations and reporting, the vendor says they focus on what matters most to marketers -- streamlining campaign creation, understanding engagement, improving conversion, and driving more revenue. Salesfusion was acquired by SugarCRM May 2019.
$750
per month
Pricing
ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Core
$1,000
Database size
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeRequired
Additional DetailsPrices listed are monthly subscription rates. Our packages include live support and training. Additional charges apply for contact databases above 10k, dedicated IPs, CRM integration and sandboxes. Please complete the form on our site to request a quote based on your specific needs.
More Pricing Information
Features
ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Email & Online Marketing
Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
8.9
664 Ratings
13% above category average
Sugar Market
4.4
4 Ratings
56% below category average
WYSIWYG email editor9.4581 Ratings3.03 Ratings
Dynamic content9.1520 Ratings5.03 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content8.8471 Ratings4.02 Ratings
Landing pages8.0338 Ratings6.03 Ratings
A/B testing9.1380 Ratings4.03 Ratings
Mobile optimization9.3526 Ratings1.03 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting7.3631 Ratings7.04 Ratings
List management9.6650 Ratings4.04 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences9.7574 Ratings6.03 Ratings
Lead Management
Comparison of Lead Management features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
7.5
524 Ratings
3% below category average
Sugar Market
5.3
4 Ratings
37% below category average
Lead nurturing automation9.2491 Ratings6.04 Ratings
Lead scoring and grading8.0359 Ratings4.04 Ratings
Data quality management9.2401 Ratings5.04 Ratings
Automated sales alerts and tasks9.2355 Ratings6.03 Ratings
Lead segmentation and distribution1.81 Ratings00 Ratings
Campaign Management
Comparison of Campaign Management features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
9.6
374 Ratings
23% above category average
Sugar Market
6.5
3 Ratings
16% below category average
Calendaring9.6295 Ratings6.03 Ratings
Event/webinar marketing9.5286 Ratings7.02 Ratings
Social Media Marketing
Comparison of Social Media Marketing features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
9.5
287 Ratings
23% above category average
Sugar Market
8.2
1 Ratings
9% above category average
Social sharing and campaigns9.6254 Ratings8.21 Ratings
Social profile integration9.4250 Ratings00 Ratings
Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
8.3
627 Ratings
10% above category average
Sugar Market
2.3
4 Ratings
106% below category average
Dashboards8.0597 Ratings5.04 Ratings
Standard reports8.0584 Ratings1.04 Ratings
Custom reports9.1377 Ratings1.04 Ratings
Platform & Infrastructure
Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
ActiveCampaign
9.2
491 Ratings
19% above category average
Sugar Market
4.8
4 Ratings
45% below category average
API9.6391 Ratings5.02 Ratings
Role-based workflow & approvals9.2267 Ratings6.02 Ratings
Customizability9.4420 Ratings3.02 Ratings
Integration with Salesforce.com9.392 Ratings9.22 Ratings
Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM9.760 Ratings1.01 Ratings
Integration with SugarCRM9.856 Ratings00 Ratings
Third-party software integrations7.520 Ratings00 Ratings
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ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Small Businesses
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Score 9.5 out of 10
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Score 9.5 out of 10
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Score 9.3 out of 10
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Score 9.3 out of 10
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Score 9.3 out of 10
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User Ratings
ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Likelihood to Recommend
7.8
(676 ratings)
3.0
(7 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.4
(25 ratings)
10.0
(3 ratings)
Usability
7.7
(38 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
7.0
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
1.4
(41 ratings)
8.2
(1 ratings)
In-Person Training
9.1
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
7.3
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.6
(14 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
6.4
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
9.0
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
1.5
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
6.4
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
7.2
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
ActiveCampaignSugar Market
Likelihood to Recommend
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign is brilliant for small businesses wanting a secure, reliable and user friendly email capture software that filters users emails into the appropriate category/tags and have endless options when it comes to having different lead magnets and ways users may sign up. It's been super handy for my small business to send regular emails and be able to analyse the success rates and open rates of emails and the ability to resend them with a different subject line. It's made email marketing really easy peasy.
Read full review
SugarCRM
Salesfusion is a marketing automation platform more appropriate for small companies considering the limited functionalities are limited. The email builder tool is easy to use and ideal for someone with no coding knowledge
Read full review
Pros
ActiveCampaign
  • The graphic design is very good, especially fonts, colours and templates
  • Flexibility of design and functionality
  • Takes a little while to learn it, but generally user-friendly
  • Looks very professional but doesn't cost much to get started
  • There are masses of integrations for ActiveCampaign, and the ones I tried all worked well and didn't take long to figure out.
Read full review
SugarCRM
  • It was easy to navigate.
  • I liked that I could click on a link to email a potential client and that it would track/link that email back to the Salesfusion profile.
  • I liked the reporting features so that I could see exactly how many cold calls resulted in appointments, with whom I last left voicemail or need to follow up with.
Read full review
Cons
ActiveCampaign
  • The email designing part could be easier to use. There are certain simple shortcuts that don't work, for example, adding links is more complicated than it should be, moving blocks around is hard, etc.
  • There's no good way to filter by 'active' and 'inactive' subscribers when editing en-mass.
  • I'd like more reporting data on one page.
Read full review
SugarCRM
  • The user interface is somewhat cumbersome and not intuitive at times.
  • Additional user education available through downloads for existing customers rather than scheduled webinars would be helpful.
  • Custom reporting is complicated to set up.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
ActiveCampaign
I am committed at the moment. Rebuilding the automations I have would be a huge time drain. Plus the cost of learning a new system and the risk to deliverability of porting a 6,000 person list to a new platform. Also, AC offers everything I need ast a reasonable (but a little high) price. So, why not a 10? Because, early 2023, AC dropped a massive 2x price hike on long-term customers. They knew few would shift, so this feels like a cynical cash grab and left a bad taste, If they do something like this again, this camel will have a broken back.
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SugarCRM
We've been very happy with SalesFusion since day 1. We've also created a new website during the time period that we've had SF and everything carried over great to our new website!
Read full review
Usability
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign has been the easiest marketing automation software we have ever used. They provide tips throughout the entire process of anything you are building. Their support team through LIVE CHAT has been extremely fast and helpful. The monthly meetings provided with the enablement team has helped us through several large and urgent needs.
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SugarCRM
No answers on this topic
Reliability and Availability
ActiveCampaign
I haven't experienced application errors or unplanned outages at all. Active Campaign is ultra reliable and I would not be using them if that were the case. Also, the helpful emails they send are welcomed and informative, and present very practical tips and guidance for using the platform. They're always demonstrating new features and I'm thankful for that.
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SugarCRM
No answers on this topic
Performance
ActiveCampaign
Oh my gosh, Active Campaign's performance gets an A+++ in my book. The pages load quickly and so do the reports. I haven't noticed any slowdowns when it's integrating with other programs and it performs excellently on all levels.
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SugarCRM
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
ActiveCampaign
This might be the best part. The chat support lady offered to make a video to help me solve my problem. I worked in customer service for years and I've never done that, lol. So, if they're offering things like that, I can only imagine that they'd be able to handle most any issue you throw at them.
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SugarCRM
The support team has always been helpful, friendly, prompt and knowledgeable. They follow-up on all my tickets promptly and when needed are available for screen sharing to illustrate solutions for more complex problems. The support department at Salesfusion is one of my favorite things about the platform.
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Implementation Rating
ActiveCampaign
Very satisfied with our implementation in our professional medical practice, allowing us to be on top of client service, and not miss out on crucial information and insights. Marketing is often neglected in professional practices and ActiveCampaign solved this problem with aplomb.
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SugarCRM
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
ActiveCampaign
I moved to ActiveCampaign from Mailchimp. Admittedly, I was using the free version of Mailchimp, but I had numerous episodes of subscriber data NOT being added to Mailchimp, despite using API to integrate with my mailing list. Obviously, I couldn't pay for clicks and not capture subscriber data, so I had to find something else. ActiveCampaign has been 100% reliable in testing.
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SugarCRM
I was using Net-Results and it seemed more geared for an experienced marketer who was familiar with HTML and didn't need as much training. I found the system frustrating and didn't have much success when I called in for training. I was brand new to automation marketing and needed more hand-holding than Net-Results was able to provide
Read full review
Scalability
ActiveCampaign
My web designer told me about Active Campaign and although I don't recall which platform I had before, I LOVE Active Campaign and its user friendliness. The transition was seamless and I've never had a problem with functionality or server failure.
Active Campaign provides so many features, and makes it easy for non-techies to maneuver around the site with ease. They capture information and put it in an easy-to-read format.
At this point, I don't think I'd ever use any other platform!
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SugarCRM
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
ActiveCampaign
  • I haven't monetized my list yet so no clear ROI but great from a list-building perspective
  • The software is not cheap so at times I feel like I may not be getting the most out of the product because I'm not using all of the features
Read full review
SugarCRM
  • Increased employee efficiency
  • Better customer service
  • The ability to send email campaigns from a specific user and not "from" the organization title. We use this funcationality a lot and it was not available with other software so this is huge.
Read full review
ScreenShots

ActiveCampaign Screenshots

Screenshot of tagging, that when combined with conditional content helps to put the right message in front of each customer.Screenshot of marketing automationScreenshot of audience segmentation based on engagement, purchase activity, lead score, or any other dimensionScreenshot of live chat, site messaging, email, and a unified inbox that can be used to build relationships with customers.Screenshot of the CRM, which helps sales reps to get more done in less time