Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued) vs. MessageGears

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
The Bronto Marketing Platform was an email marketing solution from Oracle which was acquired from NetSuite in 2016. It was optimized for creating automated, yet personalized emails, and subscriber profile segments, analyzing click and visit behavior, and tracking geolocation. It has since been discontinued.N/A
MessageGears
Score 9.8 out of 10
N/A
MessageGears is a hybrid email marketing service built around deliverability, actionable customer data, and audience segmentation and targeting.N/A
Pricing
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsRequest pricing at info@bronto.com.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Considered Both Products
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)

No answer on this topic

MessageGears
Chose MessageGears
Bronto is a much better email service provider, though our choice to use MessageGears is based on our unique database situation, our partnership with them, and our deal structure. The automation and functionality within Bronto is superior, but it also comes with a hefty price …
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Email & Online Marketing
Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)
7.4
58 Ratings
9% below category average
MessageGears
3.3
3 Ratings
84% below category average
WYSIWYG email editor7.050 Ratings1.52 Ratings
Dynamic content6.450 Ratings3.83 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content6.449 Ratings2.23 Ratings
Landing pages4.525 Ratings00 Ratings
A/B testing9.055 Ratings2.73 Ratings
Mobile optimization7.850 Ratings8.01 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting9.458 Ratings3.83 Ratings
List management7.456 Ratings2.13 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences8.448 Ratings2.23 Ratings
Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)
7.6
57 Ratings
1% below category average
MessageGears
1.1
3 Ratings
150% below category average
Dashboards7.857 Ratings1.13 Ratings
Standard reports7.856 Ratings1.13 Ratings
Custom reports7.143 Ratings1.03 Ratings
Pre-Send Testing
Comparison of Pre-Send Testing features of Product A and Product B
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)
-
Ratings
MessageGears
3.7
3 Ratings
76% below category average
URL Validation00 Ratings1.01 Ratings
Link Tracking00 Ratings2.83 Ratings
Image Validation00 Ratings7.01 Ratings
Inbox Display00 Ratings7.01 Ratings
Spelling and Grammar Check00 Ratings6.01 Ratings
Spam Testing00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Email Previews00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Small Businesses
Mad Mimi
Mad Mimi
Score 10.0 out of 10
Mad Mimi
Mad Mimi
Score 10.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
VerticalResponse
VerticalResponse
Score 10.0 out of 10
VerticalResponse
VerticalResponse
Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Emma by Marigold
Emma by Marigold
Score 8.8 out of 10
Emma by Marigold
Emma by Marigold
Score 8.8 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Likelihood to Recommend
8.1
(60 ratings)
9.9
(3 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.0
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(1 ratings)
6.0
(1 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
2.0
(2 ratings)
8.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
8.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Bronto Marketing Platform (discontinued)MessageGears
Likelihood to Recommend
The Bronto Marketing Platform
If you're a mid-size to larger business and rely on regular email engagement from customers, then Bronto Marketing Platform could be a potentially great partner if not game-changer for how you've been doing email campaign management previously. Their automation tools and development interface is amicable. The amount of data that's collected and available from engagement with subscribers through their tools can be overwhelming. Still, if you enjoy digging into every kernel of possible user activity information, you'll love it.
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MessageGears
MessageGears can be a solid, inexpensive email solution and you can be able to send millions of emails per year. In 2020, we delivered over 235 million emails at a fraction of what that would cost with any other email service provider. We worked with MessageGears on a custom solution with our database.
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Pros
The Bronto Marketing Platform
  • It's easy to work with – it has seamless integration across all platforms, which helps when you're working with big clientele.
  • It's logically organized, which can't be said of all ESP's.
  • It has the LIVE CHAT support. A lot of email marketing clients simply don't have that. It's the little things!
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MessageGears
  • The MessageGears Support team is very helpful.
Read full review
Cons
The Bronto Marketing Platform
  • Segmenting- although there's a lot that can be done with segmenting audiences, there's a bit of a learning curve when it comes to setting up segments. Wish it was more intuitive.
  • Workflows- setting up automation workflows requires some practice and I've needed to consult a Bronto support person each time I set up a new workflow.
  • Bronto Pop-up manager- we use this feature, not sure how common it is among Bronto clients, but there is overall some improvement needed with this tool. There is limited capability to update the look and feel of the pop-up manager, and we've run into some conflicts with other pop-ups on our website interfering with the Bronto pop-up.
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MessageGears
  • Multivariate testing
  • WYSIWYG email builder
  • SQL audience error report
  • Native reporting
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Likelihood to Renew
The Bronto Marketing Platform
Never really had any issues that caused out-of-the-ordinary frustration levels. Of course, you'll have days where the learning curve of using a tool gets challenging. Still, I don't remember ever really coming across an obstacle or roadblock while using the tool because of a feature or function it just couldn't do successfully or at all. Customer support was always available as needed, and it was generally easy to find answers to questions when they arose.
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MessageGears
No answers on this topic
Usability
The Bronto Marketing Platform
Usability is great. Very intuitive drag-and-drip metaphor for building automations. And the UI is very user-centric. It constantly prompts you with suggestions and next steps such that you hardly have to refer to the (excellent) documentation.
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MessageGears
Our situation is unique so I believe we are working on a semi-outdated UI which needs a tune up / version upgrade. Similarly, our custom connection means that we do not have access to the full feature set so I've never experienced MessageGears' best functionality
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Reliability and Availability
The Bronto Marketing Platform
I never experienced any downtime.
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MessageGears
No answers on this topic
Performance
The Bronto Marketing Platform
No issues.
Read full review
MessageGears
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
The Bronto Marketing Platform
They used to be good, but they've evolved into a monolithic bureaucratic nightmare after the Netsuite / Oracle acquisition. Can't talk to anyone that actually knows the system and support tickets seem to go days or weeks without responses and resolution.
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MessageGears
MessageGears support is always quick to respond when we have an issue, which is rare. Gail has been our main rep and she has been great. We don't have many issues so luckily, we don't need to lean on their customer support team much. That said, it would be beneficial to hear from upper management more.
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Online Training
The Bronto Marketing Platform
They have lots of videos on list importing / segmentation / report customization etc. when you sign on they give a link to online tutorials and documentation which is very helpful. They have very helpful PDFs on how to import / set up platform
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MessageGears
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
The Bronto Marketing Platform
Easy to set up.
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MessageGears
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
The Bronto Marketing Platform
Bronto hits the sweet spot for us. It is most similar to the Salesforce family of products. Salesforce however can feel cluttered and configuration and setup can be time consuming and confusing. Bronto is much more streamlined and also has features built in that may require additional purchases in the Salesforce world. Adobe Campaign is a very powerful solution and can do many things hard to achieve in Bronto. However, Campaign is much more of a developer tool where Bronto is easy to learn and use right out of the box.
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MessageGears
MessageGears doesn't come close to Salesforce Marketing Cloud. We chose MessageGears based on how data was accessed. We never really got a good preview of how the system works or what was available, so we didn't know everything that it was lacking until we started using it.
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Return on Investment
The Bronto Marketing Platform
  • Offering great reporting for tracking everything. I can see what emails are working (I track on a monthly basis) and what people are clicking.
  • A/B split testing lets us try different things. Try this and that.
  • Creating lists and segments of subscribers lets us look at who is the best performing contacts. Really get 'into the data' and understand what is working and what is not.
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MessageGears
  • Sending more email!
  • Onboarding handoff was a little rough
  • Great control on who we are sending to
  • Dynamic content is very easy!
Read full review
ScreenShots