emfluence Marketing Platform vs. Salesforce Marketing Cloud

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
emfluence Marketing Platform
Score 10.0 out of 10
Mid-Size Companies (51-1,000 employees)
The emfluence Marketing Platform is a marketing automation platform featuring drag-and-drop email editors and automated campaign builders, simple social media scheduling, manageable landing pages, workflow management, analytics, website tracking, surveys, and modals. The platform works for B2B and B2C marketers, marketing agencies, and CRM providers. The product supports CRM integrations and an open API for custom integrations. emfluence offers digital marketing consulting…
$1,000
per month
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
Score 7.8 out of 10
N/A
Marketing Cloud is an AI-powered, cloud-based digital marketing platform within the Salesforce Customer 360 ecosystem. Marketers can segment their audience, deliver personalized messages, track campaign performance, engage leads and accounts, and optimize strategies based on real-time insights.
$1,250
per month per installation
Pricing
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Editions & Modules
Up to 30,000 Active Emails
$1,000
per month
Up to 150,000 Active Emails
$2,000
per month
Up to 500,000 Active Emails
$4,100
per month
More than 1,000,000 Active Emails
Custom
per month
Account Engagement
$1,250
per month
Engagement
$1,250
per month
Intelligence
$3,000
per month
Loyalty Management
$20,000
per month
Personalization
$100,000
per year
Data Cloud for Marketing
$108,000
per year
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup Fee$3,100 one-time fee per installationNo setup fee
Additional DetailsThe emfluence Marketing Platform offers month-to-month pricing that’s based on the number of contacts added, with no restrictions on how many emails are sent each month or by which features are used.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Features
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Email & Online Marketing
Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
8.4
6 Ratings
10% above category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
7.6
171 Ratings
0% below category average
WYSIWYG email editor9.16 Ratings7.7122 Ratings
Dynamic content8.66 Ratings7.9153 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content8.26 Ratings7.1112 Ratings
Landing pages8.24 Ratings7.7121 Ratings
A/B testing8.25 Ratings7.5151 Ratings
Mobile optimization7.75 Ratings7.0111 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting9.16 Ratings7.8132 Ratings
List management8.26 Ratings8.2129 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences8.24 Ratings7.695 Ratings
Lead Management
Comparison of Lead Management features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
8.1
5 Ratings
3% above category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
8.1
124 Ratings
3% above category average
Lead nurturing automation9.15 Ratings8.4109 Ratings
Lead scoring and grading7.74 Ratings8.1110 Ratings
Data quality management8.24 Ratings7.7116 Ratings
Automated sales alerts and tasks7.33 Ratings8.3101 Ratings
Campaign Management
Comparison of Campaign Management features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
8.4
3 Ratings
12% above category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
7.6
114 Ratings
2% above category average
Calendaring8.23 Ratings7.8103 Ratings
Event/webinar marketing8.63 Ratings7.497 Ratings
Social Media Marketing
Comparison of Social Media Marketing features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
8.4
3 Ratings
13% above category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
7.6
88 Ratings
3% above category average
Social sharing and campaigns8.23 Ratings7.783 Ratings
Social profile integration8.63 Ratings7.539 Ratings
Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
6.7
6 Ratings
9% below category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
7.9
124 Ratings
7% above category average
Dashboards9.16 Ratings8.2118 Ratings
Standard reports7.26 Ratings7.8123 Ratings
Custom reports3.76 Ratings7.6100 Ratings
Platform & Infrastructure
Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
emfluence Marketing Platform
8.2
5 Ratings
9% above category average
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
7.6
124 Ratings
2% above category average
API8.63 Ratings7.090 Ratings
Role-based workflow & approvals8.63 Ratings7.289 Ratings
Customizability8.25 Ratings7.1111 Ratings
Integration with Salesforce.com7.22 Ratings8.0113 Ratings
Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM8.22 Ratings8.714 Ratings
Integration with SugarCRM00 Ratings8.111 Ratings
Third-party software integrations00 Ratings7.224 Ratings
Best Alternatives
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Small Businesses
Vbout
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Score 10.0 out of 10
Vbout
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Score 10.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
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PFL Direct Mail Platform
Score 9.0 out of 10
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User Ratings
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Likelihood to Recommend
9.1
(6 ratings)
8.0
(328 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
8.2
(114 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
8.2
(37 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(11 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.6
(9 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(36 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
5.0
(4 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
8.1
(7 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
3.0
(17 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
5.0
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(2 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
7.4
(39 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(3 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(3 ratings)
User Testimonials
emfluence Marketing PlatformSalesforce Marketing Cloud
Likelihood to Recommend
emfluence Digital Marketing
The reporting feature is not as detailed as we require for our documentation, so we have to organize the results into charts and graphs. For every other component of our social media and digital marketing, emfluence checks all of the boxes.
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Salesforce
I think the product, by definition, is meant for marketing — and we use it exactly for that, for running campaigns. That’s the best-suited use case for the product. I don’t think it’s really meant to be used for anything else — that’s just not how it’s designed.
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Pros
emfluence Digital Marketing
  • Custom landing pages to dive deeper into campaigns and track results
  • Responsive customer service with any problems we come by
  • A/B testing
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Salesforce
  • Filter relevant content so you can priorize those that are more relevant and resolve it first
  • Measure the traffic in the different social networks, as well as the response rate, average response time and other relevant metrics
  • Configure automation rules to order the work of those who must interact with the customer
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Cons
emfluence Digital Marketing
  • I do have issues sometimes when making a website popup. I specify certain measurements of my popup yet when it shows up on my website, the graphic doesn't adjust and I have a bunch of white space. But that could also be my website.
  • When adding a new contact into the contact section, once you hit save, the contact information stays on the screen instead of an empty contact profile so you can immediately add the next person.
  • Sometimes when I update a template, The unsubscribe link will link to my email address instead of the person the email is being sent to.
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Salesforce
  • The email builder does not offer any way to catch/check bugs across different email service providers
  • Creating SQL is not as easy as drag-and-drop; a lot of technical knowledge is required
  • Salesforce Marketing Cloud is sold as a marketing tool, but to be honest, you need a LOT of technical IT support to run the tool
  • Einstein metrics are across the board; if you have multiple audiences in one instance of Salesforce Marketing Cloud you can't segment the data.
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Likelihood to Renew
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
As of right now we have not seen any other program that integrates as seamlessly into our Salesforce platform. We have barely scratched the surface of all the features and use cases. It would be irresponsible to make a move to another platform in the near future. We have not come up against any limitations that would prompt a need to switch
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Usability
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
You won't find another solution that has as many features as Salesforce Marketing Cloud Interaction Studio. We all know Salesforce, we all know how big they are and it's not for nothing... Their tools do most of the things you want, need and even imagine. Using it is complicated, but the usability is infinite.
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Reliability and Availability
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
Upgrades and timing of the upgrades were communicated well and planned during off hours for our work. If we did have a campaign scheduled during that time, it would kick-off after the system was back active. There were a few unplanned system down times, but it was a rare occurrence and those times were also short in duration.
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Performance
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
Though the make up of MA apps is not built this way today, it would be nice to see them become more real-time. The integration between Salesforce and Pardot is not a true real-time integration. If I modify something in Salesforce, those changes are not automatically reflected in Pardot immediately. There is a delay of about 15 minutes before the systems sync. This delay, although not long, is less than ideal We would love the systems to be integrated real time such that changes are propagated from one system to the other immediately.
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Support Rating
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
They are really responsive and more than not solve the problem or give you insight to how you can manage the solution yourself. I do find however sometimes a long delay on the more complex issues when they need to loop in other departments. but overall a good experience with support
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In-Person Training
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
The trainers at the Pardot user conference (Elevate and Connections) were very knowledgeable and presented the material well. Again, the content was targeted to more of a new user audience, and was not really relevant for folks who had been using the product for 2+ years.
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Online Training
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
Pardot's online training touches on all topics briefly and vaguely without much indepth exploration into how a final outcome could look, such as Nurturing Campaigns, Email templates, landing page templates, etc... The only true way to uncover Pardot's full capabilities is to have Front End design and coding experience. Without this key skill set, I would not recommend Pardot to another business.
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Implementation Rating
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
From an IT perspective, once you set up the Javascript beacon and start collecting data there is a waiting game. During this time you can start labeling your site actions which can be labor intensive for a single person, but you don't really have the final end-users on the platform yet. We did a lot of training so users were experienced, but it wasn't until they had their first tasks to accomplish that they started using the system and had questions. I'd recommend setting up some immediate goals for an end-user to start segmenting for the purpose of displaying message campaigns so you can jump start end-user action.
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Alternatives Considered
emfluence Digital Marketing
They were the only company that could solve our specific problems. When we looked at larger companies like Constant Contact, they weren't as capable at handling our specific needs for a reasonable price. Some companies need to charge us programming hours. Bigger companies couldn't help our issue. emfluence is more flexible.
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Salesforce
We use Salesforce Marketing Cloud for lead management, generating reports, tracking customer and dealer information, inputting orders, and more. I prefer HubSpot for email marketing and automation because it is easier to use and the emails are designed much better. We currently use Salesforce and HubSpot, and we are very happy to have both, as they have different pros/cons.
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
was not involved with this part but i have not heard about clompaints
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Scalability
emfluence Digital Marketing
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
Prior to this, we had no solution and literally were doing things on paper in a world where technology is outpacing paper. Having this process optimized has made it easier for the sales and marketing people to change information. From the training perspective, it has allowed us to see holes in where we could create additional support training, so the ROI here has been a lot more than just the optimization of a process.
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Return on Investment
emfluence Digital Marketing
  • It's allowed for us to generate more traffic to our client's websites.
  • It's allowed for us to generate more leads from email marketing through emfluence.
  • Visual click maps, more customized dashboard and email templates, and a deeper dive in data would help further business objectives.
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Salesforce
  • Salesforce Marketing Cloud allows us to more efficiently reach out to a higher number of prospects.
  • Salesforce Marketing Cloud allows us to nimbly communicate important messages in a timely fashion to facilitate conversion.
  • Salesforce Marketing Cloud allows us to track who is opening our messages so that we can stop sending to those not interested and focus on the most engaged audiences.
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ScreenShots

emfluence Marketing Platform Screenshots

Screenshot of search perimeters and contact characteristics using the Dynamic Marketing Group Query Builder.Screenshot of Google Analytics, used to measure the success of email and social media alongside spikes in website traffic. Granular reports can be scheduled for an overview of surveys, landing pages, forms, social posts, emails, and list growth.Screenshot of the drag-and-drop Workflow Canvas visual interface used to create automated marketing campaigns, plus send contacts from a single group into branches based on email views, clicks, or custom queries.Screenshot of the interface to build branching into automated workflows based on opens, clicks, or custom decisions (based on custom or out-of-the-box contact fields, dates, and more).Screenshot of a schedule with a month's worth of social media and email, built using the drag and drop marketing calendar.Screenshot of custom email templates, which can be reused or rebuilt with a drag and drop editor.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Screenshots

Screenshot of Pardot Analytics - Pardot's reporting and analytics can be used to perform true revenue impact analysis and closed-loop reporting.Screenshot of Pardot Email Analytics - The reach and impact of  email marketing efforts are displayed in real-time with advanced reporting and analytics by device, and email client.Screenshot of Pardot Forms and Landing Pages - Pardot's form and landing page builders are used to turn online traffic to leads with targeted offers and content marketing.Screenshot of Pardot Email Marketing - Lead nurturing flows are defined via an interface that enables definition of the simplest or most complex segmented and targeted campaigns.