Fin by Intercom vs. Salesforce Agentforce Marketing

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Fin by Intercom
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Fin is Intercom’s AI Agent for customer service, designed to deliver high-quality answers, even for complex queries. It works with any helpdesk, or it can be paired with Intercom’s next-generation Helpdesk to get the full Intercom Customer Service Suite.
$0.99
one-time fee per outcome
Agentforce Marketing
Score 7.7 out of 10
N/A
Marketing Cloud is a cloud-based digital marketing platform, used by 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
Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
Editions & Modules
Fin with your current helpdesk
$0.99
one-time fee per outcome
Copilot add-on
$35
per month per user
Pro
$99
per month For analysis of 1,000 conversations
Fin with Intercom’s Helpdesk
from $39 + $0.99 per Fin outcome
per month per seat
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
Fin by IntercomAgentforce Marketing
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsFin comes with a 90-day money-back guarantee. Here's how it works: Intercom states that users who sign up for the Fin Guarantee Success Program and do not achieve at least a resolution rate of 65% will be paid $1M. This program is designed for high volume customers. Eligibility criteria: High volume customers (over 250k monthly conversions) in North America and Europe. Intercom states that phase one of this program will admit customers on Intercom Helpdesk or Zendesk.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
Considered Both Products
Fin by Intercom
Chose Fin by Intercom
We have Pardot for web forms people can submit when they go on our website, but with Intercom, we can start that conversation and qualify or disqualify the group right then and there. Being able to talk internally with our organization on these conversations is helpful in …
Chose Fin by Intercom
The only tools I've used that are remotely similar to Intercom are primarily used for email marketing. Intercom's email marketing capabilities are slimmed down (comparatively) but still effective.
Agentforce Marketing
Chose Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
We evaluated most other marketing automation products and Pardot was best for us because of the SFDC integration.
Features
Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
Email & Online Marketing
Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
7.5
171 Ratings
2% below category average
WYSIWYG email editor00 Ratings7.7122 Ratings
Dynamic content00 Ratings7.9153 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content00 Ratings6.9112 Ratings
Landing pages00 Ratings7.7121 Ratings
A/B testing00 Ratings7.3151 Ratings
Mobile optimization00 Ratings6.9111 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting00 Ratings7.6132 Ratings
List management00 Ratings8.2129 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences00 Ratings7.595 Ratings
Lead Management
Comparison of Lead Management features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
8.1
124 Ratings
4% above category average
Lead nurturing automation00 Ratings8.5109 Ratings
Lead scoring and grading00 Ratings8.1110 Ratings
Data quality management00 Ratings7.6116 Ratings
Automated sales alerts and tasks00 Ratings8.3101 Ratings
Campaign Management
Comparison of Campaign Management features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
7.5
114 Ratings
1% above category average
Calendaring00 Ratings7.7103 Ratings
Event/webinar marketing00 Ratings7.497 Ratings
Social Media Marketing
Comparison of Social Media Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
7.6
88 Ratings
3% above category average
Social sharing and campaigns00 Ratings7.683 Ratings
Social profile integration00 Ratings7.639 Ratings
Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
7.8
124 Ratings
6% above category average
Dashboards00 Ratings8.2118 Ratings
Standard reports00 Ratings7.7123 Ratings
Custom reports00 Ratings7.5100 Ratings
Platform & Infrastructure
Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
Fin by Intercom
-
Ratings
Salesforce Agentforce Marketing
7.6
124 Ratings
2% above category average
API00 Ratings6.990 Ratings
Role-based workflow & approvals00 Ratings7.089 Ratings
Customizability00 Ratings7.0111 Ratings
Integration with Salesforce.com00 Ratings7.9113 Ratings
Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM00 Ratings8.714 Ratings
Integration with SugarCRM00 Ratings8.211 Ratings
Third-party software integrations00 Ratings7.324 Ratings
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Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
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Score 8.8 out of 10
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Score 9.9 out of 10
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Piper the AI SDR by Qualified
Piper the AI SDR by Qualified
Score 9.2 out of 10
PFL Direct Mail Platform
PFL Direct Mail Platform
Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 4.0 out of 10
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User Ratings
Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(384 ratings)
8.0
(328 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(21 ratings)
8.1
(114 ratings)
Usability
8.7
(294 ratings)
8.3
(37 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(1 ratings)
10.0
(11 ratings)
Performance
9.1
(1 ratings)
9.6
(9 ratings)
Support Rating
5.8
(10 ratings)
7.0
(36 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
5.0
(4 ratings)
Online Training
7.4
(2 ratings)
8.1
(7 ratings)
Implementation Rating
6.6
(5 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
9.1
(1 ratings)
7.3
(39 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(3 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(3 ratings)
User Testimonials
Fin by IntercomSalesforce Agentforce Marketing
Likelihood to Recommend
Intercom
Fin is great for using for first line support. We use Fin for conversations where customers have a standard question, and Fin is able to pull from our content to answer this accurately and go above and beyond to include some basic problem solving. This really helps us free up our Support Team's time for more complex queries. Fin isn't appropriate for us on technical issues or conversations which require human support. We've had to remove Fin from interacting on these conversations as customers were becoming frustrated with speaking to AI, or having Fin be unable to problem solve. However, this was easy to set up through Intercom, and now customers with complex questions/situations or bugs/technical issues do not engage with Fin and Fin only handles suitable conversations.
Read full review
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
Intercom
  • Serves as the first point of interaction.
  • Answers questions based on the knowledge base.
  • Tries to suggest a solution for reported issues (in some cases).
  • Gives the option to improve its answer.
  • Learns from other conversations and replies by humans.
  • Understands other languages.
  • Interprets images (somewhat).
Read full review
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
Read full review
Cons
Intercom
  • It seems some users really struggle to figure out how to escalate to a human (especially through email).
  • Not excited about how "soft" resolutions still count as resolutions and are paid for. Though some abandoned cases appear to be able to be concluded as "the user got the answer they needed", there are others where they clearly didn't, because they just open up another chat (or even more), trying to get more info. This pads the resolution stats and makes it seem more effective than it actually is.
  • Cost -- Fin is quite expensive. It helps us with scaling coverage, but we're not really saving money.
Read full review
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
Intercom
We have been and will be continuing our journey with Intercom and nothing too concerning has happened that I have experienced or heard of that has us on the edge yet. If it ever happens it will be something along the lines of "Outgrowing" the use of need of the platform.
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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
Intercom
From an administration standpoint, Fin is very easy to set up, train, and test. Having the ability to impersonate a user in our system to see how Fin responds is huge. It lets you test several situations and throw curveballs at it (as customers will) without the risk of setting Fin live and wondering what will happen. It's also easy to fine-tune. Some chatbots you can never quite get right without spending hours on, but Fin usually takes a few minutes to dial it in. From a customer standpoint, Fin couldn't be easier to engage with. We tell customers up front it's an AI bot and they're wow'd with the experience
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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
Intercom
always there
Read full review
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
Intercom
works perfect
Read full review
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
Intercom
Intercom is the premier customer support/engagement model and it definitely has one of the top tier customer support teams as well. I don't think I have ever waited more than 5 minutes to get the information I need or get help with an issue. They are incredible and I aim to model our customer service department after them.
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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
Intercom
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
Intercom
Easy to know the learning path
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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
Intercom
The implementation was surprisingly easy but we are having to adapt from our old process to work well with Intercom.
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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
Intercom
We only used the free live chat version from HubSpot, so Intercom is yards better! If I were just comparing an actual live chat between the two tools, HubSpot was often clunky and delayed, and it was hard to find past conversation information
Read full review
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
Intercom
No answers on this topic
Salesforce
was not involved with this part but i have not heard about clompaints
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Scalability
Intercom
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
Intercom
  • New role opportunities — Using the “Fin-first” approach has reduced the workload for our Tier 1 team, giving them more time to focus on their own career growth. It’s also opened the door to a dedicated, AI-focused role, where a team member regularly reviews Fin’s answers and makes updates to help it perform even better.
  • Enabling Fin has also reduced our response time and allowed us to meet SLA's.
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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.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Fin by Intercom Screenshots

Screenshot of Fin, delivering conversational support experience to customers.Screenshot of where to monitor, analyze, and optimize Fin by spotting trends, filling content gaps, and fixing quality issues topic by topic.Screenshot of where to customize Fin's tone of voice, teach it support knowledge and policies, and configure how it handles complex tasks in over 45 languages.Screenshot of where to test answers, review the sources and settings that shape them, and get tailored recommendations to optimize performance.Screenshot of Fin, as it appears across email and live chat to phone, SMS, and social. Fin can answer any question, across any channel, any time.

Agentforce Marketing 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.