TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Ion Interactive

    Score8 out of 10
    Enterprise companies (1,001+ employees)
    Ion is an enterprise-grade content experience platform that empowers modern marketers and designers to create no-code interactive content experiences integrated with their CRM or marketing automation tools.N/A

    Pexels

    Score8 out of 10
    N/APexels, headquartered in Berlin, offers stock photos and video under the Creative Commons Zero license, from a global network of creators.N/A
    Pricing
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Editions & Modules
    Managed Services + SaaS
    Custom
    per year
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup Fee$5,500 per customerNo setup fee
    Additional Detailsion’s Build Anything SaaS platform provides organizations with an entirely new and agile interactive content marketing capability. It enables non-technical marketers and designers to create, test and measure an unlimited number of all types of interactive content marketing experiences. It includes unlimited seats, experiences, tests, customization, phone and email support, analytics and more.—
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Considered Both Products
    Ion Interactive LLC
    No answer on this topic
    Pexels
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    94%
    Would buy again
    34 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    36 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    36 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    29 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    30 Answers
    Features
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Content Creation
    Comparison of Content Creation features of Ion Interactive and Pexels
    Feature
    Ion Interactive
    7.5
    105 Ratings
    4% below category average
    Pexels
    -
    Ratings
    Ideation10.099 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content collaboration5.094 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content Publishing
    Comparison of Content Publishing features of Ion Interactive and Pexels
    Feature
    Ion Interactive
    8.7
    120 Ratings
    11% above category average
    Pexels
    -
    Ratings
    Content hub10.0104 Ratings00 Ratings
    Forms / Gated content10.0107 Ratings00 Ratings
    Embedded CTAs10.0108 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content distribution8.093 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content promotion8.086 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content automation6.090 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content Reporting & Analytics
    Comparison of Content Reporting & Analytics features of Ion Interactive and Pexels
    Feature
    Ion Interactive
    8.5
    118 Ratings
    14% above category average
    Pexels
    -
    Ratings
    Audience profiling and targeting6.091 Ratings00 Ratings
    Closed-loop tracking and reporting8.095 Ratings00 Ratings
    Content performance analytics10.0116 Ratings00 Ratings
    Campaign optimization dashboard10.0107 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Small Businesses
    Contently
    Score9.9 out of 10
    Depositphotos
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    CoSchedule Marketing Suite
    Score10 out of 10
    Pixabay
    Score9 out of 10
    Enterprises
    PathFactory
    Score8.3 out of 10
    Adobe Stock
    Score8.3 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Likelihood to Recommend
    10.0
    (135 ratings)
    8.0
    (36 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    7.0
    (22 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Usability
    7.4
    (17 ratings)
    8.5
    (3 ratings)
    Availability
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Performance
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Support Rating
    10.0
    (18 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Online Training
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    10.0
    (6 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Ion InteractivePexels
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Ion Interactive LLC
    If you want to choose a quick start template and fill in the fields with your content, Ion will be fantastic for you. We've done this with whitepapers and quizzes and it's been great and extremely easy to use. If you have an exact idea of what you want, and a background in web development, you may get frustrated. Ion has some quirks that make it tricky to fully customize - everyone once in a while I really just want to go into the HTML and make some changes, but can't. If you are looking to reuse a piece of content for specific targeting (industry or account-specific), Ion is great. The dynamic substitutions are great and very helpful.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    1. Small businesses with small or non-existent budgets still need assets to create content 2. Individual content makers or freelancers who need stock assets 3. Corporate eLearning wants to modernize and replace all old-fashioned, outdated, brightly lit studio photos with more realistic and relevant imagery that will resonate with modern audiences and learners.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Ion Interactive LLC
    • Quick Starts make it so easy to get started.
    • Real-time updates are awesome and save a ton of wasteful process.
    • The combination of user friendliness for simple things and the flexibility to do more complex things is great.
    • Chat support is excellent and deeper-dive support has been super helpful.
    • The ability to use these tools in the cloud or embedded has given us tactic flexibility.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    • High-resolution images – Pexels is full of images that are high enough in resolution to look beautiful on their own, but also high quality enough to be combined with other images without distracting pixelization
    • Stock videos – other free stock sites are often limited to just images, but Pexels has a wide range of videos available as well, which we use to plus up decks
    • Good search functions – while not as robust as some paid sites, Pexels' search functions make it pretty easy to track down what you need
    • Licensing – it's very straightforward to know what you can and can't do with a Pexels photo, which protects my company and our clients
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Ion Interactive LLC
    • Ion University, while stacked with a wealth of information, is difficult to navigate from a troubleshooting perspective. The tutorial videos are all very helpful, but they are also very long. Sometimes I would want to search for how to address a particular issue I was struggling with and it would be a two-minute segment buried in a 45-minute video.
    • Again, getting back the self-guidance side of things. I think a lot of the tutorials are set up in a way that makes sense to Ion, but not as much to the end user.
    • I think the controls admins use when creating new users could be a bit more straightforward.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    • I do think that the library should grow. For example, I was looking for an image of a living room with a fireplace and there were only a few options
    • I get tricked sometimes because I see images I want to use but they are from some other company and they are paid
    • Improve search understanding for multi-word searches
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Ion Interactive LLC
    We use it for every landing page and we plan on only doing more dynamic content creation. We dont see that option coming in-house any time ever in the future. ION has a very robust platform for us to work with that really allows us to do more for our customers in regards to having the one-to-one conversation.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Ion Interactive LLC
    Usability is straightforward, with extensive documentation and tutorials provided to ensure landing pages are built to specifications and can be optimized for performance. Built-in platform funnels give insight into customer dropoff, success/failures, and conversions (at a glance). Setting up a landing page can be done quickly and easily, with numerous integrations (CRMs like SalesForce, for instance) supported
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    Pexels is extremely easy to use. Because it integrates with Canva, it makes our workflow smoother. This also saves us a significant amount of time running our business. The interface is also clean and easy to understand and follow, leading to an increase in productivity and much greater efficiency. Overall, this saves us time and money
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Performance
    Ion Interactive LLC
    Sometimes the editor can be a little slow.
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Ion Interactive LLC
    The ION support team is amazing. There has not been a single issue they they could not solve for me. If there is a feature or request that they do not have, they have even, on occasion, created custom scripts for our team. *Update 6/5/17 - ION has continued to delight on multiple occasions. I appreciate their attention to detail and ability to solve whatever issue I have. After 3+ years of use and support, ION still has my full endorsement.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    Ion Interactive LLC
    They offer a great amount of online training, videos, articles, etc. There is usually an answer available if you run into an issue. I would recommend taking advantage of the online training they offer. I wish I would have done it sooner.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation Rating
    Ion Interactive LLC
    There were a lot of things we learned about the tool once we really got in and got our hands dirty. Being hands-on was essential for our team to be able to utilize ION in the most effective manner.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Ion Interactive LLC
    I was not the decision maker to choose this over Uberflip, but the UI is much more appealing to me. It's incredibly easy to use, clean, and from a backend standpoint, it requires little to no tech savvy'ness. Our team has really enjoyed using it and has required no training what-so-ever.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    Pexels has a few unique features that stand out, the most important being a 1-click download from the search results. No need to navigate to another page to find a "download" button. This reduces the time required to find and download an appropriate image. The search results load fast, with lazy loading, so there's no annoying pagination at the bottom. I often travel as I work, and at times my internet connection can be slow or unstable. This kind of feature may seem minor to some users, but when on a slower connection, it makes a big difference. If a search term is too broad, it can recommend related keywords to search for - this helps to find the right image faster.
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Ion Interactive LLC
    Separate client portfolios enable scalability, however, some elements are still grouped for all accounts so it's difficult to scale for an ad agency with multiple clients. Would prefer totally separate sections of the platform for all clients with each element housed separately.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Ion Interactive LLC
    • Though we have not had the service long enough to see any measurable outcomes, we've been able to create interactive web content faster than ever before
    • The speed with which we can build interactive pages and re-use assets has been critical as projects we've done with Ion have made their way around and more and more internal clients have said "me too" for their own projects
    • It is very pricey at $28K for the base annual subscription (dropping to $24k after the first year), so depending on your budgetary situation, that may make no sense for your team--but we had contract money set aside for a company to build us a microsite for around the amount, so we just used it for Ion instead and will now be building the microsite ourselves using it
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pexels
    • Social media campaigns created with photos from Pexels achieves 40% higher engagement vs others.
    • Thanks to faster and easier content sourcing provided by Pexels, our campaign generation period has dropped to an average of 4 hours, instead of 2 days.
    • Their stock images adorn our offices.... and it's a much lore cheerful space for that reason. Staff are happier, and stay in the office longer.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Ion Interactive Screenshots

    Screenshot of ion empowers your other marketing technologies to deliver higher fidelity, data-driven scoring, targeting, segmentation and personalization.Screenshot of The types of interactive experiences the ion platform can create is near-endless. These are the most common types used by our customers: Assessments, Calculators, eBooks, Interactive Infographics, Interactive White Papers, Landing Pages, Lookbooks, Quizzes, Resource Library, Solution Finder.Screenshot of See what our customers are saying about our platform and services!Screenshot of Starting at $2,000 per month, you get an unlimited, scalable interactive content platform with our full feature set. Including: Unlimited experiences, unlimited use of Quick Starts, Unlimited Seats/Users, Unlimited A/B/n Testing, Unlimited Sell-Side Experiences, Unlimited Phone, email & chat support, unlimited analytics... PLUS a FREE custom-branded theme that can be applied to all of your experiences.Screenshot of You have the option to start from a template or entirely from scratch. Our Quick Start template library includes more than 100 fully tested, responsive and flexible interactive experiences you can brand, customize and launch.Screenshot of ion is the only interactive content platform that provides the scalable foundation to grow from one interactive experience to one thousand interactive experiences. With ion, interactive content development complexity, long timelines, high costs and maintenance problems are replaced with freedom and agility.