MindFire Studio vs. PFL Direct Mail Platform

Mindfire is good when using direct mail pieces. You are able to analyze the web and print pieces together. However, it doesn't allow for good scalability of campaigns. While the templates are decent, you do need some coding knowledge to make these campaigns web compliant.

I have launched various sorts of direct mail campaigns with PFL, anything from large bulk sends (thousands of kits in a month) for more of an awareness/sales enablement play all the way to triggered direct mails that are going to very specific segments based on engagement with other campaigns or being part of a nurture program.

• Mindfire provides a direct correlation to a print piece.

• Marketo & SFDC Integration, allowing visibility in to campaign results.
• Providing direct mail options based on our campaigns and goals.
• Sourcing all items for the direct mail, including being able to print all items (boxes/brochures/notes/etc.).
• Variable, on-demand printing, to create customized pieces instead of static kits.

• The UI is dated and needs to be updated. The ability to delete elements after publishing and going back to edit mode. Better UX needs to be implemented.

• Some of the packages they've sent out on our behalf arrive broken, even if we use the packaging they recommended.
• We've had instances of them sending out the wrong mailers based on the orders we've triggered.
• Before we agreed to the integration with Marketo, there were a lot of issues triggering orders successfully that required direct intervention from their team.

Only thing holding me back from a perfect 10 would be the timelines for involving the technical team on occasion. There have been a few times where the PFL technical support team has been booked up for days or more than a week out which can delay our project timelines. This doesn't happen often, let me be clear. But when it does, it's usually at the worst time for our campaigns.

Mindfire wasn't my choice. The only reason it is being used is because it correlated with direct mail.

Unfortunately, we have decided to move away from PFL Hybrid Experience Platform and to Sendoso. In my opinion, the platform is more intuitive, and campaigns are easier to launch. We are able to move around funds instantaneously and get a project set up within a day. This is important because we have a smaller Demand Generation Marketing team, and being able to get campaigns launched with little hand-holding is critical.

It does take a while to launch or re-launch a campaign, which can make it difficult to pivot quickly. However, if you're integrated with Marketo, then PFL is as scalable as your database and marketing strategy! The sky is the limit in terms of creativity. Post launch, the program is hands-off apart from report monitoring and potential optimization tweaks.

• It has been a neutral experience

• Increased live webinar attendees that lead to booked meetings
• Increased client satisfaction and rapport with sales teams and leadership
• Increased pipeline generation from events we are a sponsor of