Powerful, but clunky and hasn't innovated fast enough
March 05, 2019

Powerful, but clunky and hasn't innovated fast enough

Lawrence Ladomery | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 5 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with IBM Watson Campaign Automation

IBM Watson Campaign Automation was being used by two clients in two different ways. For one-off campaigns, simple email blasts, and more sophisticated cross-channel campaigns. And, to support the 'buyer journey' taking leads and engaging them to learn more about who they are and what they want, to be able to personalize communications and offers. Using data, both clients were able to offer a better brand experience as well as put the right products in front of their prospects.
  • Flexibility in using to data: databases (including relational databases), segmentation and powerful querying.
  • Personalization and conditional content for email as well as landing pages.
  • PURLs to extend personalization in direct mail.
  • The interface is clunky and heavy, resulting in a slow UX. This is particularly true with the email builder.
  • Processing of data (eg. returning a list of contacts for a query) is handled via 'Jobs', which means that it's not a dynamic process. Jobs need to start, crunch and end before you get a result.
  • Reporting
  • ROI very much depends on the strategy driving a data-driven marketing project, and not so much the platform itself.
  • IBM Watson Campaign Automation is more expensive than other platforms to use, day in day out, because of its clunky interface.
  • It's a flexible product and can achieve more than most.
IBM Watson Campaign Automation is more of an enterprise product for large organizations where you're plugging into all kinds of systems and workflows tend to be slower.
IBM Watson Campaign Automation is a powerful platform but one that hasn't innovated as much as its competitors. It's well suited for those organizations that have already invested in IBM products. All other ones should have a look at other platforms that are more feature rich and have a more usable interface.

Acoustic Campaign Feature Ratings

WYSIWYG email editor
4
Dynamic content
9
Ability to test dynamic content
8
Landing pages
8
A/B testing
7
Mobile optimization
6
Email deliverability reporting
8
List management
9
Triggered drip sequences
8
Lead nurturing automation
8
Lead scoring and grading
8
Data quality management
8
Automated sales alerts and tasks
9
Calendaring
7
Social sharing and campaigns
7
Social profile integration
7
Dashboards
5
Standard reports
5
Custom reports
5
API
7
Role-based workflow & approvals
6
Customizability
5
Integration with Salesforce.com
7
Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM
5