SM1
Marketing Automation Platform/ESP Feedback
Hi All,
Is it ok to ask for feedback/experience on specific platforms in the forum? We are narrowing down our search and was wanting to get real feedback on a few different platforms.
Let me know if this is allowed before I post which platforms they are.
Thanks!
Your question is a difficult one without knowing anything your business, or your marketing goals. There are hundreds of ESPs in the market and all of them cater to people differently and have their own unique service offering. Some platforms offer basic email automation, others offer more advanced features and API capabilities, and others have full e-commerce built ins that allow you to run an entire marketing automation suite. So, the best platform really depends on you and what you're looking for.
Everything is subjective. There are great platforms out there, and it becomes up to the experts to decide the best fit for them based on overall business needs and budget. Luckily, most of these platforms will give you a test account or free trial allowing you to use them & see how they work for you. This is what I suggest!
Go for it, there are a few discussions already floating around about different ESPs. This is an open forum for the email industry, just keep things civil :-)
Great!
If anyone has any feedback using either Maropost, Bronto, Adestra, or Silverpop, it would be great to hear first hand.
Also, good to have information emailed directly to me if that works better.
Thanks!
I've been lucky enough to be using ExactTarget for the last 3 years on the Enterprise level. The system has a lot of functionality that mimics traditional full stack web development. I really enjoy AMPscripting dynamic emails, the possibilities are endless.
I've used several in my career and was a huge advocate for ET but have since changed my mind. I've found ever since they had been acquired by Salesforce, they've been focusing solely on Enterprise level clients and anyone outside of that is left to struggle. If you've got a team that's quite technical, ET may be your best choice but just keep in mind that they don't have an extension built (at least not for Magento), so your team (or agency) will need to build that from scratch to ensure all data you'd like captured makes it over to ET.
However, of the ones you've listed, I have been really happy with Bronto. Their service team is great at setting you up, their extension collects all of the data you could ask for, the interface is easy to use and they've got a thorough training course that sets you up for certification. The only drawback I have with Bronto is their reporting system, but they're working on fixing that and making it more robust very soon.