A research guide for marketing agencies

SharpSpring vs. Marketo2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

MarketoMarketo launched in 2006 and has been a market leader since 2012, providing an engagement marketing platform with bundled services including marketing automation, email marketing and more. Marketo’s price point is on the high end of the spectrum, and an annual contract with quarterly payment is required.

SharpSpringSharpSpring launched in 2014 with a focus on digital marketing agencies. Today, more than 1,100 agencies use SharpSpring to deliver marketing automation to 5,000+ clients. SharpSpring is month to month and is 1/10th the cost of Marketo.

Reviews

Terms

Annual Cost Agency + 3 Client Licenses(Get Started)

$40,196($13,424 Get Started)

Annual contract paid quarterlyMonth to month

Features

8.2/10 4/5

Trust Radius Software Advice

4.2/5

MarTech

8.3/10 4/5

Trust Radius Software Advice

3.7/5

MarTech

Comparable

Basic plan plus add-ons from Pro to upgrade features and add an instance

$6,000($2,300 Get Started)

SharpSpring vs. Marketo

Steve Buck, Black Tie Digital Marketing

“I've used other automated marketing platforms at another agency, however

they are wildly expensive and more geared towards large business.

SharpSpring was affordable enough for our agency and our business clients.

SharpSpring is by far my favorite 3rd party vendor. Truthfully it is the

product as a whole that really made us decide we NEEDED to use it.”

What one SharpSpring partner says:

Real Results

GetIT Comms is a fast-growing B2B marketing agency that operates in 19 countries, providing regional services to some of the world’s leading technology organizations. After implementing SharpSpring for its clients, GetIT Comms experienced an average revenue increase of 20-30% per client.

Demodia is a digital marketing agency that specializes in demand generation, digital marketing, website development, and channel enablement. The agency got up and running with SharpSpring for lead generation in just over one month, and then began using it for clients and getting results in under three months.

2WWW.SHARPSPRING.COMSHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Annual Cost Per Client

Included Contacts

Commitment Due At Signing

Onboarding Fee(One-Time Fee, Includes Agency & All Clients)

Annual Cost

Price Point Per Instance

SharpSpring wins on cost and contract type.SharpSpring comes in substantially lower than Marketo when it comes to monthly costs and is also lower for onboarding. In addition, Marketo locks customers into a full-year contract, while SharpSpring partners only pay month to month and can cancel at any time.

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2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

$1,800

$6,000

Additional Contacts $3 per 1K/mo.

$150/mo.Month to month, cancel anytime

$2,300Includes agency instance & 3 client

instances

$1,800 $6,600

100K 100K

Emails Included Per Month 100K Unlimited

$4,500

$40,196

$200 per 10K/mo.

$550/mo.Annual contract paid quarterly

Pricing & Terms

$6,000

$40,196

AgencyBasic plan plus add-ons from Pro to upgrade

features and add an instance

ANNUAL COST FOR AGENCY + 3 CLIENTS

$13,424($4,874/1st quarter +$2,400 to tier up to 100k contacts for 1st quarter + $1,650 to add 3rd

instance for 1st quarter + $4,500 onboarding)

Includes agency & 2 instances, so this price includes a 3rd instance added for fair comparison

and also tier up to 100K contacts

7/7

2/7

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 4SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Email FeaturesAgency Features

TOTAL

Rebrandable Interface (Logo/Colors)

White-Labeled URL

Rebrandable Sales Materials

Rebrandable Notifications

Add a Client In-App

Multi-Client Management Console

Share Templates Across Clients

AGENCY FEATURES

2/77/7

SharpSpring promotes YOUR agency’s brand.SharpSpring is specifically designed to help agencies build and enhance their relationships with clients. Agency partners can reinforce their brands throughout the client relationship via SharpSpring’s rebrandable sales and marketing materials, interface, URL and more.

Basic

REQUEST A DEMO

8/8

8/8

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 5SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Email FeaturesEmail Features

TOTAL

Drag-And-Drop Editor

WYSIWYG Interface

Dynamic Content

Responsive Templates

Render Testing

After-The-Click Tracking

RSS Email Syndication

A/B Testing

Feature parity in email marketing.Email marketing is at the core of all marketing automation platforms. SharpSpring and Marketo both excel in this area by offering all of the features that help agencies use email as an effective campaign tool for their clients.

EMAIL FEATURES

8/88/8

Basic

10/10

10/10

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 6SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Email FeaturesAutomation Features

TOTAL

Unlimited Workflows and Tasks

Triggers and Filters

Branching Workflows

Time-Based Automations

Advanced Lead Scoring

Behavior-Based Automations

AUTOMATION FEATURES

Strong automation features in both platforms.Automation is another area where SharpSpring and Marketo match up almost evenly in terms of features, with both platforms offering marketers the tools they need.

10/10 10/10

Dynamic Lists

Advanced Segmentation

Personas

Dynamic Landing Pages

BasicBasic

Edge to Marketo, but autocomplete can be more effective.Marketo offers progressive profiling to gather data incrementally from leads, but this is a philosophical difference between the two platforms. SharpSpring’s approach is to use autocomplete to pre-populate a form with information previously provided, but to continuously allow leads the option to update their email, phone or other information that has changed since their last visit.

Form Features

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 7SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

11/12

12/12TOTAL

Drag-And-Drop Form Builder

Dynamic Forms

Use CSS To Match Your Site

Custom Calls To Action

Progressive Profiling

Autocomplete

Referral Forms/Fields

Hidden Fields Supported

Third-Party Forms Supported

Third-Party Post-Back

Native WebEx Integration

Navigate GoToWebinar Integration

FORM FEATURES

12/1211/12

Basic

6/6

6/6

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 8SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Email FeaturesContact Tracking

TOTAL

Identify Anonymous Site Visitors

Contact Info From Anonymous Visitors (ZoomInfo)

Track Behavior History Of Known Leads

Timeline Of Lead Interactions

Important Page Visit Tracking

Daily Email Of Site Visitors

CONTACT TRACKING

6/66/6

Contact tracking features pair up.Both platforms track information on anonymous site visitors and then tie those histories to their respective leads upon form fill-out. Both providers also offer IP lookup to reveal visitors’ company names and even offer potential lead names based upon those look-ups.

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

7/7

7/7

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 9SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

Email FeaturesLanding Page Builder

TOTAL

Point-And-Click Editor

WYSIWYG Interface

Dynamic Content

Library Of Responsive Templates

Build Single Landing Pages

Optimize For Mobile

Build Landing Page Funnels

Both platforms offer landing page funnels.SharpSpring and Marketo both offer landing page builders that go beyond basics by offering pre-built and customizable funnels – a series of landing pages designed to work together to convert and transform visitors into leads. SharpSpring offers an extensive library of responsive landing page templates, while Marketo makes it easy to set up workflows from landing pages.

LANDING PAGE BUILDER

7/7 7/7

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

AGENCY FEATURES

Blog builder unique to SharpSpring.If content is king, SharpSpring wins by offering a blog builder designed to crown your top-of-the funnel marketing and lead acquisition efforts. SharpSpring’s blog builder is also dynamic, allowing the index page to automatically respond to a lead’s attributes.

Blog Builder

WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM 10SHARPSPRING VS MARKETO

2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

7/7 0/7TOTAL

Point-And-Click Editor

WYSIWYG Interface

Dynamic Content

Library Of Responsive Templates

Advance Post Scheduling

RSS Email Syndication

Social Sharing Widget

0/77/7

BLOG BUILDER

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

Edge to Marketo in social features.Both solutions offer social media profiling and the ability for sales teams to interact with leads through social channels. More importantly, both platforms can track social media conversions/ROI. Marketo provides additional publishing and monitoring capabilities, which are on SharpSpring’s roadmap but aren’t currently available within the platform.

Social Media Features

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2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

3/5 5/5TOTAL

Social-CRM Integration

Social Profiling

Social Media Monitoring/Interactions

Social Media Publishing

Social Media Conversions

SOCIAL MEDIA FEATURES

5/53/5

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

Edge to SharpSpring in sales features.SharpSpring sets itself apart from competitors by providing a free CRM that’s also optional (i.e., it plays nice with other CRMs). With Marketo, a user must have another CRM; otherwise data is simply stored in what is effectively a repository. This means that more third-party CRM software licenses are required in order for Marketo to be as effective, which also means more required integrations and more costs.

Sales-Focused Features

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2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

4/4 3/4TOTAL

Built-In CRM

Advanced Lead Scoring

Shopping Cart Integration

Native Salesforce Integration

SALES-FOCUSED FEATURES

4/4 3/4

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

Parity in platform features.The platforms stack up well here, with both offering key integrations that are of value to marketers.

Platform Features

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2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

6/6 6/6TOTAL

Universal CMS Compatibility

Open API

Zapier Integrations

Multiple Device Tracking

Native Salesforce Integration

Third-Party/Native Form Compatibilty

PLATFORM FEATURES

6/66/6

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

Partner support is a key focus for both platforms.Both SharpSpring and Marketo offer platform migration support and a dedicated success manager, but Marketo limits support to 15 hours before extra charges are incurred. Additionally, Marketo charges a custom add-on fee for any integration assistance, while SharpSpring always offers unlimited free assistance to help partners with implementing their integrations.

Partner Support

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2017 COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS REPORT

5/5 3/5TOTAL

Dedicated Customer Success Manager

Platform Migration Support

In-App Contextual Support Videos

Ongoing Training

Phone, Email Support

Included, but limited

Included, but limited

CUSTOMER SUPPORT

3/55/5

REQUEST A DEMO

Basic

SHARPSPRING VS MARKETOJANUARY 2017WWW.SHARPSPRING.COM

REQUEST A DEMO

Grow your agency.Tie your clients to you.

Reviews

Terms

Annual Cost Agency + 3 Client Licenses(Get Started)

$40,196($13,424 Get Started)

Annual contract paid quarterlyMonth to month

Features

8.2/10 4/5

Trust Radius Software Advice

4.2/5

MarTech

8.3/10 4/5

Trust Radius Software Advice

3.7/5

MarTech

Comparable

Basic plan plus add-ons from Pro to upgrade features and add an instance

$6,000($2,300 Get Started)