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Marketo vs. Hubspot: A Comprehensive Comparison for Marketers to Make the Right Choice

Marketing automation is not just a fancy buzzword. Initiating with Eloqua way back in 1999 and still doing wonders with numerous new platforms coming up at practically every corner, it is quite evident that marketing automation is certainly here to stay and not just a passing phase. According to the findings of a study conducted by Gleanster, it was reported that 90 percent of respondents admitted to periodic and regular use of effective marketing automation for precisely gigantic-volume email campaigns. As per https://www.huffpost.com, marketing automation is fast becoming the focal point of customer experience going far beyond just the marketing function. In reality, top marketing functions have been utilizing marketing automation effectively in innovative and path-breaking ways including customer satisfaction endeavors, internal communications, and channel optimization.

HubSpot: The Way to Go

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The most striking feature of Hubspot is that it acts as a fabulous all-in-one inbound marketing mechanism. It has played a pivotal role in coming up with the ground-breaking so frequently and popularly used by digital marketers today. Right from establishing your website to effectively closing leads, we know that Hubspot is the way to go and could help you every step of the way for your complete inbound marketing campaign.

Marketo: Shining in Its Glory

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According to bigdropinc.com Marketo proves to be exceptional in terms of email workflows and advanced analytics. If you are having a solid Information Technology background, you would love to experiment with this brilliant software and try out its assortment of advanced features. We understand that large enterprises that are known to need intricate email campaigns extending across a broad spectrum of customer bases can successfully go about customizing their email marketing meticulously with the help of Marketo.

In the fight between Marketo vs. Hubspot, it is essential to have a perfect understanding of each organization’s capabilities for making the right decision for their unique marketing efforts. Just for the sake of comparison, Hubspot boasts of 15.89 percent of the market share while Marketo has just 2.04 percent as per Datanyze. However, the real differences would be commencing with pricing and functionality.

CRM Integration

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Marketo has a couple of native CRM integrations such as the Microsoft Dynamics and Salesforce and even integrations with Oracle, SugarCRM, and SAP cloud for Sales, and NetSuite. Contrary to this, Hubspot boasts of only Salesforce integration. HubSpot could, however, integrate with multiple CRM systems for ensuring that both sales and marketing teams could enjoy a 360-degree view especially, of their leads, customers, and prospects. If your company utilizes Salesforce, you would be appreciated that Marketo was developed utilizing the Salesforce platform and integrating seamlessly and comprehensively. However, simply do not consider ruling Hotspot out just because you seem to be a Salesforce company. Hotspot boasts of native integration with exclusively Salesforce. This could be set up, as well as, synced in a matter of merely a few minutes. You do not need any additional integration and CRM data could be accessed and utilized across all the Hubs in an effective way that caters to the unique needs of small and medium-sized organizations and new businesses.

Content Management Platform

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In terms of content, Marketo and Hotspot are known to offer completely different solutions. Hubspot is known to come up with a CMS or Content Management System that could be used to develop a complete website. You may not have the desire to move your whole website directly to Hubspot by creating blog posts and landing pages. Even though Marketo is known to offer effective landing page tools, it doesn’t boast of a native Content Management system or a specific blogging platform. Hence, you need to consider utilizing your website for coming up with your blog pages. You could then consider syncing it seamlessly with the marketing automation software of Marketo. As opposed to this, Hubspot would be allowing you to go ahead and host your blog straightaway on its platform. Additionally, you may consider drafting and publishing posts effortlessly using an on-page editor, adding calls-to-action, etc. Moreover, Hubspot boasts of built-in SEO tools for assisting you in ranking higher in the search engines.

User Experience

The user experience or UX with both Marketo and Hubspot generally comes down to your preference. We understand that both these software platforms are having an attractive User Interface or UI with intuitive navigation and dashboards. However, as compared to Marketo, HubSpot’s tools would be providing more detailed and step-by-step instructions as you go about using them. Hence, both an IT expert and a layman could use this software with equal ease. In the last couple of years, HubSpot has upgraded and updated the User Interface for the entire platform for making it far more quick to learn and more user-friendly and has remarkably boosted its investment for further development and research to go on improving its product set.

If you require deep analytics, as well as, workflow functionality for running your business, you may opt for the unique Marketo experience. As opposed to this, in the case, you are looking for simple and easy-to-use software for handling all inbound requirements with ease, you should opt for Hubspot.

Support and Training

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Even though both have robust support communities, HubSpot seems to have an irrefutable edge over Marketo. With thousands of tutorials and free phone support, HubSpot seems to have remarkably more resources in terms of general inbound marketing and using the software. Moreover, phone support provided by Hubspot is friendly and fast. This is truly comprehensive software but the support staff is not always well-equipped with the right answers. However, the best thing about HubSpot is that it boasts of live chat and email support very much within your portal hence, you could get in touch with a customer support personnel and obtain your information quickly.

On the contrary, several online reviews have been claiming that Marketo’s support is certainly quite a hit and miss affair. You may have trouble contacting someone over the phone, however, when you do connect and talk to the concerned person, the service seems excellent. Hubspot and Marketo both are having their Academy and University respectively that are truly dedicated to offering professional assistance to customers in learning to use the tools and get transformed into more confident marketers. These platforms offer certification courses for you to pursue and complete. Additionally, HubSpot offers courses and lessons individually on both the software and also, about inbound methodologies and strategies.

Conclusion

Investing in a competent marketing automation platform would dramatically transform the way you do marketing and even on the way you are analyzing and reporting on the precise work you are performing. If your organization is looking for certain aggressive growth objectives, you need to consistently monitor and keep track of your progress towards achieving those goals and aspirations. Thanks to both Marketo and Hubspot, you could even gain valuable insight into things that work best for you and those that don’t in your marketing. Both Marketo and Hubspot are great for achieving business success.

About David Montano