The 20 Best Marketing Automation Tools Available to You

A majority of companies use advertising and marketing automation instruments these days — actually, research cite round 56% of businesses at the moment use the know-how, and that quantity continues to develop.

Whereas marketing automation software program can assist firms improve effectivity by streamlining their workflows, there are such a lot of choices to select from, full of various options with numerous options and use circumstances.

I’ll enable you to lower via the noise to seek out the highest advertising and marketing automation platforms, highlighting what they do and the way they can assist your crew.

On this article, I am going to cowl:

What are advertising and marketing automation instruments?

Advertising and marketing automation instruments use software program to automate repetitive advertising and marketing duties.

Some platforms solely supply e mail actions, drip sequences, and CRM updates. Others could assist with lead scoring, gross sales lead rotation, SMS, and extra.

Automating your advertising and marketing duties can benefit your business by growing general effectivity and permitting you extra time to work on high-level tasks.

For instance, you should utilize advertising and marketing automation instruments to gather priceless information that can be utilized to create extra personalised advertising and marketing campaigns and improve conversion charges.

How I Examined the Greatest Advertising and marketing Automation Software program

Each advertising and marketing automation platform provides totally different advantages and options, making it a problem to slim down the most suitable choice for your enterprise.

That’s why I examined a number of choices for you. Right here’s what I appeared for when testing the most effective advertising and marketing automation platforms.

Ease of Use

I don’t find out about you, however I’m a visible particular person. If an interface appears to be like complicated, I’m hesitant to dive in. That’s why I look for easy interfaces that point out the instrument is straightforward to make use of.

I search for instruments with a easy interface that can information me via the platform after I first use it. It’s additionally useful if the platform consists of an easy-to-access information base so I can dive deeper into how a characteristic works after I need assistance.

Integrations

Advertising and marketing automation instruments that combine together with your present instruments are important.

The entire level of promoting automation platforms is that can assist you save time by making duties seamless. That is made potential when every part in your tech stack connects.

When testing the most effective advertising and marketing automation platforms, I appeared for software program with a library of integrations. In my expertise, the extra app integrations accessible, the higher linked the platform is.

Worth

This may be subjective to your finances and enterprise dimension, however value continues to be an element I thought of when reviewing these instruments.

Instruments that provide extra options and help can command the next value just because they can assist you scale back the variety of instruments in your tech stack.

For those who’re simply getting began with automation and need to see for those who can profit from considered one of these instruments, it’s additionally useful to search for ones that provide free trials. A free trial — or higher but, a free without end plan — helps you to expertise what the platform provides with out totally committing.

Right here, I’ve cultivated an inventory of promoting automation instruments that can assist you type via your choices and really feel assured selecting the most effective answer for you and your crew.

1. HubSpot Marketing Automation

HubSpot’s advertising and marketing automation performance is likely one of the strongest instruments on this record by way of options. In line with the G2 Grid for Marketing Automation, it is also some of the in style by way of buyer sentiment.

In fact, HubSpot has a full development suite that features gross sales software program, advertising and marketing software program, and help software program, which all combine mechanically with HubSpot’s CRM.

For my part, the mixed impact of getting your whole information and development exercise in a single place can unleash tons of inventive automation prospects that may be troublesome or not possible for those who used separate instruments.

As a standalone, HubSpot‘s advertising and marketing automation performance consists of an easy-to-use visible board the place you may craft easy or extremely subtle conditional workflows.

I’ve discovered it may well take time to grasp the instrument (you’ll scale up extra rapidly with the assistance of HubSpot Academy), however when you get a grasp on it, the inventive prospects are infinite.

You possibly can arrange easy e mail record autoresponders or construct a sensible and sophisticated community of guidelines designed to focus on particular customers with the precise proper e mail, live chat, web site expertise, and extra.

Mainly, HubSpot’s automation instruments go far past email, so you may scale your development and spend much less time on repetitive duties.

Worth: HubSpot’s e mail and kind advertising and marketing automation instruments are free. Paid versions of Marketing Hub, which begin at $15 per consumer/month, supply elevated entry and options.

Do you know? 57% of HubSpot Advertising and marketing Hub clients noticed a rise within the variety of leads generated with their advertising and marketing campaigns. Check out our whitepaper for extra insights into the enterprise worth of Advertising and marketing Hub (identical to this one).

2. Sender

Sender is a prime e mail and SMS automation instrument that’s reasonably priced for small and rising companies. It has every part you want for profitable campaigns, from a easy drag-and-drop e mail builder to in-depth analytics and a heatmap.

I like Sender as a result of you may develop your e mail record with high-converting pop-ups, customise pre-made e mail templates, and make use of an e mail design builder to create high-converting emails.

As soon as your e mail is prepared, you may create automated workflows with no problem and ship the proper message to the proper viewers utilizing good segmentation.

Once I examined Sender, I appreciated that I may get began immediately without spending a dime. Organising my first workflow (as proven above) was additionally very straightforward and included pop-ups that guided me via the method.

Worth: Sender has a Free Without end plan that gives many premium options for as much as 2,500 subscribers and 15,000 emails per thirty days. Paid plans begin round $15 per thirty days.

Greatest for: With its emphasis on e mail and SMS automation, Sender is greatest for ecommerce manufacturers.

3. ManyChat

Advertising and marketing automation is not nearly e mail. Think about automating among the most repetitive conversations you’ve with clients on different platforms.

ManyChat capabilities as a chatbot that may just do that on Fb Messenger, Instagram Direct Messages, WhatsApp, and SMS.

I feel ManyChat is nice as a result of you may construct a bot in minutes with its templates and easy-to-use interface. Plus, the knowledge you find out about your customers could be synced to your CRM and different instruments.

Worth: ManyChat provides a free month-to-month plan that permits engagement with as much as 1,000 contacts by way of Instagram Direct Messages, Fb Messenger, and WhatsApp. Further entry and options can be found via ManyChat’s paid plans, which begin at $15 per thirty days.

What I like: I’m a giant fan of utilizing templates to avoid wasting time and mind energy. With ManyChat, you should utilize considered one of their many templates or its AI assistant to generate automated messages.

4. MailModo

Mailmodo is a one-step e mail advertising and marketing answer platform. It permits you to create and ship AMP-powered interactive emails with out coding.

I like that you should utilize their drag-and-drop template editor to construct e mail templates with interactive widgets that give your emails app-like performance.

For those who don’t need to construct one from scratch, you may select one from their template library, which comprises templates for numerous use circumstances.

Mailmodo additionally has a visible buyer journey editor that follows the identical drag-and-drop idea, making establishing e mail automations a breeze.

For instance, you may arrange automations that ship an e mail after a hard and fast interval or by situation, like when a buyer opens an e mail, clicks on a hyperlink, or submits a response.

These workflows are straightforward to arrange and extremely customizable to your wants.

Mailmodo’s different options help you phase your subscribers dynamically, arrange ship time optimization to ship emails on the most optimum time, take a look at totally different variations of the identical e mail earlier than sending, and examine the efficiency of your e mail campaigns in a dashboard.

Mailmodo additionally provides AI-powered features, resembling its AI topic line generator, AI content material generator, and an AI template creator.

Worth: Mailmodo has three pricing plans: Lite ($39/month), Professional ($79/month), and Max ($159/month). Every plan permits you to ship emails to 2,500 contacts, with month-to-month ship limits that improve with every plan tier.

What I like: Free trials had been one of many options I appeared for when testing these advertising and marketing automation platforms, so I used to be excited to see that Mailmodo provides a free 21-day trial interval.

5. SureTriggers

SureTriggers is an automation instrument that optimizes workflows and simplifies enterprise procedures.

The plugin assists within the automation of repetitive processes, the discount of guide errors, and the enhancement of productiveness in your WordPress web site.

I feel its capability to combine with different CRM and advertising and marketing instruments makes it easy to automate quite a few processes and enhance productiveness.

SureTriggers is a helpful answer for firms of all sizes eager to optimize their advertising and marketing automation efforts because it consists of options like customized workflows, automation triggers, and reporting.

It additionally provides an efficient and user-friendly answer for automating repetitive operations like lead administration, customer support, and e mail advertising and marketing within the discipline of promoting automation.

By automating these processes, customers could save working bills, improve lead technology, and enhance buyer interplay, all of which contribute to higher advertising and marketing outcomes.

Worth: SureTriggers provides a free without end plan for one WordPress web site. Paid plans begin at $9 per thirty days.

Greatest for: SureTriggers is designed for WordPress web sites, making it a distinct segment answer for the WordPress community of plugins and instruments.

6. LeadSquared

LeadSquared is a one-stop answer for gross sales execution and advertising and marketing automation.

You possibly can seize leads throughout numerous campaigns and sources, monitor their exercise, and even phase them based mostly on demographics for a focused method to advertising and marketing.

The omnichannel platform helps you contact base with leads over e mail, WhatsApp, SMS, social media, self-serve portals, and extra.

As soon as you propose to scale your advertising and marketing efforts, you may arrange automated and trigger-based workflows to make sure constant outreach throughout platforms.

LeadSquared additionally permits you to arrange dashboards and in-depth, real-time studies for insights into marketing campaign efficiency.

Worth: The advertising and marketing automation suite is obtainable in 4 tiers:

• Important for $150.
• Primary for $400.
• Commonplace $1,200.
• Enterprise for $2,500.

What I like: The very best half in regards to the emails and touchdown pages on LeadSquared is that they require no code, which is handy for those who’re a much less technical marketer like me. The pages could be utterly custom-made with an easy-to-use drag-and-drop editor.

7. SendPulse

Having began out as an e mail advertising and marketing service, SendPulse steadily developed right into a full-scale advertising and marketing automation platform with quite a lot of channels to achieve present and potential clients.

Established manufacturers and small companies alike can construct extremely personalised message flows that mix emails, chatbots, and SMS notifications.

I discovered the visual chatbot builder itself to be very versatile because it permits customers to create chatbots for Fb, Instagram, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Viber. It additionally helps ChatGPT integration, which can make the chatbot much more human-like.

Worth: SendPulse offers a month-to-month free plan. Paid plans begin at $8 per thirty days.

What I like: SendPulse is an all-in-one platform that even provides a web based course builder. For those who’ve thought of monetizing your information or utilizing programs for lead technology, this platform might be an amazing possibility.

8. Moosend

Moosend is an e mail advertising and marketing automation platform that caters to numerous industries, together with ecommerce, SaaS, and businesses.

The automation feature makes use of superior web site monitoring and triggers that help you ship the proper e mail marketing campaign to these in your contacts who’re concerned about a selected services or products.

For instance, you may arrange a cart abandonment sequence to focus on potential clients who left their purchasing carts with out making a purchase order.

In my expertise, gathering and managing buyer information can turn out to be useful as you should utilize it to craft product advice campaigns based mostly on product views.

This information additionally permits you to create detailed studies of the marketing campaign’s progress and the customers’ exercise so you may optimize the effectiveness of your promotional messages.

Worth: Moosend provides a 30-day free trial, so you may strive before you purchase. After that, Professional plans begin at $7 per thirty days.

Greatest for: Considered one of my favourite elements of testing Moosend was seeing its agency-side options. Moosend can act as a private consumer administration hub the place you may work on a number of consumer tasks from one place. Plus, it comes with customizations, making this an amazing possibility for businesses.

9. Bardeen.ai

Bardeen is an AI automation tool that optimizes workflows. With Bardeen.ai, automation is now so simple as texting a good friend.

Bardeen helps streamline your workflow with AI, whether or not you should maintain your CRM clear and up to date, personalize outreach campaigns, or synchronize information throughout numerous instruments your inner crew makes use of.

What I like greatest about Bardeen is that it’s a Chrome extension. This made it straightforward to get began and join it with my present workflow immediately.

The power to combine with different CRMs like HubSpot and over 100 other integrations makes it straightforward to automate quite a few processes and enhance productiveness.

Bardeen is a helpful answer for firms of all sizes trying to optimize their advertising and marketing and gross sales automation efforts. Getting began is straightforward, with hundreds of ready-to-use automation templates to select from.

Worth: Bardeen provides a free without end plan, whereas a Skilled plan begins at $10 per thirty days.

Professional tip: Bardeen is a Chrome extension, so that you have to be a Google Chrome consumer to make the most of this workflow instrument.

10. Omnisend

Omnisend is an omnichannel advertising and marketing automation platform constructed for ecommerce. Providing highly effective automation workflows, you may get began rapidly with pre-built templates that maintain on-line retailers in thoughts.

With Omnisend, you may add a number of channels inside the identical automation workflow: e mail, SMS, Fb Messenger, push notifications, and extra.

I like that Omnisend additionally makes use of a user-friendly visible builder and templates, which make creating workflows, kinds, touchdown pages, pop-ups, and emails fast and simple.

Worth: Omnisend provides a free plan with primary e mail advertising and marketing automation that’s greatest suited to small companies simply beginning out. Medium- to larger-sized companies will most probably profit from Omnisend’s paid plans, which begin at $16 per thirty days.

What I like: Whereas I wasn’t capable of see too many options accessible since I don’t have an ecommerce store (most options required me to attach my store earlier than I may discover), I like Omnisend’s interface. It’s organized and simple to know, which makes establishing workflows much less intimidating.

11. EngageBay

EngageBay is one other advertising and marketing automation platform designed particularly for small- to medium-sized companies.

This software program provides a variety of options, together with e mail advertising and marketing, social media administration, and web site chat.

Different commendable options, for my part, embrace drag-and-drop builders for touchdown pages and emails, A/B testing, SMS advertising and marketing, push notifications, deserted cart retrieval and reminders, autoresponders, and canned responses.

Worth: EngageBay provides a free plan for small companies, in addition to three superior paid plans that scale with your enterprise wants, beginning at $12.74 per consumer/month.

What I like: I like that EngageBay provides a free plan, making it straightforward for small companies to get began with automation, even with a restricted finances.

12. Ontraport

Not like different advertising and marketing automation instruments, Ontraport is a enterprise automation software program particularly designed for entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, and small companies.

Whereas it has CRM and advertising and marketing automation performance, I admire that it additionally has a number of different options to run and develop a small enterprise, together with, however not restricted to, e mail advertising and marketing, touchdown pages, reporting, and ecommerce.

One of the priceless issues Ontraport provides is its give attention to reporting and insights. Whereas some instruments generally is a little bit of a black field, Ontraport provides you a transparent have a look at the efficiency of your campaigns.

Worth: Although Ontraport doesn’t have a free plan, it does supply a free 14-day trial with every of its 4 paid plans. Pricing for Ontraport’s primary plan begins at $24 per thirty days, which incorporates limitless e mail sending and drag-and-drop advertising and marketing automation.

Greatest for: Entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, and small companies.

13. Brevo

Previously SendinBlue, Brevo is a digital advertising and marketing platform that options well-liked automation software program suited to each newbie and superior entrepreneurs.

With Brevo, you may design mobile-friendly e mail campaigns both from scratch or via customizable templates. You may also run SMS campaigns from Brevo. Superior options embrace reporting and lead scoring.

Worth: Brevo provides a fairly spectacular free plan, which incorporates primary advertising and marketing automation performance, limitless contacts, and as much as 300 emails per day. Paid plans begin at $25 per thirty days.

What I like: Brevo provides different software program, resembling gross sales and conversations platforms, plus a CRM, so you may seamlessly combine your tech stack.

14. ActiveCampaign

ActiveCampaign is an built-in e mail advertising and marketing, advertising and marketing automation, and small enterprise CRM.

ActiveCampaign‘s strongest level is its highly effective and versatile advertising and marketing automation performance. I feel it’s some of the complete options available on the market, and its deliverability is also rated as among the best out there.

I’ve discovered that this most likely isn‘t the most effective instrument for newbies or these with low technical capabilities, because it takes a bit extra effort and time to study. However whenever you do study the platform, it’s fairly highly effective.

Worth: ActiveCampaign provides a 14-day free trial. Paid plans begin at $15 per thirty days.

What I like: ActiveCampaign’s top-rated deliverability charges are an amazing promoting level if you wish to make sure you get into your clients’ inboxes.

15. Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

Previously often called Pardot, Salesforce Advertising and marketing Cloud Account Engagement is a cloud automation answer that largely serves enterprise purchasers which have the technical assets and time to study the platform.

It has a ton of options that automate communication to present contacts, from CRM integration to e mail advertising and marketing, lead nurturing, and an ROI reporting performance to ensure your campaigns are working.

You possibly can monitor all interactions in your web site and construct predictive lead scoring based mostly on the parameters you set. All of this helps enhance marketing efficiency and take away wasted effort and time out of your gross sales crew.

I ought to be aware that whereas it’s extremely highly effective, this software program might not be as accessible or reasonably priced for smaller companies or entrepreneurs as there may be not a free plan or trial.

Worth: Plans for Advertising and marketing Cloud Account Engagement begin at $1,250 per thirty days.

Greatest for: At its steep value level, this advertising and marketing automation platform is greatest for enterprise firms.

16. Keap

Keap (previously often called Infusionsoft) has been round since 2001 and has helped hundreds of entrepreneurs ship on leads, income, and buyer acquisition targets.

Keap actually prospers within the small enterprise and solopreneur crowd, and in my expertise, I’ve seen it has a fairly subtle consumer base.

You possibly can arrange comparatively advanced determination timber relying on which lead magnet somebody indicators up for, what number of (and which) emails they open and click on, or different contact property information.

As Keap‘s options proceed to evolve, long-time clients could choose Keap’s Max Basic plan since it’s most much like Infusionsoft’s unique platform.

Worth: Keap provides a free 14-day trial and three totally different paid plans based mostly on buyer wants, beginning at $249 per thirty days.

What I like: Keap’s options are greatest for small companies that want built-in gross sales and advertising and marketing automation.

17. Marketo

Marketo was based in 2006 as a advertising and marketing automation software program firm. It was later acquired by Adobe and integrated into its enterprise advertising and marketing cloud.

The Adobe integration implies that, for those who use Adobe Analytics for information measurement and Adobe Goal for experimentation and personalization, you may have a robust enterprise advertising and marketing automation and optimization suite.

The instrument is usually geared towards enterprise clients — it is a bit out of vary for many small enterprise homeowners.

Worth: Adobe doesn’t supply a free trial or plan for Marketo. Since Marketo’s plan costs are decided by your database dimension, you will have to achieve out to the gross sales division for a quote.

Greatest for: For those who already use different Adobe merchandise, this might be a seamless instrument so as to add to your tech stack.

18. GetResponse

GetResponse is advertising and marketing automation software program with many alternative layers and options. Its reasonably priced E-mail Advertising and marketing plan consists of primary autoresponders, templates, and an inventory dimension of 1,000 contacts.

GetReponse’s extra premium plans embrace highly effective options like drip campaigns, contact scoring, event-based automation, ecommerce monitoring, and extra.

Basically, I discovered this software program straightforward to make use of. You will usually discover good outcomes from the instrument, though it really works greatest with the less complicated options, like e mail newsletters. It could develop into trickier to work with the platform for those who plan on implementing difficult conditional logic and advertising and marketing automation.

Worth: GetResponse provides a free 30-day trial. Paid plans begin at $19 per thirty days.

Professional tip: GetResponse provides a reduced plan — 50% off month-to-month plans — for nonprofits.

19. Drip

Drip is likely one of the few advertising and marketing automation instruments on this record that’s primarily targeted on ecommerce advertising and marketing automation.

It offers one of many extra “open” platforms, claiming that it performs nicely with “just about any advertising and marketing technique you need to put in movement.”

Moreover, I discovered e mail to be considered one of its strengths. Some e mail advertising and marketing and automation options embrace limitless e mail sends, pre-built workflows, and multi-channel advertising and marketing.

Worth: Although Drip doesn’t have a free plan, it does supply a free 14-day trial. Paid plans are based mostly in your variety of e mail contacts and begin at $39 per thirty days.

What I like: Drip excels in personalization and analytics. Total, I discovered it to be a robust instrument for ecommerce advertising and marketing automation.

20. Mautic

Mautic is the one open-source advertising and marketing automation platform on this record. Based in 2014, Mautic has grown rapidly and is seemingly selecting up steam with high-tech firms.

Presently, over 200,000 organizations use Mautic, and it’s accessible in over 35 languages.

Worth: Free

Greatest for: For extra technical entrepreneurs who need entry to open-source codes.

How one can Select the Greatest Advertising and marketing Automation Software program

A extra area of interest advertising and marketing automation product could also be higher for SMB and B2C environments, however B2B and enterprise firms might have a platform with wider functionality.

Listed here are some key areas to contemplate as you consider advertising and marketing automation software program merchandise to decide on the one which’s best for you:

1. Decide your finances and enterprise wants.

If automation’s advantages could be summed up with one assertion, it’s this: It’s going to make you extra environment friendly, so you may give attention to the duties you take pleasure in and which have the best return.

With that in thoughts, you’ll need to consider the value as you think about functionality.

For SMBs and B2C organizations focusing totally on e mail, a scaled-down system is likely to be ample. Nevertheless, with extra superior wants, enterprise (and thus larger ticket) software program is extra cost-efficient in the long term.

I like to recommend you select a supplier that is moderately priced however also can develop with you as your wants change. In spite of everything, decreasing bloated operations is important to scaling successfully.

2. Consider the software program’s ease of use.

Automation is not a easy factor to implement, so ensure that the interface of the software program will work with you, not towards you. See if you will discover screenshots of the UX or demo the software program so you may decide if it appears to be like easy and simple to navigate.

Automation could be technical, so I counsel on the lookout for suppliers which have strong information bases, tutorials, and different buyer help choices.

3. Discover analytics and reporting choices.

You will need to have the ability to measure the success of any drip campaigns you’ve working, so ensure that your automation software program will maintain monitor of the metrics that matter most to you.

In B2B and enterprise environments with many stakeholders, you may additionally want superior reporting skills resembling personalised dashboards or automated reporting by way of e mail.

For instance, HubSpot’s marketing analytics software helps you to arrange customized dashboards to watch something from web site visitors analytics to e mail signups, top-performing income sources, and extra.

4. Analysis integrations.

How nicely does the advertising and marketing automation software program play together with your present stack? Integrations help you handle information and get extra out of your instruments.

Professional tip: Yow will discover our essential apps for marketers in HubSpot’s App Market.

5. Contemplate potential limitations.

Some automation software program platforms could restrict the variety of actions in a month or the database dimension you are allowed.

Going into any analysis, I counsel you know the way many contacts you’ve, what number of emails you ship on common, and what you need the software program to realize.

It will forestall you from underestimating the price of your automation software program.

6. Request a demo.

Earlier than making a remaining determination, think about reaching out to every supplier’s gross sales crew to request a demo or join free trial provides.

Attempting out a advertising and marketing automation instrument before you purchase it may well enable you to decide which options greatest serve your wants.

Getting Began With Advertising and marketing Automation

There are tons of choices for advertising and marketing automation software program. It is all about choosing the proper one for your enterprise functions, finances, and technical experience.

Need one thing extremely highly effective and limitless? It could find yourself costing extra and taking effort and time to study. The cheaper choices, by comparability, may need too restricted a scale.

Finally, it is a trade-off that you should weigh for your enterprise.

Editor’s be aware: This submit was initially printed in April 2019 and has been up to date for comprehensiveness.