No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Pardot vs Salesforce Marketing Cloud comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Pardot
Ranking in Marketing Automation
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Salesforce Marketing Cloud
Ranking in Marketing Automation
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Social CRM (4th), Marketing Management (1st), Social Media Management Solutions (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Marketing Automation category, the mindshare of Pardot is 2.7%, down from 3.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Marketing Cloud is 10.5%, down from 22.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Marketing Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Salesforce Marketing Cloud10.5%
Pardot2.7%
Other86.8%
Marketing Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Vikram Rawani - PeerSpot reviewer
Pardot Consultant at Target
Offers an easy initial setup phase and good ROI
With Pardot, users can do the segmentation based on their requirements. You can segment your prospects based on their interests, locations, companies, or the sales cycle. You can also use the engagement studio to create a journey for the people you have segmented with the help of automation feature of the tool. The aforementioned area consists of the most useful features I found in the tool apart from its out-of-the-box features. The integration between Pardot and Salesforce is beneficial if you know how to share the leads that a company finds useful so that they don't have to invest in manual work or do anything blindly to reach out to leads. Users can segment the leads using the features that the tool provides. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. If a business is into B2B marketing and can afford to purchase Pardot, then they should buy it. If the product of a company is good, then Pardot can help multiply such an organization's ROI. Based on the product and how the sales and marketing team works, the tool can be useful. In short, the tool can be as good as the person who is using it. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.
GauravSingh2 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Targeted email journeys have boosted campaign insight and now need better data access and support
I feel that Salesforce Marketing Cloud can be improved in how the data views are accessed; it would be better to have something more physical. With data extensions, you can view them directly, but for data views, it is very difficult as you can only send it out or load it into data extensions. Improvements can also be made in the connections to different external tools such as Azure or AWS. Customer support can be improved in Salesforce Marketing Cloud, as sometimes it is not clear what the issue is or how to approach solving it, and it also takes time to resolve issues.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"It's easy to create email templates and landing pages."
"The most valuable feature is the customization of the solution."
"Campaign tracking is a valuable feature."
"The implementation process is easy, it's easy to learn, the dashboards are very convenient when you go from one option to another option, the dashboard is very neat, and the UI is very easy to understand."
"Pardot directly integrates with CRM, specifically Salesforce, which has an excellent R&D team."
"It has made email marketing quicker and easier."
"Our ROI is huge, not just in cost avoidance, but also in increased sales."
"I have not had any issues with the product's stability. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The solution is completely scalable, the sky really is the limit, and if a company needs to expand it, it can do so as much as it wants."
"It is straightforward to set up."
"The feature of Salesforce Marketing Cloud that has had the largest impact on improving my campaign outcomes is the recent WhatsApp integration, which allows Salesforce to connect with subscribers through different channels such as SMS, email, or WhatsApp."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud provides an edge for my organization by tracking the budget, how it is spent, where we stand, and how many cold calls or nurtured calls have been converted into sales."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud's journey builder is very easy to handle and quickly sets up a journey for clients who use a lot of communication."
"The user interface is easy to use, especially for my staff who use assistive technology."
"I like the user interface it has a nice look and feel."
"We use Marketing Cloud for marketing campaigns and engaging customers, and it is a business-focused application for a specific area of business, which is acquiring customers."
 

Cons

"Lacks sufficient free custom fields."
"Needs to improve list building."
"When we compare it to other automation tools, in Pardot, I'm not able to see any drag-and-drop options. We have to work on an HTML template itself."
"The solution is quite expensive, at least, for smaller teams."
"​Technical support has been quick and helpful every time."
"The user interface could be made more intuitive and user-friendly."
"For new people, the installation of the tool can be difficult."
"The price of this solution is expensive. However, you are going to receive good value for money."
"The product takes too long to manage a large volume of data, it lacks that capacity."
"Managing large volumes of data takes too long."
"The response from the customer service team could be faster and the agents could be more knowledgeable."
"If someone wants to implement a best-of-breed solution, I'm uncertain whether Salesforce Marketing Cloud will be able to work, fit, or integrate smoothly."
"The encryption and decryption have room for improvement."
"They can perhaps simplify the dashboards. In my opinion as an end-user, reports could also be simplified, but it also depends on how your company is set up. It depends on how the processes are set up within your company natively. It is linked to the way you do business. So, it varies."
"A few of our clients found using Salesforce Marketing Cloud challenging after they upgraded, they were finding it difficult to just move to the newer version of Salesforce and they were complaining about the customer support because they did not help them out."
"An additional feature needed for the next release of Marketing Cloud would be better capacity for personalization."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In terms of pricing, Pardot is cheaper than Marketing Cloud."
"It is a competitively priced product, considering what it provides."
"The price of this solution is expensive. However, you are going to receive good value for money. They could improve by reducing the price."
"We pay about $4000 a month."
"​Make sure you do not pay for features that you may not need​."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"We did a yearly license. We negotiated and got a great deal. I don't think we would have gotten far with the regular price, but they negotiated, so it was worth that."
"The solution's pricing is very high and should be more flexible for smaller companies."
"Salesforce is an expensive solution."
"Salesforce has different versions of the solution and some are more suitable for smaller clients. However, Salesforce is expensive."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud is a highly expensive solution, it needs to be less expensive. We are on an annual license to use the solution."
"The solution is paid for monthly."
"Its licensing is on an annual basis. Customers are okay with its licensing cost, and they don't find it expensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Marketing Automation solutions are best for your needs.
913,806 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Retailer
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise34
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Salesforce Marketing Cloud?
I did not work on any pricing or implementation aspects but learned on my own when dealing with Revenue Cloud products.
What needs improvement with Salesforce Marketing Cloud?
Regarding areas for improvement, the realization of value from Salesforce Einstein's predictive AI features is a notable challenge. Although the implementation partner highlighted these capabilitie...
What is your primary use case for Salesforce Marketing Cloud?
As a consultant, I partner with organizations to optimize their use of Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC). My engagement often begins pre-implementation, where I lead the requirements gathering proc...
 

Also Known As

No data available
ExactTarget
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Arketi Group
American Express, Financial Conduct Authority, KPN, Merck KGaA, Peterborough City Council, The Chapar, ADP, Financial Times, Stanley Black & Decker, SureFlap, Western Union, Philips
Find out what your peers are saying about Pardot vs. Salesforce Marketing Cloud and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,806 professionals have used our research since 2012.