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Salesforce Marketing Cloud vs SugarCRM Platform comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 6, 2025

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

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)
SugarCRM Platform
Ranking in Marketing Automation
16th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (11th), CRM (29th), Sales Force Automation (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Marketing Automation category, the mindshare of Salesforce Marketing Cloud is 10.5%, down from 22.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SugarCRM Platform is 2.0%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Marketing Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Salesforce Marketing Cloud10.5%
SugarCRM Platform2.0%
Other87.5%
Marketing Automation
 

Featured Reviews

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.
reviewer1345677 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager / IT Planning & Architecture Services at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Easily customizable, automation enhances the marketing campaigns but support is the main hiccup for us
It has been effective in managing customer relationships. It has sales email campaigns, plus integration with Active Directory. And there are centralized reports for the CEO and the general managers. We work with automation for these marketing and email campaigns. It sends out emails to prospective customers related to sales offers automatically. And it copies the sales team so that they can follow up. They are tracking the sales leads. So, the automation within SugarCRM enhances the marketing campaigns. For now, my work is done because I am the IT strategy and planning manager. I just try to deliver the solution according to the requirements of the business. From my side, it's implemented already, the requirement related to the sales funnel. But if they have any other requirement from the business side, they will submit it to me, and then I will look for a suitable solution.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We use it to communicate with our customers, look at the reports to see the communication engagement, and then do sequencing to make sure that there are continuous touchpoints with the client."
"I like that I can constantly add leads to Salesforce Marketing Cloud and look at accounts there. I also like that the solution lets me set up meetings."
"Salesforce is an excellent choice."
"The most valuable feature of Salesforce Marketing Cloud is the seamless conversion of lead to opportunity, in relation to orders is good. That seamless connection is beneficial and simple."
"A powerful platform with robust features for a seamless one-tool solution."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud has helped the organization by having centralized management capabilities."
"We have found the solution stable, the performance is good, there are no bugs or glitches, and it doesn't crash or freeze."
"Offers many great features and is intuitive."
"My advice to others is this is a good solution for importing or exporting any graphics."
"The most valuable aspect of this solution is its low cost, and it works well."
"Saying that, it has a small server footprint and is easy to set up."
"Affordable and commercial open source solution is good for organizations with budget constraints."
"The most valuable features of the SugarCRM platform include its flexibility in customizing fields, layouts, and dashboards."
"Available source code, good documentation, training programs, and a relatively active community, provide the hallmarks for a successful open source effort."
"It has sales email campaigns, plus integration with Active Directory."
"By default, it comes with a really good model where you can start working with it without having a lot of developers in your team."
 

Cons

"This solution could be more user-friendly."
"User management could be better."
"In terms of improvements, it would be beneficial to enhance the Copilot actions. The issue lies with the internal language setup."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud is expensive. The email functionality should be more modern and user-friendly."
"The product could use a little bit of BI in the sense of rule-based building."
"We'd like to see more integrations with third-party products."
"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."
"The product takes too long to manage a large volume of data, it lacks that capacity."
"Pipelines, forecasts, and reporting in general, are not that good in the free version."
"You cannot include all your entities under one instance at the moment."
"Functionality and features are well suited for small business companies only."
"Sugar Enterprise could improve by removing bugs and glitches. For example, a comment was made but in the comment section, it was never displayed. However, the problems we faced might not be the fault of the solution."
"I would like to see more integration on a mobile platform in the next release."
"The interface could be more user-friendly."
"While it is already user-friendly, a slight enhancement in UI design, especially in terms of color combinations, could make the platform more visually appealing and comfortable to use."
"In the next release, I would like to see personalization of information about customers or specific businesses or opportunities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is expensive."
"This is a low cost solution suited to larger organizations."
"The solution is a bit expensive."
"The solution is paid for monthly."
"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."
"We have two types of licensing. We have a yearly license for end users and we have a concurrent login for selling."
"The licensing cost for the solution is on a yearly basis."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud is affordable, considering the significant improvements it brings to our campaign results."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Engineering Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise34
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

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...
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Also Known As

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

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