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IBM Watson Campaign Automation vs Salesforce Marketing Cloud comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

IBM Watson Campaign Automation
Ranking in Marketing Automation
20th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
1
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 July 2026, in the Marketing Automation category, the mindshare of IBM Watson Campaign Automation is 1.6%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Marketing Cloud is 11.6%, down from 22.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Marketing Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Salesforce Marketing Cloud11.6%
IBM Watson Campaign Automation1.6%
Other86.8%
Marketing Automation
 

Featured Reviews

it_user701487 - PeerSpot reviewer
Marketing Administrator and Member Web Support at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees
Valuable features include creating and using defined templates. I would like to see reporting capabilities and graphing reports.
We are currently planning to switch at the end of this year to a different ESP. One reason was that, with IBM's takeover of SilverPop, we did discover that customer care and our relationship/sales manager were no longer responsive or as caring as they had been in the past seven or eight years. The feeling is very different. We had never felt ignored because we are not super-users, but now, we do feel that way.
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

"I love their tech support; they have not been needed frequently, but when needed, they are quick and very knowledgeable."
"The most valuable feature is the 'Accelerators', which are expert-taught subject matter webinars on items such as personalization of emails and SMS to contacts and prospects."
"It is easy to use."
"Overall, I would rate Salesforce Marketing Cloud a nine out of 10."
"The tool's most valuable feature is its automation. We can integrate data with the Salesforce hub. Its Einstein feature tells us whether our campaigns are on the right track. It also helps with ideas."
"It makes it easy for a business to use any module based on their preference."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud has helped the organization by having centralized management capabilities."
"I like that Salesforce allows for the integration of different data sources."
"I think the product's best feature is its analytics, as that's where customers derive value. The second thing is its ease of implementation."
 

Cons

"One reason was that, with IBM's takeover of SilverPop, we did discover that customer care and our relationship/sales manager were no longer responsive or as caring as they had been in the past seven or eight years."
"There is a lot of room for improvement in Salesforce Marketing Cloud's dashboards and the visualization of information in each journey."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud should be linked to an email ID, so the features after 15 days can update on the opportunity. You should not have to update them manually to the next step."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud is expensive. The email functionality should be more modern and user-friendly."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud is expensive; it can be more affordable, but it doesn't matter where we implement or use it for our organization since we are able to manage well so far."
"Marketing Cloud should change the script language that it uses because it's not good. It's tricky and difficult to develop."
"The main action I want to do in Salesforce Marketing Cloud is to export data into Excel and use it. My company may have that feature locked down, or if the Excel data exporting function still isn't available in Salesforce Marketing Cloud, that's the feature I want."
"The majority of my clients are happy, but when it comes to the CDP of Salesforce, the client gets confused. They have no clue that Salesforce has a CDP platform too. If my clients want to go ahead with the same vendor, Salesforce, they get confused about the different marketing suites which are available. There is no clear marketing done for the suites available for the clients, this is where the client is facing the real challenges."
"The technicality of the solution can be streamlined."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"It's normal pricing."
"This solution is priced in the medium to high price range."
"It is a license per user."
"Its licensing is on an annual basis. Customers are okay with its licensing cost, and they don't find it expensive."
"The solution is a bit expensive."
"Salesforce has different versions of the solution and some are more suitable for smaller clients. However, Salesforce is expensive."
"This is a low cost solution suited to larger organizations."
"Salesforce is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise34
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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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

IBM Marketing Cloud, IBM SilverPop
ExactTarget
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

The King Arthur Flour, Stonyfield, InsideOut Development, Moosejaw, Big Scary Cranium, Paper Style
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 Salesforce, HubSpot, MoEngage and others in Marketing Automation. Updated: July 2026.
904,973 professionals have used our research since 2012.