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Pardot vs Salesforce Marketing Cloud comparison

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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 solution is very fast, it's easy to create email templates and landing pages, and it is very good at score lists and sending signals to a salesperson for outreach purposes."
"The product is stable."
"I have not had any issues with the product's stability. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Pardot directly integrates with CRM, specifically Salesforce, which has an excellent R&D team."
"The solution can be easily integrated with Salesforce."
"The tracking and automation of outbound messaging is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"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."
"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."
"The most valuable features of Salesforce Marketing Cloud are that it performs well and gives me what I need. It's the most friendly interface system for CRM I've worked with. Additionally, it integrates fairly well with different kinds of AI and ML to allow you to receive more out of your application."
"The automation is great. It saves us a lot of time and it makes us move faster."
"The AI-powered tools such as Salesforce Datorama and Einstein save time and have an impact on marketing strategy decisions for my customers."
"The most valuable feature of Salesforce Marketing Cloud is the reporting engine. Reports are very good and easy to build."
"The Journey and CloudPages and automation are all great."
"The Journey Builder, which has been around for a while and follows the steps that customers use, is the greatest tool that Salesforce has."
"The solution is very, very scalable."
 

Cons

"For new people, the installation of the tool can be difficult."
"Pardot needs many improvements in terms of email design and design studio functionalities."
"Pardot must be synced with Salesforce."
"Needs to improve list building."
"The solution lacks integration with Instagram, which is our top problem with the product."
"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 reporting features of the Pardot system could be improved to provide better and more data."
"Lacks sufficient free custom fields."
"I would like to see more ways to accomplish specific tasks."
"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."
"In the SMS area, it is not up to the mark, compared to what has been developed for email."
"Salesforce Marketing Cloud could improve by having more graphical options because a lot of tables are now only numbers and percentages and data. I prefer graphs, lines, and pie charts. I know there are ways to receive this from Salesforce Marketing Cloud. It doesn't play a huge role in my daily work to invest the time to figure it out. I feel that it would be time wasted. They could make the graphical options easier to find and use in the future."
"The solution can be difficult to set up for non-technical individuals."
"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."
"An additional feature needed for the next release of Marketing Cloud would be better capacity for personalization."
"Clarity around new features could be improved when they are released."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a competitively priced product, considering what it provides."
"We pay about $4000 a month."
"The price of this solution is expensive. However, you are going to receive good value for money. They could improve by reducing the price."
"In terms of pricing, Pardot is cheaper than Marketing Cloud."
"​Make sure you do not pay for features that you may not need​."
"The licensing cost for the solution is on a yearly basis."
"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."
"My company pays to use this solution."
"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 is an expensive solution."
"Salesforce has different versions of the solution and some are more suitable for smaller clients. However, Salesforce is expensive."
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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.
914,262 professionals have used our research since 2012.