Ontraport vs. Salesforce Marketing Cloud

If you’re comparing Ontraport and Salesforce Marketing Cloud, you’re clearly on track to finding an established platform you can trust with your email and marketing automation.

Still, with so many different features, packages and price points offered by both platforms, it can be overwhelming to figure out which one is right for you.

It’s a big decision and an important investment for your business.

We get it, and that’s why we’re here to help clear things up. We’ll give you the facts about Ontraport and our honest assessment of how Ontraport compares to Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

But first, a note: We realize we may come off as biased (heck, we’re Ontraport, comparing ourselves to one of our competitors), but that’s not our intention! We want what’s best for you, whether it’s Ontraport or not. (It’s true — we often refer potential customers elsewhere if we know another tool would better suit their needs. We want you to be successful with our platform, not just pay our bill.)

So, let’s take a look ...

We’ll get into the feature comparisons below, but what it all comes down to is this:

At Ontraport, we see ourselves as a partner in your success, not just as another software tool on your belt. Our team cares about your business: We’ll start by working side-by-side with you to create a roadmap for your success, and from then on our over-the-top-helpful support team will be available anytime you need.

Outside of our team, you’ll find a strong community of entrepreneurs and marketers in our highly active Facebook group. While you’re there, you’ll get to know our founder and CEO: He pops up on the regular (really, we can’t keep him away!) to answer questions and share updates.

We built this platform because we wanted to remove the burden of technology so small businesses could bring their value to the world (ahem, that's our mission statement). That translates to a thoughtfully built toolset that empowers you to effectively market and sell your services, alongside a team that’s got your back — for the long haul.

Let's look at the top differences

Our sales reps have talked to thousands of people who are comparing Salesforce Marketing Cloud and Ontraport, so they have a good idea of what separates the two. Here’s what they had to say.

Ontraport has a full feature set, without enterprise pricing

If you’re looking at platforms like Ontraport and Salesforce Marketing Cloud, you know the importance of running the full picture of your marketing and sales in one place. Both platforms offer extensive feature sets, but Salesforce Marketing Cloud doesn't include core functionality like ecommerce, sales pipeline management and lead source attribution. If you want those features, you'll need to buy additional packages, which cost in the range of hundreds to thousands of dollars.

Ontraport is easier to use and is built for small businesses

Salesforce is known as a complex enterprise platform used by large corporations with developers on staff. Ontraport, on the other hand, was built intentionally to give small businesses — which tend not to have teams of tech experts nor the interest or time for learning tech — all the features they need to succeed, in an accessible way. Ontraport also offers highly customizable templates for emails, pages, forms and automations, plus done-for-you systems that you can install to get up and running in minutes.

Ontraport handles your ecommerce and sales pipeline without pricey add-ons

Salesforce Marketing Cloud comes with powerful email and marketing automation, but it’s missing the crucial ecommerce features you need to actually sell your product. For that, you’ll need to invest in Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Likewise, if you want to automate and manage your sales pipeline, you’ll need to buy Salesforce Sales Cloud. It adds up fast. With Ontraport, all your essential ecommerce and sales automation features are included — no pricey add-ons needed.

Screenshot of the Card View feature in the Ontraport app

Ontraport lets you run a membership site without integrations

Salesforce Marketing Cloud doesn’t come with any membership functionality so it’s not ideal if you plan to offer online courses. With Ontraport you can build, publish and host your entire site without pricey integrations. Whether you want to use our prebuilt system to get your site up and running in minutes, build your site from scratch or connect your existing WordPress site, you can do it all in Ontraport.

Ontraport gives you award-winning support, without the wait

Icon of a headset and a laptop computer with letters coming out of it

Salesforce support comes with a cost. You can either purchase a plan that guarantees a two-day response time or a more expensive plan that offers 24/7 support. With Ontraport, all users get free access to our team of dedicated support reps seven days a week. They’re available via chat, email and screen share — and they not only respond quickly, but they’re over-the-top helpful.

What about pricing?
Let's compare.

If you plan on doing more than just email marketing, you’ll have to pay for add-on Salesforce products.

For example, if you want automated campaigns, you’ll have to upgrade to the $1,200/month Pro plan. If you want analytics to track your growth and drive better results, you’ll need the $3,000-$10,000/month Datorama add-on. All in all, you could be spending up to $65,000 per month on the Salesforce Marketing Cloud alone — and that doesn’t even include the add-on costs for the Sales and Commerce clouds.

Plus, Salesforce requires an annual contract, so you’re locked in for at least 12 months — no downgrading or canceling until your contract is up.

Ontraport, on the other hand, gives you the full feature set without the enterprise price tag. Our pricing is transparent and listed clearly on our site, and our pricing tiers are designed to grow as your business grows so you’ll never end up with a price tag that’s disproportionate to your business size.

All plans start with a 14-day free trial, and there’s no commitment. If you decide to purchase, you can choose a pricing plan that fits your needs and upgrade or downgrade any time — and we won’t lock you into an annual contract unless you want one.

Here's what our customers are saying

“Affordable business automation at its best. I love everything about the Ontraport CRM platform... the automation features, payment processing, landing pages & forms, ease of use, and most of all, everything you get for the super affordable price you pay. You really just can't beat it! I've had it for a few years now and have referred many people to Ontraport already. I recommend that you at least try it. Ontraport offers a free trial so you can't lose. And even if you're not a techie person, Ontraport offers free screen share sessions to walk you through everything you need to know and get you up and running. The competition won't do this for free. They won't even do it for close to free. So it really is a no-brainer. Just sign up and start growing and improving your business today!”

Yusheeka Gray
DIY Credit Clinic

“I think Ontraport is the best CRM on the market. The platform is intuitive to use and the access to support is *AMAZING*. Telephone, chat and email are always available with instant support... which is what I feel makes Ontraport stand out heads and shoulders above others. You aren't left in the dark for figuring out your tech; they will literally hold your hand and I think they are the only ones in the industry that do to that extent. You can do anything your imagination comes up with in Ontraport. No other platform in this market can really do that unless you go up to an enterprise-level software like Salesforce... and sales force is really just good for super large corporations like Microsoft or John Deer. It just makes sense to support your own business with Ontraport.”

Annette Perry
Viva Automated LLC
Trustpilot

“Ontraport is a beast of a marketing machine. I can't think of anything I dislike (the team at OP are often so far ahead making development changes that when rolled out they're a pleasant surprise). Not only is the software top notch, but the support is outstanding and the community of users are incredible. And if I'm being honest, I doubt we are utilizing 5% or the software's full capabilities — still, our limited use of the tools provided is translating into a big ROI: last month’s ROI was 2848%”

Matt Jull
Automation Central

“Ontraport is sophisticated, market-leading automation software without the complexity of traditional ‘enterprise’ platforms like Salesforce. Its campaign builder is amazing — integrated visual builder and analytics. I initially chose Ontraport because it is a great balance of simplicity and feature complexity, but moreover is as "all-in-one" as you can get, whilst still supporting integrations and customization.”

David Kellam
Automate Your Business

“Such an amazing all-in-one system. We had worked previously with Salesforce and enthusiastically leapt over to Ontraport when we saw what the system could do for way less cost. Fantastic customer support, they work hard to really listen to the customer. Love how they are always working to improve their product and stay ahead of the curve in the industry.”

Nicole Fandrick
Trustpilot

“Of all the marketing automation systems I have tried over the years, Ontraport is by far the easiest one to implement and manage. The features you get rival the features that you would find in a system that is four or five times the price. And then there’s the customer support — their live chat is amazing and if you need some more in-depth support, they will schedule a live screen share with you. You can't go wrong with Ontraport.”