I know firsthand that choosing the right marketing automation platform can make or break your marketing (and your budget). Having worked with many marketing automation tools in the past, I've seen the good, the bad, and the downright frustrating. Of course, no one expects these platforms to be effortless, but there's nothing worse than shelling out thousands of dollars on a tool everyone dreads using—or worse, doesn't get you the results you want.
Marketo (now called Adobe Marketo Engage) and Pardot (now called Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement, or MCAE) are two prominent players in the space, but they serve different needs. Your level of success with each will depend on a variety of factors, including how well the platform aligns with your sales and marketing goals, the complexity of your workflows, and how easily your team can adopt and manage it.
To help you figure out whether Marketo or Pardot is best for you, I'll be diving into some key strengths, weaknesses, and quirks of both platforms to give you an idea of which one makes the most sense for your business.
Table of contents:
What is Marketo?
Marketo is an enterprise marketing automation platform known for its powerful features and deep customization capabilities. It's primarily meant for B2B marketing, but it also works well for B2C (especially compared to Pardot).
It launched in 2006 and was later scooped up by Adobe in 2018, which helped it become a top choice for companies that need advanced automation, detailed campaign control, and greater flexibility with their marketing data. But with its robust capabilities comes complexity—some folks say it's not a very intuitive platform, so a solid technical foundation (or a dedicated admin) is key to unlocking its full potential.
What is Pardot?
Pardot is actually now called Marketing Cloud Account Engagement or MCAE, and it's Salesforce's take on B2B marketing automation.
Pardot has been around since 2007 and officially became part of Salesforce in 2013. If your team is already using Salesforce, Pardot makes a lot of sense—it plays really well with the CRM and keeps everything in one place. It's also generally considered easier to use than Marketo, making it great for teams that don't have a marketing ops expert on hand. That said, it's not the most innovative tool out there, and if you need more advanced automation, landing page design, or reporting, you might find it a little limiting.
Marketing Cloud vs. MCAE
You might have also heard of Salesforce Marketing Cloud—that's different from Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (a.k.a. Pardot). Even though they're both Salesforce products, they target different audiences. Pardot is more focused on long sales cycles and account-based marketing, which makes it ideal for B2B specifically. Marketing Cloud differs from both Pardot and Marketo because it's better suited for B2C marketing, with its emphasis on transactional purchases and real-time messaging.
Marketo vs. Pardot at a glance
Unfortunately, I was unable to test either of these platforms this time around—turns out, it's very difficult to get trial access if you're not a business actually on the hunt for marketing automation software. This is likely because both Marketo and Pardot require extensive setup before you can start using or testing them effectively (although you can get demos of the rest of Salesforce pretty easily, so who knows).
Still, I got a very good idea of what each of these marketing automation platforms has to offer. As a marketer who's familiar with a good mix of tools, from Mailchimp to Salesforce Marketing Cloud, I knew what to look out for as I sifted through product reviews, forum discussions, demos, and tutorials for this comparison.
Marketo | Pardot | |
|---|---|---|
Features | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Advanced platform for B2B (and B2C) with flexible analytics, reporting, and customization | ⭐⭐⭐ Basic but functional for small B2B teams; lacks sufficient social tools, advanced automation, and robust reporting |
Ease of use | ⭐⭐⭐ Steep learning curve; requires templates and technical setup; interface is less intuitive | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Easier to learn, lower technical barrier, and integrates well with Salesforce |
Lead management | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ More scalable lead scoring and segmentation but requires effort to set up | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Has lead scoring and grading but struggles with advanced segmentation |
Automation and workflow | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Smart campaigns provide deeper automation and customization | ⭐⭐⭐ Basic automation with segmentation rules; slower processing times |
Integration | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Strong Salesforce integration; also integrates with Zapier | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Integrates natively with Salesforce; also integrates with Zapier |
Pricing | ⭐⭐ Expensive; requires consulting or training and additional tools for full functionality | ⭐⭐⭐ Mid-range pricing for a marketing automation platform; potentially pricier for smaller teams |
Pardot is easier to use
Salesforce isn't exactly synonymous with simplicity, but surprisingly enough, one of Pardot's biggest selling points is its ease of use, especially for smaller, B2B teams without dedicated marketing operations experts or developers on call. Pardot has a much lower technical barrier to entry compared to Marketo. While Marketo requires extensive training and setup, some folks claim that Pardot can be learned in as little as a weekend (though a few days to a week is probably more realistic). This makes it a good fit for small to mid-sized teams looking to get campaigns up and running quickly.
Pardot also benefits from easy integration with Salesforce, making it the natural choice for companies already using Salesforce as their CRM. Since it's a Salesforce product, data flows naturally between the two systems without requiring any complex integrations. This is particularly helpful for lead management and tracking so Pardot users don't have to configure a separate connection to sync marketing and sales activities.
The email builder and landing page tools in Pardot are also quite straightforward and user-friendly, even if they're not the most advanced in the market. The email editor will let you do basic A/B testing, and form integration is relatively simple compared to Marketo.
This ease of use can kind of be a weakness with Pardot—it's been criticized for its outdated interface and overall lack of innovation. For example, its social media integration feature isn't what it used to be, with some users reporting that Pardot no longer even properly renders link previews.
But overall, at least for most users, Pardot is a better choice if you need to get up and running quickly.
Marketo provides advanced analytics and reporting
If robust reporting and in-depth analytics are a high priority, Marketo is the winner here. Its native reporting tools are far more advanced than Pardot's, so you can customize reports and track highly specific data points. You can also integrate third-party analytics tools for even deeper insights with Marketo, while Pardot users need additional Salesforce integrations to get similar reporting capabilities.
One of Marketo's best features is its Revenue Cycle Modeler (RCM), which allows users to map the entire lead-to-revenue process. It provides detailed insights into how leads move through the funnel, how long they spend at each stage, and which marketing tactics contribute to conversions. Pardot has a pre-defined revenue model, and many users find it restrictive compared to Marketo's more customizable approach.
Another key differentiator is Marketo Sales Insight, which integrates with Salesforce and enables custom activities and event tracking at the record level. Pardot doesn't currently offer these features.
But Marketo's reporting does come with a few drawbacks. Users mention that while the platform offers extensive data, it's not always easy to extract and use. Some have had issues when trying to pull raw data for external reporting, especially when integrating with data warehouses. Plus, those who aren't power users often struggle to generate the reports they need without assistance from marketing operations teams. Marketo provides incredibly powerful analytics, but compared to Pardot, it requires a more technical skillset to fully leverage all it has to offer.
Pardot has more structured lead management
Marketo's lead management is solid—which makes sense, since that's a big part of marketing automation. But Pardot takes a unique approach to lead scoring and management that many users prefer over Marketo's system.
One of Pardot's biggest advantages is that it separates lead score and lead grade into two distinct metrics. Score reflects a prospect's engagement level based on their marketing activities, while grade assesses how well they match the company's ideal customer profile (ICP). Separating the two makes it easier for sales teams to prioritize leads based on both interest and fit instead of combining everything into a single number like Marketo does.
Because Pardot is natively built into Salesforce, it also provides a smooth lead tracking and nurturing experience. It syncs directly with Salesforce Campaigns so your marketing efforts are tied back to sales activities without the need for a ton of extra integration work. Marketo also integrates with Salesforce, but Pardot's built-in nature makes the connection more intuitive.
Another feature that Pardot users appreciate is its tagging system, which lets you tag prospects and use those tags across nurture campaigns and automation sequences. It ultimately helps with organizing and segmenting leads more effectively.
Of course, lead management in Pardot isn't totally without complaints. Some users struggle with many-to-one account relationships, meaning companies with multiple contacts under a single account may find it difficult to segment and nurture leads properly. If you're working with complex account structures often, you may have to rely on hacky workarounds to make things function as needed.
Marketo offers more customization
For any team that needs deep customization, advanced segmentation, and multi-channel automation, Marketo will meet every edge case need you have.
Marketo's Smart Campaigns are particularly powerful, with extensive automation capabilities that handle everything from lead nurturing and lifecycle management to custom integrations and lead routing. Users love the flexibility of these campaigns because they offer far more options than Pardot's automation and segmentation rules.
While Pardot does provide automation features, they're more fragmented, so you need to stitch multiple rules together manually or rely on Engagement Studio to build nurture sequences.
Another area where Marketo excels is multi-channel lead nurturing. It gives you dynamic personalization across email, web, ads, and other touchpoints for more effective complex enterprise marketing strategies.
But great customization also demands great technical expertise and resources to fully unlock Marketo's potential. For teams that have the bandwidth to manage a sophisticated marketing automation platform, Marketo is a powerful tool. But for those who prioritize ease of use, Pardot may be the better fit.
Both Marketo and Pardot connect with Zapier
While both platforms come with their fair share of integrations, using Zapier, you can connect Marketo and Pardot to thousands of other apps, so you can take advantage of AI automation and solve tough challenges as you scale your marketing. Send data in and out of Marketo and Pardot, integrating your marketing automation with the rest of your tech stack.
Learn more about how to automate Marketo and how to automate Pardot, or get started with one of these pre-made workflows.
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Pardot vs. Marketo: Which should you choose?
If your team values ease of use, quick setup, and native Salesforce integration, Pardot is likely the better choice. It's a good option for small to mid-sized B2B companies that need a marketing automation platform without a steep learning curve. The built-in Salesforce sync, lead scoring and grading system, and user-friendly email and form builders make it great for teams that want to focus on marketing execution rather than platform administration. Just take into account that if you need advanced reporting and automation, or easily integrated social tools, Pardot could feel more limited.
If you value more sophisticated segmentation, in-depth analytics, and highly customizable automation workflows, Marketo is the better option. It's especially great for larger marketing teams or companies with complex sales cycles that require multi-touch lead nurturing across multiple channels. Of course, the tradeoff is complexity. Marketo needs a more technical skill set, requires more time to implement and manage, and demands a larger budget.
If neither of these platforms are what you're looking for, take a look at Zapier's picks for the best marketing automation software.
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