Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud)

B2B marketing automation built on the world’s #1 AI CRM.

Marketing Automation
★★★☆☆ 3.3
2007 Founded
1001-5000 Employees
29,000+ Customers
Atlanta, GA, USA Headquarters
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Quick Facts

✓ Free Trial
Website
salesforce.com →
Starting Price
1250
Pricing Model
tiered
Free Trial
30 days
Company Type
acquired
Social
LinkedIn Twitter/X

About Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud)

Pardot, now branded as Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement, is a B2B marketing automation platform designed to align marketing and sales around shared revenue goals. It provides tools for lead generation, lead nurturing, email marketing, account-based engagement, and multi-touch attribution, all tightly integrated with Salesforce CRM. Marketers can build landing pages and forms, automate multi-step journeys, score and grade leads and accounts, and surface sales-ready signals directly to sales teams.

The product originated as Pardot, founded in 2007 in Atlanta, Georgia, and quickly became a well-known independent marketing automation vendor focused on B2B use cases. It was acquired by ExactTarget in 2012 and then became part of Salesforce when Salesforce acquired ExactTarget in 2013. Since then it has been deeply embedded into the Salesforce ecosystem and, in 2022, was officially rebranded as Marketing Cloud Account Engagement to align with Salesforce’s broader Marketing Cloud naming.

Within Salesforce’s portfolio, Account Engagement occupies the B2B marketing automation niche, complementing Marketing Cloud Engagement (for high-scale B2C and cross-channel messaging) and Data Cloud (for unified customer data). Its native integration with Salesforce Sales and Service Clouds gives revenue teams a single view of prospects and customers, enabling shared dashboards, campaign influence reporting, and AI-driven lead and account scoring. The product also increasingly leverages Salesforce’s Agentforce and Data Cloud capabilities for generative campaign creation, predictive insights, and cross-channel activation.

In the marketing automation landscape, Account Engagement competes with platforms such as HubSpot Marketing Hub, Adobe Marketo Engage, Oracle Eloqua, and ActiveCampaign. Its strongest differentiation remains its tight linkage to Salesforce CRM, enterprise-grade security and compliance, and breadth of partner ecosystem. At the same time, reviewers often note a steeper learning curve and higher total cost of ownership than some SMB-focused competitors, making it especially suited to organizations that are already standardized on Salesforce and have dedicated operations resources.

Key Features

Lead generation with AI-assisted landing page and form builders to capture and qualify inbound prospects.

Lead nurturing programs using visual, multi-step journeys (Engagement Studio) to automate timely, personalized follow-up.

AI-driven lead and account scoring and grading (Einstein) to prioritize the most sales-ready prospects and buying centers.

Account-based marketing and engagement dashboards to target key accounts, coordinate outreach, and track account-level pipeline.

Drag-and-drop email builder for responsive emails, with A/B and multivariate testing and dynamic content personalization.

Segmentation and dynamic lists that update in real time based on behaviors, demographics, and CRM data.

Tight, bi-directional integration with Salesforce Sales and Service Clouds for shared data, campaigns, and reporting.

B2B Marketing Analytics and multi-touch attribution to connect campaigns to pipeline, revenue, and ROI.

Automation rules and completion actions to trigger field updates, alerts, list membership, and external actions based on behavior.

Prospect activity tracking across web visits, email engagement, forms, and files to build rich engagement histories.

Account Engagement + Marketing Cloud Next capabilities like Agentforce-generated campaign briefs, content, and segments.

Native support for SMS and WhatsApp (via Marketing Cloud messaging credits) to extend journeys beyond email.

External actions and activities in Engagement Studio to trigger webinars, surveys, SMS, and other third-party workflows.

Granular permissioning, business units, and sandboxes on higher tiers for complex, multi-region or multi-brand environments.

Extensible REST and SOAP APIs plus a large partner ecosystem for custom integrations and advanced use cases.

Pros & Cons

👍 Pros

  • Seamless integration with Salesforce CRM, giving sales and marketing a shared view of leads, contacts, and opportunities.
  • Strong lead management with robust scoring, grading, segmentation, and nurturing capabilities tailored to B2B buying journeys.
  • Powerful automation and journey orchestration that can handle complex, multi-step campaigns and account-based programs.
  • Comprehensive reporting and B2B Marketing Analytics that connect campaigns to pipeline, opportunities, and revenue.
  • Enterprise-grade scalability, security, and compliance as part of the broader Salesforce platform and ecosystem.
  • Rich ecosystem of connectors, partners, and Salesforce-native extensions that extend functionality for specific industries and use cases.

👎 Cons

  • High licensing and add-on costs that can be prohibitive for small businesses or simple use cases.
  • Steep learning curve and a user interface that many reviewers find less intuitive than newer, SMB-focused competitors.
  • Reporting and analytics configuration can be complex, with some users feeling out-of-the-box dashboards are limited.
  • Sync delays and architectural quirks between Account Engagement and Salesforce can complicate time-sensitive automation and reporting.
  • Email and landing page builders, while improved, are still often criticized as clunky compared with modern marketing tools.

User Reviews

G2
3.9
★★★★☆
Capterra
4.1
★★★★☆
TrustRadius
3.8
★★★★☆

Integrations

Salesforce Sales Cloud Salesforce Service Cloud Salesforce Data Cloud Adobe Experience Manager Apollo.io Boomi CleverTap Facebook for Business Google Ads Google Ad Manager LinkedIn Microsoft Excel Zapier TextUs Eventbrite Olark Chat bitly Webinar platforms Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement Slack

Best For

Company Size

smb mid-market enterprise

Industries

Technology and SaaS Professional Services Manufacturing Financial Services Healthcare and Life Sciences Education and Nonprofit

Use Cases

B2B lead generation with gated content, forms, and landing pages Lead nurturing and drip campaigns across email and other channels Account-based marketing and account scoring aligned with sales Sales and marketing alignment with shared dashboards and alerts Pipeline attribution and ROI reporting tied to Salesforce opportunities Re-engagement of dormant leads and renewal/expansion campaigns

FAQ

What is Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement)?

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Pardot, now known as Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement, is Salesforce's B2B marketing automation platform. It helps marketing and sales teams generate and nurture leads, score and grade prospects and accounts, run automated email and cross-channel campaigns, and measure the impact of marketing on pipeline and revenue. Because it is built on and tightly integrated with Salesforce CRM, it gives revenue teams a shared view of prospects and customers along with AI-driven insights and B2B analytics.

How much does Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement) cost?

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Salesforce prices Account Engagement in four main editions billed annually per org: Growth at $1,250 per month for up to 10,000 contacts, Plus at $2,750 per month for up to 10,000 contacts, Advanced at $4,400 per month for up to 10,000 contacts, and Premium at $15,000 per month for up to 75,000 contacts. All tiers can purchase additional contacts and add-ons such as B2B Marketing Analytics Plus, Sales Emails and Alerts, and messaging or AI request credits. A time-limited free trial is often available, but there is no permanent free plan.

What are the main features of Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement)?

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Key features include AI-assisted landing pages and forms, email marketing with a drag-and-drop builder and A/B testing, Engagement Studio for automated nurture journeys, lead and account scoring and grading, account-based marketing dashboards, segmentation and dynamic content, tight Salesforce CRM integration, B2B Marketing Analytics and multi-touch attribution, and extensibility via APIs and third-party integrations such as Google Ads, Eventbrite, chat tools, and more. Higher tiers add capabilities like business units, sandboxes, and advanced AI features.

Who are Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement)'s main competitors?

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Pardot's primary competitors in B2B marketing automation include HubSpot Marketing Hub, Adobe Marketo Engage, Oracle Eloqua, ActiveCampaign, and increasingly cross-channel platforms like Mailchimp Marketing Platform. Many buyers also compare it with Salesforce's own Marketing Cloud Engagement for high-scale B2C and multi-channel messaging use cases.

Is Pardot (Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement) good for small businesses?

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Pardot can work for smaller B2B organizations, especially those already committed to Salesforce CRM, but its pricing, complexity, and administrative overhead often make it a better fit for mid-market and enterprise teams. Small businesses that need simpler email and basic automation and are not yet on Salesforce may find platforms like HubSpot, ActiveCampaign, or Mailchimp easier to adopt and more cost-effective. For Salesforce-centric SMBs with growth ambitions and dedicated ops resources, however, Account Engagement can provide a scalable foundation that they won't quickly outgrow.

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