Planning to implement marketing automation and considering ActiveCampaign? We advice to view similar platforms to find a solution.

When customers choose marketing automation app, most often they are trying to find functionality for omni-channel communication, lead management, website builder, lead scoring, B tests etc.

Comparing ActiveCampaign with competitors people pay attention to the HTML email builder, customer data platform, chatbots, conversations, form builder, segmentation, number of triggers and actions and so on.

We’ve made a list of top 10 competitors that are very resembling in cost and functionality to ActiveCampaign. The list is based on user reviews, so if ActiveCampaign doesn’t suit you in any way, here you can easily choose the best solution for you.

E2 Shop System

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We help shops and manufacturers of all kinds and sizes work smarter for improved efficiencies, greater flexibility and bigger profits.

DoTimely

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DoTimely provides scheduling, invoicing, staff management tools for businesses.

BigTime

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BigTime is the access-anywhere operating system behind the greatest consulting firms on the planet. We help accountants, architects, engineers, IT-services firms, scientific and management consultants budget, track and bill their most important asset - time.

Freshsales

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Freshsales CRM is all-in-one project software, that is free and can enhance team collaboration and communication and streamlines the entire project management journey. This CRM brings context, collaboration, and productivity that helps you sell better.

Webmecanik

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Webmecanik is a marketing automation software that allows you to intelligently identify, segment and nurture unknown website visitors, leads and customers. Using an Open Source framework, it can be integrated with all major CRM's solutions on the market and more than 1.000 other systems through Zapier. This all-in-one solution enables you to create campaign scenarios and choose from many triggering criteria to send the right information to the right contact at the right time.

SharpSpring

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SharpSpring is one of the most flexible platforms on the market, offering behavior-based email marketing, native or 3rd party CRM integration, dynamic forms, landing page and blog builders, universal CMS compatibility, and integration with hundreds of applications.

Stellar File Repair Toolkit

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Advanced “4-in-1 specialized tool, highly recommended by users & IT professionals worldwide to repair Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF files and is compatible with Microsoft Office 2019, 2016, 2013, 2010, & previous versions.

PipeDrive

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Pipedrive is a Flexible, highly focused on driving the sales, and easy-to-use CRM software built by salespeople and marketing professionals with a single goal – to simplify your sales process and assist salespeople in clinching the deals. Using Pipedrive CRM you can focus on the right people at the right time and convert those people into deals.

FreshCheq

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FreshCheq was designed by restaurant operators for restaurant operators.

Infusionsoft by Keap

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Keap is a pioneer of CRM, when it comes to marketing automating of your small business. The platform serves more than 200,000 users globally. The tool can be used for inbound and outbound sales.

Gmail

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Gmail is a free email service developed by Google that allows you to send and receive emails, manage contacts, and work with other people through its integration with Google Workspace.

How to choose ActiveCampaign substitute

Many marketing automation apps are similar to each other. Tools with identical functionality can differ in price by 4 times. The first feature you should look at is the availability of funnel builder. This is a basic feature of marketing automation platforms and if it doesn’t include this feature, most likely this software isn’t completed yet. All node interfaces look almost the same. It's important not to pay attention to the UI, but pay attention to the functionality.

In a month, you'll get used to the design, but the lack of functionality will always annoy you. Changing marketing automation apps is very time-consuming. If you have the usual email chains set up, it's not that hard to switch to another tool. But if you've already set up integrations, business processes, and have complex funnels, it can take weeks to change the software. That's why you should be attentive to choosing an alternative.

What to pay attention to when investigating the node interface? It has 4 significant features categories.

1. Triggers. For instance, "Form submit" is a trigger that starts a business process. The most popular triggers are: opening an email, clicking a link in an email, reaching a goal, adding or removing a tag, closing a deal, visiting a page, etc. In each platform for marketing automation this set may differ. The more, the better.
2. Action. For example, "Send email". This is the most basic action you can have. The most popular actions are: add or remove a tag, send a text message, send a messenger message, set a salesperson task, update a transaction, notify someone by email, move a transaction to another stage, etc.
3. Delay. For example, "Wait 3 hours. Prospect fill in the form on the website and get in the marketing automation platform (Trigger), the tool sends a Welcome email (Action). After that the app waits 4 hours (delay) and sends a second email. This is the most simple automation. But there are other options. For instance, "Wait until something happens". Or wait until January 10th, or wait until 10 PM in the contact's time zone.
4. If/else. For example, "If a lead, has the tag "Bought product #1", send the email, if the lead doesn't have the tag "Bought product #1", wait 5 days and send the email. The most popular if/else parameters are: visited the site page, bought certain items, opened certain emails, user field the client card matches some criteria. This is data according to which you can segment the subscriber base.

Studying the automation builder, you should look carefully at all four categories of functions. The more, the better. Sometimes it appears that powerful marketing automation platforms with the biggest number of functions look uncomfortable. Young software look nice, but they have few functions. You look into the software you want to use very deeply. Otherwise, it will be very painful to change it in the future.

Once you've studied the automation builder, you understand whether there are integrations with the tools you need. Fortunately, Apiway can help you. In most cases, software like ActiveCampaign are the core of business IT infrastructure. It's kind of digital hub for all your subscriber. This type of system is like an tree, which is putting its tentacles into other system. Tool like ActiveCampaign need to integrate with most other ones. Or you’ll have to spend a lot of money and time developing custom integrations.

Also people who are looking for alternatives to ActiveCampaign use systems from other categories like email marketing software, helpdesk software, CRM software, sales engagement software