17 years helping South African businesses
choose better software
About Lead Gen & CRM (formerly SharpSpring)
Grow your leads and convert more deals by adding the power of marketing to your sales arsenal with Constant Contact Lead Gen & CRM.
The customer support team is absolutely amazing and helps us make sure we are running smoothly. The support team is willing to go the extra mile and even double check our work when needed.
The large amount of metrics can confuse some users.
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Alternatives Considered:
Full-featured marketing automation on a budget
Comments: Prioritizing leads for Salesforce, collecting customer feedback, and better tracking the effectiveness of marketing efforts are the key things we get out of SharpSpring. We are able to collect leads using SharpSpring forms and then deliver them to the right salesperson using their visual workflow tools. We can make lists and campaigns based on ANY criteria in the system, which is super impressive. The Life of the Lead is a revelation: Being able to see all digital interactions of our customers is a complete game-changer for Sales. With Life of the Lead, Sales is more informed and can take on calls armed with the right information to best serve the customer.
Pros:
The support is top-notch. They go above and beyond to ensure all questions are answered. If there is a key feature needed in the software, they'll work to make sure that you get that feature or have a workaround. They respond quickly, and they are incredibly knowledgeable. It's hard to list just one thing I like best! It's the most competitively-priced tool on the market... and it's a fraction of the cost of nearly any other marketing automation tool on the market.
Cons:
With their constant upgrades, SharpSpring occasionally can be a bit buggy while features get ironed out. Nearly all issues have easy workarounds, and the fixes come fast. It's a minor quibble for a service that is basically as good as it gets.
Alternatives Considered:
SharpSpring user for 4+ years
Comments: We really are able to do so much more with our marketing. We can see the interaction of clients with our marketing as a whole, not just off of one campaign. We can trigger emails and actions based on their behaviors which is very beneficial.
Pros:
Being a Partner for 4+ years has allowed us to grow with them. When they were a startup, we were able to really see the changes the partners were requesting and the software has come a long way. They really value their Partners (agencies).
Cons:
Sometimes SharpSpring likes to release new features, while they need to also work on continually improving their existing features.
Alternatives Considered:
Not worth it
Comments: Not good. Lots of "oh yeah, sure, it does that." Only to find out that the software doesn't actually do what they just said it does or no one from sharpspring knows how to make it do that.
Pros:
Seemed like a great and more affordable option compared to HubSpot. Not much else to say here since we had a boat load of issues with it.
Cons:
Everything was cumbersome. From onboarding to implementation. Even getting someone on the phone from the right department to help us when we had issues with email was a problem. Overall, really clunky and outdated. We ended up going to Hubspot and it's SO much better and not even that much more expensive especially when we think of all of the time we all wasted trying to get sharpspring to work.
Constant Contact Response
4 years ago
Hi there, Thank you for taking the time to share your experience with SharpSpring. We hate to hear that you had a negative experience with the platform. Our exceptional support is something we work hard to maintain so we hate finding out we missed the mark there as well. We never take losing a partner lightly and will use your feedback to continue to improve our resources for our agency partners. If you'd be open to sharing any additional feedback, please email us at [email protected].
Alternatives Considered:
A better option to Hubspot and other Marketing Automation solutions
Comments: We like the platform as we can track online and email interactions with prospects, customers and partners. This helps us with qualifying lead generation and tracking the stickiness of campaigns. The training of SharpSpring was challenging but we were able to muddle through and figure out a lot of stuff on our own. Customer support has also been great when they are able to help with issues that may arise.
Pros:
We like the fact it is much cheaper in cost as compared to HubSpot and other marketing automation platforms. The ease of using the platform has made it easy to early adoption of the end users and we are able to fully track our MQL and ROI.
Cons:
SharpSpring has an extremely high demand on email accuracy rate of 98% so quite often we get suspended due to bounced back emails. Sometimes it is difficult to have an almost 100% list when people leave companies. We have as a solution, pay for 3rd party email checker services,to help mitigate this and we also send a larger portion of emails though mailchimp.
Alternatives Considered:
Sharpspring is the solution for all-in-one marketing
Comments: We have implemented SharpSpring for our clients and are using it ourselves for Marketing Automation, emailmarketing and social media marketing. Our clients are very pleased for the way we create leads for them. SharpSpring gives a lot of insight in the way leads are generated and we use the automation tool also for cross selling and stay in touch with existing customers. Before SharpSpring we looked in to both HubSpot and Infusionsoft but SharpSpring is the best solution for us. Worth every penny and more.
Pros:
SharpSpring is best for clients who want to generate lots of leads and convert them to clients. If you look for a complete solution for marketing automation, social media, emailmarketing, Google Ads and a CRM, this is the go to solution. If you are only looking for emailmarketing without the rest then this is not the best fit.
Cons:
Social media monitoring could be beter. No other cons.
Alternatives Considered:
Marketing Automation - at a fraction of the cost of Hubspot
Comments: I'm enjoying using it as being able to do everything in one platform makes life much easier and it's much more affordable than Hubspot. There are enough tools to keep the most experienced marketer busy to help attract leads through chat, emails, forms, landing pages etc...
Pros:
The ability to create a clear sales funnel and track your client through the sales process is really easy and highlights areas where more work and focus might be needed in your sales process. There is a ton of features to engage users and build your audience, you just need to spend time and be open to exploring ideas. Implementing dynamic content which changes depending on the customer persona is cool. The support team always reply same day, there is online chat (US times) too.
Cons:
There are some definite bugs such as data fields 'locking' when creating a landing page and the later it becomes editable again. Strangely the design side of emails and landing pages is not cohesive. So you have a limited range of fonts in forms but lots of customisation for colours for headings, then the reverse for landing pages. Thinks like buttons for GDPR can't currently be customised which looks odd. Also, the onboarding process for Squarespace websites is different and this is not mentioned anywhere. Just needs to have someone invest some time to deal with all these issues and implement a decent upgrade. Generally, all very minor things but stacked up can provide a bit more challenging onboarding process than what it needs to be.
Alternatives Considered:
SharpSpring Marketing Automation
Comments: SharpSpring has a very quick implementation process and is very easy to learn. Within the first 30 days of having SharpSpring we already ran 2 separate email campaigns for 2 separate clients. Their representatives check in with us frequently so we never feel like we're on our own. Our next challenge will be selling SharpSpring to prospects/clients.
Pros:
The amazing customer support that is offered. Anytime I have a question I can either look it up myself in their library of resources with tutorials and instructional videos, or I can call their partner support line and speak to a real person who even follows up after the call to make sure all of the needs were met.
Cons:
I wish you could edit Life of Lead to be able to put custom events in there. We uploaded a prospect database we had been tracking since 2017 and it had every time we touched a prospect. Unfortunately, once we uploaded this list into SharpSpring we were not able to edit their Life of Lead prior to the upload date. While this is barely an issue, it would be nice to see how long we have been tracking some of these prospects to give us a better prediction at how many touches it takes for a prospect to convert to a customer.
Alternatives Considered:
Sharpspring the most complete marketing automation software you can get in this price range!
Comments: We use this software for the "marketing automation" catch leads and convert them to customers (for us but also our custumers). I have been using other tools and they tend to be FAR to big and overwhelming. So my experience is that i can easy train others to use SharpSpring and let marketing and sales work together in the tool and with the tool.
Pros:
- Price - Easy of use - Easy to implement and learn - Fast support - Active community and many updates - Possible to have skype calls and team sessions with SharpSpring to spar.
Cons:
- The Social Media part in the software is not optimal, we still use other software next to it. - CRM feature is small, great for small companies, but bigger ones can come short.
Amazing Enterprise-level Marketing Automation + Integrated CRM Platform
Comments: SharpSpring has saved us time and money by bringing together everything we need internally, as well as the needs of our clients, into one platform. Having the ability to dedicate time to only leads that truly show an interest in working with us, as well as, to see that interest with the click of a button is amazing.
Pros:
SharpSpring is a game-changer! Getting an all-in-one platform that allows us to go from capturing lead information and behavior all the way through to identifying qualified leads through marketing campaigns is amazing. Having one place for marketing emails, landing pages, social media, blogging, meetings, video chats, and more is almost unheard of. Match that with a really robust CRM that tracks leads, beautifully outlines the life of a lead, and allows you to easily manage the sales pipeline and one-on-one engagements with pre-qualified leads with lead scoring is amazing.
Cons:
Seriously, there isn't much negative to say about this platform. The onboarding was amazing, the self-guided trainings were awesome, it's a great platform. The only downside is it's not as "pretty" as some platform, but hey, I'd rather have a functioning product helping me make more money and something pretty to look at.
Alternatives Considered:
Perfect for Digital Marketing Agencies
Comments: There was a fairly steep learning curve to use SharpSpring, even though I'd used HubSpot and other marketing automation platforms in the past. I think this seems expected for a lower cost solution, though. Once we got comfortable with it, though, it's been very quick and easy to build out all the assets and start our campaigns. It's worked beautifully for our own marketing and for clients. It's easy to build emails and customize them to match your client's brand.
Pros:
What I like most about SharpSpring is how much you get for the money. It packs every feature you'd expect from the expensive marketing automation platforms but doesn't throw exorbitant costs on those features. I also like the ease of integration with other platforms.
Cons:
I highly dislike the recent shift in having clients pay for their own accounts with separate billing. We were sold this platform as one we could completely white-label for clients, but now we are required to put a client CC on file.
Alternatives Considered:
We moved ourselves and our clients over from Hubspot
Comments: The support is always there for us if we need them, but any new feature is introduced with great support materials (how-to guides/videos etc) so the need for my team to refer to them is minimised. The pricing is great when you compare to others with similar functionality and they go from strength to strength.
Pros:
Originally it was transparency and pricing that made us move. But since then it's the fact that Sharpspring have continued to develop the platform with great new features (like the inbuilt CRM, Sales Automation and integrated Meeting booking functionality) many of which at no additional cost (unlike Hubspot) that means we continue to use and recommend Sharpspring over any other platform for our SMB clients.
Cons:
I would like SMS functionality to be built in as well as email (I appreciate it's not as big in the USA where Sharspring's biggest customer base is) but it's big here in the UK
Alternatives Considered:
Integrated Marketing and Sales with no hassle
Comments: For the B2B tech startups I serve, who are just getting started with their sales and marketing efforts, SharpSpring is the ideal platform. They change quickly, and it's easy to quickly change the platform to adapt to those pivots and support developing processes.
Pros:
1. Customer service is highly responsive. 2. Templates for emails and landing pages are easy to use without design or development expertise. 3. Incredibly easy to customize: add fields, pipelines, dashboards, automations particular to your processes without coding or other specialized knowledge.
Cons:
1. Landing page builder is kind of basic. However, new releases come regularly and is probably not a big deal if you have an html developer handy. 2. Integrated social scheduler functionality is a bit basic. 3. If you have significant custom complex report needs, this is not the platform for you. They have great canned reports that any layman can find value in, you can download csv files of many things, and you can customize a dashboard with report "widgets." But not a lot of ability to dig into raw data.
Alternatives Considered:
We have embraced the Software to lead our company in communicating with customers and managing sales
Comments: We didn't realize how slow we were when communicating with customers and how important the speed of communication really is. We now have automations in place that don't let the conversation and engagement drop off.
Pros:
Our customers are benefitting as much as we are and it starts with the automated services. We can route inquiries to sales reps faster and continue conversations with customers instantaneously through dynamic messaging.
Cons:
We need to understand Sales Optimizer better. It may be a software solution that we don't necessarily fit with, but we still think this is something we can improve with, but right now its a slice of the pie that we struggle with.
Alternatives Considered:
Economical and POWERFUL Marketing Automation Solution
Comments: SharpSpring is a great tool and I have been so pleased with the automation and resources I have at my fingertips. The have great new features coming out all the time and their customer service and team members are always so helpful and enjoyable to talk to.
Pros:
All the marketing automation is incredible and so easy to use. We have been using the chatbot feature and love it! It is easy to set up and we have it integrated with Slack to make the ability to manage it simple. The email automation and workflow automation makes me day to day job so easy as well. I can set up new prospects in my sales workflow and they get moved down my funnel with just automation. It saves me a ton of time.
Cons:
I love SharpSpring but the overall user interface is not the most beautifully designed one. However, I am getting so many features and resources for an incredible price that this is not a big issue at all. And it really isn't that bad.
SharpSpring is full featured, low price, and amazing tech and account support
Comments: I've helped a number of businesses drive revenue with this software and it always drives more revenue for them. Of course, you have to understand how marketing automation works (I teach it at a local business school) and how to use the software correctly but there is a ton of documentation and how-to videos and when that fails, there's always a support person to walk you though whatever you're trying to do and they stick with you. My "customer success manager" will even get on the phone with a prospective client and help with a demo. Just a great company
Pros:
I love the way the tracking is displayed on a timeline so you can see everywhere a prospect went. The built-in CRM and sales funnel pics up where the marketing funnel leaves off and keeps the automation going during and after the sale to upset and resell. The new retargeting and (soon to be) advertising feature is amazing, not only retargeting your visitors but it finds similar customers to target. Overrall, it's really intuitive and easy to use, and I've used many marketing automation platforms over the years. This is the least expensive. No long-term contracts to sign but still has all the features of the much more expensive ones. And the LiveChat feature you can put on your Web site that was just added (at no additional cost) brings a huge feature that other companies charge more than the entire cost of the SharpSpring subscription.
Cons:
No complaints at all. The learning curve wasn't very steep and the price is right. They even have evening support hours.
Alternatives Considered:
Comprehensive Marketing Automation Software
Comments: SharpSPring has been a massive help to our business. We are agency partners and we have grown our business by using the software and demonstrating the power of the software to others. SharpSpring themselves are always looking to improve the software and often realse new features or updates which improve the overall experience. They are constantly evolving and I like that. It's what is needed to keep at the forefront of today's marketing.
Pros:
SharpSpring has a comprehensive range of tools to help you get the most from Marketing Automation. It integrates with your website easily and can track visitors to your site from all your differing campaigns. The tools are easy to use, once you have been through the training and can be manipulated to work together to suit your business. Delivering insights and analytics to help you tweak your marketing and increase your ROI.
Cons:
The software is comprehensive, so there is a learning curve. You can get started easily with it, but you have to continue to learn to get the real powerful insights from it. Setting up takes quite a lot of tweaking to get the results you need, but it is simple and powerful to use and delivers results right from the get go.
Alternatives Considered:
Functional Middle Market Software
Comments: Overall, I'm very happy with my expereince with SharpSpring. I think it is a functional tool that is easy to use and it feels good to have check lists and to do's that are easy to set up. I like using this software.
Pros:
I love using this software on a daily basis and using it to manage my leads. As a salesperson, it is challenging to find a CRM that actually works for you, not where you have to work for it. I like the ease of use with the kanban boards as well as the marketing automation for drip campaigns.
Cons:
The mobile app is inoperable and not relevant. Sometimes the search feature is challenging to use- sometimes you need to use the companies name, sometimes you have to use the contacts name. When working in the drip campaigns you have to be really specific about which dates you select.
Alternatives Considered:
A great software alternative to Marketo or Pardot
Comments: It's a great platform overall. Expect great customer support, but also plan for a lot of time setting up automation workflows and action groups. But the tool will do what you need it to do, and then some.
Pros:
The biggest plus is its affordability - all the features you need at a price that is accessible. It has all the core functions one needs in a marketing automation platform, with a powerful sales pipeline and lead management component that provides an exceptional, integrated experience. Added bonuses are chatbox and book-time features included in the price, and the ability to sync Outlook emails to a contact's record. Lead scoring
Cons:
The email editor can be a bit clunky and formatting copy and layouts can be finicky. The email previewer can be cumbersome. Visual workflows can be arduous to make
Sharpspring made sales tracking so much easier for me and my team
Comments: What really makes Sharpspring stand out from other platforms is their excellent customer service and constant improving of the features within the platform. Although the platform still has a few improving points, my experience overall has been very satisfying. I would recomend this 100% to other coleagues.
Pros:
What I mostly appreciated about using sharpspring was the diverse range of features within the platform, since they identify and capture prospect information much easier; wich is very valuable in terms of sales optimization.
Cons:
Sharpspring has a very accelerated rate for putting out new features, to keep up and compete with other platforms, wich is a pro; however, the new features often need updates. Video Calling, for instance, was great by the time the pandemic began; however, it might not be as established as other video conference competitors.
Alternatives Considered:
I love this CRM
Comments: I love that fact of being able to add buyer personas to the contact info and I love the personalization that is used on the Software. Oh and the templates that they provide are great and easy to use.
Pros:
I like that I can do everything in one location. Also, I love the fact that Sharpspring is always adjusting with new things adding the system. If the software does not do something that you want to do. They put in to start working on that method or idea.
Cons:
If you get a hard bounce you can not update that contact with the new info on your own - you have to deal with support and send them the list of changes to be done.
Alternatives Considered:
Great Marketing Automation Tool for B2B
Comments: We help credit unions build content driven in-bound funnels - the tool has met that need very well. Their onboarding and support have been super responsive and helpful.
Pros:
It was very quick to deploy, fast to get my team trained, and effective in demonstrating results for clients. In addition, the feature functionality vs. price balance is fantastic. Other tools have lots of bloatware and tools that you will never use.
Cons:
I wish it had some built-in SEO tools and I wish their email list management was more forgiving on spam traps.
SharpSpring won me over from HubSpot
Comments:
A couple of years ago our agency was a relatively happy HubSpot customer. We sold inbound services via HubSpot to our web development clients most often, but it was a hard sell and required a certain client profile to be successful. The most important aspect of an inbound client for us was deep pockets! Why? Simply because of the cost of the HubSpot platform. If a client had sufficiently deep pockets, AND was convinced of the business validity of inbound marketing versus traditional methods, the full court press was on. To give HubSpot credit, they got very involved in the client sales process and they provided a lot of tools to aid agencies in the inbound sales process, BUT, all of that comes at a cost. A significant cost. While HubSpot gets a lot of credit for pioneering the inbound marketing platform space, they have become, in this agencies opinion, a bit bloated over the years. What we mean is that they provide so much it is sometimes difficult to choose what is most important to push and provide for each client. The net effect is, however, that whatever your client does want to do, Personas, email marketing, automation, web site development, contact list management etc., it's all included. So what's the downside? Their strength is their biggest weakness. No matter how little or how much of HubSpots resources you use, the cost is the same. Of course there are tiers of cost, but even the lowest tier is roughly ten times the cost of SharpSpring. So use a little, pay a lot. Use a lot, pay a lot. Now we at CX3 Group don't necessarily sell on price, however, if the tools that you bring to the table for your clients are less expensive, but still as, or more, effective, it gives the agency a lot of flexibility when customizing various packages to promote. While generally content with HubSpot back in the day, we are extremely pleased with SharpSpring. Approaching our two year anniversary with them we take every opportunity to sing their praises, and it's NOT just about pricing.
While SharpSpring is a fraction of the cost, of HubSpot (& others) the features it includes are all the features we ever really used with HubSpot. That is to say, we are paying for what we use, and not paying for anything that sits in the cupboard looking pretty, but we don't need.
If I had more space here I'd go into the newest features that SharpSpring has rolled out over the past 6 months. Suffice it to say, we're a very happy and satisfied SharpSpring client! -CX3 Group
Pros:
Cost vs. benefit. Has all of the features our clients want or need, without a bunch of stuff we have to pay for that they don't need.
Cons:
It's a struggle to find something I don't like, but if it was one thing over the past two years, it would be the lack of support on the sales side for our clients. More customized training and presentations for client side would be great.
SharpSpring is a Gamechanger for Campaign Tracking
Comments: SharpSpring has been a successful decision for our agency since we got it in 2017. Within the first month it was making a huge positive difference for us and our clients. Their support has been a big part of our success with it and it continues to be an essential part of our digital marketing offering.
Pros:
The biggest benefit of SharpSpring is having visibility into the leads we generate. In the past we could see impressions and clicks and website visits from our campaigns. Now we are seeing the actual leads and being able to follow activity after the initial contact. The added visibility has been an absolute game changer in the value we can provide our clients. I really like the Life of the Lead feature where once you have a lead in the system you can track all their activity in great detail, seeing when they came back to the website, what pages they went to, if they opened emails, etc. We've even had instances where clients claimed they were not getting leads from our campaigns and once SharpSpring was installed, not only could we now provide reports of leads we were generating, but we caught a hole in their customer service where leads we were providing were not getting responses from scheduling staff. So we not only provided reports of the leads we generated, but helped close a gap in a serious customer service issue that was happening.
Cons:
It takes quite a bit of effort to get up to speed on SharpSpring as there are a lot of moving parts. But their support is great and always gets back to us quickly and efficiently to keep us on track.
The best way to create an effective email marketing campaign.
Comments: SharpSpring has aided in the efficiency of your email marketing efforts and provided us with fresh ideas for organizing and distributing them effectively. Their analyses aided in our comprehension of the target sample.
Pros:
SharpSpring has a plethora of tools and is always introducing new ones to assist you in creating an effective email marketing campaign. SharpSpring's customizability is excellent, which simplifies all tasks. Additionally, importing and configuring contact lists is a breeze. SharpSpring You may construct unique campaigns by utilizing the numerous concepts and custom templates that it generates, as well as editing and saving them as drafts for future use. You'll receive notifications and data about client replies in real time. This exact approach is easily replicable in subsequent marketing initiatives. I appreciate the ability to conceal and reorganize unnecessary dashboard elements. As a consequence, the business team will be able to more effectively manage and cooperate with the customer database, as well as all stages of advertising, email marketing, customer tracking, contact pages, and marketing job automation, among other things.
Cons:
I encountered no technical difficulties when using it. SharpSpring is a critical component in optimizing email marketing operations for both small and large enterprises. For optimal utilization, additional training is required; SharpSpring developers provide numerous videos and tutorials, and the support team is always available to answer your questions.
Making great progress with SharpSpring
Comments: I've used a couple of different Marketing Automation platforms in the past. Marketo briefly and Act-On for a couple of years. I switched to SharpSpring around 6 months ago when I set up my own marketing agency. Really happy with how its going. OK - its obvious that SharpSpring is a smaller company. I come across the occasional feature that could do with some refinement. But overall its fair to say I love SharpSpring. Top features from my POV... Ease of use - The separation of Tasks and Workflows seems to make this a much simpler product to use than Act-on. Easier than Marketo as well - though its about 3 years since I used that. The templates provided for rapidly building landing pages are excellent. The new personas feature is brilliant when combined with "Dynamic content blocks" (which you can use on landing pages as well as Emails. The built in CRM is a huge advantage and is perfect for BDM teams or smaller companies. Obviously if you can make do without a full-featured CRM like Salesforce, you'll save thousands $$ by switching to a simpler product like SharpSpring. (I used to use Act-on integrated with Salesforce and that was an absolute pig.) Cost - SharpSpring is much less expensive than Act-On and Marketo. You get unlimited users on their standard license plans - so you're not penalised for spreading use across Marketing, BDMs and Sales folk. So features - not a problem. I've found the training / on-boarding satisfactory and the ongoing technical support is fast and personal.
Pros:
Ease of use, good templates, built in CRM (although you can integrate with 3rd party CRM if you need.) Cost saving compared to competing products - especially if you can dispense with a full-fat CRM like Salesforce which is bloated and over priced for SME market in my opinion.
Cons:
Occasional glitches. Sometimes you have to refresh the page to see the result of a change that you have made. For example - the number of members in a list - can take a few minutes after saving the query to report a true number. But you soon learn to live with minor issues like this.
