Functionality | 4 <p>As a sales outreach platform, Reply is very much fit for purpose. However, in terms of other marketing features, such as aesthetic email templates or richer automations geared towards e-commerce, Reply lags behind.</p> | 8 <p>Salesforce Marketing Editions is a powerful, highly customizable marketing tool with a strong focus on CRM and customer segmentation. It’s a heavyweight platform, packed with features, but leans more toward data-driven marketing than sleek design.</p><p><br></p><p>You get the essentials – marketing automation, email marketing, and deep CRM integration – but there are some notable gaps:</p><ul><li>No modern, visually polished email templates</li><li>No built-in landing page builder</li><li>No native SMS sending (SMS requires an integration)</li></ul><p><br></p><ul><li>If you need a marketing tool that’s tightly connected to Salesforce and built for segmentation, it delivers. But if design and ease of use matter most, you might find it lacking.</li></ul> |
Ease of Use | 5 <p>We didn't find Reply particularly easy to use; its learning curve will be quite steep for those who are only used to running marketing automations on the bigger player apps - the layout on the home bar is not particularly easy to navigate.</p><p><br></p><p>We'd estimate the app to take at least a day for a regular startup employee to pick up - significantly more time than the other apps we tested.</p> | 3 <p>Salesforce Marketing Editions is not particularly beginner friendly - we'd recommend it to those with previous Salesforce or CRM experience, simply because its marketing automation functions also rely heavily on the same interface.</p> |
Look and feel | 8 <p>Reply has an excellent look and feel. The interface is clean and modern - and once you find your way around, it's a pleasure to use. Pages also load very fast, meaning that technical holdbacks won't set you back!</p> | 6 <p>While relatively straightforward to navigate, the interface does not deliver delight. This is mostly due to the fact that many buttons and fields feel crowded - unless you know your way around Salesforce software already, this may be hard to wrap your head around.</p> |
Customisability | 8 <p>Automations and emails are highly customisable - and the API key is easily accessible within the main menu, helping you create any integrations you may need.</p><p><br></p><p>Moreover, the emails are mostly text-based, and are also highly customisable.</p> | 9 <p><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Salesforce Marketing Editions offers some of the best customisation options we've seen. Specifically, it offers: </span></p><ul><li><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Analytics customisation, allowing you to see the key details for key customer segments </span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Email customisation, based on customer behaviour and traits </span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Flow customisation, allowing you to build complex and conditional flows. </span></li></ul> |
Ease of Setup | 5 <p>Given the complexity of setting up any type of sales system, we've given Reply an average ease of setup score. This encompasses the amount of time it takes to complete basic setup (around an hour), as well as the amount of time it takes to complete more advanced customisations, such as advanced workflows and integrations.</p> | 3 <p>Salesforce Marketing Editions offers a self-serve free trial, but setup takes time – expect at least 45 minutes just to get started.</p><p>Even basic tasks, like setting up automations or email campaigns, take more steps than most other marketing platforms, since there are more fields to fill out. Full customization and implementation can stretch to weeks or even months. And, just like with Salesforce CRM, you may need dedicated consultants or technical experts to handle data migration.</p> |
Customer Support | 7 <p>Reply has a live chat feature which has been enhanced by AI (thanks to intercom, their customer support provider). There's also a dedicated customer success team on hand, who you can email anytime with strategy or project-specific queries.</p> | 8 <p>Depending on your subscription level, different customer support channels are available.</p><p>Phone support is offered to most customers, and live chat is offered to limited segments of customers. Online support (i.e., via email) is always available.</p> |
Integratability | 5 <p>There is a fantastic list of integrations provided by reply - covering automations, account-based selling, and marketing. However, it does not cover a whole list of e-commerce and marketing tools that other platforms do cover.</p> | 5 <p>Salesforce Marketing Editions doesn’t quite live up to Salesforce’s reputation for integrations. While the broader platform connects well with other tools, Marketing Editions has more limitations. If you rely on multiple apps, it’s worth double-checking whether Salesforce Marketing Editions supports the integrations you need before committing.</p> |
Ease of Migration | 3 <p>There is no clear way to export contacts from Reply. However, if you use Reply Data – their database with 140m+ contacts – there an option to export selected contacts.</p> | 8 <p>Salesforce Marketing Editions offers solid export options – you can easily export contacts as CSV files, as you’d expect.</p><p>If you ever need to handle data portability requests for compliance reasons, Salesforce Marketing Editions provides a clear process for exporting all customer-related information, making it easier to stay on top of data protection requirements.</p> |