Migrating from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud to Achieve 10% Increase in Conversion Rate

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Comparative Analysis: Salesforce Marketing Cloud Vs Marketo
• Why Companies May Choose Salesforce Marketing Cloud?
• Case Study: Migrating from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud to Achieve 10% Increase in Conversion Rate
• Best Practices for Migrating From Adobe Marketo Engage to Salesforce Marketing Cloud

Sarah, a marketing manager at a growing tech firm, had been using Marketo for years to manage their email campaigns and lead nurturing. As their business expanded globally, Sarah found herself facing limitations with Marketo’s integration and reporting capabilities. She struggled to unify customer data across different platforms, hindering her ability to create personalized marketing experiences.

One day, Sarah attended a conference where she heard success stories about Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

Intrigued, she researched further and discovered that Salesforce offered not just email marketing but a comprehensive suite of tools—from social media management to detailed analytics and customer journey mapping. These capabilities promised to provide a holistic view of customer interactions, going beyond what Marketo offered.

Back at the office, Sarah presented her findings to the team. They discussed how Salesforce Marketing Cloud could integrate seamlessly with their existing Salesforce CRM, enabling them to leverage rich customer data for more targeted campaigns. The team was particularly impressed by the platform’s scalability and robust analytics, which would allow them to measure campaign ROI accurately.

Ultimately, Sarah’s company decided to migrate to Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

One of our customers, a leading designer and manufacturer of engineered access solutions for 70+ years, faced a similar situation.

The customer was using Marketo for their marketing operations and Salesforce as their CRM tool. However, Marketo had a few limitations such as reporting, limited sync with Salesforce CRM, and the inability to directly edit custom objects in Salesforce. This was making it difficult for their marketing team to get the desired results.

In this blog post, we will share our step-by-step process that helped the customer migrate from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud and drive profitable business outcomes.

Let’s get started:

Comparative Analysis: Salesforce Marketing Cloud Vs Marketo

As competition intensifies in the marketing technology sector, businesses face critical decisions when evaluating platforms like Marketo and Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

Major players such as Salesforce, Adobe, Oracle, and IBM continually expand their capabilities through acquisitions, making their offerings increasingly robust and intricate.

For enterprise firms exploring new marketing platforms, Marketo and Salesforce Marketing Cloud often emerge as top contenders. Adobe’s acquisition of Marketo for $4.75 billion^[i] escalated competition between these two giants in the years ahead. It’s essential, therefore, for marketers to delve into how Marketo and Salesforce Marketing Cloud compare directly, considering usability and features tailored to their specific needs.

Why Companies May Choose Salesforce Marketing Cloud?

According to a study by Forrester, organizations using Salesforce Marketing Cloud achieved a remarkable 299% ROI over three years. The study highlighted these key findings:

• Generated over $5 million in additional revenue across multiple channels.
• Improved site conversion rates by 60% in the third year.
• Increased average order value by 35% in the third year.
• Saved 60% of the time typically spent on creating and executing marketing campaigns.
• Reduced post-campaign reporting efforts by 90%.

Source^[ii]

Apart from this, when compared with Marketo, here’s what gives Salesforce Marketing Cloud a competitive edge:

• Data Management: Salesforce Marketing Cloud excels with its flexible data model, ideal for complex B2C environments needing custom data structures.
• Campaign Orchestration: Journey Builder offers superior visual journey creation and cross-channel integration compared to Marketo’s more email-centric approach.
• Triggered Activities: Both platforms offer robust automation, but Salesforce Marketing Cloud’s Triggered Emails provide more flexibility for non-email actions.
• Content Management: Salesforce Marketing Cloud’s Content Builder provides easier access to code for customization, enhancing flexibility.
• User Experience: While both platforms are improving usability, Salesforce Marketing Cloud’s integration with Lightning Experience and community support offers a more cohesive user experience.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud stands out for its scalability, advanced customization options, and comprehensive multi-channel capabilities, making it the preferred choice for enterprises needing robust, flexible marketing solutions.

Case Study: Migrating from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud to Achieve 10% Increase in Conversion Rate

Now that you understand why companies choose Salesforce Marketing Cloud, let’s share a real-life example demonstrating how migration to this platform helped one of our customers achieve profitable results.

The customer, a leading designer and manufacturer of engineered access solutions, wanted to migrate from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud for a higher level of personalization in their marketing campaigns with multilingual marketing collaterals, customized reporting capabilities, and advanced syncing with its Salesforce CRM. They were looking for a reliable Salesforce partner who could help them migrate from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud and drive personalized and data-driven campaigns.

After carefully assessing the customer’s needs, Grazitti’s team undertook the following actions:

• Assessed the marketing team’s requirements, which included multilingual asset creation and greater control over marketing campaigns. This led to guiding them through migration from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
• Configured an advanced suite of tools within Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC), including Email Studio, Content Builder, Automation Studio, and Journey Builder. This setup aimed at enhancing campaign management, customer segmentation, and automation efficiency.
• Developed templates for email campaigns and landing pages to ensure consistent and effective messaging aligned with the customer’s branding and marketing objectives.
• Facilitated the ability for the marketing team to send emails directly from their work email addresses, enhancing personalization and trust in communications.
• Provided comprehensive documentation and conducted tailored training sessions for the customer’s marketing team. This ongoing support ensured that the team could operate SFMC proficiently, maximizing the platform’s capabilities and achieving seamless operations.

With Grazitti’s help, the customer was able to seamlessly migrate from Marketo to SFMC and configure functionalities without disrupting the existing processes. The customer can now:

• Execute targeted marketing campaigns for enhanced customer engagement and improved conversion rates.
• Keep track of customer journeys and contact details by leveraging SFMC Studios.
• Access the performance of the campaigns with better insights than earlier.
• Easily check all the customer data at a centralized location due to better syncing between Salesforce Marketing Cloud and Salesforce CRM.

As a result of our efforts, the customer reported:

• 10% Increase in Conversion Rate
• 7% Improvement in Click-through Rate
• 90% Improvement in Email Deliverability Rate

Best Practices for Migrating From Adobe Marketo Engage to Salesforce Marketing Cloud

Migrating from Marketo to Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC) requires careful planning and isn’t a simple “lift and shift” from one platform to another. A successful migration should focus on achieving your business goals and objectives.

Here are some key considerations:

• Data Model Differences: Marketo’s data model is fundamentally different from Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC). You’ll likely need to transform some data fields during migration to fit SFMC’s structure.
• Feature Parity & Process Adjustments: While both are powerful platforms, Marketo and SFMC have different strengths and functionalities. Carefully evaluate how features you used in Marketo translate to SFMC. You might need to adjust your marketing processes to take advantage of SFMC’s capabilities.
• Translation Considerations: Be mindful of the translations between Marketo and Salesforce Marketing Cloud terminology and functionality. This will help avoid confusion during migration and user training.
• Unsubscribe Syncing: Create a process for syncing unsubscribes when transitioning between platforms. This is crucial to maintaining good email deliverability and ensuring compliance with anti-spam regulations.
• Identify What to Migrate: This includes contacts, leads, emails, landing pages, forms, programs/automation, and potentially historical data depending on your needs.
• Data Transformation: Plan for data transformation to account for differences in data structures between the two platforms.
• User Training & Adoption: SFMC has a different user interface than Marketo. Plan to train your marketing team on using the new platform effectively.

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Statistical References

^[i] CNBC
^[ii] Salesforce