I had a chance to catch up with marketing automation guru Sam Boush, President of LeadLizard.com. He has built his team from scratch, creating an impressive capability across several platforms. As an enterprise marketing automation consigliere, LeadLizard is well positioned to help firms make the most of their systems to deliver revenue.

Tell me about your approach to client engagements.

When we engage with a client, we first make sure we’re a fit for each other. There are a lot of things we look for in a client in the same way they look for specific things in us. We target enterprise accounts – with revenue in the hundreds of millions of dollars or more – because they have the internal resources to work well with us, and often have a really good understanding of the space already, which makes it easier for us to deliver high-quality demand generation solutions.

We also want our clients to have Eloqua, Salesforce.com, Marketo, Pardot, or Act-On. What we offer is a best-practices approach to using these tools, not just so our clients can get more out of their marketing automation or CRM platform, but also so they can get more out of their entire demand generation efforts. We specialize in these tools, which makes us unique.

What’s your favorite platform?

Well, any of the ones I just mentioned are great. It comes down to finding the right platform for the individual organization. Cost isn’t the only factor. If you’re a billion dollar organization – and we work with several – it’s usually Eloqua, though sometimes Marketo or Pardot. But that’s not to say one is the only choice for enterprise organizations. It comes down to their demand generation efforts, the other tools they’re integrating, the internal resources they can bring to bear, and a whole host of other factors.

What’s been your favorite engagement so far?

We’ve had so many extremely successful engagements. I love the advanced forms we’ve done for Box. Tibco really uses us heavily for their Tibbr team. Our work with Avid recently was nominated for an Eloqua Markie.

Our clients really love working with us and I know our team really enjoys our clients. We have maybe twenty active accounts right now – more I think. And there’s really not a single one that isn’t great in its own way.

I guess I’m really happy with WisdomTree, because they’re in the financial services space, which is a space we’re moving into rapidly. Most of our clients are in technology (software, hardware, IT, etc.) so having worked with WisdomTree for about a year – and really doing great things for them – has opened us up to doing a lot more work in finance.

How many people do you have on your team?

We’re up to 12, but hiring all the time. In fact, we’ve been interviewing for an Account Manager position this week, and as soon as that’s filled, we’ll interview for another open Demand Generation Architect position.

Which areas do you specialize in?

If it touches on a marketing automation or CRM platform, we probably do it. Just some of what we do: lead nurturing, lead scoring, advanced systems work, integrations, reporting, systems audits, system migrations, sales enablement, revenue performance management and managed services for Eloqua, Marketo, Pardot and Salesforce. We really do a lot – that’s certainly not a complete list. But really, we help marketing teams accomplish their goals using the demand generation tools they have.

What’s the best way for marketers to get in touch?

Send an email to info[at] leadlizard.com and I, or someone on my team, will get back to you right away.

Disclosure: I have an affiliate agreement with LeadLizard, but that has nothing to do with the links on this page 🙂

Thanks to everyone who sent in more ideas for marketing automation tools to review. Since that was a popular post, I thought I’d check out a few of the other services people suggested.

Infusionsoft

This tool came up several times in email questions. I’ve never used it, so I can’t say much about it’s real usefulness. First, I can’t watch a demo without filling out a form. That bothers me a lot – I should be able to view a basic demo without giving up my contact information. Next, let’s look at the feature set. Infusionsoft is a “complete” tool in that the Plus and Premier packages offer a basic CRM. There appears to be no SFDC integration, so if that’s an issue for you, this is not your solution. The service does offer email marketing, automation, lead scoring, and tracking. The higher value packages even offer shopping cart tools, which are not available on the major B2B solutions.

From the video demos, Infusionsoft seems to combine the oddness of Act-On and the Visio-like workflow tool of Eloqua. This could work well for people who like the complete visualization. Infusionsoft also appears to have an active user community and extensive library of pre-built workflows. Support options also include chat, phone, email, workshops, and in-person help. So Infusionsoft is a bit closer to the mainstream automation solutions.

As for pricing and value, this could be a good fit for a small business with 2-10 staff and  under 100,000 contacts. The sticking point for me is that there is a contact and an email limit for each pricing tier. The last thing I want to think about is how many emails do I have left this month, especially if I’m approaching 4-10 emails per month at 80,000 contacts. As one user put it, “Good for first year…Bad for scale.” This solution is best for a small business that is doing local outreach.

GreenRope:

I hadn’t heard of GreenRope until the other day. Clearly Marketo and Eloqua have made the Marketing Automation solutions market hot and many firms think they have a solution for each segment of the market. GreenRope definitely fits the Small Biz segment with even better plans than Infusionsoft.

I’m always impressed by new features that some firms make difficult. GreenRope includes SMS and an event calendar system with payment tools. Many other firms force you to do this yourself or to integrate Eventbrite or third-party tools. Of course, many enterprise firms would find this tool limiting, but small businesses will find it an easy tool.

Like Infusionsoft, GreenRope includes a basic CRM and the usual email marketing and customer support cases. GreenRope does appear to offer some level of workflow templates through their modules and does include email and page templates. Neat options include integrated P&L and company support forums. GreenRope’s support includes chat, email, and phone except for the most basic plan.

GreenRope’s pricing plan tiers take the full range of the small business, up to 50,000 contacts (with an option to increase at 1/2 a cent). For 12 months, the full plan costs $4788/yr vs Infusionsoft’s $4588, however in year 1, Infusionsoft asks for $1999 one time setup fee. The kicker is that GreenRope has unlimited email for each pricing tier. GreenRope will have a lower total cost of ownership than Infusionsoft.

GreenRope knows they are up against Infusionsoft and wrote a comparison which sounds like the salesperson’s objection handling sheet. Ombud also has a review, albeit incomplete. Since there is an easy Free Trial option, I’d probably test GreenRope out before hitting up Infusionsoft. [Updated free trial link at Greenrope’s request – 11/12/14]

Office Autopilot

Office Autopilot is another tool I hadn’t heard of before. Given their emphasis on direct mail tools and ecommerce, I’d say they grew out of an old direct mail house.

The feature set in Office Autopilot is similar to GreenRope. They offer payment processing and an event management tool, rather than open workflow rules. Of course, you can do your own workflow rules if you want. WordPress integration and direct mail postcards are tied into the system as well, which is perfect for many small business that primarily sell from their blog. If I weren’t such a fan of Genesis Theme or custom solutions, I’d test this out.

The support options for OA are limited to email, phone, and chat during certain hours. As for the interface, the videos were less clear than the other services.

Pricing is where Office Autopilot seems to fall short against GreenRope. They offer two tiers: Pro and Team. With a max of 100,000 contacts and 100,000 emails/mo, Office Autopilot will cost you $7164/yr. If you need more emails, it’s $99/mo. This makes Office Autopilot a poorly scalable solution if GreenRope is an option for you, so I could only recommend it to pro-bloggers who are still well under 100,000 contacts and who also need integrated direct mail and WordPress.

Bottom Line for Small Business Marketing Automation

If you are a very small business, I would suggest trying GreenRope. Their packages are straightforward and they offer full support, which is not available with Office Autopilot or even Mailchimp. I can’t recommend Infusionsoft or Office Autopilot because of their pricing and support tiers; I also see their interfaces lack something. GreenRope also doesn’t pull back features for their packages. If you need Salesforce intergration and automation and if your budget permits, Pardot is good alternative to HubSpot and Marketo Spark/Standard because the feature set is similar and the pricing is usually 50% less.

Image: Tax Credit