Act-On
Lifecycle marketing automation platform for building long-term customer relationships at scale
By Act-On Software · HQ Portland, US · 3.8/5 verified-buyer score
Positioning guardrails
Best for
- Midsize and enterprise marketing teams running lifecycle campaigns across email, web, SMS and social
- Organizations that want an open ecosystem platform rather than a CRM-locked add-on
- Brands running distributed marketing through branch offices, franchisees, agents and partners
- Teams that want CRM choice (Salesforce, Dynamics, Sugar, NetSuite, Zendesk) with Act-On embedded in the CRM UI
- Marketers who need advanced automation in an approachable, non-technical interface
Ideal size: 10–500 people · Scale-up or enterprise with an established marketing ops function
Not for
- Very small teams needing a free tier or sub-$500/month entry point
- Buyers who require published, self-serve list pricing before a sales call
- Companies that want an all-in-one CRM plus marketing suite from a single vendor
- Regulated buyers who need publicly documented SOC 2 or ISO 27001 attestations
- Teams needing native Snowflake, AWS or Slack integrations out of the box
Value metrics scorecard
Time-to-Value
4–6 weeks
~30 days to first production value
Total Cost of Ownership
$24,000/yr
Starts at $10,800 · Active Contacts model: annual contract priced on the number of contacts emailed per month, with unlimited database size and no forced purging
Implementation Friction
3/5
Engineering + admin effort required
Buyer Score
out of 5 · verified buyers
Full cost breakdown
Mandatory implementation fee
None
Seat tiers
Not seat-based; published example is Professional at 2,500 contacts emailed per month for $900/month
Add-on costs
- CRM integration (add-on on Professional; included in Enterprise)
- Data Studio for advanced reporting and BI integration
- Account-Based Marketing
- Automated SMS marketing
- Transactional email
- InSite AI Web Agent
- AI-Powered Advanced Analytics
Company & support
Who is behind Act-On, and how your team gets help once it is live.
Company
- Founded
- 2008 · 18 yrs in business
- Headquarters
- Portland, US
How you get support
- PhoneNot listed
- EmailAll plans
- Live chatNot listed
- Support portal / ticketsNot listed
- Community forumNot listed
- Help centre / docsAll plans
- Dedicated account managerNot listed
- In person / on-siteNot listed
- Hours
- Not recorded
- Response time
- Not stated
Professional includes a standard package with email-based support; premium support is recommended for Enterprise. Self-serve knowledge base, training videos and onboarding resources are available at act-on.com/support.
“Not listed” means the vendor’s public pages don’t mention that channel, not that it is unavailable. Ask about it during evaluation.
Market position
Where Act-On sits against its closest alternatives. Pick any two of cost, speed, friction and buyer score, and up to 9 companies to compare.
Quadrant view
Typical annual cost × Time-to-value
The lines cross at the median of the solutions shown, so about half sit on each side of each line. A dashed ring marks an outlier pinned to the edge; hover for its value.
Companies on the chart 6 / 10
- Act-On
- Salesforce Sales Cloud
- Bizzabo
- Conga
- HubSpot
- Narvar
Add or change companies
Up to 10 companies including Act-On. Listed closest first.
Stack fit signal
Compatibility with standard B2B ecosystems.
No supported MCP path today, so it cannot be driven from an AI client.
AI & MCP readiness
What Act-On ships in AI, and what it asks of your ecosystem.
AI features shipped
Vendor describes predictive lead scoring, an InSite web agent for visitor answers and intent capture, agentic data analysis via natural-language conversation, AI Create copy generation, Adaptive Send timing and Subject Line Optimizer. No statement about model hosting, customer-supplied keys or AI audit logging.
In your ecosystem
- AI connection
- Not supported
- Model key
- Not recorded
- AI usage audit
- Not recorded
Compliance attestations
* IAPP AIGP certifies individuals, not products. It means named staff hold the credential — not that the platform does.
Bottom line
Act-On is a lifecycle marketing automation platform from a Portland-based vendor founded in 2008. It orchestrates personalized journeys across email, web, SMS, social and direct mail, with bidirectional CRM integrations (Salesforce, Dynamics, Sugar, NetSuite, Zendesk), an open API plus Zapier and Integrately connectors, and AI capabilities including predictive lead scoring, an InSite web agent and conversational analytics. Pricing follows an Active Contacts model from $900/month on annual contracts, with add-ons for CRM integration, ABM, SMS, Data Studio and advanced analytics.
Frequently asked questions
How is Act-On priced?
Act-On uses Active Contacts pricing: you pay for the contacts you email in a given month, not the size of your database, and non-active contacts keep their engagement history without forcing you to purge. The published Professional example is $900 per month at 2,500 contacts emailed per month. Annual contracts are required, and CRM integration, Data Studio, Account-Based Marketing, SMS, transactional email and several AI capabilities are add-ons or Enterprise features.
How long until a team sees value?
Act-On positions itself as powerful but easy to use, letting non-technical marketers build and launch automated campaigns without extensive training, and it sells Implementation Services to get teams onboarded quickly. Buyers should still plan for a few weeks of setup, data and CRM connection plus template building before production campaigns run; a realistic first-value window is roughly four to six weeks.
Which systems does Act-On integrate with?
CRM integrations include Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, SugarCRM, NetSuite and Zendesk, with Act-On's UI embedded inside the CRM for bidirectional data flow. A Data Bridge connector exchanges data with any API- or webhook-enabled system such as ERP and financial services platforms, and iPaaS links exist for Zapier and Integrately. An Open API supports custom builds.
What AI does Act-On include?
Vendor material describes predictive lead scoring, an InSite web agent that answers website visitors and captures intent, agentic data analysis that produces insights and visualizations from natural-language questions, AI Create for brand-compliant copy, Adaptive Send for optimal send times, and a subject-line optimizer. Some AI capabilities are add-ons on the Professional plan. Act-On does not publicly document model hosting, bring-your-own-key options or AI audit logging.
Does Act-On publish security certifications?
Act-On does not publish specific certifications such as SOC 2, ISO 27001 or ISO 42001 on the pages reviewed; the security URL serves general product content. Healthcare marketing material references HIPAA-conscious outreach, and the vendor emphasizes security and privacy in IT services positioning. Compliance teams should request current attestation reports, a DPA and any BAA directly from the vendor.