Emarsys vs SAP Marketing – comparing marketing automation solutions

As a IT industry leader, SAP is constantly expanding its product portfolio, establishing a strong market position. In recent years it has managed to acquire such solutions as Ariba , Hybris or Concur. This time, the eyes of the technology giant turned to Emarsys, a cloud-based solution for managing marketing activities and customer relationships.

SAP acquires Emarsys

The news of Emarsys becoming a part of SAP Customer Experience product portfolio was announced during SAP Customer Experience Live 2020 event. The acquisition differed from previous ones as SAP already offered a marketing automation platform – SAP Marketing. This decision became a topic of heated discussion, raising questions about the future of both solutions and the direction in which they will be developed.

Emarsys is a solution that significantly streamlines marketing processes so that the campaign audience receives personalized offers, which ultimately leads to organizations’ profit. Depending on the business needs, the application collects customer data from e-commerce platforms using ready-made integrations. With their help, an individual profile of each customer is created. The more data in the system, the more accurately it will be possible to determine the preferences and needs of the recipients. Then they are divided into segments, to which campaigns will be addressed. In order to create them, a tool is used to extract the audience based on selected attributes accurately.

Additionally, built-in AI mechanisms that analyze available data can be applied to predict future customer behavior. The next step is to automate the campaign. For this purpose, an easy-to-use wizard will come in handy, in which you may set the next stages of the process. Alternatively, you can also use one of the ready-made “tactics”. These are scenarios prepared by specialists that best meet the set goal. This is a great convenience for users, which can significantly accelerate the entire operation.

Example of a campaign planned with Emarsys

Source

Emarsys offers many off-the-shelf solutions

Source

Emarsys is now a part of SAP Customer Experience suite

However, the question arises why SAP decided to purchase Emarsys when it already has a solution for planning marketing campaigns in its product portfolio? After an analysis of the functionalities offered by these applications, it turns out that both of them fulfill their purpose under specific conditions.

Emarsys’ strong point is the tool for designing e-mail marketing campaigns and creating personalized messages. With its help, you can prepare visually appealing content, which is crucial to engage customers in our campaign. This functionality along with the previously mentioned “tactics” makes Emarsys an ideal solution for organizations wishing to target their messages to the individual customer. Furthermore, the ease of message creation and the multitude of built-in pre-defined scenarios give you the ability to reach customers quickly, which in today’s world can be crucial when fighting for their interest.

We can safely say that SAP has enriched its offer with a powerful solution addressed to marketing specialists and despite similarities to the already existing SAP Marketing system, it’s a great addition to the Customer Experience suite of the German software producer. Emarsys will prove useful for companies focused on B2C sales in the sports, tourism or gastronomy industry, whereas organizations focused on business-to-business trade should choose to purchase SAP Marketing license.