Last week marked a dramatic turning-point for us at LoopFuse and the general Marketing Automation sector, with the unveiling of our Free Marketing Automation offering, FreeView. The release of FreeView and a new low-cost, zero-risk pricing model, marks an almost year’s-worth of work in planning and infrastructure investment geared to accelerate the adoption of Marketing Automation.
The Value to Marketers
While most in the industry often reference a Forrester report claiming 5% penetration in the Marketing Automation sector, the unusual thing is that no one seems to wonder (publicly) why the rate of growth isn’t much higher given the value Marketing Automation provides.
So allow me to rain on the price-gouging parade. Many of our competitors would have you convinced that Marketing Automation is reserved for marketers with million-dollar budgets, dedicated staff to manage the tools, and a bus-load of expensive professional services representatives to “help” them manage it. “Oh, marketing automation is much too complex for you mere mortal marketers…”, the million-dollar-quota sales-rep claims. In many ways, our competitors are distorting the market by projecting their own enterprise-sales commission structure on to you. The model works for them, at the cost of the consumer (your arm, and your leg). In a market with single-digit penetration, and many competitors continuing to follow Eloqua in to the realm of pricing-out the masses, it is evident that many marketers are simply priced-out of the market. And so now the high price barrier to entry for marketers wanting to adopt marketing automation is lowered to ZERO.
The benefits to marketers under this innovative model are clear:
- Zero-Risk: Sign-up and use a full-featured marketing automation product for FREE. Forever.
- Easy-to-Use: A complete wizard-based user-interface will have you up-and-running in minutes, identifying high-quality leads, sending email campaigns, and tracking lead conversion rates.
- Help at your fingertips: Our comprehensive knowledge base and community site is backed by LoopFuse support staff and community members exchanging ideas and best-practice advice.
The value in “free, forever” to marketers is clear with a zero-risk, easy-to-use, supported, and proven product.
The Value to Partners
As individual marketers benefit from a free offering, so do our Partners. The benefits are actually much more clear to partners, as they are now able to fully-implement a customer for FREE and not have to worry about the product vendor affecting their pricing structure. To a Partner, the relationship becomes pure-profit, and not revenue-sharing, as our competitors would enforce.
Last week, the status-quo of distorting the market with overpriced products ended. Marketing Automation is now open to any and every marketer, to use it for Free Forever. No strings attached, no bait and switch, no credit cards required. Just Sign-up and you’re ready to go in minutes.
Thoughts on the announcement, by others:
- LoopFuse Offers Free Marketing Automation System: Another Step Towards Industry Consolidation
- LoopFuse Removes the Budget Barrier from Marketing Automation
- LoopFuse Ignites Freemium Strategy
- LoopFuse FreeView: Free Marketing Automation
Tags: Demand Generation, freemium, LoopFuse, Marketing Automation, Marketing Channels, Salesforce.com Integration
Roy,
First, congratulations on the launch of FreeView. Without a doubt being the first to market with a a free offering is a huge step in the right direction for segments of the market. I concur and reported on this on the TheMarketingMojo – “what-does-free-mean-for-marketing-automation”.
As contradictory as this may seem, I don’t think what makes the LoopFuse FreeView offering unique is the fact that it is free marketing automation. Rather, what makes FreeView special is that it enables SMB marketers to experience in a low risk manner the effect a complete marketing automation package can have on their business. It’s critical for SMB marketers to minimize draining dollars from working budgets (on media buys and content development) until they fully understand how to successfully incorporate into their go-to market strategy.
I’d also argue that Eloqua is doing a great job of meeting the needs of specific market segments. For a small business their fees may seem like “gouging”, but for an enterprise they are offering a solution that meets enterprise needs. Yes, that is expensive, requires upfront consulting, and ongoing bodies to maintain, but that is frequently what an enterprise need. While I agree Eloqua is expensive, I think Eloqua meets the needs of a certain market. Just like LoopFuse with Freeview meets the needs of SMB marketers.
– Tewks