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Marketo
Marketo
from Wikipedia

Marketo, Inc. is an American software company, with its headquarters in San Mateo, California. Marketo develops and sells marketing automation software for account-based marketing and other marketing services and products, including SEO and content creation.[1][2][3]

Key Information

In 2018, Marketo was acquired by Adobe Inc.[1][4]

History

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Previous logo

Phil Fernandez, Jon Miller, and David Morandi, formerly of Epiphany,[5] founded Marketo in 2006.[6][7]

In April 2012, Marketo completed its first acquisition by acquiring Crowd Factory, which enabled the company to integrate social media marketing capabilities into its application suite.[8]

By 2013, Marketo had filed for an initial public offering and went public on May 17, 2013.[9][10] In December 2013, Marketo acquired Insightera, an Israeli company specializing in website personalization, for $20 million in cash and stock.[11]

In June 2016, Vista Equity Partners announced an agreement to acquire Marketo for approximately $1.79 billion,[12] and the acquisition was completed in August 2017.[13][14] Steve Lucas was named the new chief executive officer of Marketo in October 2016.[15] In August 2017, Marketo announced that it would move all of its marketing automation software onto Google Cloud Platform as part of a six-year partnership to integrate Google's tools into Marketo's products;[16] however, this was paused in 2019.

On September 20, 2018, Adobe Systems announced that it was buying Marketo for $4.75 billion.[17][18]

Products

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Marketo Lead Management was launched in 2008, followed by Marketo Sales Insight in 2009, and Marketo Revenue Cycle Analytics in 2010.[19]

In November 2012, Marketo introduced LaunchPoint, an app and service network for marketing.[20]

References

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from Grokipedia
Adobe Marketo Engage is an AI-powered platform within 's Experience Cloud suite, designed to streamline, automate, and measure marketing workflows to engage customers and prospects through personalized, multi-channel campaigns while driving revenue growth. Marketo was founded in 2006 in , by , Phil Fernandez, and David Morandi, former colleagues at Epiphany, with the initial aim of providing marketers with tools to better measure and optimize campaigns in a data-driven manner. The company quickly grew as a leader in B2B , offering solutions for , , and analytics. In 2013, Marketo went public on the under the ticker , raising approximately $79 million in its priced at $13 per share. Following its IPO, Marketo expanded its enterprise offerings and was acquired in 2016 by private equity firm for $1.79 billion, which represented a 64% premium over its then-current stock price. In 2018, Adobe announced its acquisition of Marketo for $4.75 billion—the largest in Adobe's history at the time—allowing the platform to integrate with Adobe's broader for enhanced , content optimization, and real-time data synchronization. As of 2018, Adobe Marketo Engage served nearly 5,000 customers worldwide, focusing on B2B and B2C scenarios with features like AI-driven customer journey orchestration, , and attribution reporting to align sales and marketing teams.

Overview

Background

Marketo was founded in 2006 by , Phil Fernandez, and David Morandi as a B2B-focused provider, specifically targeting and the demonstration of (ROI) for chief marketing officers (). The company emerged from the founders' prior experience at Epiphany, where they identified gaps in existing marketing tools, aiming to empower marketers with technology that aligns sales and marketing efforts directly to revenue outcomes. Initially, Marketo concentrated on developing on-demand marketing software to overcome the limitations of traditional enterprise solutions such as Eloqua and Aprimo, which were often expensive, complex, and difficult to implement for mid-market businesses. This approach made more accessible, allowing organizations to automate processes without the heavy demands of on-premises systems. At its core, Marketo's mission was to enable scalable and measurable marketing campaigns through automation, transforming marketing from a cost center into a revenue-driving function by providing tools for lead nurturing, scoring, and performance tracking. This emphasis on data-driven insights helped CMOs quantify marketing's impact on business growth.

Current Status

As of 2025, Adobe Marketo Engage serves as a core component of the Adobe Experience Cloud, providing B2B marketing automation capabilities that enable organizations to manage demand generation and customer engagement across multiple channels. Rebranded from its original Marketo identity following Adobe's acquisition, it has been positioned as a leader in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for B2B Marketing Automation Platforms, recognized for its completeness of vision and ability to execute in supporting enterprise-scale marketing operations. This leadership underscores its role in delivering AI-driven, omnichannel experiences that integrate seamlessly with Adobe's broader ecosystem, including tools for content personalization and analytics to enhance customer journeys. In recent updates, initiated the phase-out of the legacy Marketo Engage Identity login system in August 2025, transitioning users to the more secure Adobe Identity Management System (IMS) to streamline access and align with Adobe's unified framework. This migration, which began for most subscriptions earlier in the year, had a firm deadline of September 30, 2025, after which the legacy Marketo Engage Identity login system reached end of support. Administrators are supported through tools in the Adobe Admin Console for managing permissions and monitoring migration status, reflecting 's commitment to . Marketo Engage maintains its market dominance in lead nurturing and , powering scalable campaigns that leverage to drive revenue growth for B2B enterprises. Highlights from the Adobe Summit 2025 roadmap emphasize advancements in workflow , enabling automated, cross-channel journeys, alongside generative AI (GenAI) enhancements for and optimization, such as AI-powered designers and integration with GenStudio for faster at scale. These developments position it as a forward-looking solution for hyper-automated , with deeper connectors to 's AI agents for account-based . The October 2025 release introduced further enhancements, including an upgrade to the CRM integration deploying to production starting November 13, 2025, and the end of support for the Forward to a Friend feature on September 29, 2025. Additionally, the access_token parameter and support are scheduled to end on January 31, 2026.

History

Founding and Early Years

Marketo was founded in 2006 by Phil Fernandez, , and David Morandi, all of whom had previously served as executives at Epiphany, a CRM that was acquired by SSA Global Technologies in 2005 for $329 million. At Epiphany, Fernandez had been president and COO, Morandi the CTO, and Miller vice president of product marketing, giving the trio deep expertise in customer relationship management and analytics software. The company was established in , during the emerging era of software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions for marketing, as businesses increasingly sought cloud-based tools to streamline and . Marketo's initial focus was on developing an on-demand platform to address gaps in B2B , particularly for in a market still dominated by on-premise systems. The company secured its first funding round, a Series A , in October 2006 from investors including InterWest Partners and Mayfield Fund, providing capital to build its SaaS infrastructure. By 2008, Marketo released its inaugural product, Marketo , a cloud-based solution emphasizing lead scoring, nurturing workflows, and performance analytics tailored for B2B marketers to align marketing efforts with sales pipelines. In its early years, Marketo faced challenges in a nascent sector, where it competed with contemporaries like (founded in 2006) and Pardot (also launched in 2006), both vying to capture the shift toward inbound and automated marketing strategies. Additional funding rounds, including a Series B in 2008, helped sustain development amid economic uncertainty following the , enabling the company to refine its platform for scalability and user adoption. These efforts laid the groundwork for Marketo's emphasis on revenue-focused marketing tools in the evolving SaaS landscape.

Growth and Public Offering

In 2011, Marketo expanded its global footprint by opening its first international office in , , where it planned to create 125 new jobs to support growing demand for its cloud-based marketing solutions. That same year, the company enhanced its platform with advanced capabilities and campaign management tools, enabling more sophisticated for across multiple channels. These developments marked a pivotal shift from its initial focus on to a broader suite, positioning Marketo as a leader in . Marketo experienced rapid customer growth throughout the early , scaling from a startup serving hundreds of clients to over 2,000 customers by , with a diverse base spanning business services, financial sectors, and technology firms. This expansion was driven by the platform's emphasis on ROI tracking through revenue cycle analytics and multi-channel , which allowed marketers to measure campaign effectiveness and nurture leads more efficiently. By the end of , the customer count had risen to more than 3,000, reflecting strong adoption amid a booming SaaS market. Marketo went public in May , listing on under the ticker and raising $79 million through the sale of 6.1 million shares priced at $13 each, at the high end of its expected range. Shares surged 78% on the debut day, closing at $23.10 and valuing the company at approximately $1.5 billion, a significant jump from its pre-IPO valuation of around $550 million. The continued to perform strongly in the following years, peaking at over $35 per share in 2016, which pushed the above $2 billion at its height and underscored investor confidence in the sector. In the mid-2010s, Marketo invested in platform enhancements, particularly in and lead database , to improve data-driven for users. For instance, updates in introduced a refreshed for and expanded Sales Insight features for real-time opportunity tracking. By 2015, integrations like Marketo Insights for and advanced content in its Real-Time Personalization tool further refined lead nurturing and . These improvements helped Marketo differentiate itself from competitors, notably Eloqua, which acquired in March 2013 for $871 million, intensifying the competitive landscape in enterprise .

Acquisitions

In 2016, Marketo was acquired by in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $1.79 billion, with shareholders receiving $35.25 per share, representing a 64% premium over the company's closing stock price on May 9, 2016. This deal took Marketo private, allowing the company to prioritize long-term growth and innovation in its enterprise customer engagement platform without the short-term pressures of public markets. expertise in scaling high-growth SaaS companies was cited as a key factor to support Marketo's product development and initiatives. On September 20, 2018, announced its acquisition of Marketo from for $4.75 billion in cash, marking 's largest acquisition to date and aiming to strengthen its B2B marketing capabilities within the . The transaction, which provided Vista with a profitable exit yielding nearly $3 billion in returns after just two years of ownership, was completed on October 31, 2018, following regulatory approvals. 's strategic intent focused on integrating Marketo's and strengths with its own analytics, personalization, advertising, and commerce tools to deliver end-to-end B2B customer experiences at scale. Immediately following the acquisition, Marketo's Engagement Platform was incorporated into Adobe's Experience Cloud, with Steve Lucas continuing to lead the Marketo team and reporting to Brad Rencher, Adobe's EVP and General Manager of Digital Experience. This period emphasized early efforts to combine Marketo's B2B with Adobe's data-driven and capabilities, setting the stage for enhanced cross-product synergies. Following the acquisition, Marketo was rebranded as Adobe Marketo Engage and has continued to evolve with integrations into 's ecosystem, including AI-powered features for customer journey orchestration announced in updates through 2025.

Products and Services

Marketo Engage Platform

Marketo Engage is a cloud-based platform serving as Adobe's flagship solution for B2B and B2C considered purchase . It enables organizations to manage leads across all stages of buying journeys, incorporating a robust database for contact management, tools for orchestrating campaigns, and for tracking revenue cycles. The platform supports both demand-based and account-based strategies, with built-in customization options and capabilities for measuring impact across channels to drive personalized buyer engagement and predictable revenue growth. At its core, Marketo Engage comprises three primary modules that form its architecture. The Lead Database acts as the central repository for storing and managing contact records, with capacity limited by the subscription's quantity to ensure scalable data handling. The module powers orchestration, including up to 250 engagement programs for nurturing sequences, 40 segmentations for audience targeting, and trigger or batch campaigns for automated execution across channels. Revenue Cycle Analytics provides performance tracking through revenue models and attribution tools, such as Marketo Measure available in the package, to analyze lead progression from initial interaction to closed-won opportunities. Following Adobe's acquisition of Marketo in September 2018 for $4.75 billion, the platform underwent significant evolution, including a to Adobe Marketo Engage in 2019 to align with the ecosystem. This emphasized its role in delivering end-to-end management, with post-acquisition updates integrating Adobe's AI technologies, such as the AI Assistant for enhanced . The platform now natively supports complex considered purchase journeys in B2B and B2C contexts, focusing on long sales cycles and multi-stakeholder decision-making. Marketo Engage is deployed via a SaaS model as on-demand services, licensed per 1,000 contacts to accommodate varying organizational scales. Base entitlements include 25 marketing users per instance, database limits tied to contact volume, and 50,000 calls per day, with add-ons available in increments (e.g., packs of 10,000 calls) for expansion. Designed for enterprise scalability, higher tiers support increased throughput, such as up to 175 million activities per week and 15 times the trigger campaign velocity, alongside static limits like peak batch send rates of 1 million to 5 million per hour based on package selection.

Key Features

Marketo Engage provides advanced capabilities that leverage behavioral data to identify and prioritize high-quality prospects. Lead scoring assigns numerical values to leads based on their interactions, such as opens, visits, and content downloads, allowing marketers to evaluate levels and readiness for handover. Nurturing workflows guide leads through the customer lifecycle with targeted content, using behavioral triggers to deliver personalized experiences that increase conversion rates. Segmentation further refines this process by grouping leads according to their actions and attributes, enabling precise audience targeting without manual intervention. Campaign automation in Marketo Engage is powered by Smart Campaigns, which serve as the core engine for executing marketing tasks through configurable triggers and flows. These campaigns activate based on specific events, like form submissions or page visits, and automate workflows such as sends, score updates, or notifications to teams, streamlining multi-channel execution. Complementing this, Journey Builder facilitates the creation of multi-step customer paths, integrating existing Marketo assets with generative AI assistance to coordinate personalized journeys across buying groups and target accounts. Personalization tools in Marketo Engage enable dynamic content delivery to enhance across touchpoints. Dynamic content blocks adapt emails and landing pages in real-time based on lead segments, displaying customized elements like product recommendations or messaging tailored to user behavior. Generative AI further supports this by generating real-time updates for messaging, such as in chat interactions or authoring, allowing for scalable, context-aware customization that boosts . The platform's analytics suite offers built-in tools for measuring campaign effectiveness without requiring external integrations. ROI tracking utilizes pre-configured dashboards to calculate returns by incorporating cost data and attribution across channels. Attribution models, including first-touch, last-touch, and options, provide insights into how efforts influence pipeline and conversions, with every-touch B2B analysis enhanced by AI. Interactive dashboards and reports visualize performance metrics, while capabilities allow optimization of emails and campaigns by comparing outcomes like open rates and conversions directly within the interface.

Integration and Technology

Adobe Ecosystem

Marketo Engage, as part of the since its acquisition in 2018, synergizes with core tools to enable comprehensive marketing orchestration. It combines with Adobe Analytics for advanced data analysis and attribution modeling, allowing marketers to track campaign performance across channels and correlate marketing efforts with revenue outcomes. Integration with Adobe Target facilitates real-time personalization, delivering tailored content and experiences based on visitor behavior and lead data from Marketo. Additionally, Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) streamlines through native asset integration, supporting form creation, data synchronization, and automated lead nurturing directly within content workflows. Post-2018, these integrations have evolved into a unified platform via the Experience Platform (AEP), which serves as a real-time for end-to-end journeys. Marketo connects to AEP through source and destination mechanisms: the source connection exports Marketo attributes—such as leads, activities, and custom fields—to build unified profiles, while the destination connection imports AEP segments to create or update Marketo records without overwriting existing . This setup supports B2B-specific profiles linking accounts, opportunities, and buying groups, enabling seamless flow across Adobe tools for continuous profile enrichment and intent-driven interactions. In 2025, deeper generative AI (GenAI) ties via Adobe Sensei have enhanced these capabilities, introducing agentic AI for automated task orchestration, content generation, and predictive personalization, such as AI-driven chatbots and real-time journey adjustments, all while adhering to responsible AI principles like transparency and ethical use. Key benefits include enhanced attribution across Adobe tools, where Marketo's lead and campaign data feeds into Adobe Analytics and Marketo Measure for multi-touch revenue insights, reducing silos and improving ROI measurement. The migration to Adobe Identity Management Service (IMS) was phased throughout 2025, beginning in August, with full end-of-life for legacy Marketo identity on September 30, 2025, unifies authentication across Adobe products, enabling (SSO), enhanced via IP restrictions, and streamlined admin access without disrupting workflows. For instance, Marketo can feed qualified leads into Adobe Campaign via AEP or Adobe Journey Optimizer B2B Edition, incorporating Marketo campaigns and assets into broader orchestrations while syncing data bi-directionally to avoid duplication through granular field mapping.

Third-Party Integrations

Marketo provides native bidirectional synchronization with leading (CRM) systems, enabling seamless data exchange between marketing and sales teams. The integration with supports real-time syncing of leads, contacts, and campaigns, with compatibility for introduced in 2019 to facilitate enhanced user experiences in the Lightning interface. In October 2025, the CRM integration was upgraded to improve performance and functionality. Similarly, the native connector for allows bidirectional syncing of leads, contacts, accounts, and opportunities, with initial full database copies followed by incremental updates for changed data only, typically completing in seconds or minutes. For , integrations are available through API connectors and Adobe Experience Platform, supporting data synchronization for leads and activities, though not as a fully native bidirectional setup like or Dynamics. Beyond core CRMs, Marketo's LaunchPoint facilitates API-based integrations with hundreds of third-party applications, allowing marketers to extend functionality across diverse tools without custom development. For instance, integration with enables the tracking of web personalization segments and events, sending user interaction data directly to GA for comprehensive analytics. Zapier connectivity supports automation workflows, such as triggering Marketo program creation from external form submissions or syncing data across apps via webhooks. In , enhancements to Marketo's connectivity with Adobe Experience Platform improved data export capabilities, enabling the ingestion of Marketo datasets like leads and activities into AEP as audiences or static lists, with support for scheduled batch exports limited to daily frequencies to manage performance. These integrations offer key benefits, including near-real-time lead syncing to ensure timely updates across systems, customizable field mapping to align data structures (e.g., selecting specific lead or opportunity fields for sync), and the elimination of data silos in multi-tool environments by enabling unified data flows. Setup typically involves configuring credentials in Marketo's Admin > Integration > LaunchPoint, defining sync filters, and mapping custom fields to maintain data consistency.

References

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