Braze is Salesforce’s third marketing / CX deal since June, after Contentful and Fin.
Yesterday Salesforce announced it’s buying Braze for about $5.7B. Braze has roughly 2,770 customers (Canva, Instacart, Venmo and Urban Outfitters among them), and Salesforce plans to sell it alongside Marketing Cloud and Agentforce to big B2C brands (Retail TouchPoints, CNBC).
Contentful closed on September 1 (about $1.5B) and Fin, formerly Intercom, closed on September 10 ($3.6B). Braze is the biggest of the three, and the one that sits closest to a product Salesforce already sells.
So we went back through our interviews. Braze came up in 117 of them in the last 12 months alone.
Here’s what Braze buyers told us before the announcement.
Braze is where people went when they left Marketing Cloud
117 buyer interviews in the last 12 months where Braze came up
51 of those buyers also run Salesforce
Braze is well liked. 65 of those buyers gave it an 8 or higher. And some of them picked it specifically to get off Salesforce Marketing Cloud. A $1B-$10B consumer electronics company made that move and rated Braze an 8/10:
“Salesforce Marketing Cloud was a great tool that we used for many, many years and a lot of it, has a great potential, but you kind of have to build it all from the ground up. You kind of have to have all experts to know that. Whereas in Braze it’s a little bit more, I would say, user-friendly.”
Manager Marketing, $1B-$10B consumer electronics company
A $100M-$500M financial services company has been on Marketing Cloud for eight or nine years. They rated it 3/10 and described it like this:
“It’s a complex platform that requires an amount of investment in terms of not only its price but also in terms of internal resources… It looks like a very old platform that’s just a combination of different tools that Salesforce acquired through the years.”
Director Marketing, $100M-$500M financial services company
That was in April, six months before Salesforce agreed to buy Braze.
Ratings are the 1-10 satisfaction scores buyers gave when we asked them to rate their stack.
Some were halfway out the door when the deal was announced
That same financial services company is evaluating Braze and ActiveCampaign to replace Marketing Cloud. Asked why:
“For sure they are modern solutions that can allow us to be faster and more flexible… The investment, the cost that you put in there, and what you get is ten times better than what you get today from Marketing Cloud.”
Director Marketing, $100M-$500M financial services company
A $1B-$10B consumer subscription company (Marketing Cloud, 5/10) had already run audits on Braze. Asked whether switching was worth the pain:
“Yes, because it’s not just the pain of the change, it’s also the cost of the cloud options that Salesforce right now is pushing in terms of enabling their AI solutions… That pain is becoming enough for us to make a decision in the near time.”
Director Marketing, $1B-$10B consumer subscription company
Both were evaluating Braze as a Marketing Cloud replacement when the deal was announced.
Acquisitions send buyers back to their shortlist
Salesforce buying Braze will push a lot of companies into a reevaluation that probably wasn’t going to happen otherwise. When a vendor gets bought, customers re-check pricing, roadmap and contract terms. We’ve heard it play out after other deals.
The CMO of a $100M-$500M fashion retailer rated mParticle 3/10 after Rokt bought it:
“They sold to somebody who then, you know, that’s such a small part of their stack, they took a lot of the features off it and absorbed it into a much bigger stack and then tried to sell you the whole stack. So it’s a bit of a bait and switch there. So, yeah, safe to say that our renewal for them comes up early next year and it’s under scrutiny and review.”
CMO, $100M-$500M fashion retailer
The same CMO had already dropped a personalization tool, Qubit, for the same reason:
“We haven’t used AB Tasty at the front end because we used to be a Qubit customer, but when they were acquired, we took that away.”
CMO, $100M-$500M fashion retailer
An IT executive at a $1B-$10B computer hardware company rated their PIM, Jasper, 6/10 and pointed to the deal:
“Strengths would be it’s easy enough to pick up… I would think stability of the company, they got acquired over the past year or two by yet another company, and there were some blips in support.”
IT Executive, $1B-$10B computer hardware company
And a $1B-$10B specialty retailer is building its own replacement for Cheetah Digital (rated 5/10) after two ownership changes, even with a year left on the contract:
“They were acquired and then became Cheetah Digital, and since that point have now been acquired by Zeta Global. It was more of a grandfathered-in type of engagement… However, we’ve been having significant issues with that partner.”
Director Marketing, $1B-$10B specialty retailer
It can go the other way too. A $1B-$10B restaurant chain says mParticle got better after the Rokt deal:
“They also recently merged or Rokt acquired them, so I think having the Rokt team on board has been helpful and just how they’ve restructured the contracts and the kind of quality of support we’ve been getting has improved.”
Manager Marketing, $1B-$10B restaurant chain
And the bundle doesn’t always hold. A $1B-$10B apparel retailer rates its email platform, Emarsys, 2/10 and is replacing it. Asked how they ended up on it:
“We ended up on that platform because it was bundled with our larger SAP contract.”
Director Marketing, $1B-$10B apparel retailer
Either way, the acquisition is what put the question on the table.
What to do about it
- If you sell into Salesforce shops, expect to get compared to “it’s in the bundle.” Salesforce now owns the messaging layer, the CMS and the support agent. Have the answer ready before procurement asks.
- If you partner with Braze, talk to its customers before the deal closes. Salesforce expects to close in its fiscal 2028 (which starts in February). Until then, Braze customers will be asking every tool connected to it what changes, and the partners who answer first get the next conversation.
- If you compete with Braze or Salesforce, this is a reevaluation window that wasn’t going to open otherwise. Customers will re-check pricing, roadmap and contract terms over the next year (especially the ones who picked Braze to get away from Salesforce). Be in the conversation when they do.
Three marketing / CX deals since June, all landing in the same customers’ stacks. If you sell anything that sits next to Salesforce, your next renewal just got a new competitor. Better to hear it from us now than from their procurement team.
Jon
P.S. Those 117 Braze conversations also cover what buyers run alongside it and what else they’re evaluating. If you want the breakdown, let us know. Best case, you spot your next opp. Worst case, you know what you’re up against.