Top 10 marketing planning software

Marketing is complex. There are a lot of moving parts across creative teams such as design, copy production, SEO, PPC and more, which can make production and coordination confusing if everyone’s not on the same page.

Streamlined communication across multiple teams and stakeholders is paramount for success. Who’s responsible for what? Where can internal stakeholders and clients go to find information and review assets?

Deploying a conglomerate of software platforms can get messy fast. Instead, it’s ideal to have a single source of truth for all marketing planning, budgeting and other campaign processes. Sure, using just one platform may not be possible for some of the large businesses, but that’s where integration comes into play.

This is everything marketing planning software platforms should be able to do with little fuss.

What Is Marketing Planning Software?

A marketing planning platform is the quarterback of a marketing team — it helps coordinate the plays and strategies integral for successful campaigns.

Simply put, it’s a centralized marketing planning tool that allows teams to align and collaborate on planning and executing; a digital command center, if you will, where you can:

• Organize tasks.
• Set goals.
• Track progress.

But what features make these possible? 

What Should You Look for in Marketing Planning Software?

Hunting for marketing planning software is like shopping for a Swiss Army knife: You want it to have the right tools for the job. Here are some key things to look for:

• Collaboration capabilities: Teams should be able to work seamlessly together and collaborate on projects with little obstacles standing in their way. Look for features that facilitate communication, file sharing and collaborative editing.

• Ease of use: Like any piece of software, marketing planning tools should be user-friendly and intuitive, ensuring that teams can get started quickly without a steep learning curve.

• Customization: Ideally, you want software that can be customized and tailored to your team’s unique needs and workflows.

• Integration options: While a great marketing platform is a one-stop-shop, it should still play nice with other tools your team already uses, like CRM systems, web analytics platforms or social media management tools.

• Project management features: From task assignments to deadlines, software should have robust project management capabilities.

• Resource management: Look for features that help you plan and track your budget, as well as allocate resources efficiently.

• Analytics and reporting: A good platform should provide analytics and reporting tools to measure the success of campaigns and identify areas for improvement.

• Scalability: You want a tool that can grow with your business and evolving needs. Ensure that your chosen software is scalable and can accommodate future marketing plans for your business.

The 10 Best Marketing Planning Software to Use in 2024

Without further ado, here are the top marketing planning software solutions available today:

1. Brafton CMP

What it does well: Brafton’s content marketing platform operates on 5 core functions, including digital asset management, content calendar, content production planning, resource tracking and campaign measurement. It’s a Jack of all trades!

Standout features: Plan, produce and track performance all in one place with the Brafton CMP.

Pricing: $100 per month for up to 50 users, but you can start with a 14-day free trial.

Takeaway: If you need one platform that can handle just about any marketing plan you throw at it, the Brafton CMP is for you.

Say “bye” to spreadsheet calendars

And “hi” to smarter planning with the Brafton Platform. 

Thank you! We’ll be in touch with you about setting up your free demo.

2. Asana

What it does well: Asana is built for teams. The platform easily enables complex cross-departmental work for product and project management.

Standout features: Project views, time tracking, custom fields, admin console.

Pricing: Asana offers special pricing for individuals and small teams from $0-$24.99 per month. For Enterprise rates, contact the Asana sales team.

Takeaway: If your organization does a lot of cross-team collaboration, Asana may be the perfect project management platform.

3. Trello

What it does well: Trello helps keep teams organized to boost productivity. Create boards, lists and cards to organize and track each stage of a task, from start to finish.

Standout features: Power-ups. Trello allows you to “power up” your teams by linking their most-used and favorite marketing tools directly to Trello plugins. Additionally, you can select a solution that works for you, whether that’s one purpose-built for engineering teams, start-ups or design work.

Pricing: $0-$17.50 per month.

Takeaway: Trello seems to know a thing or two about staying productive. If your organization needs a boost in that department, it may be the solution you’re looking for.

4. Sprout Social

What it does well: If the name didn’t give it away, Sprout Social is specifically designed for social media management. They say and I quote, “Our all-in-one social media management platform unlocks the full potential of social to transform not just your marketing strategy — but every area of your organization.”

Standout features: This platform’s core features offer tools for engagement, publishing and analytics, but a step up will give you access to even more, including tools for influencer marketing, employee advocacy and more.

Pricing: $249-$499 per month for standard to advanced options. Enterprises must contact Sprout Social directly for pricing.

Takeaway: Sprout Social is something of an industry standard for social media marketing. If you do a lot on social media, this platform is sure to offer value.

5. HubSpot

What it does well: If you work in marketing and haven’t heard of HubSpot, we’d accuse you of living under a rock. If you need inbound marketing and sales support, HubSpot does those very well.

Standout features: Known for its Hubs, HubSpot offers dedicated software for marketing, sales, service, CMS, operations and commerce. There’s a hub for virtually everything. The most popular of which may be the HubSpot marketing Hub, but there’s a lot more where that comes from.

Pricing: HubSpot’s free plan offers access to a selection of useful tools. Paid plans range between $800-$3,600 per month.

Takeaway: HubSpot speaks for itself. If you’re at the helm of a large marketing operation, the platform is sure to make managing it a little easier.

6. Wrike

What it does well: Workflows, workflows, workflows. Need them streamlined? Wrike can probably help with that.

Standout features: Wrike is in the business of streamlining. Enjoy features for resource planning, proofing, cross-tagging and more.

Pricing: $0-24.80 per month. Contact Wrike for Enterprise and Pinnacle rates.

Takeaway: Wrike does a little bit of everything — and has some robust integrations with leading apps as well, such as Slack, Salesforce, Teams, Adobe and more.

7. Toggl Plan

What it does well: Are you a visual learner? Is your organization made up of people who would appreciate more visual marketing project management? Toggl Plan helps agencies and internal teams balance capacity by making workloads easier to look at.

Standout features: Built for smaller teams, Toggl Plan helps visualize and balance workloads with project and resource planning and task management tools.

Pricing: $0-$15 per user per month.

Takeaway: Visual doers unite — Toggl Plan could be the key to project management success for teams that appreciate easily perceptible marketing planning.

8. Planable

What it does well: With Planable, it’s all in the name. If you do content marketing and your teams typically plan content in sheet programs, like Google Sheets or Excel, “This is for you.” Planable is a content planning tool.

Standout features: “Stop living in spreadsheets,” says Planable. Bring all your sheet content together in specialized views, like feed view or calendar view, and collaborate more easily.

Pricing: $0-$22 per user per month. Contact Planable for enterprise pricing.

Takeaway: Content planning? Planable. If you have content teams and they need to collaborate, Planable makes it pretty much hassle-free.

9. monday.com

What it does well: If you appreciate fully customizable software, you’ll appreciate monday.com. 

Standout features: Key features of monday.com allow you to build your ideal custom workflow, with options for dashboards, integrations, kanban, docs, files, marketing automation and much more.

Pricing: $0-$24+ per month. Price increases with the number of users.

Takeaway: monday.com stands by the sentiment “free forever.” If you’re a one-person-show or a freelancer (or even two-person), you use many of monday.com’s features for free.

10. Notion

What it does well: Notion is a content creation and management platform that helps creative teams work better and faster. It’s a connected workspace where teams can centralize knowledge, manage projects, create content and more.

Standout features: Notion just rolled out a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature that allows users to ask virtually anything and “Notion will answer.” Write, plan and share more intuitively all with the help of AI.

Pricing: $0-$15 per user per month. Contact notion for enterprise rates.

Takeaway: Notion helps businesses of all sizes consolidate the number of tools they use by offering a customizable solution that can handle many of the integral marketing tasks you need to manage.

Creating a Marketing Plan? Use Marketing Planning Software

These 10 tools don’t even scratch the surface of what’s available to marketers today; there are hundreds more where these came from. While freedom of choice is a great thing, deciding between so many options can be overwhelming. We hope we’ve made it just a little easier to make the right choice for your business.

For your next marketing effort, save yourself and your team some headaches by investing in the right marketing tool. We trust you’ll choose the one that works best for you.