MarketFirst

About MarketFirst

MarketFirst, Inc. operated as a software vendor specializing in marketing automation before its acquisition. The company provided a suite of applications designed to manage various marketing and sales processes for mid-market clients.

The firm was acquired by Pivotal Corporation in a stock-for-stock transaction announced in October 2002. This merger was intended to integrate MarketFirst's marketing automation technology into Pivotal's existing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) offerings, which already covered sales and customer service applications. At the time of the acquisition, MarketFirst had approximately 35 customers, and its President and CEO was David Lambert. The MarketFirst platform included tools for direct marketing, event management, lead management, and partner relationship management, along with marketing analytics. This strategic move allowed Pivotal to offer a more comprehensive CRM package, reducing the need to rely on third-party partnerships for marketing automation capabilities.

Subsequently, Pivotal Corporation, which was founded in 1994 by Norm Francis and Keith Wales, was itself acquired by CDC Corporation (chinadotcom) in February 2004. CDC Software, a unit of CDC Corporation, integrated Pivotal to enhance its front-office solutions for mid-sized enterprises. The strategy behind this acquisition was to combine Pivotal's CRM strengths with CDC's existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) and supply chain management (SCM) products. Over the years, the technology has seen further corporate changes, with CDC Software merging with Consona Corporation in 2012 to form Aptean. The product line, including the marketing automation features originally developed by MarketFirst, became part of the Aptean CRM suite, which is now offered by Avolin.