Dear Vista Equity Partners (re: Marketo),

Hey, there.

This is a pretty big win for you guys, I’m guessing, nabbing the leader in the marketing automation space. Honestly, good for you.

I don’t like just passively hearing news, you know? So I took a look at your portfolio. I was mildly impressed – lots of technology there. I didn’t know an equity firm owned Return Path, so that was kind of cool to learn.

Anyway, that’s not what this about.

Admittedly, this will have less impact on me now. Did you know that you lose your Marketo certification if you don’t work for a company that uses Marketo? So I’m out in the cold there, unfortunately.

But I still have kind of a soft spot for the platform. It was my first cert, you see. Purple and I have a special relationship. I put a lot of time into my old instance, and I even almost contracted part time on a project. So even though I am kind of kicked out of the club, I want to make sure this all works out.

This isn’t me getting angry or even telling you how to your job. Not at all. Look at your portfolio – you know what you’re doing. This is about me asking that you help Marketo get to the next level.

As I learned more about the platform, it was easy to see that Marketo wants to be a leader, wants to be innovative, wants to do right by its customers. And it does a lot.

Sometimes, though, I got this feeling that they liked a product idea, went after it, and then deployed it…incomplete. Not always! But training materials might sometimes lag behind. Functionality that other, smaller, platforms have is missing in the industry leader (dwell time on an email, for instance).

I mentioned Return Path earlier…I hope there’s something in the works there. Honestly, for a platform that a lot of companies use primarily for email campaigns, having that kind of optimization functionality would be amazing.

And I see that Main Street Hub has some social functions? That was one of the only pieces really missing from Marketo.

I guess what I’m trying to say here is that you’ve made a good purchase, and now Marketo and her customers are looking to you to do something big. Pump equity into development of the product, support it, and champion it. I don’t think she’ll steer you wrong, if you treat her right.

In other words (barely contained glee) with great purchase, comes great responsibility.