Transcription
So, I need new email marketing software. I used MailChimp for years, but I'm done with them. To find a replacement, I'm doing a deep dive on the top 26 email marketing tools. On this journey, I'll navigate unhelpful chatbots, strain my eyes reading fine print, build a massive comparison spreadsheet, and of course, send actual emails using the tool. So strap in; things are going to get wild!
I use email marketing for Atlas, a software company I started with my friend Carl. But even though we're a software company, our email marketing needs are not super unique; they're similar to what most businesses need. We use email marketing for automations and newsletters. "Automations" is just basically a fancy word for saying we send emails based on a trigger. In our case, when a user signs up for a 14-day free trial, they get a few automated emails: day one, they get a welcome email; day 13, they get a reminder that their free trial is almost done; and day 15, they get a notification that their trial is complete. We also send an email newsletter when we release a new feature, though we don't send these emails to everybody—just to people who click this box during sign-up. And that's it! That's all we do: a few automations and an occasional newsletter. It's not complicated.
Like many people, for a long time, we used MailChimp for this. MailChimp is easily the biggest email marketing tool; estimates have them at 64% of the market, while other email marketing tools make up just 36%. But that doesn't mean they're the best, and right now, I'm canceling MailChimp. So how did this happen? What turned me off of MailChimp? In the last two years, they've increased my price three times, so it's gotten more expensive. I'm not the first person to point this out; lots of people are complaining about this. But it was more than that, because there were also the shady billing practices.
To explain that, let's rewind back to when I first signed up for MailChimp in 2011. Back then, if you clicked over to the pricing page, you'd see MailChimp charged per subscriber. As you got more subscribers, your price went up. But fast forward to 2019, and MailChimp makes a big change: instead of subscribers, they start charging you per contact. "Contact" is a slippery word because if we read MailChimp's support docs, we see that they count subscribers as contacts, but also unsubscribers and even nonsubscribers. So under the old pricing, you just paid for subscribers, but under the new, you also paid for unsubscribers and nonsubscribers.
But wait, it gets dumber. You see, MailChimp charges you based on tiers of contacts. So let's say you have 1,300 contacts; well, you'll want this tier. But let's say next month your list grows to 1,800 contacts. MailChimp doesn't automatically move you up a tier if you grow; instead, you incur overage charges. So next month, you have to guess at what tier you might grow to, and if you underestimate and go over, yeah, there are overage charges.
To recap: price increases, counting unsubscribers as contacts, and overage charges—it all just got me mad. I started noticing all kinds of crazy things about MailChimp. For example, they constantly claim that they have award-winning customer support. They won the awards from this award show called The Stevies. The Stevies was started to restore public confidence after the Enron scandal, and guess what? Up to 40% of entries win, so "award-winning" is a bit of a stretch.
Then I noticed this sneaky checkbox when you sign up for MailChimp. By not checking the checkbox, you agree to be opted into their promotional emails. Finally, MailChimp is owned by Intuit, and Intuit famously lobbied the U.S. government to stop Americans from filing their taxes for free, which is frankly straight-up evil. So, long story short, I'm done with MailChimp.
Now that MailChimp is canceled, let's dive into research. I started by making a list of the top email marketing tools. As I researched these tools, I realized almost all of them used the same pricing model as MailChimp: you pay based on tiers of contacts, and this worried me. MailChimp had kind of screwed me on these tiers; would other companies do the same?
So the first thing I did was get rid of any companies that counted unsubscribers as a contact. I hated that MailChimp did that, and I didn't want it again. Thankfully, only three companies did this: MailMoto, Drip, and AWeber. By the way, here's a tip: never trust pricing pages. AWeber literally says on their pricing page you're charged per subscriber, but if you go to the help docs, this is where AWeber says they count unsubscribers toward your total count of subscribers, which is just dishonest, right? I mean, the prefix "un" literally means to make something the opposite, so how can an unsubscriber be a subscriber? I don't know.
Anyways, onwards. Next, I got rid of any companies that had overage charges. I don't like overage charges; I don't want to have to think about avoiding them. I'm trying to run a business here, and I found a number of companies with hidden overage charges: Constant Contact, GetResponse, Mailjet, SendGrid, and Benchmark—you're all out. I'm not saying you're bad companies; I'd just be much happier if you gave me the full cost up front.
Finally, I wanted to know that if my contact list grew, I would automatically move up a tier. Makes sense, right? But even more importantly, what if I deleted a bunch of contacts and my list got smaller? Would I automatically go down a tier? Well, unfortunately, not. For example, on ConvertKit's pricing page, they say, "We'll automatically upgrade you to the next level," but if you search through the support docs, you'll discover that they won't automatically downgrade you to a previous level. Instead, they make you contact support. It turns out a number of companies did this: ActiveCampaign, Klaviyo, HubSpot, Campaigner, ConvertKit, EmailOctopus, and Zoho Campaigns—you're all out.
Now, is this a big deal? Yes! In case it's not clear, having to think about this is a burden. I'm trying to run a business; I don't want to have to stay on top of my email marketing software's billing. To me, it's also just dishonest. If you're going to automatically increase my price, you should automatically decrease it too.
But I couldn't help but wonder: was I being too hard on these companies? Did I expect too much from capitalism? Companies like ConvertKit made me feel jaded. Look at this video ConvertKit posted recently, really establishing the company mission to be, "We exist to help creators earn a living." The shift for me was realizing it's not me taking center stage; it's me sharing this mission and being the spotlight or the voice for this mission that we're all doing together. What are you talking about? We exist to help creators earn a living. How many ConvertKit creators right now are overpaying because they don't even realize they have to manually downgrade their tier? Obviously some, because you put it in your support docs, although conveniently buried at the bottom of the page.
I mean, I worried I was missing something obvious, like maybe there's a technical reason that I'm missing. So I asked one company, Campaigner, why they'd make the upgrade automatic but not the downgrade. Here's what they said: "That's just the way things work." Well, no, not at all, because guess what? The ten remaining companies don't do that. Big shout out to these companies!
But I still wanted to reduce my list one more time, so I calculated what I'd pay monthly for each company. I got rid of anyone who cost more than $200. MailChimp had been costing me over $500 a month, so anything less than $200 seemed like a major improvement. So Campaign Monitor, Moosend, Intercom, and Omnisend—it's just not going to work. Nothing personal; I'm not against companies charging a high price, but my needs are pretty basic.
And there we have it: my list was down to six. I called them the Elite 6. By this point, I'd already done a lot of research, so if you appreciate my work at all, I have links to each email marketing tool in the video description. Almost all the links are affiliate links, so if you want to try one of these tools, click those links, and you'll be supporting my work. I hope it's clear I'm not some sponsored vlogger. The tool I choose is the current tool we're using for Atlas, and it's a major pain to switch, so I can guarantee you this is our choice for the long term.
Anyway, it's time to finally actually try the Elite 6. First up, Bravoo. Okay, yeah, that music was a little much; we're just testing software here. This is Bravoo. It has a nice interface—not too cluttered—and I was able to design my email just like I had in MailChimp. Automations worked exactly as I needed. It's worth pointing out that Bravoo offers more than just email marketing; there are lots of additional products: WhatsApp marketing, SMS marketing, live chat, and chatbots. Their pricing is unique because, unlike most tools, it's based on how many emails you send, not how many contacts you have. So solid interface, lots of additional products, and the monthly price for me came in at $95. Really good! Bravoo gets a thumbs up.
Next up, Loops. Loops had a nice minimalist interface, and like Bravoo, I could design my email how I wanted. Unfortunately, their automations editor was just a little too simple for me; it didn't do what we needed it to do. So nice minimalist interface, but automations were too simple, and at a monthly price of $199, Loops just wasn't going to be a fit for me.
Next up was Flesk. Flesk had a really minimalist interface. Unfortunately, they didn't have our font, Inter, which is not exactly a deal breaker, but it's something. And like Loops, their automations workflow was just a little too simple for us. So minimalist interface, but automations were too simple. But here's the thing: the price—$35 a month—that's crazy! But there's a bit of an asterisk. On Reddit, people seem to be complaining that Flesk disabled their account without notice, so Flesk gets a shoulder shrug—basically a yellow light. I'm just not up for rolling the dice on this service, but comment below if you try Flesk.
Next up was ClickFunnels. I found their email editor clunky, and they didn't have our font. But honestly, more than anything, the vibe was just kind of off. I mean, they offer a lot of features, but I just need basic email marketing; I don't need all this other stuff. Plus, they required a credit card for the free trial, which I don't love, and they kept pushing these coaching sessions, which, I mean, I'm good. It just didn't feel like the right fit, and Reddit kind of confirmed my suspicions with some suggestions that it's basically an MLM scheme, so I'm out.
At this point, I started to get a bit worried; Bravoo was the only company that seemed like it might work for us so far. The next company I tried, SendPulse, was also a pretty quick no. The email editor was clunky, and they had no web fonts. I don't want notifications. Overall, I found their interface just kind of a mess, with too many things calling for my attention, and at a monthly price of $151, I just wasn't interested.
But fortunately, things took a turn for the better with the next company, MailerLite. I found the interface to be refreshingly clear and straightforward. Part of this is because MailerLite is focused on email marketing—none of the other stuff. Their automations were great and worked for my needs. For example, it even let me mark a subscriber as unsubscribed or even delete a subscriber at the end of an automation. Other companies don't let you do this, probably because they charge based on contacts, so I appreciate MailerLite letting me do this. The email editor was solid, had my font, and I was able to design my usual email. So easy to use, strong automations, and focused on email marketing. The price came in at $143, and it was a thumbs up from me.
Now, before I tell you which tool I used, I should mention email deliverability. Deliverability is what percentage of emails you send actually arrive in your contacts' inbox, and what tool you choose can have an impact on deliverability. How much of an impact? Hard to say, and frankly, something I'm not an expert in. So if you're worried about that, if you're thinking about that, you'll probably want to seek somebody out other than me.
So at the end of the day, there were a couple of tools that I would recommend to friends: Bravoo, Loops, and MailerLite, and maybe Flesk. My choice in the end was MailerLite. It was a bit more expensive than Bravoo, but it has a really easy-to-use interface, and that's really important to me. I like that it's mostly for email marketing; I think that leads to a focused product. It's funny; the name kind of threw me off at first. "Lite" sounds kind of like a light version of a tool, not a full version. Then I read a bit more about their philosophy, and it made a little more sense to me. Specifically, keeping it light means clean and functional design. I think that's what I was attracted to when I first used the tool.
But more than anything, I'm just happy to have found an email marketing tool for Atlas that I'm hopeful will be a long-term fit. I already mentioned this once, but this video took a long time to research and film, so if you appreciate the work, there are affiliate links in the video description. In any case, a very happy goodbye to MailChimp and a hopeful hello to MailerLite. Thanks for watching!