Compare Email Marketing Software

Email marketing software can make a world of difference when reaching and engaging customers. Unfortunately, finding the right solution for your business can be tricky. With so many options, it can be hard to narrow your choices down. That's where our email marketing software comparison tool comes in.

What Is Important for an Email Marketing Software Comparison?

In order to properly compare email marketing software, you'll want to consider essential factors like pricing, features, integrations, automation capabilities, and more.

To make sure you're not comparing a lot of unimportant things, we've done intensive market research and interviewed experts to present only the most important things in our comparison tool. With this information in hand, you can make an informed decision about the best fit for your business.

We've split these criteria into six distinct categories, each containing their own attributes. What follows are the most important things you should consider when comparing email marketing software.

1. Ease of Use

Upon selecting your desired email marketing software to compare, the first thing you'll notice is a score for the "Ease of Use." This score is based on how user-friendly the software is (i.e., the user experience.) A higher ease of use score indicates that you should have no problem navigating the platform while learning new features and functions. Conversely, a lower ease of use score suggests that the software may have a steeper learning curve.

It's an essential factor to consider depending on your team's background and previous experience with email marketing solutions. In some cases, you may benefit from a more intuitive platform, even if it comes at the cost of functionality.

2. Pricing

Naturally, pricing is among the first things people compare when they look at software. As a business owner, you'll want to understand how a software fits into your budget. Pricing is not as straightforward as it seems, however. There is always a balance between the features you need versus the price you're willing to pay.

Paid Plans

Since most email marketing software providers charge monthly, we've collected the most up-to-date pricing plans for you. Generally speaking, the amount you pay will affect the number of contacts you can reach in your mailing list (and/or in rare cases the amount of emails you can send per month). As such, we've made it easy to compare the prices for 1,000, 5,000, 25,000 and 100,000 contacts per month.

Free Plan

Some email marketing software providers offer free plans, which are great for smaller businesses or those on a strict budget. However, remember that the features offered under a free plan may be limited compared to its paid counterparts. If you're looking to get started quickly and don't need all the bells and whistles, a free plan is a great choice. When you search for providers, the free plans are listed seperately with an indication so you can even compare free plans with paid plans.

3. Support

Support is essential when troubleshooting any issues or needing advice on how best to use the platform.

The second overall score at the top of the comparison tool is for "Support." This score is based on our research into each provider's type of customer service and technical support. A higher support score indicates that you can count on a timely response from knowledgeable representatives who can help guide you in using email marketing software.

Additionally, you'll find the following categories on the comparison page:

Email

This box indicates whether the software in question offers customer service through email. They may use a ticketing system or simply respond via your email address.

Chat

Live chat is usually offered on the website or as a widget in the software dashboard. It typically results in faster responses to your inquiries.

Phone

Phone support is usually available for more complex issues that can't be addressed via email or chat. Depending on the provider, you may even get a dedicated phone number to call in case of any problems. Phone support has become rare and is mostly just offered by more advanced tools.

4. Features

Next, we get into the thick of it—the features themselves. Most email marketing solutions are based on the same core principles, but the features that each one offers can vary widely. These features can make your job easier, faster, and more efficient. Think of them as the tools you have at your disposal to manage your email campaigns.

In our comparison tool, you'll find features such as:

No. of Emails

The number of emails you can send monthly is one of the most important factors when choosing an email marketing software. Some providers set a cap on the number of emails you can send, while others don't and just limit the contact size. If there is a limit on the amount of emails that you can send it’s mostly direlty tied to the pricing tiers. Hover over the purple highlighted number to view how many emails are available in higher plans.

Remember that each email address in your list counts as one email. So, if you send the same email to your entire list of 5,000, then that counts as 5,000 emails.

No. of Users

Likewise, the number of team members who can access the software may vary. If you have multiple people working on your email marketing campaigns, you'll need to ensure that the software allows for multiple users. Having an account for each team member can help keep everyone organized and on the same page.

Drag & Drop Builder

Gone are the days of boring, plain-text emails. Today, email marketers need to be able to create visually stunning designs for their campaigns. Drag and drop builders allow you to quickly and easily create professional-looking emails without any design experience whatsoever. Add images, videos, or even custom HTML elements to make your emails stand out from the crowd.

Dynamic Content

Dynamic content is a great way to personalize your emails. With dynamic content, you can customize each email based on the recipient's preferences or past interactions with your company. It allows you to create targeted campaigns that are more likely to get opened and clicked on by the right people.

GEO-Tracking

Simply put, geo-tracking is the ability to track where your emails are being opened from. It gives you vital insights into where your customers are located, what time of day they're most active, and more. This information is invaluable for planning future campaigns. For example, if you notice that over 50% of your customers are located in the UK, you can plan special campaigns or offers around the British holidays.

Landing Pages

Creating an effective landing page for your campaigns can be the difference between success and failure. The ultimate goal of a good email is to get the user to take action, and the landing page is where that action takes place.

Landing pages allow you to capture leads, generate interest and increase conversions. Look for software with an easy-to-use drag-and-drop builder or templates that make it simple to create beautiful, high-converting landing pages in minutes.

CRM

Does the software offer a CRM (Customer Relationship Management)? A CRM system keeps track of customer data, such as purchase history, contact information, preferences, etc. This readily available information gives you a clear view of how your customers interact with your business, which can be used to make better marketing decisions and reach out to leads individually..

A/B Testing

Perhaps the most talked about feature of any email marketing software is the ability to A/B test campaigns. With A/B testing, you can split your list into two (or more) groups and send each a different version of your email. You can then measure the performance of each version to determine which one performs best. A/B testing allows you to fine-tune your campaigns and get the most out of them.

Segmentation

Another crucial feature of email marketing software is segmentation. Segmentation allows you to divide your list into different groups based on specific criteria. For example, you can create a segment for people who have purchased from you in the past month or those who haven't opened any emails in the past three months.

You can also segment by location, gender, and other personal information. Once you have your different segments, you can send tailor-made emails to each group.

SMS

An emerging strategy in the ecommerce world is the use of SMS. While not exactly an email marketing tool, SMS is an addon that many software tools started to offer as it can be used as part of your marketing automation. Look for software with SMS-sending capabilities to easily send mass texts to your customers if you need them. It's no secret that people pay more attention to texts than emails, so it's a great way to increase engagement.

Analytics

Finally, we'll let you know whether the software has analytics capabilities. Analytics is a key part of any email marketing strategy, as they allow you to measure the success of your campaigns. The best software will provide detailed analytics, such as open and click rates, conversions, and bounce rates.

With these metrics, you can make better decisions and refine your campaigns for maximum impact.

5. Marketing Automation

Businesses today rely on automation more than ever, from manufacturing to customer support. Email marketing is no exception. Look for software that offers marketing automation capabilities, enabling you to save time and increase efficiency. Automation may even save you money in the long run, as it reduces the need for manual labor.

There are a variety of automation features available on most email marketing software. Here are some of the most common:

Automation Builder

Ever wonder how automations works? It's a complex process handled behind the scenes, but the best software will have an easy-to-use automation builder. With it, you can create automated email campaigns in minutes with just a few simple clicks. The automation builder allows businesses to easily set up and manage their campaigns.

It's usually as easy as dragging and dropping elements from one place to another and filling in the blanks. Once your automation campaigns are set up, you can sit back and watch them do their job without your intervention.

If/Else Conditions

If/else conditions are a great way to make automated campaigns more sophisticated. For example, you can create an automation campaign that sends one email if someone takes action A and another if they take action B. If my customer opens the email on a certain date, the automation can send them another personalized message based on that fact.

Adding these conditions and rules to your automated campaigns helps you follow the customer along their journey without moderating it manually.

Website Tracking

Website tracking is another feature that massively impacts the way you can use marketing automation. It allows you to track visitors' activities on your website and send them emails based on their behavior. For example, you can track which pages your subscribers are looking at and send them an email that contains information about the products they've been viewing.

Great email marketing software will provide a tracking code that you can embed on your website so you can accurately track visitors.

Go-to Actions

This automation helps to move users to another step of the automation based on certain actions. It can be used to move users to a different step in the automation if they click on a link, open an email, or take any other action. This feature allows for more complex automation and helps you create tailored customer journeys that drive conversions.

Goal Actions

Goal actions also allow you to trigger emails based on certain criteria. You set your own goals, such as “purchased a product” and then create automated emails sent when someone completes a goal no matter where they were in the workflow. It's an effective way to move subscribers to a specific step in your workflow without having to build any check-up functionalities along your automation workflow. If your defined goal is reached, your subscriber will immediately move to your goal action, and the automation continues from there.

Tags

Remember how we talked about segmentation earlier? Tags are an excellent tool to make segmentation even more specific and targeted. You can automatically assign tags to your customers that reflect their interests, behaviors, or demographic information.

Contact Scoring

In a similar vein, contact scoring is a feature that assigns a score to each customer based on their interactions with your business. You can set it up so that higher scores are given to customers who are more likely to purchase your products or services. It lets you quickly identify your most valuable customers and double down on campaigns to reach them.

Automation Splits

Next to A/B split testing of single email campaigns, automation splits allow you to test entire automation paths enabling you to test completely different approaches for your customer journey and find out which path performs best. Picture a decision tree where 50% of your subscribers go one way with only formal content, and the other 50% take another path where you only share informal content.

Predictive Sending

Predictive sending is a feature that allows you to send automated emails at the most optimal time. By analyzing customer data, the software can determine when each individual recipient is most likely to open and click on your emails. This helps ensure your campaigns reach customers at the right time, resulting in higher open and click-through rates.

6. Integrations

Last on our comparison checklist is integrations. At the bottom of our tool, you'll find checkboxes for the various integrations offered by each email marketing tool. These integrations allow you to pull in data from other software, such as ecommerce platforms and CRMs.

Each integration serves a different purpose, so it's important to carefully consider which ones are relevant for you.

No. of Native Integrations

The number of native integrations varies wildly from tool to tool. Some software offer hundreds, while others may only offer a handful. The providers must maintain active relationships with the companies they integrate which leads to large differences in the number of native integrations.

API Access

If you want to build a custom integration or need access to special features that aren't available through the integrations provided by email marketing software, you may need API access. An Application Programming Interface (API) is a way for two pieces of software to communicate and exchange data.

Most email marketing software providers grant access to their API including detailed documentation that you can hand to your developer. In some cases, API access is only available for higher plans.

Salesforce

Salesforce is a leading CRM software that many businesses use to manage their customers. If you're already using Salesforce, it's important to make sure your email marketing software can integrate with it. With a Salesforce integration, you can share data between the two platforms and get a complete view of your customer relationships.

For instance, if you already have an established customer base in Salesforce, you can sync that data with your email marketing platform for segmentation and targeting and vice versa.

WordPress

Rare are businesses today that don't have a website. If yours is built with WordPress, an integration can help you with setting up signup forms, pop-ups, and website tracking without needing to touch any code.

Shopify

Shopify is another popular platform for businesses with an ecommerce presence. With a Shopify integration, you can connect your email marketing software to your store and send automated campaigns based on customer behavior. For example, when a customer makes a purchase, you can use this data to trigger emails like product recommendations, loyalty discounts, and more. And if it didn't come to the purchase, you can still throw out an abandoned cart email.

Zapier Triggers

If some integrations are just not available, there is still a good chance that you can work your way around with Zapier. Zapier is a third-party automation tool that allows you to connect two different apps with a few clicks. It covers the technical complexity, so you don't have to. Within Zapier, a trigger is an event that causes a certain action.

For example, let's say your chosen email marketing software doesn't integrate with Shopify. You can use Zapier to create a trigger that sends an email to a customer whenever they purchase on your website. The trigger will detect when a purchase is made and then automatically send an email to the customer.

Zapier Actions

In the example above, the trigger was the purchase, and the action was sending an email to the customer. Email marketing software providers who offer a Zapier integration will have their set of both. Be sure to check how many different actions and triggers they offer and if they are useful to you.

How to Compare Email Marketing Software

There are many different factors to consider when comparing email marketing software. You'll want to apply all the features listed above to your specific needs. We've found that available features were the biggest differentiator when comparing products, followed by automation capabilities and pricing.

However, your needs could be different. Larger companies may need more specific features, such as API access and integrations with enterprise-level platforms like Salesforce. A small business might not need the same level of complexity, instead looking for a bargain-priced or free email marketing software solution. Some level of reflection is necessary to ensure you pick the right option.

Once you've determined the features of your must-have list, then you can start comparing the various options. Our tool makes this as easy as 1-2-3. Click the "+" icon to add multiple email marketing software products and start comparing. You'll be able to see the features of each software side-by-side to quickly determine which is best for you.

Get a detailed step-by-step guide on how to use our tools to choose the best software for you in How to Compare Software.

Your Result of Comparing Email Marketing Software

Using our data-driven comparison tool makes it easy to narrow down your options and pick the best email marketing software for you. But there might still be more than one option once you weed out the non-contenders. If that's the case, we have additional resources to help you out.

Our Best Picks section offers additional insights into the best email marketing software from different categories providing you with a market overview of the best-performing software. Alternatively, you can use our Finder Tool to answer a few questions about your needs to receive a personalized recommendation.