Email marketing is a very affordable way to promote your business online. There are many online companies that provide this type a service. I had run-ins with many of the but the following 3 really stood out:
As an owner of a small business myself, I understand that there are many important factors which play a big role in making the right decision in selecting one of these email marketing providers.
Here are some pros and cons that I’ve personally find out by using the listed 3 services:
Contact Contact (CC)
CC is definitely the well-know solution out of many. Most users default to this solution. CC offers many more options for export/import then other competitors. The pricing can be more competitive. It offers WYSIWIG email editor as most of the email marketing services out there.
To sum up: Trustworthy service, great functionality, good customer service, ok pricing.
VerticalResponse (VR)
VR is the underdog. It has similar user-interface to Constant Contact. VR is an obvious choice for non-profit organizations (501 c 3) because of its offer of 10,000 free emails each month for qualified orgs. We’ve worked with over a dozen local and national non-profits that are now using VR’s services for free – you can’t beat that!
To sum up: Trustworthy service, great functionality, awesome customer service, great pricing (amazing pricing if you are a non-profit – IT’S FREE).
MailChimp (MC)
MC is a newer solution on the block. Its the most stylish one as well, offering amazing flexibility when it comes to customization of email templates. It offers great integrations with social media and social marketing, but lacks in some simple tasks such as more options for pre-created email templates (only 4, I believe) and their customer support sucks. You can look on the bright side, you can host up to 500 contacts in your list and email up to 3,000 emails per month for FREE. So, if you are a designer/developer and know what you are doing (most likely you are using your own HTML email template as well), you don’t really need the customer support. Just get those 3,ooo emails out because they are free.
To sum up: Trustworthy service, ok functionality (good functionality when you know what’s you’re doing), no phone customer service, good pricing (500 contacts and 3,000 emails per month for FREE).
If you are looking for a more technical and in-depth review, view this link.