There are many benefits to email marketing, but the most important is that it reaches a customer on their own timeline rather than yours. Here is what the category does, what to check before you buy, and which tool we settled on.
What email marketing is for
Email marketing lets you promote your business and what it offers, communicate directly, and inspire customer action through email invitations or notifications. It is a fast and affordable way for small and large businesses alike to promote products or services and encourage customers to visit their website.
An email campaign gives a marketer the ability to track each message delivered and opened by recipients, through clickthroughs, in real time. That data is what shows which emails are getting more responses than others, so campaigns can be optimised on evidence rather than instinct. Our note on what an email marketing agency does day to day covers the work that sits around the tool.
Five benefits marketers name
- Cost-effectiveness. The vast majority of these platforms offer affordable monthly rates, and free plans for a limited number of subscribers.
- Ease of use. Pre-designed templates and a drag-and-drop builder make an engaging, professional email quick to assemble, which is most of why companies prefer the format.
- Targeted marketing. The better platforms let you segment your list of subscribers, so a campaign goes to the people it was written for.
- Understanding customer behaviour. Campaign tracking options are what tell you what your customers actually want.
- Brand awareness and loyalty. Well-crafted emails that are more than another sales pitch raise a brand’s visibility and its value.
What to check before choosing an email marketing service
Packages
Most email platforms offer a limited number of messages and progressive pricing packages, which means the payment depends on the number of subscribers. Some platforms, Sendinblue among them as described here in 2021, offered free unlimited contact storage instead.
Support
Before purchasing online marketing services, pay attention to support availability. If you are a beginner you will struggle with technical glitches, so check whether the option you are choosing offers full-time support.
Campaign settings
The best email software providers offer custom interfaces that are easy to use, so anyone can set up a campaign and build a newsletter.
You also need to be sure your emails do not trigger red flags at the receiving providers. Email marketing software includes tools that warn you when a word in your text is likely to set off a spam filter.
Campaign tracking
Tracking results is what turns a send into something you can learn from, and it is the basis for understanding customer behaviour. Sendinblue includes marketing automation for the same reason.
- Delivery and interaction tracking make campaign behaviour observable
- Segmentation directs a message toward the part of the list it was written for
- Reusable templates reduce the work required to assemble a campaign
- Package limits and pricing models determine how a service scales
- Support availability matters when a campaign hits a technical problem
- Spam warnings and campaign settings shape whether a message can be sent safely
- A and B testing compares two versions of a message
- A template builder assembles the message without requiring code
- Contact management and lead scoring connect email activity to the wider relationship
Why we chose Sendinblue
Sendinblue was one of the most budget-friendly tools we had tried at the time of writing, because of its free plan, and it is straightforward to use. That is our own assessment from using it, not an independent benchmark.
It helps companies keep in touch with their contacts through marketing automation, email marketing and transactional email. The strength we noticed was not only performance but support. It can also be used in conjunction with other applications, such as Slack or Salesforce CRM.
The features we used most were the A/B testing tool, which compares two versions of a message to see which performs better; the template builder, which designs a template without technical skills; and the built-in CRM with contact management and lead scoring. Our separate note on SMS marketing tools covers the same vendor’s other channel.
Three alternatives to Sendinblue
The email marketing platform that ticks all your boxes is the one that will grow your business, which is why it is worth shopping around. This is a short comparison based on users’ opinions, as it stood in 2021.
Mailchimp
Mailchimp offers professional email tools, letting users create relevant and engaging emails from pre-designed templates and a drag-and-drop builder. It also sends transactional email and reaches the right person at the right time through marketing automation. Its content studio stores and manages your images and files so a campaign can find them.
The main difference from Sendinblue is what you pay for. Sendinblue priced on the number of emails sent rather than the number of contacts stored, so a contact list could grow without changing the bill. Mailchimp charged per contact stored, and a contact on two lists counted as two. That was the position when this comparison was written in 2021.
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign sets up emails in a few clicks and offers tools to customise a message and send targeted email to a segmented audience. Its reporting shows which emails are performing and which need work, which is what lifts engagement rates over time. It also allows unlimited image uploads for a campaign.
The main difference from Sendinblue is scale. Sendinblue is designed mainly for small and medium businesses, so ActiveCampaign may be more than some entrepreneurs need, and its cost rises as the contact list grows.
MailerLite
MailerLite builds professional newsletters without help, and its features include a website builder, landing pages, pop-ups and embedded forms for attracting new subscribers. It also optimises campaigns by delivering according to time zone and automatically resending unopened emails, and it offers a wide variety of options for growing a subscriber list.
The main difference from Sendinblue is what happens when deliverability drops: MailerLite reserves the right to suspend an account that does not maintain a high enough delivery rate.
Our verdict
Email marketing tools are essential to digital marketing work, and if you want to move your business up a level, any of the options discussed here is worth trying.
On Global Wizards’ own experience, Sendinblue checked all the boxes we had in mind for an effective email marketing tool, mainly for its cost-benefit ratio. It improved how we communicate with clients and simplified our daily tasks. That is our experience of the product and not an independent test of it.
Get started with sendinblue now!
If you are looking for further information, visit our webpage and feel free to contact us for more details.
Frequently asked questions
What is email marketing?
Email marketing promotes a business and what it offers, communicates directly with a customer, and inspires action through email invitations or notifications. It is a fast and affordable way for a business of any size to promote products or services and encourage customers to visit its website, and campaigns can be tracked message by message as they are delivered and opened.
What are the main benefits of email marketing?
Five, as set out here: cost-effectiveness, because most platforms offer affordable monthly rates and free plans for a limited number of subscribers; ease of use, through pre-designed drag-and-drop templates; targeted marketing, by segmenting the subscriber list; a better understanding of customer behaviour through campaign tracking; and brand awareness, built by sending emails that are more than a sales pitch.
What should you check before choosing an email marketing service?
Four things: the packages, since most platforms limit the number of messages and price progressively by subscriber count; support availability, which matters most to a beginner who will hit technical glitches; the campaign settings, including whether the tool warns you about words that trigger spam filters; and campaign tracking, which is what turns a send into something you can learn from.
What are the best features of Sendinblue?
As this article described the product in August 2021, its strongest features were the A/B testing tool for comparing two versions of a message, the template builder for designing a template without technical skills, and a built-in CRM with contact management and lead scoring. It could also be used alongside other applications such as Slack or Salesforce CRM.
How did Sendinblue pricing differ from Mailchimp in 2021?
As the two products were described here in August 2021, Sendinblue priced on the number of emails sent rather than the number of contacts stored, so a contact list could grow without changing the bill. Mailchimp charged per contact stored, and a contact appearing on two lists counted twice. Pricing models change, so treat this as a snapshot of that date.
How do ActiveCampaign and MailerLite compare with Sendinblue?
On the comparison this article made in August 2021, ActiveCampaign was aimed at a scale that could be more than a small business needs, and its cost rose as the contact list grew. MailerLite reserved the right to suspend an account whose delivery rate was not high enough. Sendinblue was positioned as the option for a small or medium business entering the market.
