Email is one of the most important and effective marketing channels available. When used correctly, it can be one of the best ways to build a customer base and, consequently, sales. Email is low cost, relatively easy to use and maintain, and most platforms make it easy to measure and tweak your campaigns to get the best results.
Whatever you do, don’t overlook the value of email marketing.
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According to ExactTarget’s 2012 Channel Preference Survey, 91% of consumers use email at least once daily. They also found that about 66% of consumers have made a purchase as a result of an email they received.
Litmus, an email platform software vendor, released that email has one of the highest click-through rates and ROI of any channel. They found that the average email earns $40 for every $1 spent. Emails also have an average 5% click through rate, compared to a .08% for banner ads and .14% for rich media banners.
Email marketing gives you the ability to be seen by a large percentage of your audience. Beyond that, when used right, email can be an engaging piece of content that encourages your prospects to convert.
In other words, it’s something you should be doing.
To help you decide, we’ve looked at some of the most popular email marketing platforms. These are in no particular order, nor do we advocate for one platform over another. You have to find the best fit for you. We just hope to help you look at some of the most popular and find features that matter to you.
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Mailchimp is one of the most popular email marketing platform choices. It offers all of the usual tools needed for creating, managing, and tracking email campaigns of many sizes. It’s user-friendly and easily customizable, making it great for those of you who don’t have a lot of experience with these platforms. It also has a very sleek interface.
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Mailchimp is a great platform, you can see that from how popular it is. But it does lack a few features.
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Mailchimp does offer an excellent free version, supporting up to 2,000 subscribers and up to 12,000 emails per month. This is a great option for those of you who have limited email marketing needs or just want to try the service out. Also, it doesn’t expire.
The paid version can cost as low as $15 to upwards of $525 per month depending on the amount of subscribers and emails sent.
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Constant Contact is a company that focuses on getting small businesses started with email marketing. Alongside email marketing, Constant Contact offers a few other services that can help you grow your business.
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While Constant Contact is a great option, we did find it lacking a few really important features.
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Constant Contact’s monthly pricing is based on your list size. It ranges from $15 a month for up to 500 contacts to more than $150 a month for 25,000 contacts and above.They also offer discounts for pre-paying customers and non-profits.
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Emma mail service touts “a simple, stylish way to stay in touch with customers, members, and fans.” Thus, you can see this tool focuses on stylish design and superb customer service. It’s also built to be pretty simple, so it will be a little less difficult for those of you who aren’t used to using an email platform.
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Again, we did find it lacking a few different features that could be important:
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Unlike MailChimp, there are no free options beyond the 60 day trial. Pricing is based on the number of subscribers, starting at $35 per month for up to 1,000 subscribers.
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If you’re looking for an email marketing service that is extremely easy to use, iContact is probably your best choice. While some email marketing services can seem overwhelming, iContact keeps things extremely simple.
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Like all the other options listed, iContact does lack a few different features:
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Pricing is again based on the size of our list. It ranges from $10 a month for up to 250 subscribers to $109 and beyond for 15,000 or more contacts.
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Marketing automation platforms almost always include some form of email marketing platform. This is probably one of the best options, especially for companies who utilize email marketing as part of their marketing campaigns. This allows you to track your email performance alongside the performance of your other campaign components.
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This list is by no means exhaustive, obviously. We have only listed a couple of the many email marketing services available today. Each platform has something to offer. But the key to instituting a successful email marketing strategy is finding the one that best aligns with your needs.
