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To build a successful blogging business, you need more than outstanding content. You need to use creative ways to convert readers into subscribers and subscribers into customers. This is where email marketing comes in. The best email marketing services help you capture leads and build a list of your biggest fans.
- What is email marketing?
- What to consider when choosing an email marketing service
- 11 best email marketing services for bloggers
What is email marketing?
In simple terms, email marketing is when you reach out to your readers via email to send messages, provide value, and promote your products or services. It allows you to build a relationship with your readers, share new blog posts, and market your blog through emails.
To get started, you usually need to create a pop-up, slide in form, landing page, or other method to collect emails. The most effective way to do this is to offer something of value to your readers, such as a checklist, cheatsheet, training, or other free resource in exchange for their email.
Once you have a list of emails, you can communicate in a couple of ways. For one, you could send one-off emails to your list, often known as broadcasts. With a broadcast, you might make an announcement or share a new blog post with your subscribers.
You can also often set up automated sequences, sending out a series of pre-written emails over several days whenever a new subscriber signs up. With this approach, you can “set it and forget” and ideally make sales or earn affiliate commissions on autopilot.
Whatever methods you choose, communicating regularly with your list will help readers develop a stronger connection to you and your blog.
What to consider when choosing an email marketing service
Now that you know what email marketing is and how it could benefit your blogging career, consider the following factors to select the best email marketing service for your blog.
Price
If you’re a beginner blogger, you want to choose the most affordable email marketing tool out there, without compromising on quality. Don’t worry, there are free email marketing services for those on a very tight budget, though they typically have some restrictions.
Ease of use
You want a digital marketing service that doesn’t require advanced tech skills. The easier it is to use, the better.
Features
The best email marketing platform should have features that are geared toward helping you succeed. Some features to consider include form and landing page templates, broadcasts, email sequences, and automations.
Deliverability
It’s important to choose an email marketing software that guarantees deliverability.
If a reader shares their email to download a freebie from your site, you don’t want them to have to wait hours before they receive it. Nor do you want your emails getting lost in their spam folder.
Make sure to choose email marketing software that actually delivers your email to the intended contacts – and fast!
15 best email marketing services for your blog
Here are the best email marketing tools available in the market today. Read on for a look at their pros and cons, pricing, and key features.
- ConvertKit
- MailerLite
- Moosend
- EmailOctopus
- Omnisend
- HubSpot
- MailChimp
- Drip
- GetResponse
- AWeber
- Sendinblue
- Mailjet
- ActiveCampaign
- Automizy
- OptinMonster
1. ConvertKit
ConvertKit is my number one recommendation for the best email marketing service for bloggers. This email marketing tool was made for bloggers by bloggers; it’s 100% committed to helping bloggers succeed.
Not only is it incredibly easy to use and navigate, even if you’re completely new to email marketing, but the company also provides weekly live trainings to help you grow.
Plus, ConvertKit comes with a supportive community of like-minded creators to help you throughout your email marketing journey. (You’ll even get a free T-shirt after you sign up and complete its new user checklist.)
With ConvertKit, you can create eye-catching pop-ups, slide in forms, and other types of forms, as well as landing pages to encourage readers to subscribe.
It’s easy to get these forms on your blog with the free ConvertKit plugin for WordPress. On the free plan, you can collect up to 1,000 emails and send broadcast emails.
If you upgrade to a paid plan, you can also create sequences of emails and automate them. In other words, you can create a series of emails to send automatically after someone subscribes to a certain form.
If you’re trying to market an affiliate product or sell one of your own, these automations will help you make sales 24/7 without having to do any extra work on your end apart from the initial set-up.
For a deeper dive, check out my full ConvertKit review here.
Pros of ConvertKit
- Ability to create email sequences and automations
- Powerful email creation tools
- Easy integration with blogging tools, such as WordPress
- Option to send free automatic downloads to your readers in exchange for their email addresses (for instance, you could offer them a checklist, cheatsheet, workbook, roadmap, or other freebie)
- Generous free plan for up to 1,000 subscribers
- Allows you to “tag” subscribers into different categories so you can separate them into different lists. For instance, you could create one list of potential customers and another of people who have already made a purchase.
- Easy-to-use interface that’s intuitive, even for those completely new to email marketing
- Attractive templates for forms (pop-up, slide in, in-line, etc.) and landing pages to boost conversions of readers into subscribers
Cons of ConvertKit
- If you have over 1,000 subscribers already, you will have to pay $29 per month (or more on the pro plan), which is higher than you’ll find on some other plans
ConvertKit pricing
Here’s a look at how much you’ll be charged every month to use ConvertKit.
Bottom line: ConvertKit is an email marketing tool that’s incredibly easy to use and has lots of useful functions. It’s my #1 recommendation for the best email marketing service for bloggers.
2. MailerLite
MailerLite is another user-friendly email marketing service that’s great for bloggers and online business owners. It’s a little more affordable than ConvertKit, and it offers even more templates for designing your email.
However, it doesn’t have quite as many options when it comes to categorizing your subscribers, nor does it have as many advanced automation features.
To learn more, head to my in-depth MailerLite review.
Pros of MailerLite
- Offers affordable pricing, including a free plan that allows up to 1,000 subscribers
- Has lots of well-designed email templates to snazz up your emails
- Provides a variety of form templates, as well as the option to place forms in different places on your site
- Allows you to set up email automations
Cons of MailerLite
- Doesn’t offer chat support on the free plan
- Doesn’t have as robust subscriber tagging or email automation features as some other services
- Has a longer sign-up process than some other sites that requires approval before you can email more than 500 subscribers
Although MailerLite may not have as powerful features as ConvertKit, its pricing is a little easier on the wallet, making it a solid choice for new bloggers.
3. Moosend
Moosend is an all-in-one marketing platform that offers email marketing, landing pages, automation, and plenty of integrations.
It’s an excellent choice for bloggers and online business owners with its easy, drag-and-drop design tools and affordable pricing structure. While some email marketing platforms are tough to learn, Moosend has a straightforward user experience that anyone can pick up.
With this platform, you can design customized newsletters, build your email list, and automate emails. You can either build your own email automation or use one of Moosend’s “recipes,” or pre-built automation templates.
You choose the trigger that starts the email automation, specify the steps, and set the actions. For example, you can send out a series of emails when someone subscribes to a form, or even send “abandoned cart” messages to remind someone to check out.
You can learn more about Moosend in my in-depth review here. Or keep reading for a closer look at its pros and cons.
Pros of Moosend
- Intuitive drag-and-drop builder makes it easy to design beautiful newsletters, forms and landing pages without knowing any code
- Landing page builder tools allow you to design custom pages to increase sign-ups and conversions
- Automation tools and templates let you set up pre-written series of emails to send to subscribers after they take a certain action
- Opt-in forms that you can customize to increase sign-ups and grow your email list
- List segmentation options to tag and categorize your subscribers based on certain identifying features or behaviors (e.g., when they subscribed, who abandoned a cart, etc.)
- Reporting tools that give insight into all the important analytics of your email marketing efforts
- Customer support that includes phone support with each paid plan, live chat, email, informative webinars, and a large knowledge base. Plus, custom enterprise plans have their own account manager.
- Affordable pricing that beats many of the other competitors on this list, as well as a free plan for up to 1,000 subscribers
- Integrations with lots of other apps and platforms
Cons of Moosend
- Doesn’t offer phone support on the free plan
- Free plan doesn’t include landing pages
- Some Moosend reviewers have said the dashboard can load slowly at times
Moosend pricing
Moosend is one of the most affordable email marketing platforms out there. Not only does it offer a free plan for lists of fewer than 1,000 subscribers, but its paid plans start at just $8/month when paid annually.
The price goes to $44 per month for up to 10,000 subscribers and $100 per month for 10,000 to 25,000 subscribers. You can also request a custom enterprise plan for your business with a dedicated account manager.
4. EmailOctopus
EmailOctopus is one of the best email marketing platforms when considering value vs. cost. It offers a completely free starter plan that lets you have up to 2,500 subscribers per month. Its paid plans start at just $20 per month for up to 5,000 subscribers. Plus, EmailOctopus offers a 20% discount to charities and nonprofits.
Not only is EmailOctopus easy on the wallet, but it provides an excellent user experience for new and experienced email marketers alike. With EmailOctopus, you can easily design beautiful forms and landing pages, grow your list, send out customized newsletters, and craft high-converting landing pages.
It has over 30 email templates to choose from, or you can import your own HTML designs. Plus, you can create and customize simple sign-up forms and connect them to your WordPress website.
You can also set up automations so that a pre-written series of emails sends to subscribers. And you can integrate EmailOctopus with a number of other apps and platforms to make your marketing campaigns a success.
In addition to its main email marketing platform, EmailOctopus has a secondary service called EmailOctopus Connect. This service is for advanced users who want to integrated their email marketing with Amazon Web Services Account and are familiar with Amazon SES (and it’s offered at an even lower price).
You can learn more in my in-depth EmailOctopus review.
Pros of EmailOctopus
- One of the most affordable email marketing platforms available (plus it has a free plan)
- Provides great value for the price with easy-to-design email newsletters, sign-up forms, and landing pages
- Allows you to set up automated drip campaigns to your target subscribers
- Integrates with a variety of other apps and platforms
- Lets you analyze your campaigns with detailed reports and analytics
- Offers a 20% discount to charities and nonprofits
- Provides live chat and email support, as well an extensive knowledge base and video tutorials to answer all your questions
- Offers an even more affordable secondary service for advanced users who are familiar with Amazon SES
Cons of EmailOctopus
EmailOctopus markets itself as “simple, powerful tools to grow your business. Easy to use, quick to master and all at an affordable price.”
While it’s a great option for those looking for a simple, straightforward tool, it’s lacking some of the features that you can find with a pricer, more advanced email marketing platform, such as A/B testing or customer relationship management (CRM).
If you’re looking to grow your list with forms and landing pages, send out newsletters, and set up automated email sequences, EmailOctopus will help you do that. But if you’re an advanced email marketer needing more advanced solutions, you might be better off with a different service.
EmailOctopus pricing
EmailOctopus offers a completely free plan that allows you to have up to 2,500 subscribers. For up to 5,000 subscribers (and to remove EmailOctopus branding on your emails), you can upgrade to a paid plan for $20 per month. Like most other email marketing platforms, prices increase as the number of subscribers on your list goes up.
5. Omnisend
Omnisend is a leading email marketing software with advanced automation and SMS features. With its social media integrations and email funnel tools, Omnisend helps businesses convert subscribers into customers. It’s especially useful for e-commerce businesses with its abandoned cart reminders and transactional emails.
You can learn more in my full Omnisend review.
Pros of Omnisend
- Premium automation features
- Centralized dashboard that lets you track multiple marketing channels
- Multiple integrations
- Product picker feature that auto-populates product details in your emails
- Pre-built email templates and workflows
- SMS text message functions
- Abandoned cart messages and transactional emails
- Affordable pricing and a free plan
Cons of Omnisend
- Somewhat limited email templates compared to some competitors
- Might not be the best option if you’re not an ecommerce company
Omnisend pricing
Omnisend offers a free plan, which lets you reach up to 250 contacts and send 500 emails per month. You can also upgrade to one of its premium plans to reach more contacts and send more emails.
Its premium plans include the Standard plan, starting at $16/month, and the Pro plan, starting at $59/month.
6. HubSpot
If you want to work with the company whose founder literally wrote the book on inbound marketing, check out HubSpot’s comprehensive marketing software. HubSpot’s software helps you bring all of your marketing campaigns under one roof. It helps you attract the right audience, boost conversions, and run inbound marketing campaigns from start to finish within a single platform.
Depending on the plan you choose, you’ll get a full suite of email marketing features, as well as a CRM, blog, and content creation tools.
Pros of HubSpot
- Custom landing pages and emails
- Marketing automations
- Ability to track ROI of your campaign’s with revenue attribution reporting
- Contact management (with collection of customer data to personalize your emails at scale)
- Live chat feature
- Traffic and conversion analytics
- Additional features on its premium plans, including SEO, blog, and content creation tools
Cons of HubSpot
- Depending on your business, HubSpot’s software might be more comprehensive than you need
- Pricing is higher than some other tools
HubSpot pricing
HubSpot offers free tools so you can start building your list with forms, email marketing, and other useful features. To access additional features, you can opt for its Starter plan, Professional plan, or Enterprise plan, starting at $45/month (with the price increasing depending on your number of contacts).
7. Mailchimp
Founded in 2001, Mailchimp is one of the most popular email marketing tools on the market. Here’s why:
Pros of Mailchimp
- Comes with a free plan where users can send up to 10,000 emails a month to up to 2,000 subscribers
- Easy to use interface which is ideal for beginner bloggers
- Comes with additional features such as geo-tracking, social media, and Google Analytics integration
- Has hundreds of design tools and flexible templates to choose from
- Has automation features to help you reach out to your readers at the right moment
- Trusted by industry-leading brands such as TED and Vimeo
Cons of MailChimp
- Once your audience grows and you need to reach out to more subscribers, you may have to subscribe to the premium plan, which is relatively expensive
MailChimp pricing
Here’s a preview of MailChimp’s pricing for both its free and premium plans.
8. Drip
This email marketing platform is relatively new in the industry, but is becoming increasingly popular. Drip mostly focuses on e-commerce businesses, particularly those that sell products online.
Pros of Drip
- Offers detailed email analytics for its users
- Has a huge library of integrations to choose from
- Provides behavior and event tracking to increase sales
- Comes with multichannel automations
- Features an online learning hub for new users
- Has a huge collection of customizable forms
Cons of Drip
Even though it offers a free plan, Drip is not the cheapest email marketing tool out there. The exact pricing depends on the number of subscribers in your mailing list.
For example, if you have 100 subscribers, you’ll get access to all of Drip’s core features, and you will be able to send unlimited emails after the trial period. During the trial period, you can send up to 20,000 emails.
Drip pricing
Here’s an example of how much you’ll pay per month for Drip if you have 1,500 subscribers.
9. GetResponse
GetResponse is an email marketing tool that’s easy to use despite offering a variety of robust features. Let’s take a look at the reasons to use GetResponse for your email marketing campaigns.
You can also head to my comprehensive GetResponse review here.
Pros of GetResponse
- Comes with a drag-and-drop builder, among other tools that don’t need technical experience to use
- Has unsubscribe tracking to help you plan your content based on your subscribers’ behavior
- Can integrate third party software, such as Google Docs
- Sends any number of emails for specific groups
- Comes with a comprehensive guide to help new users get the most out of their email marketing campaigns
- Offers a 30-day free trial
- Has lots of free email templates to choose from
- You can try any of their plans for free for 30 days without providing your credit card information
Cons of GetResponse
- GetResponse doesn’t offer phone support unless you’re on the Max plan
GetResponse pricing
Here’s how much you’ll pay each month if you choose GetResponse as your email marketing platform:
10. AWeber
AWeber is a powerful email marketing tool that’s designed with small businesses in mind. If you’re a beginner blogger, this tool offers a great way to launch your email marketing campaigns. Here’s why.
(Want a deeper dive? Check out my AWeber review here.)
Pros of AWeber
- Has a powerful design assistant that helps you build emails in seconds
- Comes with a drag-and-drop email and landing page designer
- Has a huge library of pre-built email templates
- Offers automated email campaigns
- Guarantees end-to-end deliverability
- Pre-built reports and analytics
Cons of AWeber
- Pricing seems a little bit high
- Their monthly quota is lower than some other email marketing platforms
- Unsubscribed email addresses count towards your monthly quota (you’ll have to remove these from your list so you don’t end up paying for them)
AWeber pricing
Here’s AWeber’s pricing. As you can see, the free plan only allows up to 500 subscribers.
11. Sendinblue
SendInBlue is one of those email marketing tools that’s designed for the average user. You don’t need to be an expert email marketer to get great results from this platform.
If you want a run-down of all of Sendinblue’s features, you can find it in my Sendinblue review.
Pros of Sendinblue
- Allows segmentation, which helps you target a more defined audience
- Supports transactional emails if you’re selling products or services
- Has hundreds of customized forms for your email marketing campaign
- Has a shared inbox to keep track of your email history
Cons of Sendinblue
- Sets a daily quota of 300 emails on the free plan
Sendinblue pricing
Sendinblue’s pricing is comparable to most other email marketing services.
12. Mailjet
Just as the name suggests, Mailjet offers fast email delivery services in bulk. This is actually one of the most respected and popular email marketing tools in the industry, used by big companies like KIA, Microsoft, DHL, American Express, and other top brands.
Here’s why Mailjet is so popular.
Pros of Mailjet
- Their free trial has no expiration date
- You don’t need a credit card to sign up for the free trial
- The free plan costs $0 per month – forever
- You can send up to 6,000 emails per month and 200 daily with the free trial
- Has been designed to accommodate the email marketing needs of both small and big businesses
Cons of Mailjet
- Has limited segmentation options, which could potentially lead to a loss of subscribers
Mailjet pricing
Mailjet is surprisingly one of the most affordable email marketing tools available on the internet today. You’d expect this software to be expensive, given that it’s being used by some Fortune 500 companies, but that’s not the case.
13. ActiveCampaign
Founded in 2003, this Illinois-based email marketing service comes with a wide range of benefits for users. Here’s why you should consider ActiveCampaign.
Pros of ActiveCampaign
- No need for technical experience or coding skills to use this software
- Free migration from another email marketing service
- Users can send unlimited emails per month
- Has excellent phone support
- Has advanced automation and easy drag-and-drop email builder
- Offers free training for new users
- Integrates over 350 apps, including WordPress
Cons of ActiveCampaign
- Pricing is a little bit high, while monthly quota is on the low side
- Free trial only lasts for 14 days, and you can only send emails to up to 100 contacts
ActiveCampaign pricing
I mentioned that their pricing is a little bit on the high side; let’s take a look.
As you can see from their pricing above, the $9 fee for 500 contacts is still higher than some other services, even if you can send unlimited emails.
Find out if ActiveCampaign is right for your business with my in-depth ActiveCampaign review.
14. Automizy
Email marketing tool Automizy claims to help increase your email open rate by at least 34%. If you’re new to email marketing, open rate refers to the percentage of subscribers who open an email out of your total subscribers. If 10 out of 100 people open your email, for example, your open rate is 10%.
Pros of Automizy
- Promises a high open rate of up to 34%
- Does not need credit card information for the free trial, so you can try it out risk-free
- Has advanced features, such as email marketing automation, website behavior tracking, and tagging based on interest
- Offers free analytics and metrics for campaigns, automation and forms
- Integrates a number of sales tools, including Shopify
- Has a 60-day money-back guarantee
- Only charges for active contacts
- Customers can cancel any time, and they will not be billed for subsequent months
Cons of Automizy
- Free trial only lasts for 14 days
- Appears to offer fewer email template options than some other email marketing tools
Automizy pricing
The most basic plan starts at $9 per month for 200 users and goes up from there.
15. OptinMonster
More than one million websites use this email marketing software to turn their web traffic into subscribers, leads and customers. Some examples of popular brands that use OptinMonster include Pinterest, TripAdvisor, ClickBank, Harvard University, McAfee, Patreon, and American Express.
Pros of OptinMonster
- Trusted by industry-leading brands
- Has hundreds of email templates to choose from
- Comes with advanced options, such as lightbox popups, floating bars, scroll boxes and gamified wheels
- Offers geolocation targeting and exit intent detection
- Provides comprehensive analytics and insights if you integrate it with Google Analytics
Cons of OptinMonster
- Money-back guarantee only lasts 14 days
OptinMonster pricing
Surprisingly, OptinMonster isn’t that expensive despite being trusted by a number of popular brands. The image below shows how much you’ll pay for each plan, and the features that will come with your subscription.
Find the best email marketing service to build a relationship with your readers
Most readers (75% or so) who come to your blog will never return. But if you use email marketing, you can make sure a reader stays connected to your blog.
By offering a valuable freebie (such as a checklist, e-course, training, or other resource), you can provide value to your readers while getting their email address. Then, you can keep providing value with useful emails and other resources.
As you build this relationship, the reader will gain a greater connection to you and your blog and be more likely to purchase a product you recommend.
This process of nurturing leads is, in a nutshell, what a sales funnel is all about. That’s why email marketing is so popular among bloggers and can be a huge source of revenue for your blog.
Even if you’re a brand new blogger, I recommend collecting subscribers from Day 1.
Hopefully this list has helped you find the best email marketing service for you and your blog so you can start building your list of raving fans and future customers!
For more insight into how to monetize your blog, check out my ultimate guide on how to make money blogging.
