Introduction![Email_Marketing_Tool_Reviews]()
When it comes to getting in touch with your customers, or even building your customer base, nothing says it like writing them a personalized message; it is intimate, makes them feel special and keeps the brand loyalty on a constant high. While social media is fun for a quick update and letting people know about the latest deals and offers; mails, even though it might essentially say the same thing -says a lot. So if you are looking for good mailing partners here are the top two contenders we have for you – GetResponse and iContact.
Email Marketing Tool Reviews – The BIG Difference Between GetResponse and iContact:
On first instinct, the site that seems more inviting is definitely GetResponse, this may be a personal thing, but sites that are clean, have a modern appearance and are less cluttered seems more attractive. When you are choosing your email marketing provider, you need to know what it is compatible with, which in turn makes it easier to work with. To begin with, GetResponse is integrated with WordPress, making it a great partner to work with, if WordPress already is your base. Apart from that importing information from Sales Force also becomes relatively simpler, as GetResponse is compatible with such platforms. Integrating it into your system and importingyour contacts becomes that much simpler. Although this is not necessarily mentioned on iContact, integrating it with your platform and importing your contact list may not be tough as well.
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While websites are just skin deep, it is the cumulative features offered that bring home the vote. Both services, maintain blogs, which is always great, if you need to read more about the services and products. However we did find that the blog with GetResponse was loaded with far more relevant information and was easier to find, we dint have to spend a lot of time looking around the site for the blog.
Even though iContact does not have a very conveniently located blog button, it does have a pop up live chat that directly connects you to the sales rep, who is more than willing to clear your doubts, which is always helpful. Apart from that iContact also provide users with an ‘Account Health’ side bar which helps you track your marketing goals and achievements. iContact also has an app that allows you to edit and modify webforms, which is a great addition.
GetResponse on the other hand had a very helpful auto response calendar which is easier to set and manage. All you have to do is drag your contacts and the rest is done by the system. While iContact also boast a webform creator, the one offered by GetResponse is far more sophisticated at getting the job done with finesse. Apart from that, GetResponse offers its customers a unique photo library, on subscription, which is a charged benefit on iContact.
The Real Deal
While all the peripheries sound amazing, the ultimate test is how user friendly the service is. With user friendly we don’t mean tech support and web page navigation, it is the software provided by your mailing partners that allows you to make an effective and strong campaign, which we did find with GetResponse. With over a hundred templates to choose from GetResponse gets right to business with providing templates that are attention grabbing as well as classy and sophisticated that set the tone for your email. Once you have your template selected for your landing page, it is as simple as moving icons around, selecting what you want where, giving you the complete freedom to make your campaign as close to home as possible.
Unlike other software and templates that are rigid and don’t allow any room for flexibility, GetResponse gives you, the tools and means to make things happen. Finally after you have made your landing page all you have to do is hit publish and your landing page is done and ready to use. Apart from creating a brilliant landing page, GetResponse also allows you to integrate web forms. These are a great way to keep a track on your subscribers without being too invasive. Data collected from web forms can also provide you important information about market preference, statistics etc. tools for which are provided by GetResponse. The emailing service also allows you to conduct surveys for you to get a better understanding of your market.
The Conclusion
While the entire features act as factors that pits one service against the other, the deciding factor is many a times is pricing. GetResponse offers free trials to all its features to all subscribers, iContact only offers freebies to first 100 subscriptions. Having said that, if you are a small company or it’s your first time investing in an email marketing service you might want to choose iContact. The flexibility offered by iContact is great if you arenot planning to commit a substantial amount for a long term on an email marketing service.
But for all long term planners, you are better of choosing GetResponse over iContact, mainly because of the scale to which GetResponse works. The pricing list on iContact is convenient for a beginner who just wants to know how email marketing can boast the sites sale. When you do get to a point, where you need services that can handle the multiple numbers of subscriptions along with multiple emails, GetResponse works out to be the best bet. We hope this article made it clearer which company is right for you.
Excellent article, Himadri. It offers a good comparison of both the tools on all important aspects. Thanks, Niraj (Founder at grexit.com)
Thanks @Niraj for your nice and wonderful comment. Hope you will stay tuned with TechnTechie 🙂