Are you running a small business and need to boost your marketing and sales numbers?
Email marketing campaigns may help you engage your customers better and gain more sales.
Since the top email marketing platforms are Mailchimp and Constant Contact, you must decide which one is right for your business.
This guide will teach all about Constant Contact vs Mailchimp and which one is best for you.
Hear about the similarities and differences between Contact Contact and Mailchimp.
We look into templates, design, automation, integrations, and reporting features between the two email marketing platforms.
Most importantly, you will find out the advantages and disadvantages of Constant Contact vs Mailchimp.
Read on to learn all the details behind the two email platforms!
What is Constant Contact?
When I worked as a marketing manager for a legal services company, I used Constant Contact for sending email marketing campaigns to lawyers and other legal firms.
Constant Contact is an online marketing services company founded in 1995 which serves various small businesses.
The platform from Constant Contact allows business owners to monitor and send email marketing operations.
You can also use it for social media marketing and developing websites and online stores.
What is Mailchimp?
When I worked for a nonprofit organization, I utilized Mailchimp to send out impressive email campaigns and provide health information to everyday people.
Mailchimp is an email marketing tool that enables business owners to communicate with their customers and others interested in their products or services.
Mailchimp provides contact management facets, a well-designed email marketing campaign, sound data analytics, and several advanced features.
Suitable Users
The best email marketing service focuses on specific audiences and does not provide an infinite amount of capabilities for any possible customer base.
When too many diverse clients are part of the game, email marketing services tend to lack the customized features consumers need.
Who is Constant Contact For?
Constant Contact is valuable for small businesses.
The email marketing software from Constant Contact is perfect for the commerce industry and small shops.
It provides companies with online store development and other e-commerce capabilities.
Currently, the email solution provider has more than 600,000 customers.
Who is Mailchimp For?
Mailchimp provides an email marketing service for a wide range of customers.
The diverse consumer base includes one-person startups, small businesses, nonprofit organizations, and even Fortune 500 companies.
Even bloggers use Mailchimp.
The industries represented include:
- Food services
- Finance
- Education and training
- Government
- Health and fitness
- Insurance
- Legal services
- And more
When to Use Constant Contact Vs Mailchimp
Email and digital marketing solutions serve a variety of roles and provide different features.
Each consumer can decide which email marketing tool is best for them based on customer support services, automation capabilities, and other email marketing features.
When to Choose Mailchimp?
When considering Mailchimp vs Constant Contact, choose Mailchimp when looking for a user-friendly interface and gorgeous designs for your email template.
You can also split test your email marketing campaigns through the platform to see which time is best to send them.
When to Choose Constant Contact?
If you are looking for email marketing software with an easy-to-use interface and a simple design, then Constant Contact is the right choice.
Constant Contact is perfect for beginners as well as those with advanced email campaign marketing expertise.
Comparison Between Constant Contact and Mailchimp
Constant Contact alternatives include Mailchimp Pro and the standard Mailchimp email marketing platform.
Essentially, Constant Contact and Mailchimp do have some similarities.
Nonetheless, they also have divergences in terms of:
- Email list management
- Templates
- Analytics
- Each automation feature
- Designs
- Integrations
- Reporting
- Phone support and customer service
List Management
Email list management involves collecting important information about subscribers to your email solution account.
Using specific marketing strategies to assess business email lists can help marketers better understand their consumer base.
It allows marketers to figure out whether a specific email campaign will effectively target their audience.
How is Constant Contact’s List Management?
Constant Contact’s list management features involve adding client emails and organizing customers based on industry or other characteristics.
Doing so allows small businesses to target the right audience in each email.
Some features include tagging, segmenting contacts, integrating with Outlook, and storing a wide amount of information on each customer.
How is Mailchimp’s List Management?
Mailchimp’s list management capabilities allow you to create a master list and import lists from zip files and more.
Lastly, you can identify groups within each list and match customers to each group.
Mailchimp also lets you track which groups open your emails the most.
Templates and Design
The right email template needs to have compatibility among various devices and a consistent layout.
The design of any email newsletter needs to consistently match the company brand.
Automated email features and visual graphics that align with the content may help.
What are Constant Contact’s Templates and Design?
Constant Contact has 100 built-in email templates for you to choose from.
As such, you should have enough choices without an infinite amount to look through.
You can also use layout and column features to create the best email newsletter for your audience.
What are Mailchimp’s Templates and Design?
On Mailchimp, you can reuse past email templates or edit those you’ve used before.
Along with more than 100 email templates available to choose from on this platform, Mailchimp also provides a chance to produce a personal brand template.
Reporting and Analytics
Email marketing software features reporting and analytics to help marketers better assess and engage their audience.
For instance, Constant Contact uses the Google Analytics application while Mailchimp has its reporting capabilities.
With analytics, you’ll see which campaigns get the most openings and clicks.
What is the Strength of Constant Contact’s Reporting and Analytics?
The Constant Contact email platform has the key strength of simplifying the reporting procedure.
All essential statistics are available in one simple chart.
As such, users will easily understand the analytics of Constant Contact and gather all relevant data in one spot.
It also integrates Google Analytics.
What is the Strength of Mailchimp’s Reporting and Analytics?
Mailchimp has its reporting features that provide real-time statistics and a Click Map that tells you where your customers clicked after opening your email newsletters.
You can even obtain comprehensive revenue reports that will track sales from each email campaign.
Automation
The best email marketing services include automation features so that you don’t spend needless hours creating the perfect email template.
For instance, you can create an automatic email sent to consumers who had products in their online cart but didn’t finish purchasing.
Send an automatic email with a discount to tempt the customer to buy the products.
What Automation Feature Does Constant Contact Have?
Constant Contact allows you to send automatic emails including welcome emails, emails for those with abandoned online carts, and anniversary or birthday emails.
You can even have automatic resending of emails to customers who failed to open the initial newsletter.
What Automation Feature Does MailChimp Have?
Mailchimp provides automated emails such as those based on specific dates like birthdays or ones that are triggered based on the actions an email subscriber takes.
Integrations
Email marketing platforms also tend to have integration capabilities, such as downloading email contacts from Outlook, Gmail, your files, and other email systems.
Further, integration can involve combining multiple tools and systems to streamline the production of email campaigns.
Constant Contact’s Integrations
Constant Contact has numerous integrations to consider.
For example, you can add Eventbrite attendees to Constant Contact subscriber lists and contacts from Google Sheets, Gravity Forms submitters, and Google Contacts.
Calix Marketing Cloud also recently announced an integration with Constant Contact.
You can even integrate Mailchimp subscribers to the platform.
Mailchimp’s Integrations
Similarly, you can add your subscribers from Constant Contact to Mailchimp in case you decide to switch your email marketing platform.
Generally, you can integrate nearly any app with the Mailchimp platform including Shopify, Salesforce, HubSpot, and WordPress.
Design and Flexibility
Every email newsletter process comes with many design factors.
The factors include the background, visual imagery, and even call-to-action buttons.
Flexible email templates are also essential.
They can make automatic emails and other newsletters.
Flexibility provides simple processes to customize borders, backgrounds, paragraphs, and more.
Constant Contact’s Design and Flexibility
Depending on the price point, Constant Contact can provide you with more than 200 email templates and designs to choose from.
You will have the ability to customize the design and the text blocks.
Constant Contact provides greater flexibility in terms of designing the type of newsletters you prefer.
Mailchimp’s Design and Flexibility
Mailchimp also provides enough flexibility to customize an email with the colors you prefer, the fonts that make the best impact, and the images in the sizes you choose.
You can also personalize emails with sign-up forms and automation features.
Email Marketing Features
You should find numerous email marketing features on both Mailchimp and Constant Contact.
The best email platforms have robust analytics features, optimization for mobile devices, automation capabilities, and third-party app integrations.
Email surveys are also effective features for marketers.
What to Know About Constant Contact’s Email Marketing Features
Constant Contact includes features like automation and interactive email templates.
For instance, the platform can trigger automatic emails based on subscribers’ actions.
Constant Contact allows email newsletters to include interactive content like RSVPs and responses to surveys.
It also allows tracking in real-time.
What to Know About Mailchimp’s Email Marketing Features
Via Mailchimp, you can manage subscriber lists, data analytics and click-through rates, and social media sharing.
Some other features include mobile signup forms, subscriber email testing, and customization of email designs.
You’ll benefit from detailed analytics and an easy-to-use interface.
Reporting
Reporting features via email marketing platforms provide a plethora of information, including:
- The growth of subscriber lists
- Real-time data
- Reports based on your company brand
- Overall engagement
- Click-through rates, open rates, and bounce rates
The best email marketing report should also include how many people unsubscribed, recent subscribers, business metrics, and a list of the best-performing campaigns.
Constant Contact’s Reporting
Constant Contact has various analytics features to assess the success of email campaigns.
You can track the click-through rates, email open rates, and the number of newsletters sent.
You can download every report and save it for future use.
You can also compare the metrics with industry standards and prior email campaigns.
MailChimp’s Reporting
Similar to Constant Contact, the Mailchimp reports also show the number of clicks and email opening rates.
You can also view landing page reports about the number of clicks, views, and signup rate.
You can even see how well your social media channels are engaging customers.
Registration Forms
Email marketing involves registering subscribers and producing effective registration forms for potential consumers.
When you create an account on Mailchimp or Constant Contact, you need to create an email signup or a registration form.
Then, you can share the form through social media channels and other means.
Constant Contact’s Registration Forms
Constant Contact includes professional email sign-up forms with mobile-optimized and security features.
You can personalize the email signup form to fit your website and your company brand.
Further, you can integrate email marketing services to simplify registration forms.
MailChimp’s Registration Forms
To create a Mailchimp registration form, click on the audience and then choose the audience dashboard.
Now, pick the “current audience” and click “Manage Audience.”
Now, you can pick “signup forms” and then the “Form Builder” button.
Highlight and copy the signup form URL and paste it into a new browser tab.
Now, right-click and pick the “View Page Source” tab.
Now, you can edit the signup form and customize it.
Landing Pages
There are numerous landing pages available through email marketing platforms, such as online store pages, lead generation pages, product description pages, and subscription pages.
Constant Contact’s Landing Pages
Constant Contact provides customized landing pages that allow you to boost your conversion rates.
Constant Contact’s landing page builder allows you to quickly design your website landing pages without needing to manually code them on your site.
Mailchimp’s Landing Pages
Mailchimp also provides a landing page builder feature.
Here, you can choose your favorite template and customize it to fit your company brand.
You can also produce the URL for the landing page.
Also, you can choose your audience, tags, and tracking features.
Ease of Use
What is the easiest email marketing platform to use?
Which one has the best user-friendly interface?
Which one is best for beginners and which one is better for experts?
You can find the answers to these questions below.
Is Constant Contact Easy to Use?
Constant Contact is the easiest email marketing system to utilize.
The platform is also great for beginners, especially since it has a simple interface where you can easily manage the contact lists, calendar of campaigns, and email templates.
Is Mailchimp Easy to Use?
Mailchimp may not be the perfect choice for beginners, but, once you get the hang of it, the interface is one of the simplest to get used to due to the drag-and-drop capabilities.
You should also find the email editor easy to use.
Customer Service
An easy-to-use interface isn’t always enough.
Email solution platforms also require effective customer service capabilities.
From live chat options to phone support, the best email marketing system aims to solve customers’ problems.
What is Constant Contact’s Customer Service System?
The customer service phone number for Constant Contact is 866-289-2101 for those in the United States and Canada.
The company also provides a live chat option for its customers to talk with a specialist.
You can find other customer service phone numbers here.
What is Mailchimp’s Customer Service System?
Mailchimp does not offer as many options for customer service support.
You can choose a topic in a form ranging from technical support and account access to billing and contact sales.
Once you pick the topic, you will see tutorials and guides as well as a contact form for customer service support.
Pricing
What is the price of Constant Contact vs Mailchimp?
There are multiple different pricing plans to choose from with more features and email templates when you pay more.
If affordability matters to your needs, then check out the pricing plans below.
Constant Contact’s Pricing Plans
The pricing plans for Constant Contact have tiered costs that start as little as $9.99 per month and can grow above $300 under the Core pricing plan.
You can get away with $9.99 a month if you have 500 or fewer contacts.
The Plus pricing plan starts at $45 per month and grows to $410 per month when the contact list grows above 45,000 subscribers.
Mailchimp’s Pricing Plans
Mailchimp has one very simple plan starting at $0 and then grows to the Essentials pricing plan at $11 per month, the Standard pricing plan at $17 per month, and the Premium pricing plan at $299 per month.
What are the Similarities Between Constant Contact and Mailchimp?
Mailchimp and Constant Contact both provide data analytics reports including click-through and open rates.
Further, both email marketing platforms provide automated emails after you customize your account.
Lastly, both Mailchimp and Constant Contact enable A/B testing to see which email variations work best.
Pros and Cons of Constant Contact and Mailchimp
You’ll find numerous benefits along with disadvantages of the two email solution providers for business owners and nonprofits.
Pros
The pros of email marketing systems include automation, customized email templates, integration, data analytics reports, and easy-to-use platforms.
Also, straightforward email list management benefits customers as well.
What to Like about Mailchimp
Mailchimp has numerous reporting feature benefits and user-friendly design features.
Mailchimp also provides more automation capabilities than Constant Contact at a more affordable cost.
In addition, you can obtain more A/B testing options through Mailchimp.
What to Like about Constant Contact
Constant Contact has a higher deliverability rate than Mailchimp, so you can rest assured the emails make their way to customers’ inboxes.
You’ll love the simple design and the easy-to-navigate interface.
It’s perfect for beginners as well as those with advanced skills.
It also integrates with Google Analytics and Eventbrite.
Cons
Nonetheless, every email solution provider comes with certain drawbacks and disadvantages.
Below, I detail the cons of Mailchimp and Constant Contact.
What Not to Like about Mailchimp
The interface on Mailchimp is more awkward to use and somewhat outdated compared to more modern platforms.
Since it is a membership-based site, it is more difficult to import email contacts.
The email templates are rather basic and customers spend more time creating a well-designed template.
What Not to Like about Constant Contact
The email templates on Constant Contact lack advanced features and workflows.
Essentially, the email templates are limited in terms of customization.
The automation capabilities are also limited.
Can You Transfer Contacts Between Mailchimp and Constant Contact?
It is possible to transfer all of your email contacts from Mailchimp to Constant Contact and vice versa.
You will need to follow the steps below.
Transferring Contacts From Mailchimp to Constant Contact
- Go to the Audience tab on Mailchimp
- Click the “Current Audience”
- Press “View Contacts”
- Click on “Export Audience”
- Choose “Export as CSV”
- Unzip the Mailchimp files
- Upload the Mailchimp contact list to Constant Contact
Transferring Contacts From Constant Contact to Mailchimp
- Go to the Contacts section and click “Active”
- Select “all active contacts” and click export
- Pick the fields you want and then click “Export Contacts”
- Then choose Download CSV
Final Word
The complete guide detailing Constant Contact vs Mailchimp should have helped you decide which platform is best for you.
You can pick the best automation capabilities, data analytics reports, and integration features.
What email marketing system are you planning to use?
Let us know!
