Email marketing software- Suggestions?
- Thread starter William.Wallace
- Start date
Hi William,
Hopefully this helps. I would suggest Email Marketing Professional, you can download it for free at EMP.com where you can run it with limited functionality. Failing that you can upgrade it for $40.00 and it'll take on the full functionality of a fully fledged E-Mail Campaign highly similar to what some companies charge £1000s for. - bounce backs, opt-ins etc.
BTW if you require targeted email address to send out to please let me know and I may be able to help.
Kind Regards,
Peter
Business DataSolutions Limited
0843 2892786
Hopefully this helps. I would suggest Email Marketing Professional, you can download it for free at EMP.com where you can run it with limited functionality. Failing that you can upgrade it for $40.00 and it'll take on the full functionality of a fully fledged E-Mail Campaign highly similar to what some companies charge £1000s for. - bounce backs, opt-ins etc.
BTW if you require targeted email address to send out to please let me know and I may be able to help.
Kind Regards,
Peter
Business DataSolutions Limited
0843 2892786
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Newbus
One of my clients TangerineDream Consultancy has an Email Marketing tool. I use it to great effect. I can make nice Looking HTML emails from my laptop (No coding skills here). It not free but cost me about £40.00 a month to send 2000 emails, but I get live reporting and can run surveys.
Still not got enough post to give you a link sorry. I am sure if you Google the name you will find the site
Good luck
Still not got enough post to give you a link sorry. I am sure if you Google the name you will find the site
Good luck
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Aweber, mailchimp and campaign monitor are all paid for but worth the outlay. Campaign monitor has a good model where you only pay a small fee of approx £3.00 and 0.5p per email.
If it must be free, the php system mentioned above running on your own kit is likely best bet but remember, no such thing as free, if you have a problem and it eats up a lot of your time the paltry monthly fee from aweber or one others will suddenly seem very cheap!
If it must be free, the php system mentioned above running on your own kit is likely best bet but remember, no such thing as free, if you have a problem and it eats up a lot of your time the paltry monthly fee from aweber or one others will suddenly seem very cheap!
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Pete Crane
This tends to be a recurring question - email marketing is identified as a possible way to reach out to prospects and/or clients and the research starts. Unfortunately (and this isn't meant as a personal slight as you are not the first to ask the question 
), the focus suddently switches to doing it on the cheap. And that's a bad way to go about email marketing.
The second mistake is opt for doing everything in-house. You're not sending out large volumes (2000 onwards is a small list) and chances are you won't be sending out messages on anything like a daily basis. Those are two of only three half-decent criteria why having an in-house system is truly cost-effective, and you're not meeting them.
Here's some facts about going the in-house route:
All that before you can even think about sending a message out the door and I haven't even mentioned plenty other technical and commercial joys such as SPF, legislation, or design and content! Now you could of course not bother with all that, and as a result see your domain name rubbished, none of your business emails will reach their destination and your ISP services withdrawn. That's not being a drama queen about this subject; it happens and can be swift and painful.
The point is this: you have spent time and sweated effort building up your online presence and trying to get a good reputation for what you do. Email marketing is a brilliant tool that can support your marketing efforts, and it can be easily on a par with search engine marketing in terms of its ROI - but only if you do it properly, take the time to get your knowledge up and work with some professional services who have been through the pain, learned the tricks and the things to avoid, and help countless others get their message out.
You would be much better placed reading up (some good blogs out there giving independent advice - I write one along with plenty others too), talking to some ESPs instead of thinking about free software, and thinking about how you are going to invest time and money in email marketing - which ultimately is not going to be all that expensive if you outsource prudently and certainly less than the total costs involved in an in-house solution.
), the focus suddently switches to doing it on the cheap. And that's a bad way to go about email marketing.The second mistake is opt for doing everything in-house. You're not sending out large volumes (2000 onwards is a small list) and chances are you won't be sending out messages on anything like a daily basis. Those are two of only three half-decent criteria why having an in-house system is truly cost-effective, and you're not meeting them.
Here's some facts about going the in-house route:
- An in-house services has to be installed and commissioned. We're not talking about MS Office here, it can - depending on the vendor - be a particularly fiddly operation requiring time, possible expert help called in, and keep you away from doing core business tasks
- An in-house service has to have a supporting infrastructure. That takes time to set up, requires potential investment in hardware software, along with increased costs in services such as your internet connection. Time and capital costs
- An in-house service has to be maintained. That means time, resource, and therefore money - and free apps can have support ranging from barely acceptable to non-existent, leaving you completely on your own
- You will need to spend time setting up relationships with ISPs to prevent being blocked. And that certainly takes time.
- You will have to undertake ongoing monitoring of blacklists and abuse reports, and sort out being reomved if you should get listed on any of them. MXToolbox is a simple way to do rudimentary checks, but bear in mind they scan nearly 150 email blacklist databases in the process.
All that before you can even think about sending a message out the door and I haven't even mentioned plenty other technical and commercial joys such as SPF, legislation, or design and content! Now you could of course not bother with all that, and as a result see your domain name rubbished, none of your business emails will reach their destination and your ISP services withdrawn. That's not being a drama queen about this subject; it happens and can be swift and painful.
The point is this: you have spent time and sweated effort building up your online presence and trying to get a good reputation for what you do. Email marketing is a brilliant tool that can support your marketing efforts, and it can be easily on a par with search engine marketing in terms of its ROI - but only if you do it properly, take the time to get your knowledge up and work with some professional services who have been through the pain, learned the tricks and the things to avoid, and help countless others get their message out.
You would be much better placed reading up (some good blogs out there giving independent advice - I write one along with plenty others too), talking to some ESPs instead of thinking about free software, and thinking about how you are going to invest time and money in email marketing - which ultimately is not going to be all that expensive if you outsource prudently and certainly less than the total costs involved in an in-house solution.
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Pete Crane said:
Most php based scripts are simple to install. It's a case of FTPing the files to the server, creating a database, and hitting the "install" button on the script. Obviously, it varies from script to script, but 20 minutes to have it installed and configured if you have a basic sense of how these things work.
Pete Crane said:
The software I use happily runs on my VPS alongside my main site. No additional cost for hardware, or any other costs besides purchasing the software and a few minutes composing emails.
Pete Crane said:
Or, pay for a script that comes with support
The one-off cost of the script I use is less than half the price I'd pay for a month's subscription to mailchimp.Pete Crane said:
Get your server provider to configure domain keys, SPF, make sure your list is opt-in, provide an unsubscribe link, remove email addresses that bounce back and include your trading information in the emails. All very easy to do and will all very much reduce the risk of getting blacklisted.
You've written a long post there, but haven't mentioned that you run an email marketing company. I hadn't noticed until I saw how skewed the post was and checked your homepage.
OP, don't be fooled into thinking you HAVE to spend a lot on your email marketing solution. The correct implementation of a half decent script in the first place and you're sorted with little to no ongoing costs (in my opinion)
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Peter,
I have to disagree with you and support sneaksms's comments - you do paint a picture that possibly applies to a corporate bod, but not to a standard SME user!
We regularly send out several thousand messages via joomla/Acajoom. Yes, it can be a bit tedious and I would prefer to use phplist, however, it works fine.
Sure, it is beyond the realm of many people, however, an intermediate user could do it and, to save several hundred quid, I would learn (well, I did!!).
I have to disagree with you and support sneaksms's comments - you do paint a picture that possibly applies to a corporate bod, but not to a standard SME user!
We regularly send out several thousand messages via joomla/Acajoom. Yes, it can be a bit tedious and I would prefer to use phplist, however, it works fine.
Sure, it is beyond the realm of many people, however, an intermediate user could do it and, to save several hundred quid, I would learn (well, I did!!).
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Pete Crane
@sneakSMS
Interesting reply, which makes a few assumptions worth considering.
First, you base your reply on your own circumstances in using a hosted service. This is something the majority of SMEs won't have, and is a cost to get one - which is something the OP was trying to avoid by the clear comment about preferring free software. No matter which way you try and cut the cake you're paying money out, potentially more than if you had just gone for a service, which makes the decision utterly illogical. Many firms simple don't have the starting point you posses, others don't have the skills either, and it's the access to these which makes it much preferable in the vast majority of cases.
Secondly, you clearly have some skills in configuring such an app and indeed you also comment on needing some idea on the environment. What if the business doesn't have the skills - which in reality will be a lot - or an individual thinks they do but goes on to make a complete horlicks of everything, which is prefectly feasible. But even if this is not the case, and a company has the skills to undertake an in-house service, they still don't take it up for the simple reason that they've realised the advantages in working with a partner and enjoying the benefits of their hard work and experience. Taking the DIY approach can be a distraction and in many areas cost more than outsourcing. If that wasn't the case then you would have no business case in offering an SMS service just as much as the likes of mailchimp (or my company) would not have any clients.
On a tangent to this, I have stated very clearly in a lot of previous posts what my business activity was and always recommended that people look round the ESPs to get a fair and balanced view. My post was intended to help give a counterbalance to the previous sugestions that didn't mention what are significant drawbacks in opting to have an in-house email marketing solution - which the vendors don't tell you about funily enough - and as I did not, at any point, recommend the OP puts business my way I certainly hope you are not inferring such a thing either.
@consultant
I would disagree about my post being applicable to corporates. It is not really the size of the business that determines whether they go for in-house or outsource across many business applications but the mindset some have when doing their research and having a shallow view of cost without making a realistic judgement of their own position; what resources they have, their infrastructure and the potential demands on their time.
For many firms, just getting the content together for a monthly message can be a struggle, such is the lack of time they have; to pile on top of this the range of other tasks required can turn what was a well intended effort into a very real burden sitting on someone's shoulders, and it is where a good ESP, just like any other business service from kashflow, gmail and all the rest, comes into its own.
Interesting reply, which makes a few assumptions worth considering.
First, you base your reply on your own circumstances in using a hosted service. This is something the majority of SMEs won't have, and is a cost to get one - which is something the OP was trying to avoid by the clear comment about preferring free software. No matter which way you try and cut the cake you're paying money out, potentially more than if you had just gone for a service, which makes the decision utterly illogical. Many firms simple don't have the starting point you posses, others don't have the skills either, and it's the access to these which makes it much preferable in the vast majority of cases.
Secondly, you clearly have some skills in configuring such an app and indeed you also comment on needing some idea on the environment. What if the business doesn't have the skills - which in reality will be a lot - or an individual thinks they do but goes on to make a complete horlicks of everything, which is prefectly feasible. But even if this is not the case, and a company has the skills to undertake an in-house service, they still don't take it up for the simple reason that they've realised the advantages in working with a partner and enjoying the benefits of their hard work and experience. Taking the DIY approach can be a distraction and in many areas cost more than outsourcing. If that wasn't the case then you would have no business case in offering an SMS service just as much as the likes of mailchimp (or my company) would not have any clients.
On a tangent to this, I have stated very clearly in a lot of previous posts what my business activity was and always recommended that people look round the ESPs to get a fair and balanced view. My post was intended to help give a counterbalance to the previous sugestions that didn't mention what are significant drawbacks in opting to have an in-house email marketing solution - which the vendors don't tell you about funily enough - and as I did not, at any point, recommend the OP puts business my way I certainly hope you are not inferring such a thing either.
@consultant
I would disagree about my post being applicable to corporates. It is not really the size of the business that determines whether they go for in-house or outsource across many business applications but the mindset some have when doing their research and having a shallow view of cost without making a realistic judgement of their own position; what resources they have, their infrastructure and the potential demands on their time.
For many firms, just getting the content together for a monthly message can be a struggle, such is the lack of time they have; to pile on top of this the range of other tasks required can turn what was a well intended effort into a very real burden sitting on someone's shoulders, and it is where a good ESP, just like any other business service from kashflow, gmail and all the rest, comes into its own.
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These scripts will happily chug away on even a shared hosting account, so anyone with a website that isn't a mr. site or similar is likely to be able to run it without problem. If they can't, it's because they have sub-standard hosting. If their web presence is with a half decent host, then there will be no problem and no additional cost apart from the initial software cost (and even that can be avoided by going with phplist which has plenty of supporting documentation).
I have highlighted in bold what I consider to be absolute nonsense. As I have pointed out, apart from the $79 initial outlay in my case (I bought a version with unlimited licenses, but the one license version is only $39), there are no additional costs. Again, I am using mailchimp as an example because it's the first one that comes to my mind, but for between 1000-2000 emails will cost $30 per month. I assume other services have similar pricing. For free with php list, or for $39 with the script I use, you can send UNLIMITED emails. The only difference is that it's likely you can send less emails per hour on a shared hosting service. But for me to put my mailing list through mailchimp would be $150 a month
I can send out the same amount of emails over the course of 24 hours (automated by the script) for nothing.It doesn't take a huge amount of skill to upload some files, fairly basic knowledge will do. And everyone knows someone who can do this sort of stuff and get it set up.
Again, I've put bold around something I'd really like to pick up on. It's marketing talk really isn't it? The advantages of working with a partner? You're uploading a list of email addresses and firing off a mailshot every now and again, and I don't think the OP is looking for anything more than that. What extra knowledge can you share then that's going to make the vital difference? My approach, and that I am suggesting to the OP, is likely to cost NOTHING ELSE on top of what is already being paid.
I suspect that the OP, having this as his first post, has not seen your previous posts about your business activity, or if he did, had not cared to remember them. As such, it was certainly worth pointing it out again. Especially as I believe that the "significant drawbacks" aren't quite all you make them out to be.
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Hey
I think it really is a case of finding a solution that fits the individual and budget. If you are not scared of setting something up and running something yourself and your spend would be in the higher regions like $150 a month then there is a real strong case for that approach.
If you are sending much less email and are terrified by the above type setup (as many are) then using a simple, hosted system (which still confuses the hell out of some peeps) is likely a better option.
I truly believe there is no single correct approach to these kind of things and you have to way up the options for each client.
I think it really is a case of finding a solution that fits the individual and budget. If you are not scared of setting something up and running something yourself and your spend would be in the higher regions like $150 a month then there is a real strong case for that approach.
If you are sending much less email and are terrified by the above type setup (as many are) then using a simple, hosted system (which still confuses the hell out of some peeps) is likely a better option.
I truly believe there is no single correct approach to these kind of things and you have to way up the options for each client.
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I have to agree with Peter. The time saved by setting up with an esp, the rich features such as split testing, using past purchase data, trigger based email etc. etc. are well worth the monthly outlay.
Leave it to the experts and don't waste your precious time trying to figure out why your emails are not being delivered. Go with a good ESP.
If you do not recoup these costs ten fold then you ain't doing it right
Disclaimer: i too run an email marketing agency before you moan
Jay Chambers
Leave it to the experts and don't waste your precious time trying to figure out why your emails are not being delivered. Go with a good ESP.
If you do not recoup these costs ten fold then you ain't doing it right
Disclaimer: i too run an email marketing agency before you moan
Jay Chambers
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If you have the technical knowledge, want to spend days implementing, a day creating your email, 24 hours to actually send it, a day running through your unsubscribes, 3 days running through your Hard Bounces, several days wondering why your emails are not getting delivered and 6 weeks crying when your normal one to one business emails are blocked as youve been blacklisted then buy a script and teach yourself the hard way.
Or use an ESP, pay a few pounds a month with unlimited support and advice and send your emails in minutes.
As an SME how much is your time worth?
For those paying an Email Marketing Company in US Dollars, be warned...
Or use an ESP, pay a few pounds a month with unlimited support and advice and send your emails in minutes.
As an SME how much is your time worth?
For those paying an Email Marketing Company in US Dollars, be warned...
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Possibly a linked in group?
Sounds good to me, i have no plans to go to London, are you up in Manchester anytime?
Are there any events coming up in your area? Let me know and i will make a visit!
Cheers!
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L
lawrence11
You Can go for the AJ Email Marketing Software or otherwise you can try for some Email Marketing Service Providers. I think you can better prefer for email marketing service providers. Its cost less. You Can Make use of the Free Trail of Doing Email Marketing with Email-M.Com.
email-m dot com
email-m dot com
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It is always fascinating reading polarised views So far on here we have been told that you absolutely must consider a 3rd party company, and you absolutely must consider doing it yourself... well, in the spirit of openness I will declare myself - we have customers doing each We have customers using mailchimp, others using constant contact, and we have those for whom we have written their own system... (and yes some of our customers are USA based before that red herring comes up again!)
The conclusion? It totally depends on what you / your business needs.
Lets start with the premise that email as a means of communication (news / offers / selling) is good. Consider what your needs are - maybe it is a soft sell, maybe just news updates, maybe something all together different...
I would say that there are three approaches:
1 - use a 3rd party such as those mentioned - ease of use (though technically they can be confusing!), simplicity to get up and running, handles all the DPA stuff such as bounces / opt outs / etc.
2 - do the same but running your own scripts - there are good explanations above, some warnings which are valid (you can end up blacklisting your mail server and some hosting companies will freeze your account if you do, bringing down website and email for your business), so you need to understand what you are doing, but of course there are definite cost benefits
3 - look for a bespoke system (tends to be why our clients do it themselves, i.e. we rarely go for option 2), this is a system which is integrated into your website / your internal database systems etc. - this is where it particularly starts to make sense of putting time in - not cheap to do, but the best ability to tailor / focus / leverage customers & data. At a simple level this should mean that every email that goes out is unique to that customer / prospect, tailoring the content based on their browsing habits on your website / their order history / etc. At a more complex level you get your email marketing / website / internal systems to auto-adjust to match the customer and to encourage the customer to transact
An example of this might be:
- you know the time you send out the email
- track the time your customer joe brown reads it / clicks on the links to read more and come to your website
- know you know the time of day they will read your communication
- now send them an offer which is time sensitive based on that time information - one email going out to 1000 prospects, each getting a bespoke timed offer - click here by 7pm and get an extra 10% off etc.
This latter approach can not be handled by the third party companies - it requries a system integrated into your business systems, it will cost you a lot more money - but my goodness it is powerful...
So, take the good advice above, and make your decision - there is a time and a place / a level of technical expertise / a type of company which will suit each of the three options:
- 3rd party company
- run your own scripts / software
- bespoke & integrated option
but whatever you do, don't ignore the possibilities
Alasdair
So far on here we have been told that you absolutely must consider a 3rd party company, and you absolutely must consider doing it yourself... well, in the spirit of openness I will declare myself - we have customers doing each We have customers using mailchimp, others using constant contact, and we have those for whom we have written their own system... (and yes some of our customers are USA based before that red herring comes up again!)The conclusion? It totally depends on what you / your business needs.
Lets start with the premise that email as a means of communication (news / offers / selling) is good. Consider what your needs are - maybe it is a soft sell, maybe just news updates, maybe something all together different...
I would say that there are three approaches:
1 - use a 3rd party such as those mentioned - ease of use (though technically they can be confusing!), simplicity to get up and running, handles all the DPA stuff such as bounces / opt outs / etc.
2 - do the same but running your own scripts - there are good explanations above, some warnings which are valid (you can end up blacklisting your mail server and some hosting companies will freeze your account if you do, bringing down website and email for your business), so you need to understand what you are doing, but of course there are definite cost benefits
3 - look for a bespoke system (tends to be why our clients do it themselves, i.e. we rarely go for option 2), this is a system which is integrated into your website / your internal database systems etc. - this is where it particularly starts to make sense of putting time in - not cheap to do, but the best ability to tailor / focus / leverage customers & data. At a simple level this should mean that every email that goes out is unique to that customer / prospect, tailoring the content based on their browsing habits on your website / their order history / etc. At a more complex level you get your email marketing / website / internal systems to auto-adjust to match the customer and to encourage the customer to transact
An example of this might be:
- you know the time you send out the email
- track the time your customer joe brown reads it / clicks on the links to read more and come to your website
- know you know the time of day they will read your communication
- now send them an offer which is time sensitive based on that time information - one email going out to 1000 prospects, each getting a bespoke timed offer - click here by 7pm and get an extra 10% off etc.
This latter approach can not be handled by the third party companies - it requries a system integrated into your business systems, it will cost you a lot more money - but my goodness it is powerful...
So, take the good advice above, and make your decision - there is a time and a place / a level of technical expertise / a type of company which will suit each of the three options:
- 3rd party company
- run your own scripts / software
- bespoke & integrated option
but whatever you do, don't ignore the possibilities
Alasdair
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Hi Alasdair,
As you mentioned, some of your clients use Constant Contact and MailChimp, these may not be able to handle the integration your clients need, but do not tar all 3rd parties with the same brush.
Wizemail will do all you have suggested that only an in-house system can do and more.
Segmentation queries, Behavioural targeting, geographic segmentation, triggered communication based on buying habits all live, in real time.
Full API integration.
To build a bespoke professional system will be circ. £100k and a year of development, or your clients could start today for <£500.
Take a trial and look around, youll be pleasantly surprised.
All the best,
Don
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