ActiveCampaign vs. Customer.io vs. Gist

Gist

Overview
Product	Rating	Most Used By	Product Summary	Starting Price
ActiveCampaign	Score 8.5 out of 10	N/A	ActiveCampaign is presented as an AI-first marketing platform for marketers, agencies, and entrepreneurs. It uses Active Intelligence for goal-aware automation and personalized experiences across email, SMS, and WhatsApp. ActiveCampaign integrates with 950+ apps and generates insights to optimize every workflow.	$15 per month (billed annually)
Customer.io	Score 9.0 out of 10	Small Businesses (1-50 employees)	Customer.io is a customer engagement platform that enables marketers to build sophisticated automated messaging campaigns. With access to real-time behavioral data, users can create personalized and relevant messages to engage and retain customers. This includes sending emails, push notifications, SMS, in-app messages, and more through a visual building experience. Built for scale, Customer.io boasts users among over 5,300 companies, sending over 17 billion messages per year.	N/A
Gist	Score 9.5 out of 10	N/A	Gist is a unified marketing, sales, and support platform. It includes live chat, a help desk, knowledge base, email marketing, marketing automation, opt-in forms, and more.	$29 per month

Pricing

ActiveCampaign

Customer.io

Gist

Editions & Modules

Starter: $15
per month (billed annually)
Pro: $49
per month (billed annually)
Plus: $79
per month (billed annually)
Enterprise: $149
per month (billed annually)

No answers on this topic

Professional: $29.00
per month
Premium: $99.00
per month

Offerings

Pricing Offerings
ActiveCampaign	Customer.io	Gist
Free Trial
Yes	Yes	Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No	No	Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No	No	No

Entry-level Setup Fee

Optional

No setup fee

Additional Details

—

Essentials: For startups and small teams engaging customers on their mobile and web apps. - Up to 5,000 profiles*, Send Emails, Push, In-App, and SMS, Visual Workflow Builder, Segmentation, Two Workspaces, Email Support, Customer Community Premium: For high-growth companies looking for greater control over their messaging outcomes. - Everything in Essentials, Custom Data + Message Volume, Premium Product Features, Additional Workspaces, 90-day Onboarding Program, Premium Email & Chat Support, Managed Deliverability, Dedicated IPs, Parcel Pro Licenses, HIPAA Compliance Enterprise: For at-scale companies looking to create world-class customer experiences. - Everything in Premium, Managed Infrastructure*, Customer Success Manager, Quarterly Success Reviews, Technical Account Manager*, Audit Logging & Data Governance*, Parcel Business Licenses, Migration Support*, *Available by consultation.

—

More Pricing Information

Community Pulse
	ActiveCampaign	Customer.io	Gist
Considered Multiple Products	ActiveCampaign BW Brittany Warman CEO Chief Executive Officer Chose ActiveCampaign Mailchimp simply did not have all the features we were looking for, particularly with regard to list segmenting and automation. ActiveCampaign is more expensive, but it's a big step up for us. I think that Mailchimp is excellent for beginners and those who don't need all the … Incentivized Helpful? CB Chris Baird Business Owner Chose ActiveCampaign Much better than Mail Chimp Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign pricing is quite competitive compared to similar products. It was also recommended to me from a business partner with a similar line in business Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign Keap and MailerLite Incentivized Helpful? Kristin Clark CEO - Founder Chose ActiveCampaign I don't see a big difference Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign much more user friendly than these other alternatives. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign ActiveCampaign feels like the professional, empowered and much more fully set up version of MailChimp. I was using MailChimp when I first started my business, but was then introduced to AC, and it's a million times better. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign I used Mautic/Acquia for 4 years. It was more expensive for less features than ActiveCampaign. Also, I find ActiveCampaign is more intuitive and easier to use. The support system is more helpful. The pages are easy to navigate and the menu and submenus are well laid out. … Incentivized Helpful? Lindsay R. Allison Dierking Publisher Chose ActiveCampaign MailChimp, Mailer Lite, Constant Contact: ActiveCampaign is much better and much more versatile with automations, tags, and options for customizable lists and forms. Incentivized Helpful? AF Anne Fraulichkeit Menstrual Cycle Coach Chose ActiveCampaign More options, more control, better reports Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign Mailchimp is in a different league to the above platforms. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign ActiveCampaign has much better segmenting and more powerful automations, contact info, and integrations with other platforms. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign In my opinion, ActiveCampaign is wayyyy easier to use than MailChimp. It's easier to choose your lists and to resend to unopens. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign Salesforce is a beast! The learning involved to use the system is prohibitive. Mailerlite is limited in functionality but ConvertKit is a solid alternative. Both are easy to use but clunky to navigate, while ActiveCampaign is logical. Mailchimp is great for small businesses … Incentivized Helpful? Justin Danford Director, CX and MKTG Chose ActiveCampaign You'll be able to accomplish everything you need to with ActiveCampaign. A lot of these platforms distinguish themselves with bells and whistles. If a certain 'luxury' is important to you, then go with the platform that offers it. Generally speaking, they can all get the job … Incentivized Helpful? JH Jens Heuchemer Self employed Chose ActiveCampaign It's simply intuitive! You know what to do and what you can do by just looking at it. So it goes very fast into a natural usage where You don't need to think too long. You can execute faster and build amazing funnels, because the functions are so easy and come with a great … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign MailerLite Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign We selected Active Campaign several years ago due to its competitive cost and ability to integrate well with other software that we were using. With recent pricing changes, however, we will likely be shopping for alternatives. Incentivized Helpful? Natasha Betancourt Marketing Director Chose ActiveCampaign Klaviyo, Mailchimp and Constant Contact Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign In my opinion, not easy to use. Very limited in regards with features. I think the forms you integrate in webpages are ugly and not fully customizable. for almost the same price I have more features with ActiveCampaign. I feel more confortable using ActiveCampaign since it is … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign The level of sophistication and detail of the automations and segmentation is much higher with ActiveCampaign vs. Mailchimp resulting in much more targeted campaigns. Also, the user experience is so much more intuitive and easier to navigate with ActiveCampaign. Incentivized Helpful? Nancy Morris Owner Chose ActiveCampaign ActiveCampaign can do the simple stuff and the really complicated stuff all in one place. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign Clear winner on all fronts over most products, excluding HighLevel. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose ActiveCampaign I don't like MailerLite and Flodesk because they only offer segments, no tags. I like to add many tags to my contacts depending on the products they purchase, and this gets too cluttered when there's only segments. They also don't have clear insights on the home page of people … Incentivized Helpful? Paola Bisicchia Holistic Therapist Chose ActiveCampaign I used to use the free version of Mailchimp, but it did not allow me to construct automated email marketing campaigns the way I wanted to do it. So I decided to migrate all my list to ActiveCampaign. The migration process was easy enough. I am happy I did it. Incentivized Helpful?	Customer.io Mantra Manan Saraswat Product Manager Chose Customer.io Generous startup program plan which was one of the main drivers of us choosing it - additionally, it offers ample of features. For anyone from engineering, marketing or sales - this was super intuitive so no knowledge transfer was necessary. Incentivized Helpful? AJ Ajay Jagtap Head of Growth Marketing Chose Customer.io I have tried multiple email marketing software, including MailChimp, ConvertKit, CustomerIO, and HubSpot, but I really liked how CustomerIO solved our problem. They were all somehow solving our problem, but lacked a few things here and there. For instance, ConvertKit’s forte is … Incentivized Helpful? Sue Cho Head of Lifecycle Marketing Chose Customer.io There are so many ways to seamlessly connect all your tech together so the data stays consistent. I like their pricing model of charging per user vs data stored, like Iterable and Braze do. I also think their marketing is so good and the content they put out are actually … Incentivized Helpful? Nelu Cebotari Product designer Chose Customer.io Customer.io offers push notifications, email building process in much much better, and the workflow building is way more intuitive. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io Customer.io is easier to use and offers better bang for the buck. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io Klaviyo doesn't have all the integrated options that Customer.io has. Braze has all the same features, but have a different pricing model (pay only for users that logged in and not for everything in the account), so depending on the company's needs it might be more suitable. Incentivized Helpful? Sneha Dhakan Lifecycle Marketing Manager Chose Customer.io Pardot has a clunky, outdated interface and capabilities, making it highly challenging to work with. On the other hand, Customer.io has been the opposite and it's one of the easiest tools to work on in our entire tech stack. Incentivized Helpful? Stephen Kelly Product Manager Chose Customer.io Customer.io delivers better value for money. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io because the functonalities and how it is integrated with our Redshift database Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io Customer.io had the best suite of features and - most importantly for us - was willing to sign a BAA with us so we could maintain HIPAA compliance. Mailchimp was fine but we felt Customer.io had a cleaner interface and was easier for general marketers who aren't dedicated email … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io Customer.io has in my opinion more robust features for comms campaigns vs some of the other tools available on the market that have other focuses primarily and then have CRM tacked on. We've also found Customer.io to be more easy to integrate with the tech stack of our business … Incentivized Helpful? Jasmine Reyes Marketing Manager Chose Customer.io Customer.io is much more comprehensive and powerful. It takes some getting used to but once you understand how it works, you have a ton of control when it comes to email marketing. Incentivized Helpful? PR Padraic Ryan Community Manager Chose Customer.io I found Customer.io much easier to navigate than any of the other email platforms out there, and the pricing is MUCH better as well. Incentivized Helpful? Joel McLean Growth Product Manager Chose Customer.io Customer is much more flexible and enables a greater amount of personalization. Incentivized Helpful? Mike Koolwijk Marketing Automation & SEO Specialist Chose Customer.io Customer.io is one of the tools we use or suggest based on the situation. Customer.io is in a place between basic email marketing and marketing automation (in my opinion). And suits well with clients who wants to advance or start with marketing automation. It's easy, the price … Incentivized Helpful? Santiago Valdés Cofounder / Marketing, Growth, Technology, Experience Chose Customer.io We used Autopilot in the past. It worked well but the integration wasn't very good, considering they only used cookies. We have a very complex system right now to be able to track every customer, and it was expensive but worth it. Autopilot worked very well when we were … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Customer.io I think Customer.io is a unique product. Most of the other email marketing products you'll find are more B2B focused and don't provide a good solution for high volume emails at a low price. If you're a B2C company, I can't think of any email product I'd rather use than … Incentivized Helpful? Ted Bennett User Engagement Chose Customer.io We do still use Hubspot, but their email automation is very native and fixed within Hubspot. We needed something that was going to collect our events and integrate 2-ways with Segment in order to effectively send the campaigns we desired. There are so many events in our app … Incentivized Helpful? Sean Anderson Director of Operations Chose Customer.io Customer.io was really the first pure, full-featured drip email program on the market and as far as I know, it's still the simplest and best overall for that specific function. SendGrid has also added drip campaign features, but I would seriously evaluate Customer.io against … Incentivized Helpful?	Gist Shade Odeinde Founder Chose Gist Gist is a much more robust software with a variety of marketing tools in its arsenal. Things like website tracking is also extremely robust and it has many more features. The ease of setup is also more enjoyable and intuitive in Gist so the overall result is that you can learn … Incentivized Helpful? DI Dakotah Intriglia Co-Founder Chose Gist Gist is much more affordable, but intercom is a better product. I recommend going for Gist to begin, and then migrating if you need more. Incentivized Helpful? Deyan Kanev Digital Marketing Specialist Chose Gist Gist is more refined and its tools are very well integrated overall. However, its pricing is on the expensive side and this doesn't really help it stand-out. HubSpot has significantly more generous Free plan, while Dashly offers many of the Premium Gist tools at a fairer price, … Incentivized Helpful? Stefan Glumpler COO (Chief Operations Officer) Chose Gist Best value for money along with a great set of features. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist My main use for Gist is live chat. I personally find their live chat to be one of the best, and their mobile app to be invaluable for small businesses on the go. I can receive and response to messages wherever I am, which is imperative for my use case. Incentivized Helpful? PL Prarin Lekuthai CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Chose Gist All-in-one bundle with a good price. Incentivized Helpful? João Paulo Beluca Founder Chose Gist Intercom increases its price on a monthly basis. Besides they don't offer some features as Gist, specially about on forms. We think Gist is targeted to SMB companies, differentially from Intercom that seems to be appropriate for larger companies. One main difference between then … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist [N/A] Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist Gist is only a few years old, so it lacks some of the features of Drip and ActiveCampaign, but I believe they will get there. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist Hubspot and Salesforce are great and powerful, they are just so much more expensive than what I need. Incentivized Helpful? Jonathan Teixeira Co-Founder Chose Gist We went with Gist because it had the features we needed at a price we liked. The feature list has grown over time, which is really appreciated. We joined Gist a long time ago (it was still called ConvertFox back then) and have been happy customers for a long time. Happy with … Incentivized Helpful? Michael Storzieri CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Chose Gist Gist is much more than a basic mailing list system with chatbot integration and automation that connects you to your prospects in real-time live from your website. Administering your contacts on Gist is much easier with less hassle. And Gist can integrate with most of the major … Incentivized Helpful? Christopher Maselli Ghostwriter and Web Designer Chose Gist Gist is slightly slower than ActiveCampaign but MUCH easier to use than Mailchimp. Overall, you can't beat the bang for the buck you get with Gist. And its messenger bot is the best I've used, it works on not only our main site but also our subdomains, kicking the competition … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist We've used Dashly and Tawk.to. Gist looks better than Tawk and that's the reason we switched from Tawk to Gist. But the feature that puts Gist above Dashly is the ability to collect user names and emails before they start the chat automatically. It is important for our business … Incentivized Helpful? Austin Dwight Creaitve Director Chose Gist They both seem to have parity with each other with each having their own small advantages. I went with Gist because it was more affordable. Infusionsoft customer for almost 5 years and it seemed I was always working more on getting it to work instead of getting work done. Gist … Incentivized Helpful? Alvaro Asprilla CEO Chose Gist Gist is better because easy of use and pricing. Hands down. It has an unbeatable cost-benefit ratio. Customer service has been with us since we started using it. That's great. For us, shortcomings such as no CRM are manageable. We like its front end appearance and customization … Incentivized Helpful? DH David Harvey Director Chose Gist Gist is my first email and chat multi-purpose automated SAAS tool so can't really comment on others I've tried. They came recommended to me by an entrepreneurial group I am a member of. Anecdotally I evaluated it against ActiveCampaign and Mailchimp and it was far better in … Incentivized Helpful? AF Adrian Fernandez VP of Digital Content Chose Gist Gist costs less than Live Chat app. Incentivized Helpful? MO Michael O'Brien CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Chose Gist Gist a more integrated and unified product for Sass companies. Some competitors don't have strong chat + email automation + help desk. Other competitors have the features, but they are not well integrated. Gist has integrated complete customer contact with a very finished … Incentivized Helpful? Daniele Renda CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Chose Gist Gist is much more complete than other tools like Crisp, Customerly, etc, at a cheaper price. The perfect deal for your business. Incentivized Helpful? PR Phillip Roru Founder Chose Gist Having a support ticket system is good and will help you resolve issues but, having an all-in-one tool that can let you not only resolve an issue but also to go above and beyond with customer support that later on translates into sales is priceless. That is the kind of tool … Incentivized Helpful? Donald Chan Founder, Head of Business Chose Gist Haven't really used other apps, so no point of comparison. Incentivized Helpful? Kejda Gjermani founder Chose Gist You can do everything you can with AC or Mailchimp (minus dynamic cart recovery for ecom) at a fraction of the cost, and you can do MORE -- better integration with FB ads than MailChimp, more powerful workflows, unified inboxes, live chat and chatbot, etc. It's just a more … Incentivized Helpful? Michael Kwan Founder & CEO Chose Gist I have a lifetime deal with Gist so I may be a bit biased, but Gist is quite easy to use and has a free tier so it's worth a serious look compared to the other players on the market. Personal preference does play a big role in your final decision, as feature-wise, Gist has most … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose Gist Intercom was pricy and less user-friendly in comparison to Gist. It did have a broader range of features that we could use in our plan. However, we didn't see any return of investment in having many features to choose from if the price was too high for what was being offered at … Incentivized Helpful?

Features

ActiveCampaign

Customer.io

Gist

Email & Online Marketing

Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 8.7 Ratings 13% above category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
WYSIWYG email editor	8.50 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Dynamic content	8.30 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content	8.30 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Landing pages	7.20 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
A/B testing	8.60 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Mobile optimization	8.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting	8.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
List management	9.20 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences	10.00 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Lead Management

Comparison of Lead Management features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 8.7 Ratings 11% above category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
Lead nurturing automation	8.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Lead scoring and grading	8.40 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Data quality management	9.70 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Automated sales alerts and tasks	8.70 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Lead segmentation and distribution	8.00 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Campaign Management

Comparison of Campaign Management features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 9.6 Ratings 26% above category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
Calendaring	9.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Event/webinar marketing	9.30 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Social Media Marketing

Comparison of Social Media Marketing features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 6.8 Ratings 8% below category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
Social sharing and campaigns	7.20 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Social profile integration	6.50 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Reporting & Analytics

Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 8.2 Ratings 11% above category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
Dashboards	8.30 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Standard reports	8.10 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Custom reports	8.10 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Platform & Infrastructure

Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign 9.0 Ratings 19% above category average	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist - Ratings
API	8.60 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Role-based workflow & approvals	8.50 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Customizability	7.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Integration with Salesforce.com	9.10 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM	9.90 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Integration with SugarCRM	9.60 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Third-party software integrations	9.00 Ratings	00 Ratings	00 Ratings

Chat Analytics and Reports

Comparison of Chat Analytics and Reports features of Product A and Product B
	ActiveCampaign - Ratings	Customer.io - Ratings	Gist 8.9 Ratings 2% above category average
Chat history and transcripts	00 Ratings	00 Ratings	8.90 Ratings
Chat reporting	00 Ratings	00 Ratings	8.90 Ratings
Chat and web analytics	00 Ratings	00 Ratings	8.90 Ratings

Best Alternatives
	ActiveCampaign	Customer.io	Gist
Small Businesses	Vbout Score 9.9 out of 10	Simplify360 Score 7.8 out of 10	Olark Score 10.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies	PFL Direct Mail Platform Score 9.0 out of 10	Dialpad Support Score 9.1 out of 10	Genesys DX (discontinued) Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises	PFL Direct Mail Platform Score 9.0 out of 10	Verint Community Score 10.0 out of 10	Genesys DX (discontinued) Score 10.0 out of 10
All Alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives

User Ratings
	ActiveCampaign	Customer.io	Gist
Likelihood to Recommend	8.9 (0 ratings)	9.1 (0 ratings)	9.5 (0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew	9.0 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	8.2 (0 ratings)
Usability	9.3 (0 ratings)	9.2 (0 ratings)	6.7 (0 ratings)
Availability	9.1 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Performance	7.3 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Support Rating	1.3 (0 ratings)	10.0 (0 ratings)	8.6 (0 ratings)
In-Person Training	9.1 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Online Training	7.3 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Implementation Rating	8.5 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Configurability	6.4 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Ease of integration	9.1 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Product Scalability	1.0 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale	6.4 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale	7.3 (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)	- (0 ratings)

User Testimonials
	ActiveCampaign	Customer.io	Gist
Likelihood to Recommend	I've been using ActiveCampaign since around 2018-2019 and I've always been satisfied with the software. It's simple to use, connects with the other tools I use and makes it easy for me to duplicate automations, email templates and workflows as I need to. On top of that, any time I've had an issue (which I think is around twice in the past 5/6 years), the customer service has always been super helpful and my issue has been resolved quickly. Incentivized RH Rebecca Hawkes Confidence Coach & Content Creator Read full review	This tool is well-suited for companies looking to run email marketing campaigns or send out newsletters regularly to their users/customers. The workflow setup is especially useful for companies who want to send specific emails based on user behavior - i.e. they've not logged in recently, have bought a specific product, haven't opened any emails, etc. This could also be useful for freelancers like me since you can create different workspaces within Customer.io. I have configured it this way to handle email marketing for a few of my clients, and the software keeps everything organized and separate. This might not be the best tool for small businesses, considering the price. It may be better to start out with a cheaper email marketing tool, and then if/when necessary, scale-up with a tool like Customer.io. Jasmine Reyes Marketing Manager Read full review	Gist is perfect for SaaS I'd say, and perfect for long sales cycles with lots of lead nurturing involved, and for scenarios where you re-market via FB ads, because there's FB custom audience integration built into the workflows. Perfect for customer service and support. Really outstanding there. It's a little less suited to ecom but they're hammering out the finishing touches to make ecom cart recovery easier. Incentivized Kejda Gjermani founder Read full review
Pros	The graphic design is very good, especially fonts, colours and templates Flexibility of design and functionality Takes a little while to learn it, but generally user-friendly Looks very professional but doesn't cost much to get started There are masses of integrations for ActiveCampaign, and the ones I tried all worked well and didn't take long to figure out. Incentivized SA Sabrina Allison Managing Director Read full review	Ease of use, a good tool for non programmers, or not so tech savvy people. Great support, willing to help a lot, by chat, calls, or screen sharing. Fast updates, it's a newer tool, but they are coming with fixes and updates fast. Incentivized Mike Koolwijk Marketing Automation & SEO Specialist Read full review	Gist provides endless ways of interacting with customers. I can chat and email with them, track their usage on my site, qualify them, add tags and other profile information, and so much more. There is even an awesome live view that lets me spy on visitors to see how they're using the site. The tools are powerful, easy to use, and constantly getting improvements. It seems like every week there is another update being rolled out that substantially extends the functionality or usability of the features in Gist. Tristin Roney Multipurpose Utility Tool Read full review
Cons	The email designing part could be easier to use. There are certain simple shortcuts that don't work, for example, adding links is more complicated than it should be, moving blocks around is hard, etc. There's no good way to filter by 'active' and 'inactive' subscribers when editing en-mass. I'd like more reporting data on one page. Incentivized Ellie Busby Nutritional Therapist Read full review	Customer.io needs to be more known! I don't know why they don't come up as a direct competitor to Iterable and Braze. Their new Design Studio drag + drop tool could be improved with further customization. Reports aren't the strongest - I use Amplitude to do all my Customer.io reporting. Incentivized Sue Cho Head of Lifecycle Marketing Read full review	Free plan limits are too low. Chatbots should work not only for Gist's native online chat, but also for the other chat-based channels such as Facebook. (instead of having to use another software for that purpose) Pricing structure - Support bot should not be an add-on but a core feature. Incentivized Deyan Kanev Digital Marketing Specialist Read full review
Likelihood to Renew	I am committed at the moment. Rebuilding the automations I have would be a huge time drain. Plus the cost of learning a new system and the risk to deliverability of porting a 6,000 person list to a new platform. Also, AC offers everything I need ast a reasonable (but a little high) price. So, why not a 10? Because, early 2023, AC dropped a massive 2x price hike on long-term customers. They knew few would shift, so this feels like a cynical cash grab and left a bad taste, If they do something like this again, this camel will have a broken back. Incentivized Mike Clayton Owner Read full review	No answers on this topic	Gist is a quite reliable service with a lot of added values. We don't need to pay for different Saas for these important features. If I had an issue the team was super responsive and helpful, that is essential for every business. The email delivery is great, so virtually no email has landed into spam folder Incentivized Laszlo Csukas Co Founder & UX designer Read full review
Usability	ActiveCampaign has been the easiest marketing automation software we have ever used. They provide tips throughout the entire process of anything you are building. Their support team through LIVE CHAT has been extremely fast and helpful. The monthly meetings provided with the enablement team has helped us through several large and urgent needs. Matt Dickerson President of Catalyst Movies Read full review	Super intuitive and easy interface to start off with. There are not a lot of guides and the documentation is helpful but not super extensive, but even if you're a little technical, you can easily figure most of the things out by yourself. Everything is super easy to start with and the platform does not overwhelm you with a lot of options, or data. Incentivized Mantra Manan Saraswat Product Manager Read full review	Gist does pretty much anything you want it to when it comes to managing your contacts. Sometimes I wish it updated faster, but wait a few beats and it gets there. I really love that I can show a colleague how to use the chat messenger and they understand it right away. Very user friendly! Incentivized Christopher Maselli Ghostwriter and Web Designer Read full review
Reliability and Availability	I haven't experienced application errors or unplanned outages at all. Active Campaign is ultra reliable and I would not be using them if that were the case. Also, the helpful emails they send are welcomed and informative, and present very practical tips and guidance for using the platform. They're always demonstrating new features and I'm thankful for that. Incentivized Michelle Hill Book & Publishing Consultant Read full review	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
Performance	Oh my gosh, Active Campaign's performance gets an A+++ in my book. The pages load quickly and so do the reports. I haven't noticed any slowdowns when it's integrating with other programs and it performs excellently on all levels. Incentivized Michelle Hill Book & Publishing Consultant Read full review	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
Support Rating	This might be the best part. The chat support lady offered to make a video to help me solve my problem. I worked in customer service for years and I've never done that, lol. So, if they're offering things like that, I can only imagine that they'd be able to handle most any issue you throw at them. Incentivized CJ Chesare Johnson Producer/Audio Engineer Read full review	My experience with their support team has always been great. Very quick to respond, have an online chat, and are very helpful. They helped me resolve any issues I've had every time in a professional and knowledgeable manner. We've now switched to another tool, and I can't even compare the service level we get there to customer.io Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	I have communicated with their team multiple times and every time they have been very responsive, knowledgeable, and polite. They work to make sure you are happy and informed of what is going on. Better their team keeps up to date with their app, giving you new features, and keeping you notified and educated about what they are and how to use them. A+ Dustin Day Director of UX development, social media and SEO/SEM Read full review
Implementation Rating	Very satisfied with our implementation in our professional medical practice, allowing us to be on top of client service, and not miss out on crucial information and insights. Marketing is often neglected in professional practices and ActiveCampaign solved this problem with aplomb. Incentivized William Ainslie Practice Owner & Founder Read full review	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered	I transitioned from Mailchimp to ActiveCampaign because it was so much more user friendly and allowed me to do a lot more in regards to lead magnets than Mailchimp can. For example, ActiveCampaign allows users to sign up for a lead magnet as many times as they like to keep receiving it (in case they've lost or deleted the email with access to the lead magnet). Mailchimp was unable to do this. And the categorization of users and the trigger email sequencing was a lot easier in ActiveCampaign. Incentivized SP Sarah Patterson CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Read full review	I have tried multiple email marketing software, including MailChimp, ConvertKit, CustomerIO, and HubSpot, but I really liked how CustomerIO solved our problem. They were all somehow solving our problem, but lacked a few things here and there. For instance, ConvertKit’s forte is newsletter emails and landing pages that it creates for you. It wasn’t a desiccated email software company. HubSpot was good, but with CustomerIO’s recent AI updates, I like it much better. Plus, support is impeccable. Incentivized AJ Ajay Jagtap Head of Growth Marketing Read full review	They both seem to have parity with each other with each having their own small advantages. I went with Gist because it was more affordable. Infusionsoft customer for almost 5 years and it seemed I was always working more on getting it to work instead of getting work done. Gist is so intuitive I had it setting up and running the basics in a few hours. Incentivized Austin Dwight Creaitve Director Read full review
Scalability	My web designer told me about Active Campaign and although I don't recall which platform I had before, I LOVE Active Campaign and its user friendliness. The transition was seamless and I've never had a problem with functionality or server failure. Active Campaign provides so many features, and makes it easy for non-techies to maneuver around the site with ease. They capture information and put it in an easy-to-read format. At this point, I don't think I'd ever use any other platform! Incentivized Michelle Hill Book & Publishing Consultant Read full review	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
Return on Investment	Automations free up time - once set up, email campaigns execute in seconds Emailing my newsletter is a second touch-point for my clients The flat rate for my subscription means that I reach my clients and prospects for fractions of a cent each month Incentivized Joseph Arroyo Owner Read full review	Positive impact on the sales side. I'm not sure about the specific ROI (you have to include the designer and the time it takes to set up) but you certainly get back the investment in a few months, once you are able to scale your email marketing. Customer experience is way better by having more segmented, contextual and accurate messages sent to them. Integration is costly and it will take several days or weeks to be fully achieved. Expect to invest some money on this. Incentivized Santiago Valdés Cofounder / Marketing, Growth, Technology, Experience Read full review	Our ROI has increased significantly because of Gist's chat and app integration into our website. Contact forms are great but a real-time conversation means you can be more effective in meeting your customer's needs. The additional features in the recent upgrade mean we can use Gist for more. They have always been effective for email campaigns, but the addition of the knowledge base and more effective workflows means we can automate more. This has saved us from buying more software. PH Paul Hancock Founder Read full review
ScreenShots	ActiveCampaign Screenshots	Customer.io Screenshots	Gist Screenshots