Adobe Business Catalyst (Discontinued) vs Mailchimp

• Probably one of the easiest e-commerce platforms to work in, it does take setup, but compared to a lot of other e-commerce solutions, this is probably the best one that I have seen that can be designed and implemented custom.
• Their template system works very well and allows you to create and re-use templates across Adobe Business Catalyst.
• Their pre-built modules are great, giving people a great way to use common web elements without having to use a plug-in or find some solution, it is simply built in and generally works exactly as you would expect.
• Adobe Business Catalyst is more of an all-around solution, providing elements that most smaller companies would have a hard time figuring out, since it includes the ability to build websites, send and track e-mails, analytics. It really is a powerful tool that would typically require a fair amount of coding knowledge and expertise but with the system already built, it can be easily modified and edited by those with limited or no coding knowledge at all.

Read full review

• Easy to use and updates to application have been very customer focused.
• Love the amount of services you receive from them at absolutely no cost to you. You can add up to 2,000 subscribers for free.
• Compatibility with our CRM and Hubspot which enables us to target our email marketing efforts.
• Great customer service. Any time issues arose or questions needed to be addressed, their customer service team was very responsive and helpful.
• Outstanding email analytics which allows us to measure many metrics for our email marketing campaign.

Read full review

• Multi Client Management: The dashboard for managing multiple clients as a reseller is a little difficult to get to. There is also no very easy way for me to manage multiple clients at once. I have to log into and out of individual client accounts to do billing or management.
• Lack of Server support: There are certain server protocols and languages that are not supported using BC. For example I cannot build a custom php database and upload to BC. I am required to use their tools.

Read full review

• Phone support. While the chat function is extremely effective, it can be helpful with certain questions to speak with someone over the phone.
• I'd like the ability to unsubscribe someone to all campaigns. Currently, if someone unsubscribes to a campaign, they will never receive that exact campaign again. But if their email address is on multiple lists or gets added on another list by someone who is unaware that they unsubscribed, that person will receive another email. Many recipients have been angered by this, telling me that the unsubscribed - which they did - but I have to explain that the process is not universal, and sometimes we forget to include the "exclude" list.
• The payment structure goes by the number of email addresses that are stored on Mailchimp, so to stay below a certain billing threshold, I have to periodically delete lists of stored email addresses. This gets to be cumbersome because I regularly need to delete and re-upload many of the same lists of people.

Read full review

• As someone who uses it on behalf of other clients, our ROI with BC is definitely positive. We needed a mid-range CMS without huge licensing costs to satisfy mid-range clients who have some dynamic needs but doesn't need the expense or liability of enterprise level products. Without it we would have lost possible customers or taken bigger hits on projects because of the costs involved with satisfying their mid-level needs
• Our clients are all usually very positive about the BC platform and are able to use it themselves which lessens our Support time/cost.
• To use the Web App element,. which we do on almost every site, you need to pay for the highest plan. This brings along with it many features most of our clients would never use. A more basic plan with that Web App capability would be a big improvement on our costs.

Read full review

• Its affordability keeps campaign expenditures low. For the first year of the campaign, we were able to utilize the free service which saved us about $400 on administrative costs. We have just recently upgraded to a payment plan.
• The ease of using saved templates cuts down on staff time, and even if we decide to use a new template, customizing a template is pretty simple.
• We have been able to raise $5,000+ from our email campaigns, and that was during the time when we weren't paying for the service.

Read full review