Likelihood to Recommend Lyris LM is suited well with an organization or group that have several lists, as virtual list hosting is not represented by any other hosting company as far as I can tell.
Read full review I think CheetahMail, being one of the main ESPs in the market, is a quality choice. However, I would suggest that it's really only valuable for a bit larger of an organization, generally having staff of 100+ and revenues in tens of millions -- this is mainly to justify the amount of investment required, so may be cost-prohibitive to some. You also need to make sure that you understand the entire "level of support" you will gain through your specific contract.... the key is understanding what types of resources are within your organization (who's doing the coding? who comes up with the next campaign? What's the overall strategy?) Depending on these questions and resources, may help determine your final needs from a services point of view. CheetahMail can provide a wealth of various services specific to needs (and changes over time as your business changes), but a clear understanding of what you have before you bring them on will really help getting up and running quickly. Also be sure to truly understand the costs for the initial integrations, setups, IP senders, etc.
Read full review Pros Reports: extensive reporting on mailings and membership. Pre-built reports/charts include Mailings, Members, Server Performance, Web site, Purchases, Interest and Surveys. If Aurea ListManager doesn't have the built-in chart needed, you can easily create your own. Easy to analyze mailings: Completed mailing can be analyzed quickly. Options include viewing any errors that may have resulted, and checking list performance, evaluating recipient actions, ( opens, click-troughs). Details can be seen on a per-recipient basis, allowing you to see exactly what happened with each message sent. Discussion Lists. There are numerous list setting to customize each list. Read full review Internal management - This is a great web-based tool that allows our users to see what emails go to whom. Organization - Many layers of organization for templates since there are many types of remarketing emails that we send out. Historical Records - CheetahMail sends us the raw text files of all email actions so we can upload them to our database. Read full review Cons Tech support is limited for standard users, especially during non business hours even for critical errors Installation/upgrade is often complicated Version releases are too frequent Read full review The organization of CheetahMail could at times be better, as you create more and more mailings, they just pile up in a long list. It would be useful to be able to create folders to store specific mailings in. (ex. editorial, newsletters, marketing, etc.) Read full review Likelihood to Renew We will most likely not use Lyris LM for much longer. We have recently been offered to utilize a different software that better meets our needs, is current, user friendly, and has fantastic reporting capabilities.
Read full review As I have begun exploring competitors, I've come to realize that every competitor offers so much more functionality and integration than CheetahMail does. When we first signed our contract, CheetahMail was much more innovative and at the forefront of email. Since being bought out by Experian, we've seen a huge decline in service and innovation. They have laid off much of their staff and moved their account representatives to Costa Rica. They also heavily rely on on third parties which you will have to pay large amounts of money for while other Email Service Providers have integrated new technologies into their platform. You will get more for your money going to a different email service such as Responsys, Silverpop, Listrak and the like,
Read full review Usability CheetahMail has a high learning curve to master and requires a lot of backend work with tech teams to set up. Navigation is not the best and everything that should be automated is still extremely manual.
Read full review Support Rating I have not needed to utilize customer support during my use of Lyris LM.
Read full review Account reps have a quick response time but a very slow resolution time. Because account reps do not have technical knowledge, there is a long long lead time between flagging a problem and tech team resolution.
Read full review Implementation Rating I was not part of the implementation process.
Read full review Alternatives Considered We selected Lyris LM based on cost, the fact that we can create custom reports and the way that they handle bounced emails just to name a few, It is easy to use and we have control of who can and cannot use. With a virtual list I can create a list or take a list down at any given time without filling out a form or contact with my provider and my list looks as if it is coming from my own server @museum.com.
Read full review CheetahMail is very far behind these other providers. Specifically in Lyris we could build forms that automatically generated code connected to specific lists and be up and running in less than a few hours. With CheetahMail that would take days and developers at times.
Read full review Return on Investment Aurea as a company is mediocre with support. The former LM staff was better informed about the product. LM can do almost anything you need. it's complete. ROI has suffered as Aurea has not updated the product, charges a considerable amount for renewals, promises with no results. Read full review The customer service team at CheetahMail was good and efficient. It is always a frustrating experience to call in when your stuck on something but the CS team did a good job of quickly and effectively helping us when we called them for support. Compared to other ESPs that our employees support, this platform was quite easy to learn and the documentation provided often helped us figure things out without having to go and call CS. Read full review ScreenShots