Constant Contact vs. CrowdCompass vs. Swift Digital

Constant Contact is an excellent tool for sending out flyers and newsletters. However, I feel the content's appearance is typically all the same. When I receive an email from Constant Contact, I can immediately identify it - the templates usually all look the same. When sending out communications with images, it is easy to use Constant Contact and link webpages. However, the email layout is always vertical and can get very lengthy. I prefer a more flip-book approach with options to flip the page.

Incentivized

CrowdCompass was the best part of Cvent each time I used it, from the ease of use to the customer service and handholding. I would recommend it for anyone using Cvent Event Management for an in-person event. I know Cvent just rolled out their virtual event hub though, so for virtual and hybrid events that are employing the Cvent family of tools, I would probably say CrowdCompass is unnecessary.

Incentivized

it's well suited to a business that relies on constant email marketing and to keep in contact with leads or customers. This is the heartbeat of business and suits us. We can segment qualified leads, data scores, track campaigns and effectively save time to work on other customer campaigns. If you are a smaller business that only sends one email a month, it's not for you. This software is very sophisticated and can be technical in the beginning.

• Market segmentation is great: my main segmentation is by region because that's how our sales team is divided.
• Lists: making customized email lists is easy and intuitive; the custom fields allow some flexibility in case our fields don't exactly line up with Constant Contact's.
• Campaigns: creating campaigns is quick and simple. I especially appreciate the 'resend to non-openers' option. I am constantly using this feature.
• Subject line generator: I like using the recommended subject lines. I'm able to plug in their recommended ideas, or sometimes, this feature helps me generate my own ideas.

• Provides attendees with their personalized schedules at their fingertips.
• Facilitates networking through the ability to set appointments and send messages with other attendees, and inspires competition with The Game and Click challenges.
• Gives attendees the ability to view handouts, take notes and download the information to their personal computers when they get back to their offices.

Incentivized

• drag-and-drop campaign builder
• email templates
• lead scoring
• Analytics

• It would be nice if we had more customizable options for emails - like moving around pictures and text boxes, rather than a set spot for everything to go.
• I would like it if multiple people could work on a document at one time. So if I'm in charge of graphics, I can get those updated while someone else is entering content, etc.

Incentivized

• Last year, the gamification did not allow much customization, which was a shame. I hope that by the time I am ready to build my 2020 app, this function has been expanded
• The app to upload/edit push notifications was only available on iPhone so I had to have another team member handle that seems I have an android phone.
• Emails (invites, etc.) often go to junk.

Incentivized

• More email flexibility would be good.
• Simplify the modules-there is a lot, and it can be overwhelming.

There is no doubt that we are going to renew Constant Contact. We have not just invested a lot of time in learning and creating a great looking product but we have developed a strong database of information that allows us to track how we are doing for each newsletter. This supports our goals of creating products that residents desire and are excited to receive.

We have been using CrowdCompass for 3 years and it has all of the capabilities and functionality that we need, it's easy to use, and Cvent is always implementing new features and enhancements to keep up with the latest trends and technology.

Incentivized

There is always room for improvement. I don't know how they test their systems, but they should invite not-so computer savvy people to test it. If I, as an expert have problems, they need to think like the technophobe. Since I've used Constant Contact in the past as part of my former employment, I have not viewed any of the tutorials and just jumped in to work on my client's newsletter. With that said, I found some areas easy and some a bit cumbersome

It is very easy to use as everything is very intuitive. Configurating an app does not take too much time at the end, especially as soon as you already have done one as you can dupplicate the entire content. This is very practical when you use the app for annual events. Also few elements are not updatable once the app is published. Of course you can't change the entire design and the security settings which is a good thing anyway, but the entire content can be updated which allows you to publish your app quite early in advance to boost the engagement without having to wait to have everything in your hands (for instance the speakers bios or abstracts). Plus by adding more content regularly it encourage your audience to come back also regularly to check what is going on before the event.

Incentivized

No major problems in sending out the email campaigns and accessing the analytics

Incentivized

Have not had any issues with availability

Incentivized

The system seemed quite slow sometimes. Specifically, there was sometimes a delay in sends if it was during a high traffic period. There were time-outs when uploading new code for an email, and a lag in reporting analytics which was sometimes as long as 72 hours

Have had no issues

Incentivized

I think the overall support for Constant Contact has always been incredible; I have nothing negative to say. Our customer support representative was attentive, easy to understand, and very knowledgeable. I never felt like I wasn't a priority of his and my issues, while very small, were fixed in a very short time frame.

Once we paid for our apps, I felt like I was left to learn on my own. There are plenty of Help articles available, but no training sessions. I'm a visual learner and having to poke around and use trial and error to build the apps took way too much valuable time away from other parts of my job. It was frustrating and I brought it up with my CrowdCompass contact, but was told that they don't provide any training sessions and if I had questions I should refer to the Help articles or call support.

Incentivized

Our training team walked us through the first set up which really helped me to learn where everything is located as well as all of the features available

Incentivized

Implementation is very easy for someone who wants to send out the “batch and blast” type newsletters. If you want to use their templates with no customizations, the product works fine. However, the more customizations you get into involving link color, etc, that’s where things can get tricky for someone who may not be familiar with coding

Don't wait to register with Apple and Google. You can do a lot of prep work prior to setting up CrowdCompass for integration.

Incentivized

Constant Contact is much more intuitive for people who are not tech-savvy. Also, while sendgrid offered more options in it's drag and drop interface, it displayed differently across different email clients, which made it very cumbersome to use. It also took much longer to upload contact lists and it was harder to manage existing contacts. Performance in sendgrid was much slower as well, and the Preview feature was quite buggy. Our team initially chose sendgrid because of the integration options that it's API offered, but we ultimately switched to Constant Contact because it was much easier to build campaigns and better suited our requirements.

Easier to use interface that directly links with our Cvent registration system. We switched due to this integration, the gamification improvements, the benefits for on-site check-in and session selections, and ease of design/use for our builder team. We have especially enjoyed the New Attendee experience over the look/interface of our previous apps

Incentivized

We looked into Swift based upon a recommendation. We have previously used ActiveCampaign but found it very clunky for what we wanted to use it for. We also looked into Pardot, but was on the other end of the spectrum, it had far too many features, complexities and required an implementation specialist at our expense of $15K. Swift was just the right fit for us, and we like knowing that our data is kept in Australia

Very reliable in sending email campaigns and controlling the recipients so that no contact is sent the same email more than once, even if they are on a resent list

Incentivized

works great no matter what type of program or how many people attending

Incentivized

• I have had nothing but positive impacts from using Constant Contact.
• The church is large, and there are many subgroups and axillary groups within the church. Setting up specific groups based on responsibility, interest, member goals, and service needs allows me to send information quickly, saving valuable time for other tasks.
• Constant Contact allows leadership to stay personally engaged with the members I work with, without over-taxing my time. It feels so seamless.

Incentivized

• Positive - CrowdCompass has allowed us to eliminate paper programs thus saving thousands of dollars in printing and labor
• Positive - the ability to send push notifications when there is a change to the schedule is something a paper program could never do
• Positive - adoption rates have been so high we are looking into using the program for more and more events

• Better lead quality
• Has allowed us to close clients quicker.
• Higher ROI
• Access to much more targeted customer data
• Getting used to the software took more time thn anticipated