Constant Contact vs. Smartlead.ai

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

Smartlead is well suited in many aspects. Thats why we are working on it from past 3-years or so. Running email campaigns can be a challenge because other bulk email providers do support sending email but the accuracy of landing in the inbox no one guarantee. I have used it and based on the experience I am using Smartlead. I have used mailshake, apollo, instantly, salesloft etc. none has given such results compared to Smartlead. When it comes to less appropriate: Smartlead is for sending bulk email, one cannot maintain records on the same. I have to delete the campaigns because it will pile up in the home screen once completed. Also Auto-tagging feature should be there based on the response received from prospect. If we use it as CRM, there are chances it can fail. Since it provides unanimous master inbox- I can not respond to my prospect from the dashboard because other colleagues might see my response. This is a security concern.

Incentivized

• 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.

• Slick API integration with both our waterfall and CRM
• Quick email verification tool
• Handles high volume sending with ease

Incentivized

• 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

• Context based output.
• Layout and image generation.
• Multiple language support.
• Multiple format support.

Incentivized

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.

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's a good tool and you can figure out your way around it, but overall visibility from a bird's eye view could be better. Oftentimes you have to open up multiple tabs to see different client views

Incentivized

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

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

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.

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

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.

I have used all above platform in my career. Instantly is the nearest one which can compete. relying on Apollo was my biggest mistake over the years in my previous org. Apollo does not give clear picture whether the email is bounced what the health score of my domain. I kept on using the same mailbox and my emails kept on landing in spam. I couldn't understand the reason behind my poor performance until I used Smartlead. All other tools gives fake health score, no AI suggestion on setting up campaigns. Here Smartlead outstand with other tools.

Incentivized

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

• 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

• Negligible return
• Open rates and response rates run below 10%
• Best for single channel buziness development

Incentivized