Customer.io vs. Klaviyo

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
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.
$100
per month
Klaviyo
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Klaviyo is a marketing automation platform that helps businesses to centralize and use every piece of their customer data. With Klaviyo, businesses can combine customer data with more than 350 native integrations to automate personalized email and SMS communications that make customers feel seen. From mom-and-pop shops to established companies, Klaviyo states businesses like Dermalogica, Living Proof, Solo Stove, Citizen Watches, and more than 143,000 other paying users leverage their platform…
$20
per month
Pricing
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional DetailsEssentials: 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.Paid plans start at $20/month and include: 251 - 500 contacts 5,000 monthly email sends 150 SMS/MMS sending credits Applicable SMS carrier fees Mobile push notifications (free beta) Email and chat support Additional contacts, email and text sending credits, and service plans available to meet the needs of any size business. View all of our pricing and estimate your total cost of ownership at klaviyo.com/pricing
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Considered Both Products
Customer.io
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.
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 …
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.
Klaviyo

No answer on this topic

Features
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Email & Online Marketing
Comparison of Email & Online Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Customer.io
-
Ratings
Klaviyo
8.3
128 Ratings
8% above category average
WYSIWYG email editor00 Ratings8.2114 Ratings
Dynamic content00 Ratings8.1120 Ratings
Ability to test dynamic content00 Ratings7.7112 Ratings
Landing pages00 Ratings8.02 Ratings
A/B testing00 Ratings8.1115 Ratings
Mobile optimization00 Ratings8.5123 Ratings
Email deliverability reporting00 Ratings8.6126 Ratings
List management00 Ratings8.5126 Ratings
Triggered drip sequences00 Ratings8.7112 Ratings
Lead Management
Comparison of Lead Management features of Product A and Product B
Customer.io
-
Ratings
Klaviyo
7.5
97 Ratings
4% below category average
Lead nurturing automation00 Ratings8.193 Ratings
Lead scoring and grading00 Ratings6.945 Ratings
Data quality management00 Ratings7.954 Ratings
Automated sales alerts and tasks00 Ratings7.147 Ratings
Campaign Management
Comparison of Campaign Management features of Product A and Product B
Customer.io
-
Ratings
Klaviyo
8.2
42 Ratings
10% above category average
Calendaring00 Ratings8.242 Ratings
Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Customer.io
-
Ratings
Klaviyo
7.7
123 Ratings
5% above category average
Dashboards00 Ratings8.1123 Ratings
Standard reports00 Ratings7.6119 Ratings
Custom reports00 Ratings7.479 Ratings
Platform & Infrastructure
Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
Customer.io
-
Ratings
Klaviyo
8.1
101 Ratings
8% above category average
API00 Ratings8.294 Ratings
Role-based workflow & approvals00 Ratings8.249 Ratings
Customizability00 Ratings7.368 Ratings
Integration with Salesforce.com00 Ratings8.418 Ratings
Third-party software integrations00 Ratings8.344 Ratings
User Ratings
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Likelihood to Recommend
9.1
(20 ratings)
8.3
(128 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.5
(4 ratings)
Usability
9.2
(12 ratings)
8.0
(3 ratings)
Support Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Customer.ioKlaviyo
Likelihood to Recommend
Customer.io
Talking from the perspective of a marketer at a SaaS with average. 50K email subscribers, Customer IO has been an excellent tool for us. Our requirements include sending users newsletters, marketing emails, and transactional emails, running lead-nurturing campaigns, and more. For a comprehensive use case like ours, CustomerIO is great. While it also has a learning curve, when you have such requirements, it’s worth it. I don’t think CustomerIO is the best fit if you have basic requirements like only weekly newsletter emails.
Read full review
Klaviyo
Klaviyo is a must-have email marketing platform for any company using Shopify for their e-commerce websites. The best use case scenario is if all your purchases are coming from Shopify site and/or Shopify POS. However, if you use hybrid sales (e-commerce + sales reps), then Klaviyo can be leveraged only for your e-commerce customer segment. There is a workaround where you can manually upload the list of your offline customers to have a less personalized campaigns for them, and having ultra-personalized campaigns running for your e-comm segment. But note that this method will require governance from a team member who understands compliance and data architecture as it will require regular database clean up and understanding how exclusions work.
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Pros
Customer.io
  • Managing users, attributes and events. You are easily able to modify any user, based on their ID, and add or remove attributes, assign events to them. That makes it very easy to segment later and to assign them to several campaigns based on behavior. Just a warning: this integration isn't so easy (at least it wasn't for us).
  • Creating workflows of campaigns is very easy. You can quickly create behavioral campaigns based on attributes, segments and add elements to the workflow. You can send an email, then wait, then send another, then exit the campaign if they converted, etc. The workflow is easy to configure and very powerful for automation.
  • We don't use many email templates (we make them in MJML) but it's very easy to add senders, to change templates and in general to test designs.
  • Deliverability works very well, at least for us. It sends emails pretty fast and without issues.
  • Exporting is very quick and easy. Importing wasn't a feature until recently, but it works well too.
  • Seeing activity it's also useful. In general, logs are awesome (be it of a customer, of activity on the site, email sends, etc.).
  • We don't use environments, but it might be very useful for a bigger company.
Read full review
Klaviyo
  • Very easy to setup Klaviyo with Bigcommerce for email & SMS capture, comes with templates that are simple to edit and publish.
  • Very easy to set up Klaviyo with other 3rd party apps like Yotpo Reviews and Loyalty, giving you easy access to send emails based on loyalty points or asking for a review.
  • Automated campaigns are a breeze! They come with preset templates to get started quick. Including a Welcome Series, Cart Abandonment Series, Lost Customer Series, and Browse Abandonment Series among others.
  • The platform is easy to navigate and use without having to spend time learning from videos or help files, we were able to just jump right in and use it.
  • Great features like targeting based on anything available in your data, including products purchased, loyalty standing, interactions, etc.
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Cons
Customer.io
  • Price is quite expensive for Premium or once you get into high volumes of contacts.
  • Depending on how you'll use it, it may require some help from developers to set up.
  • Despite the support being great, you have to email them, there's not chat feature.
Read full review
Klaviyo
  • At times the platform isn't as intuitive as you would like. Take the time to be onboarded and play around in the platform to get the hang of things. Utilize Klaviyo's resources and attend their live training sessions to help navigate the platform and implement best practices they recommend.
  • Can be pricey depending on company and email list.
  • Customization is limited at times. The brand font we utilized on all branded content wasn't available through Klaviyo. Previously we would have to go through the back end to implement our branded font, import our font, or create content on another platform to utilize our font.
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Likelihood to Renew
Customer.io
No answers on this topic
Klaviyo
Klaviyo is simply a great solution for e-com email marketing & customer relationship management:
  1. User journey visibility: We can see our clients' customers on their individual user journeys (open email, site visits) to better understand and accommodate your customers.
  2. Flow automation: Creating automated emails that follow up with new leads, those who abandoned carts, purchased.
  3. Email design: So easy to use, and more friendly than some other visual builders that we've used.
  4. Metrics visibility: We can see our clients' metrics very easily and adjust efforts accordingly.
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Usability
Customer.io
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.
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Klaviyo
The only reason why I did not give it a 10/10 is that it cannot distinguish purchases that came through subscription recharges instead of purchases that were driven directly by email sends. Other than that, the automation qualities, design features, and segmentation options make this an incredible email platform, and I am very happy with it
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Support Rating
Customer.io
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
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Klaviyo
Their support is always quick and we have recurring meetings with our advisor. they were great when we first started at walking us through the platform and helping us understand how to do the overall setup. They also have a wide variety of articles that cover must issues in a very clear manner that will get you out of a predicament really fast.
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Implementation Rating
Customer.io
No answers on this topic
Klaviyo
Don't cut corners, do it right the first time, if you take your time to build everything the way you want it then it will run itself. The platform will help you increase revenue as long as you use the tools it provides. Don't be scared to ask questions, the support team will help you get to the next level
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Alternatives Considered
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 any other drip email provider because they really have all the key elements you need to make it work.
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Klaviyo
Klaviyo is leaps and bounds above Mailchimp. We just switched from MailChimp because we outgrew it. That is actually my recommended path to take while starting out. MailChimp had a free plan up to 5000 emails. Once we hit that, we switched and got an email marketing team and grew from there.
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Return on Investment
Customer.io
  • 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.
Read full review
Klaviyo
  • Newsletter marketing has become a major form of sales
  • The success we had in our first year forced us to shift priorities and add more resources to support newsletter marketing
  • The price for using the service is a drop in the bucket compared to the attributed revenue earned from using the service
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ScreenShots

Customer.io Screenshots

Screenshot of data-driven or manual segments that can be created in the no-code builder for recipient lists, campaign triggers, filters, and conversion goals.Screenshot of the code editor for email, that helps navigate code and iterate.Screenshot of account performance, visible at a glance from the Dashboard view.Screenshot of drag and drop messages, time delays, and branches where desired, to build cross-channel campaigns.Screenshot of triggered campaigns based on forms submissions, customer attributes, customer actions, and dates.Screenshot of localization for global audiences. One message can be delivered in multiple languages.

Klaviyo Screenshots

Screenshot of Web forms to grow contact listsScreenshot of Personalized recommendations that resonateScreenshot of Smarter targeting. Deeper personalization.Screenshot of Display of how performance stacks up against peers