Item: Elastic Email
Rating: 10
Author: Drew Harrison

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I've configured Elastic Email to work with my software licensing server. All transactional emails—from confirmation emails for trial sign-ups to license and download/access information emails after purchase—go through Elastic Email's service around the clock. It's a reliable service that helps maintain peace of mind when it comes to knowing and ensuring customers quickly receive the information they need after purchasing or opting in.

Pros and Cons

High Deliverability Rate Across Most Email Providers
Generous Free Plan for Those Just Getting Started
Fair, Competitive Pricing & Plans/Limits

Have Trouble With Outlook and Hotmail Delivery (might be fixed with private IPs)

Return on Investment

I can't speak to specific ROI numbers, but Elastic Email made it easy to get up and running with no money out of pocket, and it was extremely affordable to scale as needed.

Alternatives Considered

Mailchimp, Sendinblue and Gist

For me, Mailchimp serves a different purpose than Elastic Email (though they have many similarities and offer similar tools such as email designers, campaign tools, autoresponders, etc.). I was with Mailchimp long before I had a need for bulk SMTP services, and I've been happy with Mailchimp for broadcast emails and autoresponder services, but I didn't see much in the way of opportunity as far as STMP mailing went. I did some searching and found Elastic Email to be an appealing option instead. While helping a client configure some email automation, they mentioned wanting to try Sendinblue (as they have a higher daily free limit), and it has proven to be a solid choice as well--though I've been 100% happy with Elastic Email for my own needs and have no intention of switching. When looking for email automation solutions, I found Gist and incorporated their fine-grain automation triggers to follow up with visitors based on actions taken on my sites, which it excels at vs Elastic Email and the others mentioned.

Support Rating

I have not had any issues with Elastic Email that have required reaching out to support, so I can't speak to the quality of their customer support. The help documents were well written and presented, though, and I would imagine that anyone with issues would receive satisfactory assistance in a timely manner.

Key Insights

Do you think Elastic Email delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Elastic Email's feature set?

Yes

Did Elastic Email live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Elastic Email go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Elastic Email again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Sendinblue, Mailchimp, Audacity, Filmora, Nuance Dragon Speech Recognition, Evernote, Microsoft To Do (formerly Wunderlist), Camtasia, CloudApp, MindManager, Skype, Adzooma, Zoom, pCloud, OneDrive, Screaming Frog SEO Spider, SEO PowerSuite

Likelihood to Recommend

I can't speak to Elastic Email's internal platform as I haven't used it much (composing emails inside their dashboard, creating campaigns, etc.). So I'm not sure how well the platform works for scenarios where that type of interface/feature set would be required, but I do know that if you need to hook external services to their SMTP or API, you'll have a great experience. Everything is super straightforward, the system is reliable, and the price is hard to beat.

Elastic Email offers reliable email services at hard-to-beat prices.

Overall Satisfaction with Elastic Email