Item: Mailchimp
Rating: 9
Author: Verified User

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Currently it's being used across the organization for marketing and sales efforts. We focus on two specific audiences and multiple emails are sent to those audiences per week based on their preferences. It is currently being used by 4 people and managed by one. Right now it helps us communicate with our audiences in a very simple, yet well thought out product.

Pros and Cons

Design emails - Before creating custom HTML emails, the Mailchimp templates were extremely easy to use. Adding images, calls to action and content could be used by anybody.
Analytics - The analytics really allow you to nail down who is utilizing the content within your email. All CTA's are tracked and multiple views of how the emails are being consumed really help create an ongoing marketing plan for emails.

Although the templates are great, they can be very glitchy. Spacing issues can drive you crazy as you want to make sure your email looks perfect to your audience.
Landing pages - although they have landing pages, the customization could be better. I find other programs stress landing pages more and it could be improved. It is very important to grow your lists.

Return on Investment

For the overall features vs. cost, I feel there is not a better email program on the market. And they are constantly improving their marketing offerings.
It is hard to determine, but return and constant engagement with our users has been fantastic. Use specific call to actions to send them to sign up forms or content within our website or blogs has proven invaluable.

Alternatives Considered

Constant Contact and Emma

Constant Contact was one of the first on the market to be used in the SB market. It is fine to use and no real complaints.

I was a fan of Emma (formerly My Emma), based on the ease of use. I found that Mailchimp moved quicker and was able to integrate with other programs and I chose Mailchimp based on several points:

Ease of use (very simple UI)
List segmentation (target your audience using specific factors)
CRM (understand your audience better)
Very good customer support
Constantly evolving
Price

Usability

After initially using Mailchimp years ago, I find the overall usability to be very intuitive and simple.

The templates allow for easy image and content control.
Adding links to website pages is easy by using a very simple rich text editor.
Assigning multiple users within your organization with different roles is a very nice feature.
Creating lists is very simple and having the ability to send or schedule emails to specific lists is very easy.
Most important for me is the robust analytics that you can capture from your user's interaction with your emails.

All-in-One Marketing Platform

With all of the SaaS platforms on the market, it is easy to have platforms that are redundant. With the addition of Mailchimp's more robust CRM, behavioral targeting and now lookalike campaigns, Mailchimp has cut out using several other programs and allows us much better visibility of our audience using one platform. Especially when different department are using the data and there is one source of truth that everybody has exposure to seeing. Plus, the price alone for what you are getting is very fair and I would highly recommend it.

Lessons for Success

Having used Mailchimp at several businesses, it is a very gratifying feeling when you see your email ist grow from 25 to over 10,000 people. Using Mailchimp has taught me the value of list segmentation, how important your content is relative to your audience and constantly reviewing your analytics to see how you can grow your list and how your audience is interacting with the content you have provided them.

Likelihood to Recommend

Mailchimp has made great strides over the years. I would say it is the best program for small businesses to use for their email marketing in any industry. Creating email sign up lists for your website is easy and creating emails is very simple with their templates. I highly recommend.

Mailchimp is not suited well for surveys, which would be a nice feature instead of using another vendor. Having your email lists in one place and supporting surveys would be a nice feature to have built into Mailchimp.

Go Bananas for Mailchimp

Software Version

Overall Satisfaction with Mailchimp