7 email marketing tools for small businesses

Small businesses, on the day of their establishment, begin a journey through the valley of the shadow of failure in a bid to find success. Many times, they find success, and a lot of other times, they are knocked by the destructive claws of the saturated market.

One of the best ways for small businesses to avoid this impending adversity that befall their kind is by investing in the right processes and systems which involves indispensable email marketing. 

While email marketing is in fierce competition with other marketing tactics, it’s undeniably still a digital marketing strategy that has, according to a survey conducted by Forbes, increased sales of businesses, aided customer retainment, and generated leads for brands. 

As email marketing is becoming an impactful relationship-building marketing channel, hundreds of email marketing tools have been created to aid business owners. As a small business owner that you are, there are certain features to look out for among the hundreds that are in existence.

Here are some features that are essential for small business owners like you:

• Drag and drop builder: Vital for creating well-designed email content.
• Deliverability tools: Ensures emails are delivered into the inbox of your customer and not spam.
• List Building:  Gathers emails of your website visitors to grow subscribers’ database.
• List Segmentation: Helps in sending emails that are relevant to your customer.
• Automation: Enables automatic signal, action, and trigger.
• A/B Testing: Reveals two variants of a web page in different segments.
• Reporting: Monitors and reports activities like click-through rates.

With that being clarified, here are some of the best email marketing tools that are just perfect for your small business:

1. Aweber

Holding the title as one of the oldest used email marketing tools, Aweber, which is built with consideration for small businesses, is one of the most reliable and affordable tools for businesses with big goals but a small budget. 

It steals the limelight with its simple pricing structure that offers similar features for every plan you subscribe to regardless of the pricing plan. The price for each subscription plan is determined by the number of subscribers on your list. Any pricing plan you adopt for your business enjoys similar benefits as other plans – No discrimination!

While Aweber adorns itself with its unique user-friendly interface, AI-powered email template designs, and top-notch customer service team. Its other notable features include autoresponders, marketing automation functionality, responsive email designs, email analysis, reporting, split testing, RSS / blog to-email functionality, list segmentation option, a landing page builder, phone, email, live chat support, free stock image library of 6000+ free stock images, video-based landing page, and integrations with third-party apps.

2. MailChimp

The hundreds of email marketing tools out there make it extremely difficult for small business owners to make a decision. With MailChimp’s free plan which features an email creation and scheduling feature plus a smart recommendations feature, small businesses like yours are empowered with useful audience information that enables you to make the best of your marketing strategy. 

Email designs with a content manager are made effortlessly easy for new beginners. In addition, the ability to automate your emails in such a way that you are able to set up delivery times that match a user’s timezone is made possible. Welcome emails, cart reminders, and order confirmation features are all consequent benefits of its email automation feature.

Added features include the built-in image editor, drag-and-drop email builder, email analytics, contact segmentation, autoresponders, sign-up forms as well as third-party integration that enables you to integrate MailChimp with WordPress and other social media applications. A point to note about MailChimp is that a free trial for the paid plan is unavailable.

3. SendinBlue

Formerly a digital agency, SendinBlue with its features focuses on small businesses. It is an excellent email marketing tool that enables small business owners like you to create engaging transactional emails, segment lists of subscribers, and design responsive templates that are built to your preference.

As SendinBlue’s A/B testing and lists of segmented users allows you to target your ideal market. It also provides growing small businesses the opportunity to take advantage of sending 300 mails per day in its free plan. Email marketing automated solution feature is also included in its free plan.

Other unique and advanced features are made available within its paid plan such as drag-and-drop editors, landing page builder, sign-up forms, personalized email, retargeted ads, Facebook ads, live chat plugin, and CRM for sales.

4. Drip

Drip is an email marketing tool that’s solely created to keep small e-commerce businesses afloat in the business world. With advanced features such as built-in revenue analytics, third-party e-commerce store integration, opt-in forms, visual automation, workflow builder retargeting, reporting dashboard, split testing, excellent visual automation, active e-commerce content blocs, drag-and-drop tools, and discount code option, your small business can easily generate new leads.

These features are available on every paid plan. To build trust, Drip offers a 14 day free trial for newbies. It is recommended for your small e-commerce store as it offers strong automation and segmentation tools similar to those used by large e-commerce stores.

5. GetResponse

This email marketing tool understands the need for small businesses to generate leads hence its features are specifically designed to develop leads that, with the right workflow, will develop into consistent customers. 

Tools such as audience segmentation, drag-and-drop builder, 3rd party e-commerce integration, autoresponders, marketing automation, landing page, A/B testing, exit popups, advanced analytics, Facebook ads, and webinar software simplify email marketing for startups.

With a price start structure at $15/month and a 30-day free trial, Getresponse is the best for startup owners especially since it’s heavily invested in finding support for its subscribers through phone, live chat, email, guides, webinars, and videos.

6. Constant Contact

Constant Contact is one email marketing tool that’s becoming popular among small business owners. Offering automation, surveys, and A/B testing as some of its features. Its other specialties include helping small business owners communicate smarter with its email template builder, reporting, and analytic tool.

With Constant Contact, you can create a smarter website with its AI-powered website builder, sell smarter while leveraging constant contact’s powerful e-commerce platform. This helps small business owners market their products smartly using social media ads. They offer 60 days free trial to newcomers and after that, business owners will begin a paid plan of  $20/month. Their customer support services are amazing!

7. ActiveCampaign

Having miraculously moved from an underrated email marketing tool to a popular and high-rated email marketing tool, you can bet that ActiveCampaign has one of the best features capable of sustaining your new startup. With features similar to other top-notch email marketing tools, ActiveCampaign’s top unique features are its personal consultation call and the spam analyzing tool.

As an avid supporter of the “let machines do machine things so people can do people things” movement, ActiveCampaign thrives to answer popular questions in every business owner’s mind. These questions include:

• What’s the chance that this lead becomes a customer?
• What’s the best time to send an email?
• What does each of your contacts prefer to read?

This all-in-one sales and marketing tool is perfect for every startup as its price tag starts at $9/month.

Bottomline

Amongst the various problems plaguing small businesses, lack of proper digital marketing strategy and lack of cash flow takes the lead. While they struggle to find a place in the already saturated market, every decision they make in regard to tech tools and software requires proper planning due to the need for marketing tools that offer more with less budget.

With about 400 plus email marketing tools in existence, and about a hundred articles claiming to provide small businesses with the best tips, it’s understandable that small business owners like you find themselves in a tight spot. Hence, this list of email marketing tools has your best interest at heart and you can go ahead to try any of them out. Enjoy!