One of the most vital things you can get for your business is email marketing software. This type of software helps you craft professional email messages to deliver to your customers and keep them engaged. Without it, you’ll find it difficult or even impossible to perform effective email marketing.
There are many email marketing tools available, and two well-known examples are MailChimp and MailerLite. MailChimp is the first name that most people recall when they hear about email marketing because it’s the most popular tool for this activity, serving 13 million users globally. MailerLite is a significantly less popular tool, with users in the thousands.
We want to see how MailChimp and MailerLite stack against each other. We’ll compare them based on critical factors like pricing, features, performance, and customer support. After reading this review, you can see our previous MailChimp review for more details about the platform.
Features
MailChimp is a web-based platform that lets you send emails to as many addresses on your subscriber list. Creating good marketing emails can be tough, so MailChimp provides a vast collection of templates designed by professionals to help users. You can pick any of these templates and customize them to your tastes. If you wish, you can use the platform’s drag-and-drop editor to build your email template from scratch.
MailChimp provides tools that help you build your email list. You can create subscription forms on the platform and embed them on your website. Any email address a website visitor inputs into the form will be automatically added to your list on MailChimp. You can also import an existing list you've built elsewhere by uploading the CSV file, and MailChimp will extract all the email addresses from the list.
Just like MailChimp, MailerLite provides templates that you can edit to create effective marketing emails. But, it has a smaller collection of templates than MailChimp. MailerLite also lets you create and embed forms on your website to build your email list. Yet, this platform offers some features that set it apart from MailChimp. The first is the website builder, which helps you create websites for your business, such as a blog. It also includes a tool that lets you set up paid newsletter subscriptions and collect recurring payments from subscribers.
Another good thing about MailerLite is that includes an email verifier that lets you find and eliminate dud or honeypot email addresses from your subscriber list. MailChimp doesn’t offer this feature natively, but you can get it via third-party integration.
Performance
MailChimp is primarily a web-based tool but it also has mobile apps (iOS and Android) that enable users to manage their campaigns on the go. These apps come in handy when you’re at a place where it’s uncomfortable to use a desktop PC, e.g, during a commute.
One thing we commend about MailChimp is its user-friendliness. The platform manages to fit an enormous number of features into an interface that’s pretty easy to navigate. The interface may be confusing to new users, but MailChimp provides guides to help such users.
MailerLite is primarily a web-based tool just like MailChimp. It has a mobile app to enable users to monitor their campaigns on the go, but it’s only for the iOS platform. We think not having an Android app puts MailerLite at a disadvantage compared to MailChimp.
MailerLite has an interface that’s even more intuitive than MailChimp’s. It sports a modern look and is very responsive, making it easy to switch between features. If user-friendliness was the only criterion for this comparison, MailerLite is the clear winner.
Support
MailChimp provides direct customer support through email, live chat, and telephone. However, only users on the most expensive plan (costing $299 per month) have access to phone support. Notably, MailChimp provides email support to free users for the first 30 days after they sign up.
All MailChimp users have access to the official help center, which includes a vast collection of user guides and tutorials covering all features of the platform. There's also an official marketplace where you can hire vetted MailChimp experts to help your email marketing efforts.
MailerLite provides direct support through email and live chat– there’s no phone support, unlike MailChimp. The website boasts of a 5-minutes average response time for live chat queries, which is relatively fast.
If you're facing any challenges with MailerLite, you can consult the official guide on its website. This guide helps users navigate the platform with ease and includes solutions to commonly encountered problems. You can also view video tutorials to learn about the platform in an interactive way.
Pricing
Both MailChimp and MailerLite offer free tiers that anyone can subscribe to, but with limited features. For instance, the free version of MailChimp supports a maximum of 500 email subscribers, while MailerLite’s free tier supports a maximum of 1,000.
MailChimp offers three premium plans; Essentials for $11 / £11 / AUD$16 per month, Standard for $17 / £17 / AUD$25 per month; and Premium for a high $299 / £299 / AUD$499 per month. Essentials supports 5,000 monthly emails to 50,000 subscribers, Standard supports 6,000 monthly emails to 100,000 subscribers, and Premium has no limits on the number of subscribers or emails.
MailerLite offers two premium plans: Growing Business and Advanced. The former starts at $10 / £10 / AUD$15 per month and the latter starts at $21 / £21 / AUD$31 per month for up to 1,000 subscribers. The price increases depending on the number of subscribers you have. For example, 5,000 subscribers will cost $32 / £32 / AUD$50 per month for the Growing Business plan and $39 / £39 / AUD$59 per month for the Advanced plan. Users with over 100,000 subscribers can contact MailerLite’s sales team to arrange a custom plan.
MailChimp is the more affordable tool because it uses a flat pricing structure while MailerLite uses scaled pricing.
Verdict
MailChimp and MailerLite are both effective email marketing tools. But, we consider MailChimp the superior tool because it offers a broader set of features, better customer support, and is more affordable. The category where MailerLite outshines MailChimp is in user-friendliness, but that’s not enough to cancel out its disadvantages against MailChimp.
