Email marketing for small businesses (SMBs) and nonprofits.
4.2/5 (1007 avis)Avantages
I do independent contracting for a nonprofit and have been using Constant Constant for about 4 years now for the electronic newsletters to our supporters and network. I love that the software and the many different template options to use for mailings. I also like that I am able to change fonts, color, backgrounds and layout with ease. It is VERY user friendly and if I need to stop in the middle of my work it, will be saved where I left off. This is actually an update because in the past if you didn't save the work manually you could lose it, but they have updated that and it now autosaves (which I am very grateful for). Also, I love that I can schedule mailings and campaigns in advance for when I want them to go out (I currently have 5 pending to go out on designated days within the next 5 weeks). This save me a lot of time and not having to wait til the day of to log on and send them out.
What I REALLY like is that we can track analytics. we know what emails (and topics) people are more interested in versus ones they barely open. This helps us in choosing more engaging content. I know what percent of our contacts have opened the emails. I can create different groups to send certain thing to (like Board members, parents, LSC), I am even able to see the time and date (and by whom) an email was opened and if the donate button was clicked or not (which is good for best practices and implementing measures of accountability within the org).
Inconvénients
I don't like that the only videos that I can embed into the mailings have to be a Youtube link. But other than that, there isn't much that I do not like about using this software.
Overall a great product, easy to use, and functional. its minor limitations are countered by functionality, reliability, and the features it offers. The price is sometimes a turnoff when compared to other marketing email providers. CC offers easy to use templates that are almost fully customizable. Lots of extra features including campaigns, events, registrations, sign up forms etc. There are plenty of HELP menu items and tutorials. Love that there is no limit on the number of emails sent monthly. Overall a great go to product!
Avantages
As an email marketing solution, CC fits most small to medium business owners needs with plenty of easy to edit templates, branded emails, newsletters, calendars, event apps, and website integrations. Additionally, business owners can set up events and registrations via the app. The templates are easy to use with varied options and designs. For more experienced handlers, HTML is available to set up templates. Emails offer clients and recipients the opportunity to opt out or stay tuned while landing the emails in their in box rather than their spam filters . Analytics are a plus and helpful to see what works and what doesn't in an email campaign. CC also integrates social media platforms. Overall it is a great all-in-one marketing tool.
Inconvénients
While the software is generally easy to use, it is not intuitive and does on occasion produce glitchy results from missing images to random changes in text, font, and email structure. I do like the tiered pricing structure, although find CC to be far more expensive than their competitors. One of my biggest complaints is the placement of images - it doesn't really allow flexibility in design - if you are ok with their more cookie cutter template designs then its a 5 star - but the ability to place images becomes tedious and reduces the functionality. Overall the program is a go and worth the expense even if the image placement issues are annoying.
The email analytics and reports are great.
Avantages
I use CC to to manage our large contact database and to send out email updates. It is great for segmenting our list -- from general interest to communications to fundraising. The automated features are great, especially that it will not allow the same email to appear in the same inbox twice. It also merges duplicate contacts. We use it across the entire organization. Constant contact is great for merging duplicate contacts, updating your address book, giving a reliable open rate and thorough reports, and allowing you to segment large email lists.
Inconvénients
When uploading additional contacts, CC wants to see how they actively subscribed. This can be problematic when uploading an older email list (i.e. you may just have a spreadsheet of The List and they want to see more evidence). Additionally, it is a little pricey compared to competitors such as MailChimp. It would be great to be able to export email campaigns as HTML.Be extremely careful when importing contacts. Constant Contact wants to see how they actively subscribed. Sometimes it is hard to prove this when you have entered information for people you have an established relationship with, or if they verbally requested to be added. Constant Contact wants to actually see the (paper) sign-up sheet. This is unachievable for businesses/groups that have been around long enough to have established an email list based on personal relationships or when importing business cards. As for the design, sizing images can be difficult when you are using a self-designed template. As for the contact management services, representatives have very little technical knowledge and don't seem to understand marketing techniques used within certain industries.
Constant Contact is the standard for email marketing, and you can see why! It allows you to quickly upload your email contacts and create professional email marketing. We've been able to see how many people open each of our email campaigns, and which campaigns are most successful, making future marketing more targeted.
Avantages
Love the ease of use - whether you want to send a quick email using a premade template, or customize every part of your message, Constant Contact gives you the tools. It's easy to find what you need, and you don't need to know anything about pixel size or the HTML color codes to create professional emails.
Constant Contact just introduced A/B testing, so you can better gauge the headings and send times that get your audience to open the emails.
Constant Contact is a very solid platform - I've yet to see any service outages, or experience any features that feel buggy, unstable, or like they're still in beta testing. If you have access to a feature on Constant Contact, you know that it will work.
Inconvénients
It's difficult to manage old campaigns. Want to see what your message was last time, what template you used, or how long ago you sent an email to a particular group? Good luck - you'll be scrolling through pages of old campaigns by hand.
At this time, you can't run reports to compare the percentage of opens/click-throughs per recipient group, or to compare how various keywords or send-times compare. To really analyze your marketing approach, you'll have to extract this data by hand.
Some of the updates (i.e. A/B testing, custom template options) have been available to users of free competitor services for years. It would be nice to see Constant Contact take a more proactive approach to innovation and updates.
Converting web site visitors to email marketing recipients has never been easier, as site visitors simply select which programs they are interested in and they are automatically added to the appropriate contact lists in Constant Contact. Constant Contact has made it painless to conduct email marketing campaigns that circumvent spam filters, something that Emma and MailChimp struggled with.
Avantages
Constant Contact makes it really easy to make attractive, functional emails and to conduct email campaigns with sequencing. Building emails is done via a drag-and-drop interface (WYSIWYG), so you don't have to have any coding experience with html or css. It's really easy to schedule your campaigns, too. If you can use Outlook and Word, you should be able to get comfortable with Constant Contact pretty quickly. It's also really easy to build and manage contact lists, including importing from csv files. And Constant Contact does a good job of tracking bad email addresses and removing them from your lists, which is important because you are charged by the number of contacts you have. I also like that you can send yourself previews so you can try the messages out on different mail programs and tweak them to your liking. Once you've sent out the messages, Constant Contact offers reporting to let you know how successful your campaign was, including the click-through rate. It also sends you reports about who is being added to and removed from your contact lists. Its integration with several WordPress form plugins means it's easy to convert web traffic to email marketing recipients.
Inconvénients
Permissions. There are basically two levels of permissions besides the account owner: campaign creator and account manager. It would be nice to have more granular control over what users can do, because account manager gives users a lot of freedom, but is necessary to work with contacts, schedule a send, etc. The other thing I don't like is how quickly the cost ramps up. Having used Emma and MailChimp, I feel like Constant Contact is the most robust platform. But it is expensive.
Constant Contact has been very helpful for our company, it is an excellent marketing tool that has allowed us to increase our customers and sales significantly.
It is a very complete and effective system but at the same time a little expensive if you have many contacts, but I think it is worth the investment.
Avantages
Constant Contact has many features and functionalities that allow us to effectively promote any product, business or company.
It's easy to start creating email marketing campaigns with Constant Contact. It is intuitive and easy to use, its interface is simple and allows us to adapt easily to your work environment.
You can create effective campaigns with a pleasant and innovative visual style since the system has a large number of templates that we can customize and adapt to any type of campaign, there are many different designs that we can choose from.
Constant Contact will allow us to direct our campaigns to one or more contact lists that we have since we can segment our contacts very easily, simply creating different lists for each group of contacts that we need
We can perform an analysis on the campaigns sent through the option of reports, being able to quickly verify the percentages of opening, clicks, rebounds and unsubscriptions and thus we can be improving the effectiveness of our campaigns
Constant Contact allows integration with other systems such as Shopify, Wordpress, BigCommerce, facebook and others.
Inconvénients
I think your support staff are not so good, when we call support it is difficult to find an operator that speaks Spanish and we lose a lot of time on the call, I also think that Constant Contact is a bit expensive system.
Constant Contact was a great tool for us while we were getting started with our email program. It's reasonably priced and easy to use and makes users look very professional. We just outgrew it and needed more in-depth marketing information so we've moved on.
Avantages
Constant Contact is very user-friendly. With little to no training, users can easily create professional-looking emails. There are many templates to choose from and they, again, look very professional. It is perfect for businesses without designers on staff. Another major advantage is the pricing...it is SUPER reasonably priced.
Inconvénients
A couple of issues...first, while I understand the need to manage contacts and spam issues, they can be unreasonable with blocking you from sending emails. People unsubscribe and claim you are junk mail even when you aren't...there's nothing you can do about it, yet you still get dinged for it. Second, you are limited in how much info you can see about users. We switched to another program that provides a lot more visibility into what users do, including linking to web pages visited. This isn't a fault of Constant Contact, it's just not a service they offer. Finally, be aware that there are a lot of challenges if you are sending to a lot of users with Outlook. I know that Outlook is difficult to work with, but many if not most business users use Outlook, so templates and emails have to display well there. It's a challenge with our new software as well...I don't know if anyone has really cracked the Outlook solution yet.
Avantages
We've been using Constant Contact for a number of years for our email marketing efforts. The interface is easy to use, although a bit glitchy at times, and I have seen a number of platform upgrades as well. I like the ready made templates available which come in handy when needing to put together an email quickly. The analytics provided are good, although I can't comment on how robust they are given this is the only platform I have ever used for email marketing. The addition of some email automation has been nice as well. Also, the recently added inbox previews has been nice to help tighten up subject lines and formatting.
Inconvénients
Sometimes I've noticed the interface can be a bit glitchy when building an email. The buttons used for changing background color and making edits can be elusive at times. I also don't like how there is no search function for finding sent emails by name. I know you can filter emails by date sent and categorize them in folders but it would be nice to be able to search by an exact email title.
Sending emails out on a daily basis and extracting that data keeps my boss happy and healthy. We are always checking out their new features that might help us even more on our marketing trails. For what you get, you are not paying too much which is cost effective!
Avantages
The feature that is most useful in my current job situation is the technology this program has to track opens and clicks for basic to intricate emails that are sent out to customers. This helps us to determine our most interested and time worthy customers/prospects for different products.
Another thing is that you can import/export large amounts of data whenever you need it, and they have the tools all over the website that can help you every step of the way how to get the most out of the email campaigns. Continuous updates and features are added to the website monthly, with an article explaining all about it pops up in your notifications.
Inconvénients
Sometimes if there is too much data/campaigns integrated into the website it can slow simple tasks down by large degree. Also there are many late night website touch ups they need to do to make the program better - but also annoys us night owls that like to get projects done late at night.
Avantages
It is very simple to use! The navigation is simple :) It really couldn't be any easier for a first-time user to figure out. A kid could definitely use it without any guidance (provided that they can read). I really enjoy using it, so that's a plus. I also love that you can view how many emails were opened , even who opened them and what they clicked on! As a marketing person, that's the greatest gift ever. Real data you can see, use and understand. Sadly, not all marketing products offer that. But Constant Contact does! And they do it well.
Inconvénients
Most of the templates end up looking sort of outdated. I describe it as "an early 2000s vibe." They could really use a face-lift to make them more attractive. That's honestly the only thing I don't like about it. Everything else is super great! Wish they'd adapted a more Mailchimp-esque look for all of their products. I think they would crush the competition if they changed up the look a bit.
Constant Contact allows me to easily send professional emails to my clients and readers without worrying about leaking their data out or delivering viruses to their inboxes.
Avantages
The email design features are awesome, and adding pictures is pretty easy. You can build your own library of photos to use. Designing and changing email templates is quite straightforward, and fully customizable with colours, fonts and 'blocks' of type such as main feature, coupon, etc. I have only used customer support twice and they were cheerful and helpful. Almost every email brings one or more bookings so I feel using this service is worth the price. It's also easy to manage your email lists and CC helps guard against repeated bounces by sort of quarantining those email addresses to protect you from a poor sender reputation, which is important with ever-tightening SPAM regulations. There are upgrades available, should you want to send out forms or questionnaires to your list too.
Inconvénients
It is an expense for a small business, and the bigger your list the more it costs. Every once in a while the formatting goofs up and can be frustrating, and copy/paste formatting is sometimes a bit challenging. But the folks at CC work at that all the time and it's improved greatly over the years.
With this software I didn't run into the normal problems of implementing changes in the physical appearance of the content of my mailer and it seemed to not get caught up in spam filters like other programs that offer the same thing this company offers it and actually follows through with it. I would recommend this.
Avantages
The automation of this software is beyond intuitive it's closer to artificial intelligence than anything. Providing crucial analytical data back to myself and my team we could reconfigure our approach to different demographics which ultimately LED in huge surges and increases in business.
Inconvénients
For some reason with most of these automated mail programs the same issues tended to plague them. The double opt out feature is what I'm really talking about which is also known as the unsubscriber list. Often clunky and the only part of the whole package that wasn't intuitive as it required individual attention which raised costs in man hours. That was easily negated by the large number of business it brought in due to its strong analytics though. This is a important tool for a smaller business looking to take the next step.
Avantages
Contant Contact makes it easy for us to send a quick e-mail out to our members. They have everything set up for you, so that you can upload a document, image, and/or video. I love that they give you the option to change the background colors and schedule days and times for the e-mails to be sent out. I love how reliable this software is when it comes to importing contacts and making sure our clients receive the emails on time, I love the statistics it provides us. That has definitely helped our organization improve. Constant Contact is the way to go!
Inconvénients
The new update is a little more time consuming. I have been using Constant Contact for 2 years and getting used to the new update has been a bit frustrating. I also wish there were more templates for the buttons. Such as "click here for more", "register here" and etc. I think that would be a great addition.
Constant Contact allows us to easily manage our email contacts and lists. It has saved us time by providing email templates that we can customize to our brand.
The reporting the tool provides also gives us the intelligence we need to see if our list is growing or shrinking.
Avantages
Great tool for a small business or organization to communicate with supporters and customers. Very easy to manage contacts and lists. Countless email templates provided, plus it is easy to create your own templates.
Out of the box reporting on opens, click-thrus, opt-outs, and more are highly intuitive.
Inconvénients
Tool does not offer marketing automation functionality, as in -- if an email is opened, but the desired action is not taken, automatically send a follow-up email in two days or if the email is not opened, automatically send a follow-up email with a different subject line and different customized content in a week.
I use Constant Contact multiple times per week to market listings for a sales team. This option has allowed us to reach more contacts than other platforms and increase our visibility in the market.
Avantages
Constant Contact is EXTREMELY easy to use - it is fairly straight forward and fool proof. The customer service may be the greatest I've ever experienced with any company. Every single person I have spoken to is so nice, so knowledgeable, and quick to help me out.
Inconvénients
The features for creating layouts is really basic - there are no tables and you are limited to the pre-made columns/sections which can be incredibly frustrating. For instance, if I have five people I want to list at the bottom for contact, I have to do a row of 3 and a row of 2 which gets big and cumbersome. There are limitations to how tall certain tools are which again make the email campaign longer than necessary. The reporting section could use some help, its not easy to navigate or understand. The reporting section is prettier than it is informative.
I've used CC to create and track event and orientation registrations, send out email blasts, reminders, and/or updated messages and flyers. I've also used CC to gather new and old leads, create and maintain lists of interested applicants, as well as track applicants who move to admitted students. It is also a great tool for marketing new programs and gathering and testing different message and design styles to see which ones gather more interest. I especially use it to email large groups without being blocked as a spammer. I really don't spam targeted leads, but with some email providers all it takes is like 5 users with the same @.... address and you can get blocked, so being able to use CC for larger emails is a big plus!
Avantages
What I like most about Constant Contact (CC) is the ability to import and export contact lists so I can save and re-use particular lists as needed. I often have to run update reports to add newer applicants (or new "interested" leads) and/or change the message text to target a specific audience and then send it to those who need to be contacted; not having to create a brand new list or try and merge two different files is so helpful. Being able to preview email messages when you need to tweak something is a real time saver too! And I love the "reminders" feature so I know when it's time to reconnect with certain interested contacts.
Inconvénients
Honestly there isn't much I don't like about CC...? Oh, right now it will not seamlessly import into the CSM tool our front desk team is using (they end up having to do a little work-around), but that will soon be fixed as they are switching another program that easily works with CC.
Constant Contact is a GREAT tool for designing emails quickly and easily. At the retail establishment I worked at that used this tool, we were able to create beautiful emails announcing new products, inviting clients to events, sharing sale info and more. Constant Contact allows you to include video and links to social media, and comes with a plethora of premade templates to make things especially easy for users. The tool definitely saved time and money and was effective for getting people into the store to make sales. Constant Contact also gives you the ability to manage your email list, remove people whose emails may have bounced or who wish to unsubscribe.
Avantages
Constant Contact is a convient way to create beautiful emails to send to a host of contacts. I have used the tool personally for email marketing for retail businesses. Constant Contact allows you to easily manage your contact lists as well as design beautiful, professional emails to send.
Inconvénients
Some of the features are a bit hard to understand and take some practice to get used to. Changing colors of pre-set templates is difficult for a beginner. I also found that sometimes my emails would look different once I sent them then they did in the Constant Contact interface. These small changes weren't detremental to the email's message or anything and maybe customers wouldn't even notice them, but I found it frustrating having put thought and time into the placement of each item.
Excellent product that integrates well with overall marketing workflow. The support is prompt and it is solid technically.
Avantages
It is easy to use and provides templates to make your emails easy to create and have built in mobile design. There is help with expanded hours that will assist you with creating emails, list management and any other issue you have. I consider this a major plus because there can always be questions and with support, saves you time.
The reporting features are outstanding. You can see who is opening what and what links they are clicking on, to name just a few reporting features. Also, you can now personalize subject line and add emojis. New features are always being added.
Inconvénients
More templates are always being added, but could use a few more for holidays.
For the price, this program provides an excellent tool for organizations that focus on email marketing campaigns. If your needs are focused around email marketing, this is certainly the program to consider.
Avantages
This software worked well for our email campaigns, but it lacked some features that were specific to the growing needs of our organization. We definitely would have stayed with this software if it would have met all the needs of our organization as we grew in size and function. The templates were easy to customize, and the emails always looked very professional. I also liked how the emails were tied into the registration page and the final reports.
Inconvénients
This is not an easy program to learn how to use. It's easy to make mistakes, especially when learning the program. Thank goodness for the excellent tech support provided. Their skilled and friendly tech support makes up for the difficulty learning the software. Their tech support is the main reason I would encourage others to consider using this software because of the steep learning curve. They fixed many problems for me, and they were always eager to help!
Our organization loves Constant Contact. When we log in, we feel accomplished. It allows us to look like our organization, sound like our organization, and be received by clients who support our organization. It's a dream come true and makes all-important marketing simple.
Avantages
Constant Contact is limitless. Want to send an eblast, create a platform for registration, or send automated trials or incentives? Constant Contact does just that and so much more. Very simply, without us using Constant Contact daily, we would not know who our prospective clients are and we would not engage the ones that are with us. When we use Constant Contact, we know our members and always see results.
Inconvénients
There is nothing we dislike or like least about Constant Contact. It is marketing made easy.
Using and learning Constant Contact is not difficult... and you can really create some nice looking email newsletters and setup/manage the email lists very quickly. What I have always liked is their Event management features (with the Plus level of service) for event promotion, registration, payments, tracking, and reporting. For groups and companies that don't have members, it is a great option to consider.
Avantages
I have used Constant Contact for various groups for over 10 years. The newsletters and email list management is very easy to learn and manage and the reporting availability (opens, etc) is good too. For groups that hold events and need to promote, register, get paid, and so forth for those events the Email Plus is a great option and it works well. For all these years they have offered a consistent and strong product. One thing to consider, if you are looking for software like this is to consider if you also have or need membership management as part of your group's needs... you may want to look around for a software that includes that service feature as Constant Contact does not have that membership management feature.
Inconvénients
The price is quite high when compared to what you can get with other software (Wild Apricot) that offers email newsletters, event management, and also the total membership management part. If your group or company does not have members or need that management feature... then I always recommend Constant Contact for the newsletters and event management.
Overall the Constant Contact tools are easy to use and very professional. We are a mid-sized financial institution that sends around 14 to 28 thousand emails per week. When I came into my role we had been using Constant Contact for a number of years. However, I felt that we had outgrown its capabilities. The platform is primarily for small businesses and some of the features were lacking for what we needed. Specifically, the ability to create separate subscription lists. That said, the customer service is amazing and if you live/work in the Boston area then there are always training seminars going on.
Avantages
Great customer service. Whenever we encountered problems with data uploads/downloads or other situations, the phone support was quick to answer and very knowledgeable. Inexpensive for the quality of email platform. Great for small businesses.
Inconvénients
Not catered towards mid to large organizations selling multiple products and services. Unable to created multiple lists for product or services with the option for recipients to unsubscribe from just the one list (unsubscribes from all).
I said in my PROS for the software. A good value and love the templates in a pinch. They can really get you out of bind if sales or marketing suddenly decides a need for a mailing in an hour. Saved me many times. I do like the overall format and the timeliness of the mailings when you set up your mailings to go out in the advance . . great job!
Avantages
I recently took over the mailing and marketing for our company. Pretty much had a crash course from previous person in charge of it. Found it pretty easy to use once I figured it out. The templates have saved my life for 'on the fly' mailings. Pretty easy to go in and customize the template already close to what you want but want to add your person company or touch to it. I really appreciate the effort that goes into the templates. Also, found that the mailings go out when they say they are going to go out - a real nice feature!
Inconvénients
Understanding and navigation buttons can sometimes send you into a tizzy . . they need to work on some flexibility to size when adding a picture or custom logo. Usually have found work around but not a lot of room for error. Also . . the preview is not really a preview. The email can sometimes actually look a little off . . not bad but a small error now and then can be frustrating.
Avantages
Constant Contact provides a user-friendly interface that allows users to create visually-friendly e-blasts. The address book setup is relatively straightforward, and the creation of templates that can be "cloned" for messages is effortless. I appreciate the flexibility and incorporation of mobile-friendly newsletters. The scheduling feature has saved significant time within our organization. I've also found the statistics to be very interesting and helpful in choosing content for our messages.
Inconvénients
There is no editing tool for mobile devices (iPad, iPhone, etc.). The newsletters need to be edited within a web browser. This prevents quick messages from being created on-the-fly.
I have had great success with Constant Contact over the years. This tool will make you money to pay for the cost and your clients will appreciate the consistency in your business.
Avantages
I have used this software program for years in my real estate business. This is a great way to stay in front of your clients and potential clients. I can schedule this software to contact clients as little or as often as I like. I love the customizable newsletters and mailers to keep things interesting and fun.
Inconvénients
I would like to be able to integrate other programs to cooperate with this software, sending my clients updated listings, things like that. Otherwise, this is a powerful marketing tool and one of the best products for the money out there.
I do independent contracting for a nonprofit and have been using Constant Contact for about 4 years now for the electronic newsletters to our supporters and network. I love that the software and the many different template options to use for mailings. I also like that I am able to change fonts, color, backgrounds and layout with ease. It is VERY user friendly and if I need to stop in the middle of my work it, will be saved where I left off. This is actually an update because in the past if you didn't save the work manually you could lose it, but they have updated that and it now autosaves (which I am very grateful for). Also, I love that I can schedule mailings and campaigns in advance for when I want them to go out (I currently have 5 pending to go out on designated days within the next 5 weeks). This save me a lot of time and not having to wait til the day of to log on and send them out.
What I REALLY like is that we can track analytics. we know what emails (and topics) people are more interested in versus ones they barely open. This helps us in choosing more engaging content. I know what percent of our contacts have opened the emails. I can create different groups to send certain thing to (like Board members, parents, LSC), I am even able to see the time and date (and by whom) an email was opened and if the donate button was clicked or not (which is good for best practices and implementing measures of accountability within the org).