Our Pick for Bloggers: Brevo
Basically, it has 95% of the features, for 1/5 the price of many of the more popular email companies
Why we recommend Brevo: We feel like Brevo is kind of a secret weapon. The vast majority of successful bloggers are paying VERY high prices for services like Drip, Aweber, etc. Brevo has a POWERFUL feature set just like the big
We love that they have a full-featured marketing tool so you can set up different parts of the campaign to go out based on the customer’s previous actions. We also love that they charge per email sent instead of just how many people you have on your list. Since we don’t send out mass emails all the freaking time, we get much better pricing here.
Seriously, before paying for one of the more expensive services, ask yourself what feature they have that Brevo doesn’t. For us, there wasn’t a single feature we’d use that another company has that Brevo doesn’t.
We’ve found deliverability to be right on par with many of the other popular services.
Compared to the competition: Seriously, there is no competition in our eyes for basic email and drip campaigns. We’ve tried MailChimp, Madmimi, Aweber, and all the others. We’ve been bombarded by Infusionsoft’s salespeople. In the end, it’s Brevo.
HOWEVER, we did move our list over to Convertkit a while back. This site has some complicated tech needs, we need a system that integrates with our membership plugin and other services. For that, we’re going with Convertkit, but that doesn’t change our recommendation for SendInBlue for most sites wanting to grow an email list.
Beyond Email: HubSpot
HubSpot has all the features you would expect of an email marketing platform, but it goes way beyond that. It’s a full-featured CRM platform for businesses.
Why we recommend HubSpot: As a business with products, members, and leads I keep finding myself looking for tools that do this and that. And as I do, I keep coming back to HubSpot because they do it all.
It’s often best to work with companies that focus on the thing they’re good at. But when it comes to marketing, customer support, and anything customer-related, it makes sense that you would keep it all on one platform.
With HubSpot, I see the journey that our members make before they become members. I can have them submit support tickets or open a chat with us and have it all tied to their profile.
Compared to the competition: HubSpot is in a completely different ballpark. I’ve used some email platforms that say they are a CRM. HubSpot really is one. The more I dive into what they have, the more I’m confident they’re the right choice for businesses with customers, marketing, and sales.
Built-In Integrations: ConvertKit
SendInBlue just doesn’t have as many build-in integrations with other plug-ins. That’s why for this site, we actually went with ConvertKit.
Why we recommend Convert Kit: We moved our own list over to Convertkit a while back despite it costing a bit more than Send In Blue. For Income School, which is a quickly growing company with complicated tech needs, we need a system that integrates with our membership plugin and other services.
Compared to the competition: For what it does and all the tools it integrates with seamlessly, it’s as affordable as it gets.
Important legal notice: This post contains affiliate links. We are compensated for many of our product recommendations. Income School is a participant in the Amazon Associates affiliate program, as well as affiliate programs including Bluehost, WPX, SendInBlue, and many others. While we are always careful to only recommend the products we use and recommend, we want to be open and transparent about our relationship with companies we recommend.