Confused about which Zoho alternative to choose for affordable email marketing? Especially if you own a small business, you need an effective email marketing tool that can keep up with the standard at a super reasonable cost.
And there’s no way you can leave email marketing out of your marketing agenda. Marketing email campaign sending is a must! Why? According to a survey for small business email marketing, 85.6% of small businesses report dedicating more or less about 40 hours per week to email marketing, while 66.4% spend up to 20 hours each week. The percentages are huge, right? If email marketing hadn’t been beneficial, then such significant percentages of small businesses wouldn’t have been doing it.
So, you’re running a small business and your budget is tight, you have to spend every penny justly. And you can’t do that using a costly email marketing tool like Zoho’s Zoho Campaigns. Keeping that in mind, in this blog, I will introduce you to a highly affordable email marketing tool, MailBluster. I will walk you through a comparison between Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster to understand better why and how this tool can be one of the great Zoho alternatives.
Table of Contents
- Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Overview
- Zoho Campaigns
- MailBluster: Assessing as a Zoho Alternative
- Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Features
- Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Pricing
- Wrap Up
Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Overview
Before diving into the details, let’s briefly glimpse the overview of these two email marketing tools.
| Zoho Campaigns | vs | MailBluster |
|---|---|---|
| Automation | Best known for | Flexible pricing |
| Yes, offers a 14-day free trial | Free trial | No, but provides a 30-day money-back guarantee |
| Yes | Free pricing plan | Yes |
| Starts with $4/monthly | Paid plan | Starts with $0.60/1000 emails monthly |
| Email and chat support (with condition) | Customer support | Email and chat support (no condition) |
| 4.3⭐ | G2 rating | 4.8⭐ |
Now, before diving into the comparison, let’s bring the essential details of Zoho Campaigns and MailBluster to the table. It will ensure we know the necessary information while comparing these two.
Zoho Campaigns
Here goes the basics about Zoho Campaigns:
What is Zoho Campaigns?
Before answering that, do you know: what is Zoho? You’ll get the answer about Zoho Campaigns from it.
Zoho is a renowned Indian company. It’s a cloud-based business software suite that is similar to Google Workspace and Microsoft. Its goal is to assist businesses in simplifying processes while improving customer connections and relationships and automating key tasks. Zoho offers a comprehensive platform for managing everything from sales and marketing to accounting and collaboration. For example, it has tools for CRM (Customer Relationship Management), Marketing automation, email marketing, etc.
So, by now you can guess what Zoho Campaigns is. Zoho Campaigns is an email marketing software. Zoho also allows email marketing through its other tools like Zoho CRM, but it’s minimal. For an active and advanced level of email marketing, Zoho presents the Zoho Campaigns tool. It is designed with multiple pricing plans and features, keeping the email marketing facilities in mind.
Zoho Campaigns Pricing
Zoho Campaigns pricing has multiple plans for email marketing. It has divided the pricing based on different fields such as business, agency, etc. As our discussion is about business, especially centered on small businesses, we will go through their pricing details that concern the business route.
Is Zoho Campaigns free? Yes, it has a free pricing plan, and it also provides a 14-day free trial.
For businesses, Zoho Campaigns pricing has 4 plans, including a pay-as-you-go system. These are:
- Forever Free: $0 for up to 2K contacts per month.
- Standard: Starts at $4 for 500 contacts per month.
- Professional: Starts at $6 for 500 contacts per month.
Note: The costs of standard and Professional pricing plans increase with the addition of contacts. Plus, the cost will be less if billed yearly.
- Pay as you go (PAYG): Zoho Campaign’s PAYG is based on credit purchase. A minimum of 500 credits for $14. Each credit is intended for each outgoing email to each contact. Meaning, 1 credit = 1 email to 1 contact. It is designed for occasional email senders.
Zoho Campaigns Features
- Email automation
- Segmentation
- A/B testing
- Pre-made templates
- Drag-and-drop editor
- Contact management
- Cart abandonment and product purchase workflows
- Integrations
- Popups/forms
- Real-time reports and analytics
- SMS marketing (add on basis)
Pros and Cons of Zoho Campaigns
Pros of Zoho campaigns
- Ease of use
- Advanced automation
- SMS marketing availability
- Free trial
Cons of Zoho Campaigns
- Expensive
- Limited features
- Complex interface and learning curve
- Email deliverability issues
- Inconvenient customer support
- Allows only a 14-day support for the free trial
Reasons to Opt for a Zoho Alternative
According to Zoho Campaigns reviews from customers in G2:
- It lacks in B2B contact management
- The learning curve is complex
- Has issues with the support system
- Email templates availability isn’t much
- Complex dashboard visibility
These are some of the dislikes from the customers that have room for improvement and are valid enough to go for an alternative.
MailBluster: Assessing as a Zoho Alternative
What is MailBluster?
MailBluster is an email marketing software that works with Amazon SES and provides super pricing flexibility. All you need to do is link your AWS account to MailBluster to receive access to a wide range of pro facilities for seamless email marketing.
What is MailBluster best for?
MailBluster is best known for its flexible pricing method and Pro features that are handy and tech-friendly for the users. Its simple pricing system allows all the users to spend according to their budget.
MailBluster Pricing
MailBluster pricing has 2 basic plans.
- Starter: MailBluster’s free pricing plan! $0 up to 3000 emails per account (one time). It comes with MailBluster branding on all emails.
After exceeding the 3000 email sending limit, you need to subscribe to the Pro plan to continue.
What’s the benefit?
First of all, it’s free, duh! Second, this free pricing plan will familiarize you with the brand’s usability before proceeding to pro-level email marketing.
- Pro: Set with a pay-as-you-go structure, pricing starting at $0.60 for sending every 1000 emails per month.
What else?
The paid plan will charge you only $60 as a subscription fee yearly for each brand. Plus, you can send unlimited emails without MailBluster branding. And it comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Why pay for the yearly subscription?
Paying the subscription fee will allow you to use all the handy pro features for advanced-level email marketing. Also, if you think deeply, this yearly subscription fee is equivalent to $5 monthly. Now, it seems pretty reasonable, doesn’t it? Spending $5 to use unlimited pro facilities monthly is a good deal!
- The Pro plan is Furthermore, MailBluster offers a 30-day money-back guarantee if you are not interested in the Pro plan!
MailBluster features
- Email automation.
- Pre-made Pro email templates
- AI-assisted drag and drop email editor
- Leads management
- Segmentation
- A/B testing
- Forms
- Double opt-in
- Real-time tracking and report
- Analytics
- API access
- Custom fields
- Integrations
Mailbluster allows Zoho integration. If you use Zoho CRM, then you can integrate it with MailBluster for advanced email marketing with your customers.
Some of the other integrations you can make with MailBluster are:
- Salesforce integration with MailBluster
- WooCommarce integration with MailBluster
- Make integration with MailBluster
- Pabbly integration with MailBluster, etc.
Pros and Cons of MailBluster
Pros of MailBluster
- Highly efficient pricing plans
- Has a free pricing plan
- Provides a 30-day money-back guarantee
- Ensure ease of use
- Massive availability of pre-made email templates
- Good dashboard visibility
- Ensures good email deliverability
- Provides solid customer support
Cons of MailBluster
- Needs connection to an AWS account
- Live support requires English only
Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Features
Let’s compare essential Zoho Campaigns features vs Mailbluster features and see which one wins!
| Features | Zoho Campaigns features | MailBluster features |
|---|---|---|
| Email automation | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Pre-made templates | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Drag-and-drop editor | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Popups/Inline forms | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Segmentation | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Integrations and APIs | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| A/B testing | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Cart abandonment & Product purchase workflows | ✔️ | ❌ |
| Real-time reporting | ✔️ | ✔️ |
As you can see, MailBluster provides all the essential features you need for effective email marketing.
Pro tip:
For a small business, it would be wise not to spend a hefty amount on the cart abandonment and product purchase workflow.
Mailbluster absolutely wins in this section. You will get all the necessary pro features at a much reasonable price with MailBluster, which are enough to provide an incredible email customer journey, so why not consider it as one of the Zoho alternatives!
Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster Pricing
Let’s learn about Zoho Campaigns pricing and MailBluster’s pricing details. Let’s compare the following Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster pricing. Determine if MailBluster can be the best budget-friendly Zoho alternative for your small business.
| Pricing plans | Zoho Campaigns | Pricing plans | MailBluster |
|---|---|---|---|
| Forever free | $0/mo for up to 2000 contacts | Starter | $0 for up to 3000 emails (one-time use) |
| Standard | Starts $4/mo for up to 500 contacts | Pro | Unlimited emails starting from $0.60 per month |
| Professional | Start $6/mo for up to 500 active contacts | ||
| Pay-as-you-go | $14/500 credits (1 credit = 1 email to 1 contact) |
Let’s give a thorough analysis:
Zoho Campaigns pricing has 4 plans for businesses, whereas Mailbluster pricing has 2. MailBluster pricing is simple and less confusing. People will face no issue worrying about which pricing plans to go for.
How is MailBluster beneficial?
So what are the perks of using MailBluster and not Zoho Campaigns? With MailBluster, there’s no limitation for contact addition! Unlike Zoho Campaigns, you don’t have to pay extra for additional contacts. Sounds convenient, right? Unlimited contacts with unlimited email sending while using pro features for effective email marketing, that’s the main catch of joining MailBluster. Hence, MailBluster will eventually be the best Zoho Campaigns alternative for you.
Just be a Pro member in exchange for a $60 yearly subscription fee, and your monthly bill will be on a pay-as-you-go system with zero limitation on leads or contacts.
Furthermore, MailBluster has fewer pricing options, which are very easy to follow. Needless to say, MailBluster offers superb, affordable pricing that is significantly less than Zoho Campaigns pricing. It will be more apparent to you in the next section.
Pricing Chart: Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster costs
Now, let me show you some pricing estimates! Remember, MailBluster costs only $0.6 per month for every 1000 outgoing emails. The given estimation is based on Zoho Campaigns’s lowest pricing plan, Standard, and MailBluster’s only paid plan, Pro.
Here, assuming you’re sending each email to each contact/lead in one campaign. This means that, suppose, in a single email campaign, you send 5000 emails to 5000 contacts. This way, estimating a pricing chart.
| Monthly email sends | Zoho Campaigns costs | MailBluster costs |
|---|---|---|
| 5000 | $31 | $3 |
| 10,000 | $49 | $6 |
| 30,000 | $97 | $18 |
| 50,000 | $138 | $30 |
As you can see from the given pricing chart, all these estimations for pricing prove that MailBluster will cost you too much less than Zoho Campaigns. So, regarding Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster pricing, MailBluster is undoubtedly the winner!
Verdict
Overall, MailBluster becomes the winner in all the comparisons with Zoho Campaigns! It can be a fantastic email marketing companion considering all the essential facts! Therefore, selecting MailBluster as a Zoho Campaigns alternative without a second thought will be the right choice for a great user- and budget-friendly email marketing solution.
Wrap Up
Both Zoho Campaigns and MailBluster are remarkable platforms for email marketing, and you need to choose the one that aligns with your needs. This blog is presented to help those who are looking for a Zoho alternative for budget-friendly and effective email marketing. All the comparisons between Zoho Campaigns vs MailBluster have shown why MailBluster can be the best choice as a Zoho Campaigns alternative. So, if you think the same, don’t delay. Sign up for MailBluster and have thriving email marketing!
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