If you’re comparing Constant Contact vs. Mailchimp, feature by feature, you’re probably doing it wrong.
See… features are crucial, but if you don’t consider all of the factors, you’ll likely make a half-informed decision that could end up expensive for your business.
That’s why we’ve decided to make an in-depth comparison that covers all the factors we would like to see in other Constant Contact vs. Mailchimp articles.
The winner of this duel will be decided based on the following criteria:
- UX and UI design – Which tool provides a better user experience?
- Template, landing pages, and form builder – Which tool has better pre-built email designs, and how easy is it to customize existing templates, landing pages, and forms?
- Unique features – Which tool includes extended features to help you achieve your goals faster?
- Price – Which tool offers the best deal for the lowest price?
- Customer support – Who’s customer support service has your back when things get knotty?
And, to put the cherry on top, we will compare Constant Contact and Mailchimp with GetResponse to analyze the features and decide who has the best email marketing tool recipe for a successful campaign.
Excited? Well, we are.
Short on time? No worries – we’ll quickly summarize key points so you can make a quick decision if you so choose to.
TL;DR
Go with Mailchimp if:
- Your SMB has a small list and needs a solid email-sending service
- Your advertising company requires frequent integrations with external apps.
- Your software company needs a simple CRM solution.
- Your online business needs an email marketing tool that promotes lifetime value for assigned customers.
Go with Constant Contact if:
- Your SMB depends on social media integrations.
- Your start-up needs an intuitive yet personalizable email marketing solution.
- If you are running a non-profit organization and need a special discount.
(Note: GetResponse supports non-profit organizations by offering up to 50% discount on plans available).
Go with GetResponse if:
- Your SMB or large company requires an all-in-one marketing solution to scale and grow.
- Your online business requires a cost-effective email marketing platform with an extensive range of features and capabilities.
- You are an entrepreneur looking for an inbound marketing solution.
- You are a coach looking for a webinar hosting platform. With GetResponse, your webinars are automatically added to your templates, landing pages, and lists. In addition, automated follow-up messages will be sent to all participants.
Start a free GetResponse account. No credit card required.
If you are in a rush, take a quick look at a feature comparison table for these three email marketing tools.
| Evaluations | Mailchimp | Constant Contact | GetResponse |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ease of use | 4.5 | 4.5 | 4.8 |
| Features | 4 | 4 | 5 |
| Customer support | 4.3 | 3 | 5 |
| Ability to make a perfect sales funnel | 4 | 4 | 5 |
| Pricing | 3 | 3 | 5 |
| Total score | 3.96/5 | 3.7/5 | 4.96/5 |
| Pricing | Mailchimp | Constant Contact | GetResponse |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard plan | $45/mo for 2500 contacts | $50/mo for 2500 contacts | $15/mo for 1000 contacts |
| Medium plan | $60/mo for 2500 contacts | $75/mo for 2500 contacts | $49/mo for 1000 contacts |
| Pro plan | $350 for 10000 contacts | $150/mo for 2500 contacts | $99/mo for 1000 contacts |
| 25.000 contacts in the middle package | $310 | $310 | $179/mo |
| Feature | Mailchimp | Constant Contact | GetResponse |
|---|---|---|---|
| Email marketing | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Autoresponder | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ |
| Transactional emails | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Landing pages | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Popups | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Push notifications | ❌ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Webinars | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ |
| Marketing automation | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Chats | ❌ | ✅ | ✅ |
See how Mailchimp compares to other email marketing platforms:
GetResponse vs. Mailchimp comparison
AWeber vs. GetResponse vs. Mailchimp
Mailchimp vs. ConvertKit
GetResponse vs. Constant Contact: Detailed Tool Comparison
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp overview (and filling the gaps with GetResponse)
Constant Contact
Constant Contact is an email marketing platform founded in 1995 to help SMB’s, entrepreneurs, and non-profits reach audiences and promote their products and services.
What we like about Constant Contact
- Extensive template library – Constant Contact’s drag-and-drop editor allows for intuitive customization and 400+ pre-built templates to choose from. In addition, Constant Contact’s editor features Google fonts, social media links, logos, and PDF file uploads. It’s pretty sweet.
- Elegant UI and UX design – Constant Contact is a beginner-friendly platform. Its sleek design and simple drag-and-drop editor are perfect for email marketers regardless of their prior experience with building email campaigns.
- Facebook integrations – Constant Contact allows Facebook Ads to collect prospects’ data directly from Facebook newsfeed and mobile ads. This feature is an excellent option for keeping your customer acquisition costs low.
- Expert help – Constant Contact’s expert designer or marketer will work with you on your first email marketing campaign once you sign up.
What we don’t like about Constant Contact
- Limited A/B testing – Constant Contact allows testing on only two subject lines at once. Adding to the time consumption, a better-rated subject line has to be manually sent to the list.
Note: GetResponse offers two different testing tools. A simple A/B email testing tool for five subject lines and a more advanced Splitter tool as a part of the Marketing Automation builder.
- Email Automations are available in the Plus plan – if you purchase the Plus plan with Constant Contact, you will be able to automate your emails with basic triggers, such as click-through rates, special occasions, and adding new contacts.
Note: GetResponse drag and drop automation builder allows set up for, e.g., added contacts, click-through, purchases made, abandoned carts, particular URL visit.
- Free trial requires credit card info – right-of-the-bat requirements for running a free trial with Constant Contact are off-putting. First, you have to select a plan before testing the tool. Then, even with the disclaimer, cancel at any time, personal information and credit card details had to be provided.
Note: GetResponse offers a 100% free account. No credit card needed. You can start your own account here.
Now that we know the pros and cons of Constant Contact let’s see how cost-efficient it is.
Constant Contact pricing
The prices we will present for all three tools will be based on the lists of up to 2500 contacts.
Unfortunately, we couldn’t select a list of 1000 contacts in Constant Contact’s calculator, so we decided on the closest option available.
Now let’s get back to Constant Contact’s prices.
The Lite plan for up to 2500 contacts will cost you $50/mo.
The plan includes essential email marketing, contact management, and list growth features. It doesn’t, however, offer email automation, dynamic content, or integrations with ecommerce platforms like Shopify.
Note: GetResponse price for up to 2500 contacts in the email marketing package is $25/mo.
If you want to go beyond the essentials, you’ll have to go for their Standard plan. For up to 2500 contacts, it costs $75/mo and offers many more features, including email automation, paid ads, and integrations with ecommerce tools.
Note: GetResponse Marketing automation plan for up to 2500 contacts is $59/mo. This plan includes automation builder, webinars, sales funnels, unlimited lead funnel, Google and Facebook ads, autoresponders, and everything from the email marketing plan.
Start a free GetResponse account. No credit card required.
Mailchimp – Go-to platform for everyday entrepreneurs
Mailchimp is a renowned email marketing platform. Its Free plan is a convenient starting point for marketers to create and build email campaigns.
You probably already know much about Mailchimp, so let’s focus on the pros and cons.
What we like about Mailchimp
- Mailing list setup – Creating a new list or importing an existing list is effortless with Mailchimp. This is not an exclusive feature, but for those who are looking for an email sending platform only and are currently not in need of the advanced features, it is good to know that mailing list setup is fairly straightforward.
- Effortless email design – Predesigned options are available in the Free plan and are easily customizable.
- Integrations – Mailchimp is one of the best-integrated tools. Integrations with popular social apps are an excellent option for expanding the subscribers’s list. By saying this, please note that integrations are limited in their Free plan.
What we don’t like about Mailchimp
- Your account can suddenly be suspended – If you are getting spam complaints or too many of your contacts unsubscribe, your account can be canceled. And let’s not forget that affiliate links are frowned upon.
- Templates are so démodé – We like the ease of use template builder, but we don’t like the templates’ design (available on the free plan, in particular). It sounds nitpicking, but if you are going to create templates from scratch, you might as well hire a designer – unless this doesn’t fit your budget. Other platforms offer extensive template libraries available to everyone to get you up and running within minutes.
- A limited number of emails you can send each month – Not only are the number of emails limited in general, but Mailchimp limits the number of emails sent per subscriber. For example, in the Basic plan, you can send up to ten emails per subscriber.
- Price – Features offered in lower plans are limited and advanced features are reserved for the premium plan.
As with Constant Contact, here’s what Mailchimp will cost you for up to 2500 email contacts.
We used their calculator for each plan, and here are the results:
First of all, Essentials is a basic email sending plan. Second, with Mailchimp, all advanced features are only available in the Premium plan (for the most part).
If we pay attention to the disclaimer, Mailchimp will charge you for the overages (a special pricing plan) if you exceed any of the strict limits in the number of contacts or emails sent.
The rule applies to all purchased plans.
The Standard plan will cost you $60/mo for up to 2500 contacts, and the Premium plan is $350/mo for up to 10000 contacts.
Mailchimp’s Premium plan finally offers advanced segmentation, multivariate testing, comparative reporting, and phone support.
Is it just us, or someone else noticed that these features are offered in Basic plans with other platforms for a fraction of the cost?
Anyways, as we mentioned before, Mailchimp is not a cost-effective platform, so let’s move on to features comparison.
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp – UX and UI design
It is hard to name the winner In this category. Both are easy to navigate and user-friendly.
As far as the template design goes, we prefer Constant Contact. Their pre-built template options are modern and versatile.
With Mailchimp, your options are to customize pre-built options or create a new template from scratch. If you prefer this method, Mailchimp is a good option.
Note: If none of the above tickles your belly, GetResponse‘s huge modern template library combined with a free image gallery (with an option to download images from Shutterstock) might be a better choice.
The design of your email, popup forms, and landing pages is a make or break for a successful campaign.
Muted colors and overcrowded design of Mailchimp’s pre-built templates might be off-putting.
With Constant Contact, your choices are limited at the moment, although we are sure that they will be implementing more options in the future.
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp – Customer support
Have you tried to cancel your subscription with Constant Contact? Chances are you’ll have to do it over the phone with them, despite their promise of easy cancelation at any time.
They are not available 24/7, but they make a good effort to work throughout the whole week.
Constant Contact offers a chat option, and they are pretty responsive in their Twitter feed – once you get approved to join the group.
Due to the unavailability of 24/7 support, we waited a couple of hours to get approved.
After the approval, we could ask questions and read the tweets. However, if you are experiencing some issues and need an urgent response, Constant Contact is not a great option.
Mailchimp offers 24/7 customer support, but lately, there are more and more complaints regarding their operators’ speed and accuracy. This is understandable; its user base is one of the largest in the world, however for an award-winning email marketing tool in customer support, they need to get back in the saddle.
Note: If you require 24/7 customer support in eight different languages via email and Live Chat with experts, GetResponse is the way to go.
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp – Conversion funnels
Conversion funnels are currently unavailable in Constant Contact.
As for Mailchimp, you can set up automation for abandoned carts in the e-commerce store.
In addition, you can create landing pages and incorporate Google or Facebook ads.
Unfortunately, once you have more than 500 contacts, this feature is no longer available for free.
Note: GetResponse features a complete conversion funnel with included:
- Landing pages
- Facebook Ads
- Instagram Ads
- Sales pages
- Payment processors
- Follow-up/abandoned cart emails
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp – Autoresponders
Autoresponders feature is not currently available with Constant Contact.
This feature is also unavailable in Mailchimp unless you are willing to pay for their Premium plan.
Note: GetResponse features autoresponders for welcoming new subscribers and setting up email courses to nurture your customers. A convenient autoresponder visual calendar will help you space out the emails and organize your campaigns.
Constant Contact vs Mailchimp – Webinars
Webinars are currently unavailable as a feature nor integration with both Constant Contact and Mailchimp.
Note: If you are looking to host webinars, GetResponse’s webinar software allows you to host and invite your subscriber to an interactive event with automated follow-up for participants.
Plenty of webinar templates are available with an option to insert images, sign-up forms, and interactive whiteboards.
Prior to launching a webinar, you will have access to:
- Screen sharing
- Recording
- Chat room
- Q&A session
- An option to have more than one host
If you want your webinars to be included in your email marketing campaign, GetResponse will automatically add this to your preferred location.
Want to dive a little deeper? Check out our guide to Mailchimp alternatives or our article on the best Constant Contact alternatives!
Mailchimp vs Constant Contact vs GetResponse scores
| Evaluations | Mailchimp | Constant Contact | GetResponse |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ease of use | 4.5 | 4.5 | 4.8 |
| Features | 4 | 4 | 5 |
| Customer support | 4.3 | 3 | 5 |
| Ability to make a perfect sales funnel | 4 | 4 | 5 |
| Pricing | 3 | 3 | 5 |
| Total score | 3.96/5 | 3.7/5 | 4.96/5 |
Mailchimp vs Campaign Monitor vs GetResponse. What is the perfect tool for you?
Opt for Constant Contact if:
- You are looking for an OK drag-and-drop template builder.
- You are not pursuing advanced features at the moment and need assistance to build your first campaign.
- You are not currently looking into building sales funnels but like to have this feature available down the road.
Opt for Mailchimp if:
- You need an email sending service only with a drag and drop email builder.
- You are looking for the email marketing tool that features a Free plan to build your audience.
- You are looking for an email marketing tool that is well-integrated with external apps.
Opt for GetResponse if:
- You are looking for a complete email marketing platform, starting with email design and extending to automation and advanced analytics.
- If you are looking to host webinars, live or on-demand.
- If you require 24/7 customer support in languages other than English. Customer support is available in eight languages.
- If you are looking for pre-build pathways for complete sales funnels.
- If you are looking for a cost-effective platform.
Start a free GetResponse account. No credit card required.
Author’s note: This comparison is accurate on November 30, 2023. We do our best to keep it as accurate as possible, and we check it on a regular basis, however, if you want to acquaint yourself with the offer of our competitors, you should check it at their official website or contact their representatives.