Choosing the right email marketing service for your blog can be daunting and stressful. This review will clear things up for you.
Choosing great email marketing software can be a monumental task.
And it’s super important.
It’s not just about paying for software that sends email for you.
It’s far more than that.
You need an email list because that’s what allows you to connect with your audience. Without one, you can only “hope” visitors come back. Capturing email allows you to hold on to your visitors and connect with them directly.
Email is essential if you want to be a successful blogger.
Your email list is your direct audience… real people who are interested in you and the things that you have to offer. And your email marketing software determines how effectively you communicate and connect with them.
Your email marketing software platform is the backbone of your online business and you should think of them as partners for success.
Ponder that for a moment.
The emails you send to your audience are everything to your success – EVERYTHING! You MUST use email to communicate with your audience to build trust, to make sales, and to get feedback.
Your email list is yours to keep, and that’s how you make sales and survey your audience. It’s how you are going to grow your business.
In addition to sending emails, it is essential that email marketing software…
- Be easy to set up so you can get started quickly
- Be simple to use so you can free up your time
- Have the best deliverability so subscribers actually get their email
- Have responsive support so you’re not alone
What’s the point if you can’t get these things done?
We’re Covering:
- My Experience with Several Popular Email Marketing Services
- Why Email Marketing Means EVERYTHING to Your Success
- The Reasons Why I Love ConvertKit for Email Marketing…
- ConvertKit NAILED IT with their user interface (ease of use)
- ConvertKit hit a HOME RUN with their landing pages
- ConvertKit has the best support and service
- How do I get started with ConvertKit?
- Bonus: Pictorial walk-through to get started
My Experience with Several Popular Email Marketing Services
I have used many popular email marketing services before choosing ConvertKit. Those include:
No, I’m definitely not an email marketing service junkie 🙂
I used some of these services in my own business and I “stepped into” using others in collaborations. Either way, I used them so I know what makes them tick and how they work.
I also learned it’s smart to avoid switching services. Ugh!
Switching sucks! It involves way more than just migrating your list…
It’s a wise idea to start off with the right software. Switching is a boatload of work. In addition to migrating, you’ll also need to redesign your op-in forms, update form links, and redo your landing pages/links. This means all your links… including social media, YouTube, forums, articles directories, etc. And if you miss any, you could lose business.
With all this email software use under my belt, I can tell you about the issues I have experienced. Here they are:
- Poor deliverability – There’s no point if emails aren’t getting read
- Clumsy design – Too much clicking, hard to follow, wasted time
- No landing pages – Not a big issue if you don’t mind paying elsewhere for pages
- Customer Service – Very important but some companies just don’t get it
- Double billing – Same person on two lists? I’m pretty sure all the companies counted subscribers twice before ConvertKit came along
And those were all from the PREMIUM email marketing services. Let’s address the most popular free service: MailChimp
I learned from experience: Nothing is free
It may be acceptable in the beginning, but you still have to start paying when you reach a certain number of subscribers. It’s really just not worth the hassle to switch.
It’s a choice between the free way or the headache-free way.
Businesses that provide free services cannot maintain the level required for success. They just don’t have the incentive or the funding.
Companies like ConvertKit put bloggers first. They constantly improve through feedback from their customers (people like you and me).
You invest in them and they invest in you.
Why Email Marketing Means EVERYTHING to Your Business
Email is the lifeblood of your online business. Literally!
Email in circulation brings value and service to your audience (which develops trust), and comes back with sales and ideas (money and valuable feedback) to you… in the same way blood circulates bringing oxygen to your cells, returning carbon dioxide.
Email is the ecosystem of your business. Without it, you will not likely survive. Email marketing is the driving force behind sales in most blogging businesses today.
According to Forbes, “a whopping 59% of B2B marketers report that email marketing is their most effective channel for generating revenue”. And guess what? Email marketing continues to grow as the most effective way to generate revenue.
So whether you have an email list of 50 or an email list of 50,000 a dependable email service is the most important aspect to the growth and success of your online business.
The Reasons Why I Love ConvertKit for Email Marketing
As I mentioned earlier, I’ve used more email marketing services than I care to think about. I used to dread what should be the simplest tasks like adding a form to my site. I had to find notes that I made so it wouldn’t be so confusing.
It was a chore, but all that changed in September 2016 when I tried ConvertKit.
I started to shed my negative thoughts about email marketing and began to embrace the power I now wield. It was no longer a “necessary evil”.
I’ve come to appreciate this tool and the company behind it. Nathan Barry, the founder, put his soul into creating ConvertKit. Nathan has a talent for design and as a blogger himself, he created the simplest user interface I have seen. Everything just makes so much sense.
It’s tools like this that advance an entire industry.
ConvertKit NAILED IT with their user interface (ease of use)
As I just mentioned, the user interface makes so much sense. It’s easy to see that this software was designed by a blogger.
One of my favorite use features is the way to edit email. I can open an entire sequence at once and click between the emails with a single click. This makes it effortless to edit (and create for that matter). Then I can save it all with a single click.
Look at this screenshot of the email editor…
With every other system I used, I had to open a list, then open a sequence, then open an email. I could not open another email without first closing the other. Hard to see, hard to review, hard to use. Editing was a nightmare.
ConvertKit makes it so easy to create and edit any email sequence. This saves a TON of time, and I am so much more effective as a blogger and content creator.
Some of the best business advice I have ever heard was to focus on what I enjoy doing and don’t fuss with anything else.
The pure simplicity of ConvertKit allows me to focus on what I enjoy.
I enjoy creating content and growing my business, and I have no patience for wasting time figuring out the technical stuff.
ConvertKit is easy to use and intuitive – it just makes sense. There’s nothing else like it on the market. You can easily see what’s going on with your campaigns, broadcasts, and opt-in forms from the dashboard making it simple to see what works and what doesn’t.
Even advanced features are simple to use with ConvertKit. Features like segmenting and tagging allow you to tag and identify subscribers in simple ways. For instance, people who purchase a product can be tagged so future email selling the product won’t go to them. It’s actually pretty simple to use once you understand it.
You may not use these features at first and that’s perfectly okay. But it’s nice to know if you ever wish to use them, they don’t cost extra.
ConvertKit hit a HOME RUN with their Landing Pages
ConvertKit has landing pages, and awesome landing pages, if I may say so myself!
If I sound surprised it’s because I am. When I started using ConvertKit they had two, maybe three landing pages to choose from. They were weak, they took time to configure, and they were limited in flexibility.
So now they come along with all these new landing pages! I knew they were working on adding new and better pages but I had no idea there’d be so many high-quality choices. It’s a good example of how they listen to feedback and make changes. They really hit a “home run” with this.
Look at all the categories…
Landing pages are important for your business because they allow you to collect email and grow your list without inserting a form into a post. Sometimes you want to send people directly to a page so they are not distracted by an article.
You will need landing pages to be successful. And here’s another cool thing: Even if you don’t have a website yet, you can build your list using these landing pages.
Not all email marketing services offer landing pages, and some charge additional fees.
ConvertKit has the Best Service and Support
There’s one more enormous reason I love ConvertKit. And it’s because they really do care about your success. It shows in their top-notch service and support.
ConvertKit puts heaps of money and effort into their customer service to ensure customers like you and me are taken care of. This is huge because you know you’re not in this alone.
Additionally, ConvertKit provides a ton of education to get you to the next level. Their help section provides a vast library of support articles helping you with everything from getting started to advanced email strategies, and beyond. The ConvertKit team is interested in your email marketing success. They know that their success is based on your success.
How do I get started with ConvertKit?
Give ConvertKit a try for an entire month for free and see for yourself. ConvertKit is offering a special month-long trial for my readers through my link (their normal trial is 14 days). That gives you time to get up and running AND to begin building your list. Simply go to scottsmoneymachines.com/convertkit30.
So that’s it. ConvertKit is insanely easy to use, they include awesome landing pages, and have the best service and support in the business. It also has advanced features that you can use when you are ready, so it’s perfect for all users at all levels… even if you are just getting started.
Email marketing is necessary for online success and ConvertKit makes email marketing simple and easy. I love it and I unconditionally recommend ConvertKit for you too.
Again, to test drive it free for 30 days, just visit scottsmoneymachines.com/convertkit30.
Okay, you want a bonus?
I’ll show you how easy it is to test drive ConvertKit
It takes about 30 seconds to open an account (no kidding) and I’ll walk you through it right now… No credit card needed and you get 30 days to play with it. Here are the steps…
Go to the “try it for free” page (use my link if you want 30 days instead of 14). You will be asked if you are moving from another service or if you are just getting started. Click whichever applies to you. For this demo, I’m clicking on “just getting started”…
After clicking, this screen appears asking if you have a website. Choose whatever is appropriate for you. For this demo, I am choosing “yes, I have a website”…
On the next screen it asks what kind of website I have. This question will be skipped if you answered “no” to the above question. The only reason ConverKit asks these questions is to understand your needs to better help you. It does not change the way ConvertKit works, it’s to guide you :). In this demo, I am clicking on “WordPress”…
This is your last step (I told you it only takes 30 seconds!). Just enter your email and a password for your account, tick the terms of service and click the “get started” button…
That’s it, your account is set up and you can begin using ConvertKit. They even provide easy video guidance to understand what your next step is to start building your list. It’s very intuitive and you’re going to like it. Notice in the following screenshot where I show you how many days you have left on your 30-day free trial…
Are you ready for a live test drive? Just visit scottsmoneymachines.com/convertkit30.
If you found this article helpful, may I ask if you can help out by sharing it? It would mean the world to me. Thank you.
And if you have any questions for me, please leave a comment below! I’d love to hear from you!
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