The Best Email Marketing Services of 2023

HubSpot is known as one of the most comprehensive marketing tool suites available, delivering stellar service through its “hub” systems. You can choose from the sales, customer service, content management system (CMS), or marketing hubs, onboarding at your current pace of scale and growth.

HubSpot CRM is a competitive tool of choice if you have the resources and time to complete the extensive onboarding process.

The design of the HubSpot tool suite is to give business owners the most comprehensive options possible to effectively manage their businesses. While this does give you near-unlimited benefits, the learning curve is far larger than other platforms – requiring a greater upfront use of your resources and time. That said, many e-commerce brands choose HubSpot for their marketing and operational management tasks.

The Marketing Hub strategically offers access to just a few elements of business, such as ad, email, landing page, and social support. While you can integrate with other tools (such as the CMS and sales tools) to enhance the user experience, the simplified structure of the site allows you to go deeper and fine-tune your processes. You can also enjoy the easy-to-use native site composer tool, in-depth automation suite, and sleek template library.

Who is HubSpot CRM best for?

I found the HubSpot Marketing Hub is most appropriate for rapidly scaling midsize businesses and established enterprises that have the time and resources to fully embrace the integration and onboarding process. While smaller brands can also benefit from the tool, cost and time spent may be a barrier to fully enjoying the spectrum of the HubSpot Marketing Hub’s benefits.

Recent upgrades to HubSpot CRM

HubSpot releases multiple additions and upgrades per month, conveniently tracking them in its blog’s Releases and Updates section. Most recently, we saw the addition of HubSpot Calls for iOS and Android devices, localized App Marketplace connections, and HubSpot payments added via an activity timeline format in the CRM area of the HubSpot suite.

HubSpot pricing

You can choose from Starter, Professional, or Enterprise plans, and will be assigned a membership tier based on the number of marketing contacts you have. I recommend the Starter plan for rapidly scaling businesses, as you’ll get most of the benefits for a fraction of the price.

GetResponse, a well-known e-commerce digital marketing tool suite, is a favorite pick with brand giants like Ikea, Revolut, and the University of Nottingham. If you’re looking for visually-driven newsletter support and advanced send tools, it is the right tool for you.

GetResponse, like many platforms on this list, offers a full suite of e-commerce business marketing support. But its auxiliary tools outside email marketing support are more sales-oriented, such as the added funnels functionality.

I was pleasantly surprised at how much service and support I had through the onboarding process. While the platform is simple, you can go the extra mile and really customize your experience, inputting whatever area of business you want to focus on first. It felt comparable to concierge support. Because of this, I feel confident the service would provide smaller brands and services (or e-commerce leaders who aren’t familiar with email marketing management) with the assistance they need to make their experience successful.

In addition, I found e-commerce business owners would benefit from the site’s form and pop-up functionality, extensive newsletter creation and support services, and CRM for streamlined record management, list hygiene, and segmentation.

Finding a tool with embedded list of hygiene tools was a pleasant surprise. It’s an invaluable element of your email marketing strategy, helping make your outreach attempts as efficient as possible.

GetResponse included features such as contact import/deletion en masse, duplicate record management, and inactivity flags to help you take care of this task easily. It also offered blocklisting rule functionality to assist you in doing so on a more automated basis.

Who is GetResponse best for?

GetResponse would be a fantastic tool of choice for brands looking for a full en-suite of tools, as well as an email marketing platform. I could see SMBs getting the most use from the tool, as large-scale brands may be wanting additional features and support based on their unique business needs.

Recent upgrades to GetResponse

GetResponse doesn’t upgrade the platform regularly. But updates seem to be focused around e-commerce brand areas of need, giving you the maximum benefit with every update. The most recent update occurred in May of 2022, an e-commerce marketing automation that offered one-click compatibility and other great add-ons, such as promo codes and transactional email support.

GetResponse pricing

GetResponse features a more nuanced pricing plan than most, offering the option to set up your account and add your credit card later. You can start for free and still have core functionality (such as the website builder, domain connection, and form creation support). Yet, e-commerce brands of any size and scale might be looking for more – in which case I recommend choosing either the Email Marketing or the Marketing Automation plans.

AWeber has been a fixture in the email marketing community for over 20 years, launching during the dawn of email commercialization in 1998. It’s evolved to offer customized email marketing support for e-commerce brands of all sizes.

AWeber offers a fantastic free plan that gives you everything you need to start your email marketing strategy off strong.

The platform has been one of the longest-standing email marketing tools and has adapted to the needs of modern-day e-commerce business owners. While the user experience is slightly less streamlined than other tools in the space, I believe AWeber makes up for it. The company offers interesting AI-supported tools (such as the Smart Composer, pulling inspiration from your site into the design of every broadcast), and its extensive integration library.

Customer support within the AWeber interface is more competitive than other tools I experimented with. I connected with a customer service representative in seconds – and had the option to reach out via phone (during business hours) or email (on a 24/7 basis). The platform’s other strongest selling points were its blog broadcast functionality, advanced social CRM support, and list optimization options to help you organize every group of customers.

Who is AWeber best for?

AWeber is a strong tool of choice for rapidly growing small-to-medium businesses that don’t mind a less modern interface as they refine their email marketing strategy.

Recent upgrades to AWeber

AWeber isn’t as frequently updated compared to other tools in the space, offering published updates biannually in the Blog Updates section of the site. However, the changes it makes are always geared toward user experience and inclusivity, the most recent of which were Google Analytics 4 Tracking for site landing pages and adding social icons in emails.

AWeber pricing

AWeber’s pricing is competitive for what it offers, albeit not that straightforward. If you’re considering upgrading, I recommend going to the Price tab and determining your average monthly price (determined by subscriber count).

Constant Contact was one of the first platforms available in the email marketing space, helping business owners connect with their clients since 1995. Since then, the company has scaled and adapted to the needs of the modern-day business environment exponentially.

Constant Contact is affordable, easy to use, and packed with social media and email marketing tools to keep you ahead of the curve.

I found the site offers logo creation support, native sign-up form creation, and basic social customer relationship management (CRM) support. These allow you to better track and segment your email marketing contacts for more effective communications.

Its other strong selling points include a dedicated customer support team (available via email and live chat), comprehensive reporting across emails, contacts, e-commerce efforts, and social ad support functionality.

While it may seem like social ads and social media are unrelated to email marketing, this isn’t the case. Having everything managed out of a suite or hub like Constant Contact allows you to easily create a unified marketing presence and experience for your customer base.

Who is Constant Contact best for?

I saw that Constant Contact can benefit e-commerce brands at every level of development. It’s one of the rare tools that I could see all businesses using – from startups to fully-scaled enterprises.

Recent upgrades to Constant Contact

Constant Contact tracks its updates through the handy “What’s New” tab in its Knowledgebase. The last major changes and bug fixes occurred in August of 2022, which included additions such as seasonal templates and SMS contact import options.

Constant Contact pricing

Constant Contact’s pricing is incredibly competitive, especially when you consider the comprehensive nature of the tool. I haven’t encountered a tool with the potential for the return on investment (ROI) you can find with Constant Contact. With plans starting at just $9.99 per month, the platform is as accessible as possible – making this a fantastic option for businesses on a budget and newer e-commerce brands.

Drip is an email marketing tool that’s specifically designed for e-commerce brands looking to grow and scale. The platform is largely built around integrations and specializes in ease of use and segmentation, giving you an incredibly easy email marketing experience.

I was excited to review an email marketing tool made exclusively for e-commerce businesses, especially one as streamlined as Drip.

In my initial assessment, I appreciated the minimalistic design elements and flow of the native interface. Often, email marketing tools can feel clunky or out of date. But with Drip, there was absolutely no learning curve, and help was readily available via the startup tutorial and the chatbox to the bottom right.

Beyond the user experience and sign-on ease, I believe business owners will enjoy its other top selling points. These include the Email Series Blueprint tool for en masse campaign creation, workflow templates for easy automation support, and integrated knowledge base materials to get the most out of your tool use experience.

Who is Drip best for?

Drip is best for those looking to establish their email marketing efforts in a strategic way, and who aren’t afraid to experiment with integrations and automated workflows.

Recent upgrades to Drip

Drip doesn’t have any recent changelogs or updates available in summary form for public consumption.

Drip pricing

Drip’s pricing begins at $39 per month, offering you the ability to grow your list to 2,500 email contacts, unlimited sends, and direct support as you navigate the tool. You can then scale up to the next tier of pricing, determined based on your current number of listed contact records. Calculating your estimated payment per month can be done using the on-site calculation tool.