Category: Email marketing

Klaviyo and Hubspot are two of the most popular marketing automation platforms. Both have features such as email marketing and segmentation, email automation, CRM, SMS campaigns, etc.

However, Klaviyo focuses on e-commerce businesses looking for powerful email marketing automation. On the other hand, HubSpot is a comprehensive platform focused on customer relationship management.

But, each and every business has different needs, and choosing the right email marketing platform is crucial.

Both are well known among marketing automation platforms, let’s find out which one suits you best in our detailed article on Klaviyo vs Hubspot.

What Are They? Klaviyo vs HubSpot:

Klaviyo is an intelligent marketing automation tool that is powered by the user’s customer data. With integrations with platforms like Shopify, WIX, bigcommerce, WooCommerce, etc., it is well known among e-commerce store owners.

It is primarily known for its powerful email automation, segmentation, and analytics features for e-commerce stores.

On the other hand, Hubspot is a platform focused on Customer Relationship Management(CRM).

It is an all-in-one marketing solution designed for small to mid-level businesses, and offers tools such as CRM, lead generation, email marketing, etc.

Pros and Cons: Klaviyo vs Hubspot

Klaviyo Pros:

• Focuses highly on e-commerce store owners. It is known for its deep integration with leading e-commerce platforms such as Shopify, WIX, and WooCommerce.
• Advanced segmentation features help improve the personalization of your customers. It also has an AI segment builder that lets you save a lot of time.
• A most notable feature of Klaviyo is that it offers Benchmarking Data reports of businesses similar to your size.
• Built-in ROI that tracks the revenue you generate directly from your campaigns.

Klaviyo Cons:

• If you are unfamiliar with marketing automation software,  Klaviyo can be a bit complex.
• It has fewer CRM features than HubSpot.

HubSpot Pros:

• It offers not only email marketing tools for your email campaigns but a range of tools, from content marketing to social media marketing, lead generation, etc.
• If you are a beginner, you can easily use HubSpot without worrying about its complexity. It is known for its user-friendly interface.
• It offers free CRM, which is a great starting point for small businesses.
• Has a free forever plan beside their paid plans for basic CRM features.

HubSpot Cons:

• HubSpot has tiered pricing for its various hubs, and the overall sales and marketing promotion also adds to the price, which makes it expensive.
• It’s a CRM-focused platform, which makes it less suitable for businesses solely seeking an e-commerce automation platform.
• Has less in-depth analytics and reporting features than Klaviyo.

Does HubSpot work with Klaviyo?

You can integrate Klaviyo with HubSpot. Then, import your data, such as contacts, segmentation, and tracking engagement from Klaviyo to HubSpot.

Pricing: Klaviyo vs HubSpot

Klaviyo’s pricing is based on the contact numbers in your account. As the number of contacts grows in your list, your pricing increases.

On the other hand, HubSpot’s pricing tiers are determined by the number of features you access. Klaviyo might be more cost-effective if you are focused on email marketing.

Klaviyo pricing

• Free plan: Starts at $0/month. You can send up to 500 emails monthly.
• Email: Starts at $45 per month. Up to 15,000 monthly email sends.
• Email and SMS: Starts at $60 per month. Send up to 1500 emails with 1250 SMS credits monthly.

If you have a small business that is e-commerce-oriented and plan to scale over time, Klaviyo is the more cost-effective solution for you.

Hubspot pricing

Hubspot has different pricing segments for each of its hubs. However, the pricing for the Marketing hubs, which is designed for individuals and small teams, starts at:

• Free Tools: offers basic marketing tools
• Marketing Hub Starter: starts at $15 per month. Offers 1000 marketing contacts. Offers simple marketing automation features.
• Marketing Hub Professional: starts at $800 per month. It Offers 2000 marketing contacts. It also offers various features, from Marketing SMS and omni-channel Marketing automation to A lead-scoring app.

So, although both Klaviyo and HubSpot have tiered pricing, Klaviyo is a more cost-effective solution for users solely looking for an email automation platform.

Side-by-Side Comparison: Klaviyo vs HubSpot

read more: “ActiveCampaign vs Klaviyo“

Marketing Automation: Klaviyo vs HubSpot

Klaviyo has an email marketing automation feature called “flow.” There are also 60+ pre-built flows such as welcome series, abandoned cart, post-purchase, win-back campaign, etc.

However, Klaviyo does not let you set multiple triggers in one flow.

Hubspot, on the other hand, lets you add 250 enrollment triggers in one single workflow. HubSpot provides automation for the entire marketing funnel of a business, from lead generation to email marketing.

CRM Capabilities:

Klaviyo CRM is primarily focused on E-commerce email marketing. Although it has CRM features such as customer segmentation, behavior tracking, and personalized communication, It’s is not a dedicated CRM platform, unlike HubSpot, which is a dedicated CRM platform with its integration with tools such as Linkedin, G Suite, salesforce, etc.

HubSpot also has a free forever plan for CRM. It offers all the basic CRM features you need.

Integration with Other Apps: Klaviyo vs HubSpot

Klaviyo deeply integrates with e-commerce platforms such as Shopify, WooCommerce, and Wix.

This is useful for e-commerce owners looking to enhance their email marketing efforts. It has over 350+ integrations, most of them being e-commerce platforms.

On the other hand, HubSpot has over 1600+ app integrations, including CRM, social media, analytics tools, etc.

HubSpot’s integration covers a wide range of categories, such as:

• Email marketing: Mailchimp, constant contact.
• E-commerce: Shopify, WooCommerce.
• Social Media: LinkedIn, Hootsuite.
• Analytics and reporting: Google Analytics, Databox, etc.

Email forms and templates

Klaviyo has better looking templates than HubSpot. You can make professional looking emails with their pre made templates and email forms, without any coding knowledge. They have over 160+ email templates, 60+ sign-up form templates to choose from. You can also do A/B testing with your forms to see which one doing better.

Hubspot on the other hand, offers fewer and much less appealing email forms and templates than klaviyo.

You might need some design skills to create professional looking email forms.

Landing page builder

Landing page is often the first impression people have of your business. Whether its about engaging your customers to subscribe to your newsletter or making them buy your products, it’s crucial to have a appealing and distraction free landing page.

Klaviyo however, does not have in-built builder for landing pages. Instead, you can use a full sign-up form as landing page or you can create landing pages using third-party tools like Unbounce.

Hubspot on the other hand, have a free landing page builder, You can personalize your landing pages and even set up analytics to see how your landing pages are performing.

Analytics and Reporting

Both Klaviyo and HubSpot offer powerful reporting and analytics.

Klaviyo is more e-commerce oriented. Klavyio provides detailed analytics on email marketing metrics such as CTR, open rates, conversion rates, etc. It also has A/B testing options to give you insights into which one of your email marketing campaigns is doing better.

On the other hand, HubSpot provides all-in-one marketing reports on social media analytics, website traffic, sales performance, customer satisfaction, lead tracking, etc. HubSpot also offers more customizable options in the reporting dashboard than Klaviyo.

Customer Support

Klaviyo’s customer support mostly focuses on email and live chat for users that paid for higher-tier plans. If you are a free user, you can have their customer support through emails for the first 60 days of signing up.

Their chat support is available for users of paid plans only. Response times can vary, but premium users typically get quicker assistance.

HubSpot, on the other hand, have more support options, including phone support and live chat, depending on your plan.

Klaviyo vs HubSpot: Which one is right for YOU?

Whether you choose Klaviyo or hubSpot totally depends on your business’s needs and your marketing strategy.

If you have an e-commerce store and need email marketing automation platform, Klaviyo is the most suitable option.

With Klaviyo’s free plan, you can send up to 500 monthly emails and 150 monthly SMS for free. You also get dynamic product recommendations and high deliverability in your emails.

As your business grows, you can go up the plan and purchase higher plans according to your email marketing needs.

On the other hand, HubSpot is better for people who have marketing needs that go beyond just email marketing.

HubSpot is an all-in-one platform that provides tools for the entire marketing funnel of a business, starting from lead generation to social media marketing, CRM, email marketing, and many more.

And the plans and pricing will increase according to the numbers of features you access instead of the number of emails you send.

This is useful for businesses looking for an all-in-one platform for their marketing funnel. HubSpot is also a CRM-dedicated platform. It has a free forever plan on CRM Features.

So, if you are solely focused on Customer Relationship Management, you might choose Hubspot.

Conclusion

Both Klaviyo and HubSpot offer effective marketing automation features. At the same time, Klaviyo is best suited for small or mid-level businesses that are looking for email marketing solutions on a budget. HubSpot is more CRM oriented. HubSpot offers comprehensive tools that support all the aspects of a customer’s lifecycle. Basically, it provides a wide range of marketing tools beyond just email marketing.

Ultimately, the choice between Klaviyo and HubSpot depends on your business needs, budget, and whether you prioritize e-commerce functionality or an all-in-one solution.

For those still undecided, both platforms offer free trials or free tiers, allowing businesses to explore their features before making a commitment.     

Email marketing competitor analysis can tell you much about your competitor’s marketing strategy.  It can give you insights into their subject lines, email design, email segmentation, product offerings, etc. Whether you are a small or big business owner, knowing what your competitors are doing to stay on top is extremely important. In today’s article, we will share how to check competitor’s email marketing strategies.

1. Identify your competitors

Your first step is to identify the competitors in your niche. You can find them by simply doing keyword research on search engines. Type in the products or services that you sell and write terms like “Email newsletter” or “Email Marketing” to find relevant or similar businesses in your industry. However, you have to outline your niche and targeted audience clearly first.

One drawback is that you may find businesses in your industry but not businesses similar to your size. I mean, is doing anything easy these days?

That is why, There are Email marketing automation tools like “Klaviyo” that gives you benchmark data reports from peer groups and automatically finds businesses that are similar to your size in your industry.

read more: Klaviyo vs ActiveCampaign

2. Figure out which competitors to track

Now that we have identified our email marketing competitors, our 2nd step is to track the exact set of email marketing campaigns we want to monitor.

• Brands who are good at retargeting: Look for the brands that are efficient at retargeting their customers. Figure out the key strategies or the email automation technique they are applying to make their customers come back. By Monitoring their email marketing automation, how they segmented their customers, and how they personalized their email templates or their CTA you can stay updated.
• Brands who have specific funnels for extremely targeted niches: Why? They optimize their marketing funnel in a very specific way that aligns with their audience’s interest, which engages them more. You can analyze how they personalize their email templates, how they make their timing and segmentations, or how they automate their emails. And then optimize your marketing funnels accordingly. What you should look for when monitoring their email marketing funnels is     1. how they send follow-up emails, 2. how they highlight their products and services, and 3.Their personalized landing page templates 4. Their CTA to convert leads into customers.

3. Sign up for their emails

After determining the top competitors, it’s time to check how they manage their email.

You can check your competitor’s email by simply subscribing to their newsletter. Use your email address to sign up for their newsletter. You will find the sign up links on their websites.

This will give you direct access to their email campaigns. However, subscribing to all of the emails manually can be a tiring process if you have a lot of competitors.

There are email marketing tools that sign up to their emails for you like Mailcharts, Moonsend, Panoramata .

Here’s a step-by-step process

1. Create a dedicated email account to find and analyze competitor’s email to avoid cluttering your inbox.
2. Look for your their sign-up links in their newsletter. ( you can easily find them on their websites).
3. Sign up for their emails or newsletter.
4. Use email marketing tools to automate the process if you have a lot of competitors.

What should you look for in your competitor’s emails?

Now that we are done finding and tracking their email, what do we do? You can find and sign up for multiple email campaigns at once, but what’s the point if we don’t know what to look for in their email, right?

Let’s figure out together:

1. What they offer

Look at their special offers, seasonal sales, or discounts. Sometimes, providing more discounts does not make them more engaged.

So you should also notice how they are making their emails more appealing, are they designing their email templates better? What value did they add to make the customers actually click their emails?

Sometimes brands provide articles, how-to-guides, tutorials related to the products or the interests of their targeted audience. Providing helpful contents in your emails like this helps you build authority in the industry.

You should also check how they highlights their contents. Another important thing is to carefully check their time period of their limited time offers. Look at which one of your competitors has the best conversion rate in their limited time offer. Follow them to create a sense of urgency in your customers to buy your products.

2. How they segment their audiences

You can check by simply using competitor analysis tools. Look at how they personalize their email according to the interactions of their customers.

Brands use dynamic product recommendations to suit the needs of their customers according to their previously purchased products, products they liked, and their abandoned carts.

By analyzing what types of customers are getting highly personalized recommendations or how they are personalizing their emails for each segment, you can optimize your own audience segmentation.

This is extremely important because personalized emails tend to increase open rates by 26% and Click-Through-Rates(CTR) by 14% and can drive up to 6x transaction rates than non-personalized emails.

3. Check their branding

Check how they incorporate their email templates with their brands. Analyze how their subject line aligns with their brand.

Did you know that according to statistics, people worldwide receive 316.6 billion emails per day? So, you should check how your competitors are making their emails stand out in customers’ inboxes. Strong branding also improves the deliverability of your email.

Things to notice:

• How consistently they use their brand identity.
• If they use short or long emails. Most of the time people prefer short emails over long paragraphs of you telling them about your products. 66% of people like short emails .
• Analyze how their CTA’s are presented with their brands.
• How did they edit their email template to match their brand aesthetic?

Their are automation tool like “Shopify Email” that automatically incorporate your brand’s logo in your emails for free.

4. What their email looks like

Analyze how your competitors makes their emails visually appealing to customers. Look at the design trends they are using to ensure your emails look modern and up-to-date.

Observe where they place their CTA. Do not forget about User Experience(UX). UX is crucial for engagement. Check how they are including navigation, readability and user-friendliness in their emails.

What does their landing pages look like.

Another important aspect is checking their images. Only providing customers with your products photo sometimes do not make them interested enough to purchase. Check what types of photos they are providing in their emails and how those photos incorporates with their subscriber’s lifestyle.

Also, notice how they make their emails look emotionally compelling. Some examples of emotionally compelling emails might be

• “Don’t Miss Your Exclusive 20% Discount”
• “5 Tips for a Productive Morning Routine“
• “Don’t forget to come back to us.“

5.What Value Do They Provide

Do your competitors provide more than just product offers or coupons? If so then what type of value added content are they offering?

Things that might add value to your customers might be informational resources relevant to their interests, stories of customers from the same community, tips on things that the customers might like or customer loyalty rewards.

Check the type of value they are adding in their emails and try to incorporate them in your own email marketing campaigns.

6.Email Frequency

Check how consistently your competitors emails or their email sending time schedule. Sometimes you might be creating a bad reputation for your brand by sending too much emails too often often leading to the customers feeling overwhelmed. Which also decreases your email deliverability.

I mean we do not want to end up on spam right? Then again you can also loose brand familiarity by not sending consistent enough emails. So, make sure to check their email schedule.

Benchmark your performance

Your last step is to benchmark your performance to your competitors using metrics like open rates, click-through-rates, conversion rates etc. There are tools such as “Klaviyo” that provides you benchmarking data reports on 100 brands that are similar to your size.

speaking of tools, let’s look at some tools that will help you monitor your competitor’s email marketing campaigns.

• Mailcharts: it’s an email intelligence platform that helps you get insights on brands across various industries.
• Sendview: This one is dedicated especially to marketers. It has features to track and monitor your competitors as well as share insights with your team.
• panoramata: a specialized tool for tracking and monitoring your competitor’s email campaigns.

Consider using the Free trials of these tools to find the perfect email automation tool according to you need.

Wrap up

Remember, The goal is to learn from the success of your email marketing competitors not to copying their whole strategy. One tip is put yourself in your Customer’s shoes and analyze which email looks more appealing to you by comparing them side by side. Also look for A/B testing, which means if you notice variations in emails that means your they are doing A/B with their subject line, segmentations and automations.

Ultimately, craft an appealing email marketing strategy for your customers that resonates with your brand identity.

What is a good click rate for email marketing?

A good click-through rate for email marketing is around 2% to 5%, but it can vary across industries. Some high-performing industries can see high CTR that can range from 5% to 10%

80% of small and mid-level business owners agree that email marketing is the most important tool for retaining customers. So, if you are a small business owner or even a beginner in the realm of e-commerce, you might be looking for affordable email marketing solutions.

In this case, both Shopify and Mailchimp are the right options. But is it really?

in this detailed article on Shopify Email vs Mailchimp, you’ll find out which platform is right for you in 2024.

Why Do You Need Email Marketing?

There are 4.48 Billion Email users around the world.

With a number that huge, imagine the customer reach you can gain through email marketing alone. According to Forbes, 64% of small business owners use Email marketing.

Email marketing remains one of the easiest and most effective ways to retain and engage with your customers.

Unlike social media Marketing, where you have to depend on the algorithm to do the marketing, you can send direct emails to your customers. Not to mention, email marketing has proven return on investments(ROI).

So, as much as Email marketing is crucial and easier as a marketing channel, it’s also important to determine the right platform for yourself.

Can I use Mailchimp with Shopify?

Yes, you can use Mailchimp with Shopify. By integrating the two platforms, you can sync your customer data, automate marketing campaigns, and create targeted email lists.

Overview: Shopify Email vs Mailchimp

Shopify Email

Shopify launched its email marketing tool in 2019. Allowing Shopify store owners to seamlessly integrate their email marketing campaigns without having to worry about using third party services.

Shopify is primarily known as an all-in-one ecommerce platform that enables businesses to build and manage their online stores. Beyond its core ecommerce functionalities, They also offer Email marketing—a built-in email marketing solution designed to help merchants reach their customers with targeted campaigns.

Mailchimp

Mailchimp, on the other hand, is a service that is dedicated to Email marketing. Unlike Shopify email, Mailchimp supports a wide range of businesses, not just those in ecommerce. Starting in 2001, It has built itself as a high authority in marketing automation and email marketing platform.

It has powerful automation features and a good selection of advanced features that enable brands to create, send, and track email campaigns efficiently.

Core features comparison: Shopify email vs Mailchimp

Email Builder

Both Shopify Email and Mailchimp offer built-in email builders with simple drag-and-drop features.

Shopify’s email builder is directly integrated with their platform, which makes it easier for Shopify ecommerce store owners to build emails. It’s email builder is designed for beginners who want to create quick, basic email campaigns.

Although they have pre-designed templates they are mostly tailored for e-commerce stores. As, their Email marketing platform is directly integrated with Shopify, it’s easier for Shopify store owners to import details of products (images, prices, descriptions) directly from their store.

However, their email builder has basic customization options. it lacks advanced features like Dynamic content, A/B testing or complex design control.

Mailchimp, on the other hand, has a wide variety of tools with a lot of customization options to build your emails from. offers over 100 pre-designed email templates, including newsletters, promotions, product launches, and more. These templates are also highly customizable.

Unlike Shopify Email, Mailchimp provides dynamic content options, enabling personalized emails based on customer behavior or segmentation. It also includes A/B testing, advanced automation, and deeper analytics.

Email templates:

Shopify offers basic email templates that you can customize for free. It also has branded email templates, which allow you to use your brand logo completely for free. Other than the free part, their email templates lack customization options. It offers a limited selection of templates, typically around 10-15 pre-designed options.

Mailchimp, however, offers 100+ email templates across various industries. They are also highly customizable through a drag-and-drop editor, custom HTML, and CSS.

Content Blocks

Shopify email offers a set of pre-designed content blocks specifically for your ecommerce store in mind. As it is integrated with your ecommerce store, it automatically adds your product information directly from your store.

Its content blocks are also designed in a way that makes sure your email templates matches your store’s branding. You can also add gift card and discount codes from the content blocks.

Mailchimp on the other hand, offers more thorough customizable options in the content blocks. It also has the option to add product recommendation based on the subscribers data, this can be really helpful for targeted email campaign.

You can target different audience with a single email by enabling dynamic content block. It shows personalized product recommendations based on your customers past purchases.

Email Listing

Shopify offers a third-party app named Shopify Forms App integrated to list emails, create forms, and build landing pages.

IT integrates directly with your Shopify store, making it easier to collect and manage customer email address. You can’t really create highly customizable and engaging Email sign up forms with Shopify Forms App though.

Mailchimp, has a built-in list-building feature. Simply navigate to the top bar and click on “List” to access the List management tools. This allows you to easily create, organize, and segment your email lists.

You can import contacts, set up sign-up forms, and manage subscribers.

However, note that, When calculating your monthly price, Mailchimp will count the same email address on 2 completely separate list as 2 subscribers.

Email Automation

Email Marketing automation is one of the most important tool of marketing campaign in the era of everything automated . It reduces your manual labor and lets you focus on other important tasks such as product creation.

Shopify’s email automation includes basic features, which includes Abandoned cart, Abandoned checkout, Welcome subscribers, and some other basic automation flows.

However, if you want more customized workflows, you have to create them manually with their app called “Shopify Flow.” It’s a separate tool available on higher-tier Shopify plans (like Shopify Plus).

Unlike, Mailchimp though, they don’t have pre-built templates for automation flow.

Mailchimp, in contrast, provides more comprehensive and advanced automation capabilities. It has built-in email automation with 70+ pre-built automation flows. You can also customize the flows, allowing you to create complex workflows directly in the platform without manual setup for triggers or actions.

It allows businesses to create complex, multi-step marketing journeys based on a variety of triggers and conditions

In summary, while Shopify Email automation is designed to complement Shopify’s e-commerce functionalities with straightforward automation solutions, Mailchimp offers a more robust, flexible platform ideal for businesses seeking detailed and varied marketing pathways.

Analytics and Reporting

In the realm of analytics and reporting, both Shopify Email and Mailchimp provide tools for tracking and analyzing email campaign performance, although they differ in depth and breadth.

Shopify Email delivers basic analytics that focuses on crucial metrics such as open rates, click-through rates, and conversion tracking—offering a straightforward view tailored to e-commerce businesses looking to understand direct impacts on sales.

Mailchimp, however, goes beyond basic metrics to furnish a comprehensive analytics suite. This includes detailed reports on subscriber behavior, comparative campaign performance, and engagement trends over time.

Its analytics also integrate with other marketing data, allowing for more granular insights into customer journeys and overall marketing strategy efficacy.

A/B testing tools

one of the standout feature that Mailchimp has is it’s A/B testing tools. You can compare the performance of different types of emails and customers. By doing that, you can analyze the emails that are not performing well, and change them accordingly.

For example: If your goal is to Increase the open rate of a promotional email for a seasonal sale. You can test up to 3 subject lines and see which Subject line led to higher open rate.

With their A/B testing tool, you can test up-to 4 variables:  subject line, From name, content, or send time.

Shopify Email on the other hand, does not have built-in A/B testing options. If you want to test different subject lines, email content, or send times, you would need to manually create separate campaigns and compare results, which can be time-consuming and less efficient.

Contact Management and Segmentation

Shopify provides a lot of filtering options when it comes to contact management and segmentation, that allow businesses to categorize their customers effectively. These filters include:

• Amount Spent
• Location
• Customer Account Status
• Customer Added Date
• Customer Email Domain
• Language
• Customer Tags
• Email Events
• Email or SMS Subscription Status
• Last Order Date
• Number of Orders
• Predicted Spend Tier
• Products Purchased

Mailchimp also has various segmentation options. But one advantage their segmentations feature has is that you can add up-to 5 conditions for each segments using “AND” or “OR” operators. Here’s a short list of their segmentation options:

• Demographics: Age, gender, location, and other personal information.
• Behavioral Data: Website activity, past purchasing behavior, and engagement with previous marketing campaigns.
• Psychographics: Interests, lifestyle, and other attitudinal factors that are useful for creating more personalized marketing messages.
• Custom Fields: Custom variables and fields that can be added to the contact list to tailor segmentation to unique business needs.
• Predictive Segmentation: Split audiences based on predicted demographics or purchasing habits, driven by the data Mailchimp gathers and analyzes.
• Engagement Levels: Segments based on how subscribers interact with emails, like opens or clicks, which helps in targeting the most engaged users.

Pricing Comparison: Shopify Email vs Mailchimp

This table outlines the key differences in pricing between Shopify Email and Mailchimp, allowing businesses to evaluate which platform best suits their email marketing needs.

In case of pricing, Mailchimp has the issue of subscribers appearing on multiple audience lists being double-counted, which leads to higher prices.

Which one is more cost-effective?

If you’re using Shopify and only need simple email campaigns, Shopify Email is more cost-effective due to its free 500 emails per month and low cost. However, if you need advanced advanced features (like A/B testing, deep segmentation, and automation), Mailchimp might be more cost-effective in the long term.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Shopify and Mailchimp both offer valuable email marketing solutions, but they cater to distinct needs within the business landscape. Shopify Email is a natural choice for those already operating an e-commerce store on Shopify, as it provides a seamless, integrated experience tailored to that environment.

Mailchimp, with its extensive range of features and ability to support a broader scope of business types, is ideal for those who require advanced email marketing capabilities and are willing to integrate with external platforms.

Ultimately, the choice between Shopify and Mailchimp depends on your business objectives, the complexity of your email marketing needs, and whether you prioritize seamless integration within the Shopify ecosystem or require more advanced marketing functionalities. Consider signing up for a free trial or exploring each platform’s offerings to see which aligns best with your business goals.

Whether you are a small business owner or an e-commerce store owner, email marketing is one of the most convenient options for automation. According to Forbes, 81% of businesses use Email marketing as part of their content marketing strategy.

With features like Abandoned cart reminders, dynamic product recommendations, Marketing automation, etc., email marketing has become a go-to solution for all kinds of businesses.

In the world of Email marketing, Klaviyo and ActiveCampaign are two of the major marketing automation companies.

So, let’s explore our detailed article on Klaviyo vs. ActiveCampaign to find the right email marketing tool for you.

Introduction: ActiveCampaign vs Klaviyo

klaviyo

In 2024, 151,000 brands use Klaviyo as an Email and Marketing Automation platform. It was founded in 2012 by Andrew Bialecki and Ed Hallen. $100B+ revenue was earned by the users of Klaviyo. So you get the idea of how popular it actually is .

Klaviyo offers features like benchmark data for you to stay on top, dynamic product recommendation, Mobile push notification to keep customers engaged.

One thing we like the most about Klaviyo is its Benchmark Data feature, which helps you get insights on businesses similar to your size.

ActiveCampaign on the other hand excels in advanced automation features .ActiveCampaign was founded in 2003 by Jason VandeBoom. And ranks #2 when it comes to revenue behind campaign monitor. ActiveCampaign’s standout feature is it’s marketing automation, in which they claim to rank in #1.

Is Klaviyo Good for Small Business?

Klaviyo is well suited for small business in particular, especially those in e-commerce. Its free plan of up-to 500 emails allows smalls business to get features of email marketing without investments. It also offers strong reporting for small to mid sized businesses.

So if you were to choose between ActiveCampaign vs klaviyo, which one would you choose? To find out lets get into the key differences.

Short Summary: ActiveCampaign vs Klaviyo

Sales and Email Automation

ActiveCampaign has readymade email automation templates called “Automation recipe,” which allow you to select triggers for sales and CRM, e-commerce, email, messages, and even web properties. You can also select multiple triggers for one email.

Klaviyo however, has limited automation options and can only have a single trigger. As Klaviyo ispecializes in E-commerce, they only offer automation for e-commerce emails. Klaviyo calls their automation feature “Flow” where you can only select one trigger per email.

Although, Klaviyo’s Email automation is easier to use. The winner is undoubtedly ActiveCampaign with it’s advanced automation features. You can even create custom email automation template.

Email Templates

ActiveCampaign offers 250 Email templates which are fully customizable. That’s because they go beyond just e-commerce and offers readymade email templates to carious business types and industries. You can also create custom email template from the scratch by using custom html code.

Klaviyo, on the other hand, only has 160+ email templates. You can customize them through custom html code or the drag-and-drop editor. Klaviyo’s email templates are easier to use with its user-friendly interface.

However, the thing we like the most about Klaviyo’s email template builder is that it has a dynamic product recommendation option.

You can easily select the dynamic product recommendations option through its email templates by adding a product block. Klaviyo will then recommend products through emails to customers based on

• Their recently viewed product
• items added to their carts or abandoned cart
• products they might like            

Although, ActiveCampaign offers wider range of email templates for suite businesses. Klaviyo’s personalized product recommendation feature built in it’s template makes it more efficient. especially for ecommerce store owners.

Email Forms and Landing Pages

When it comes to capturing leads and engaging potential customers, both Klaviyo and ActiveCampaign offer robust solutions via their email forms and landing pages, though each platform has its unique strengths.

Klaviyo provides offers easy to create customizable sign up forms where you don’t need any technical knowledge. In terms of landing page however, they don’t have any landing page template to make the landing page more engaging.

ActiveCampaign, on the other hand, has various landing page templates to make the landing pages more engaging. They have 55+ landing page templates to choose from.

In summary, while klaviyo offers easy to create email forms. ActiveCampaign offers various landing page templates to create appealing landing page for your subscribers making it more effective for lead capturing.

Read more: Getresponse comparison

Reporting and Analytics

ActiveCampaign reporting goes beyond just e-commerce. It provides reports on open rates, click through rates(CTR), automation reports, email campaign reports, revenue reports etc.

As Klaviyo is specifically focused on ecommerce, It excels in detailed e-commerce data reports. You can gain insights on revenue per recipient and most importantly you can get benchmarking data. The benchmarking data report collects data from 100 businesses that are similar to yours.

ActiveCampaign offers a various range of reporting but if your requirements are more E-commerce oriented you should go for Klaviyo.

Segmentation

Klaviyo’s segmentation isn’t really user friendly or easy to understand. However they provide default user segmentation that segments user based on their time of subscribing.

They can be new users or users that subscribed within the last 30/60/90 days. You can also segment your customers based on the types of products they added to the cart or the products they viewed.

On the other hand, ActiveCampaign offers more segmentation options than Klaviyo. ActiveCampaign’s segmentation is integrated with its CRM, which allows you to create highly nuanced segments.

This includes email engagement, site visits, and even customized fields within the CRM. ActiveCampaign has up to 20 conditions that you ca select to create segmentation.

Pricing Plans ActiveCampaign vs Klaviyo

ActiveCampaign provides several pricing tiers:

• Lite: Starts at $15 per month, includes basic marketing automation and CRM functions for up to 500 contacts.
• Plus: starts at $49 per month, includes additional CRM features like landing pages, contact scoring, and deep data integrations.
• Pro: starts at $79 per month, this plan offers enhanced automation capabilities, predictive sending, and customer attribution reporting.
• Enterprise: starts at $145 per month, featuring custom domains, a dedicated account representative, and advanced reporting.

Klaviyo, meanwhile, offers pricing aligned more closely with e-commerce needs:

• Offers a free plan with 500 monthly email sends.
• Email: starts at $45 per month with 15,000 monthly email sends, includes Mobile push notification and personalization options.
• Email and SMS: $60 per month with 15,000 emails and 1250 max messages sent via SMS.

because AcitiveCampaign offers features to wider range of industry it seems more expensive than Klaviyo. If your goals are more E-commerce oriented, Klaviyo is the more cost effective solution for you.

Integration

ActiveCampaign has integration with over 960+ apps. CRM, transactional, E-commerce You name it. ActiveCampaign has every types of integration you may need for your business.

Klaviyo excels in integration with E-commerce platforms such as Shopify, Magento, and WooCommerce.

Pros and Cons of ActiveCampaign and Klaviyo

Klaviyo

Pros:

• E-commerce Focused
• Dynamic Product Recommendations
• Customizable Email Forms
• Has a free plan

Cons:

• Limited Landing Page Templates
• Complex Segmentation

ActiveCampaign

Pros:

• Extensive Integration
• Advanced Segmentation and CRM Integration
• Comprehensive Reporting

Cons:

• Higher Pricing
• Overwhelming Features

Ultimately, choosing between Klaviyo and ActiveCampaign depends on your specific requirements. If you are looking for more extensive features or tools that go beyond just e-commerce, you should choose ActiveCampaign. On the other hand, If you only require features for your e-commerce site, Klaviyo is a more cost-effective solution for you.

FAQ

Why is Klaviyo so popular?

Due to the easy integration with shopify , shopify users mostly uses klaviyo which makes it more popular in the realm of e-commerce. Their popularity also comes from their strong integration with other e-commerce platforms such as WooCommerce

Is ActiveCampaign a CRM?

Yes, ActiveCampaign is a CRM( Customer Relationship Platform)that combines email marketing, automation, sales automation, and CRM features. This allows businesses to manage customer interactions, track leads, and streamline communication, making it a comprehensive tool for marketing and sales teams.