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10 Email Service Providers for Small Business

Thursday, December 13th, 2012

Email marketing is an essential component of your small business marketing system. Email Service Providers (ESPs) come in all shapes and sizes. In addition to price, here are a few questions you will want to answer when evaluating ESPs:

How easy is the email creation process? Do they have a variety of templates to choose from? Are templates easy to edit? If I already have a template, can I import it?
How easy is it to import my existing list of contacts? What are the rules for importing, i.e., do I need to make all of my contacts confirm they have opted-in?
What other features are offered (i.e. event marketing)? Do I need those features?
How flexible is the reporting? Can I get all of the information I need?
Do I have other systems that need to integrate with my email marketing system? Does this ESP work with those systems?

Once you have your criteria checklist defined, you can start investigating solutions. Below is a list of 10 popular (there are many others) email service providers for small businesses to help you get started:

aWeber

AWeber’s email marketing tools like professional email signup forms & autoresponder services make it easy for you to build your email list and stay in touch with prospects.

Getting Started – aWeber let’s you create a trial account for $1 for your first month, and $19 on a recurring monthly basis after your trial. Learn more about aWeber

CampaignMonitor

CampaignMonitor is simple to use and provides great reporting.

Getting Started – create your account for free, you only pay when you send emails. Per send and monthly plans are available. Monthly plans start at $9 month. Learn more about CampaignMonitor

Constant Contact

Constant Contact offers email marketing, event marketing, online surveys, and social campaigns along with a robust learning center.

Getting Started – 60 day free trial. Pricing starts at $15/mo. Learn more about Constant Contact

Emma

Emma is famous for their customer service.

Getting Started – 30 day free trial. Pricing starts at $30/mo. Learn more about Emma.

GetResponse

The self proclaimed “World’s Easiest Email Marketing”, GetResponse had everything you need to get started with email marketing.

Getting Started – 30 day free trial. Pricing starts at $15/mo. Learn more about GetResponse.

iContact

Recently purchased by Vocus (the folk who own PRWeb), iContact provides email marketing services for small businesses as well as agencies who support them.

Getting Started – 30 day free trial. Pricing starts at $14/mo. Learn more about iContact.

MailChimp

MailChimp is simple to use, provides great support, and integrates with a ton of other applications.

Getting Started – MailChimp has an incredibly generous free account providing up to 2,000 subscribers and 12,000 emails/month. Paid plans start at $10/mo. Learn more about MailChimp

Mailvu

Mailvu gives you a simple way to create videos and share them via email.

Getting Started – create a send a free video message on their homepage. Monthly pricings starts at $5/mo. Learn more about MailVu.

Swiftpage (Sage eMarketing for Act)

Users of ACT! will want to check out Sage eMarketing (Swiftpage) for it’s tight integration as well as the ability to create drip marketing campaigns.

One note about pricing – while many services quote a price based on emails sent per month, Sage eMarketing quotes messages per day. This is probably due to their drip marketing capabilities, but it also let’s you use scheduling to control your costs.

Getting Started – 60 day free trial. Pricing starts at $15/mo. Learn more about Sage eMarketing

Vertical Response

In addition to your typical email marketing features, VerticalResponse also allows you to send postcards.

Getting Started – 30 day trial period. Pricing starts at $8.50/mo. Learn more about Vertical Response

I have had the opportunity to use several of these services including aWeber, Constant Contact, iContact, MailChimp, MailVu, and Swiftpage (as well as a few others not on this list) so if you have any questions about selecting an email service provider, feel free to contact me.

Comments (1)

Categories : Small Business Marketing

Tags : email marketing, online marketing

5 Questions That Lead to Better Landing Pages

By Bill Brelsford · Comments (0)

Monday, November 5th, 2012

Landing pages are an important tool for small business marketers. A landing page is a web page that allows you to capture a visitor’s information. You can build landing pages that allow visitors to exchange their contact information for your content offers (eBooks, webinars, etc.), or sign up for offers like free trials or demos of your product.

The goal of your landing page is to make a sale – you want visitors to “purchase” your content using their contact information. Here are 5 questions to ask before publishing your landing page that will help you close the deal:

Does your landing page have a clear title and description? Does the layout help visitors quickly recognize the value of your offer and give them a compelling reason to sign up for it?
Is your landing page free of navigation links and other items that distract visitors’ focus on filling out your form?
Do your forms capture the information that you need in order to follow up with and qualify the lead?
Is your form not too long or invasive?
Do you have a mechanism in place that will allow you to track your conversion rates?

Remember that your landing page is not giving something away for free; your landing page is trying to make a sale. Make sure you give your visitors a compelling reason to purchase your offer using the currency of their contact information.

Comments (0)

Categories : Marketing Tools and Software, Small Business Marketing

Tags : online marketing

Marketing Strategy and SEO Best Practices

By Bill Brelsford · Comments (2)

Monday, February 20th, 2012

In Duct Tape Marketing, we often talk about the importance of strategy before tactics. When you start with the right marketing strategy, almost any tactic can work. When small business owners jump straight to implementing tactics without a strategy, they typically end up frustrated by the (lack of) results they receive from the time and money that they spent.

Launching a website used to be viewed as one of those “let’s hurry up and get it done” tactics small businesses rushed into to. Today, some are taking a similar approach to tactics related to social media, mobile marketing and Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Saavy business owners, however, are adopting the point of view that they don’t need a “web strategy” and a “social media marketing strategy” and a “mobile marketing strategy”. The realize they need an overall marketing strategy that takes into account these different ways of communicating with prospects and customers.

When it comes to SEO and your website, Google seems to agree that tactics alone are not enough. Listen to SEOmoz’s Rand Fishkin explain how the “job of SEO has been upgraded from SEO to web strategist” by Google’s Panda update.

As Rand explains, having content and incoming links is no longer enough. The overall user experience is becoming more. As the SEO expert becomes more of a web strategist, her job will be easier if there is an overall marketing strategy has been defined and shared with everyone in the company.

I think the approach that Rand describes fits in very well with our concept of the Marketing Hourglass. The marketing hourglass helps you understand what prompts prospects to look for your solutions and how they go through their decision making process. The more closely you can match your content to the information your ideal customers need to make decisions, the better your site will do in the usage metrics mentioned in the video.

Has your approach to SEO changed since the Panda update? After watching Rand’s explanation, do you think it should (or will) ?

Comments (2)

Categories : Marketing Strategy

Tags : marketing hourglass, online marketing, seo

Google AdWords Express

By Bill Brelsford · Comments (1)

Thursday, February 9th, 2012

Small business marketers have a new option for online advertising with Google’s AdWords Express.

AdWords Express works to make Search Engine Marketing as simple as possible for small business owners. With AdWords Express, you simply set up a monthly budget for your ad, and Google determines what search keywords trigger your ad based on the categories that you select. Just like a regular AdWords account, you’ll only pay for the clicks that your ad actually receives.

If you haven’t already set up a Place Page or Google+ Page, do that first. By creating a Places business listing, you can make sure new customers will be able to find you when searching for the products and services you offer.

When you add AdWords Express, you can advertise your local business on Google and Google Maps (including mobile devices) and attract more visitors to your website, Place Page or Google+ Page. That means that even if you don’t have a website (even though you should) you can still advertise on Google and drive people to your place page.

AdWords Express can be the perfect solution for small businesses who have limited budgets or don’t have the time learn how to set up a classic AdWords campaign.

This table from Google shows some of the main differences between AdWords and AdWords Express:

AdWords Express	AdWords
Designed for Local Businesses	Advertising that can be seen globally
Quick and simple setup	Greater control and advanced features
Automated daily management	Full reporting and tracking tools
Available for customers that don’t have a website	Various display formats possible

Here is a short video overview of AdWords Express

AdWords Express is only available in the US for now. Google plans to roll out AdWords Express to Canada early next year.

Comments (1)

Categories : Local Search Marketing, Marketing

Tags : adwords, adwords express, google, online marketing

Free Online SEO Tools

By Bill Brelsford · Comments (1)

Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008

Last week I pointed out some quick SEO tips for small business owners without a lot of time or inclination to learn about SEO. If you do have time and interest to learn about SEO, check out this article by Ann Smarty where she lists more free online SEO tools than you can shake a stick at (do people still shake sticks?).

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Categories : Marketing, Technology

Tags : online marketing, seo, seo tools, Small Business Marketing, web site marketing