GetResponse is an all-in-one marketing platform which, as well as email marketing, offers landing pages, a CRM and advanced automations, I rank them pretty well. Questions in your mind right now?
What is Getresponse?
Does it have all the features I need for my email marketing?
What’s GetResponse pricing like?
How does GetResponse compare with other leading email marketing solutions, like Aweber and Mailchimp?
What’s the new ‘Conversion Funnel’ feature like?
Is Get response easy to use?
Is Get Response perfect for Beginners?
Let’s dive right in with a basic overview of the product.
What Exactly is GetResponse?
GetResponse is an all-in-one marketing platform which, as well as email marketing, offers landing pages, a CRM and advanced automations. I rank them pretty favorably due to their range of advanced features. Their entry plan is reasonably priced and they offer a generous discount to NGOs.
Getresponse is an email marketing app that allows you to: create a mailing list and capture data onto it
create newsletters that can be sent to the subscribers on your mailing list, automate your emails to subscribers via use of ‘autoresponders’
view and analyse statistics related to your email marketing campaigns — open rate, click through, forwards etc.
Recently however, Getresponse has shifted its emphasis considerably: the product now aims be more of an ‘all-in-one’ marketing solution rather than just an email marketing tool. Accordingly, in addition to email marketing, Getresponse now also provides e-commerce features, webinar hosting, landing pages and automated sales funnels.
Getresponse has been in business since 1998 and, according to the company, over 350,000 individuals and businesses now use the platform for their email marketing. Whilst this userbase is not as big as those for some other email marketing tools (notably Mailchimp), it is large enough to provide confidence that the company is well-established and is not likely to disappear any time soon.
GetResponse claim to be the easiest newsletter tool available, with a tonne of pro features. This is a big claim, especially as their prices are so competitive. The Polish-based company’s global reach extends to 182 countries, and claim to engage over 1 billion subscribers every month! That’s a lot of emails.
Feature-wise, they do boast a lot more than most other email marketing services. From simple A/B testing, to custom landing pages; comprehensive design testing to video email marketing.
Pros of using Getresponse:
So long as you are happy to use a ‘Basic’ plan, Getresponse is way cheaper than many of its key competitors (in certain cases, significantly so) whilst offering just as much, if not more functionality as them. The discounts you receive when paying upfront for one or two years of service are extremely generous — you’ll be hard pressed to find similar discounts from key competitors.
The marketing automation functionality is truly excellent. Getresponse offers a great approach to data segmentation — it’s far more flexible on this front than many competing products, especially Mailchimp.
Getresponse’s webinar functionality is a genuine USP — I haven’t come across this functionality on similar products.
Its ‘Conversion Funnel’ feature is potentially useful for merchants who want to manage all aspects of their sales funnels and e-commerce activity under one roof.
Its reporting features are awesomely comprehensive.
Getresponse is transparent about deliverability rates, publishing figures on its website and providing deliverability statistics for the e-newsletters you send.
Get response pricing:
There are four Getresponse plans:
Basic — starting at $15 per month to send an unlimited number of emails to up to 1,000 subscribers
Plus — starting at $49 per month for up to 1,000 subscribers
Professional — starting at $99 per month for up to 1,000 subscribers
Max — negotiable.
As you add more subscribers to your list, the costs increase. At the top end of the scale, you can expect to pay $450, $499 or $580 per month respectively to host a list with 100,000 subscribers in it on the ‘Basic’, ‘Plus’ and ‘Professional’ plans.
With regard to the “Max” plan, exact pricing depends on requirements and list size — if you’re interested in this plan, you’ll need to contact Getresponse to schedule a demo, discuss your needs and negotiate pricing.
Significant discounts are available if you pay upfront for 12 or 24 months of service (18% and 30% respectively). In addition to the paid plans, a 30-day free trial is also available, which you can access via this link.
Key differences between GetResponse plans
All the Getresponse plans cover the email marketing basics you might expect — core features include:
the ability to import, grow and host a mailing list
a selection of themes to use for your e-newsletters
autoresponder functionality
responsive email designs
split testing
in-depth reporting
RSS / blog to-email functionality
comprehensive segmentation options
social sharing tools
There are a number of differences between the ‘Basic’, ‘Plus’’ and ‘Professional’ plans, but for me the key ones are below:
Automation builder — arguably Getresponse’s standout feature, the automation builder (which allows you to build complex autoresponder sequences based on user behaviour) is available on the ‘Plus’ plan or higher (you can create 5 automations on the plus plan; or an unlimited number on the other plans).
Conversion funnels — Getresponse’s full set of tools and templates for building automated sales funnels become available on the ‘Plus’ plan (limited to 5 funnels).
Webinars — this functionality is not available at all on the ‘Basic’ plan and the number of webinar attendees is capped for the ‘Plus’, ‘Professional’ and ‘Enterprise’ plans at 100, 300 and 500 respectively.
Team management — you can only have one user account on the ‘Basic’ plan; by contrast you get 3 on ‘Plus’, 5 on ‘Professional’ and 10 on ‘Enterprise.’
E-commerce — the abandoned order recovery feature is only available on the ‘Plus’ plan or higher.
How does Getresponse pricing compare to that of its competitors?
So long as you are happy to use one of the entry-level ‘Basic’ plans, the pay-per-month Getresponse plans are on the whole cheaper than those provided by many of its key competitors, particularly if you have a reasonably large number of email addresses on your database.
At the smaller database end of things, Getresponse’s pricing is fairly competitive — you can host a database containing up to 1,000 email addresses for $15 a month with Getresponse, compared to $29 per month on Aweber and Campaign Monitor.
The pricing for Mailchimp’s broadly comparable ‘Standard’ plan is $14.99 per month, which puts it in the same ballpark as Getresponse.
As you go up the pricing ladder, Getresponse remains competitively priced. If you have a mailing list containing between 9,000 and 10,000 records that you wish to send an unlimited number of emails per month to, you’ll find that hosting it on the ‘Basic’ Getresponse plan costs $65 per month.
This works out:
$4 per month cheaper than Aweber
$24 per month cheaper than Campaign Monitor
$34 per month cheaper than Mailchimp (Standard Plan)
The above figures are based on entry level plans for the purposes of the comparison).
The only well-known service I can think of that comes in significantly cheaper is Mad Mimi, which charges $42 per month to host up to 10,000 email addresses. However, Mad Mimi is a pretty basic tool, and the functionality provided by this solution is nowhere near as comprehensive as that provided by Getresponse or the other platforms mentioned above.
Some other things to be aware of on the competitor pricing front:
Some competing providers — notably Mailchimp and Aweber — offer free accounts for users with a small number of records (but these do not offer the full range of features that you get on a paid plan).
Some solutions (Mailchimp again being a prime example) charge you to host both subscribed and unsubscribed contacts, which can become a significant hidden cost. Getresponse only charges you for your active subscribers. (wow! What a great tool.)
If you are prepared to pay upfront for 1 or 2 years, you can avail of substantial discounts with Getresponse that other competitors don’t yet provide.
So the bottom line is that Getresponse is pretty competitive in the pricing department.
But what about GetResponse features?
Getresponse provide all the key stuff you’d expect from an email marketing platform — list hosting, templates, autoresponders, analytics and so on, but as mentioned above, it has recently expanded its feature set to the point where has morphed into an all-in-one marketing and e-commerce solution.
The question is whether all this makes the product a jack of all trades and master of none.
Well Let’s drill down into its key features to find out.
Marketing Automation — GetResponse’s marketing automation feature lets users build scalable workflows based on customer journeys. Action-based autoresponders allow for the creation of messages that are triggered by relevant recipient actions — with personalized one-to-one responses. In addition, GetResponse provides users with advanced segmentation tools that enable them to divide their contacts into subgroups and tailor emails accordingly.
Landing Page Builder — GetResponse has an intuitive drag-and-drop landing page builder that allows users to create 100% responsive landing pages and web forms. Business marketers can build web pages for sales, webinars, thank yous, opt-ins, about-me and downloads in just a few minutes. Moreover, GetResponse lets users test, analyze and optimize their pages to increase conversion rates.
Comprehensive Reporting — GetReponse has robust reporting capabilities. A few simple reports appear directly in the dashboard, offering a brief overview of campaign success via raw numbers and pie chart. The Email Analytics section provides further detail, with line and bar graphs for clicks, unsubscribes, opens, complaints and bounces. Additionally, for every report, users can view which subscribers within their email list performed any given action.
Webinar Integration — The GetResponse webinar platform seamlessly integrates with GetResponse email marketing, allowing users to host product announcements, demos and training sessions. Features include presentation sharing, chat moderation, polls, desktop sharing, attendee management and VoIP capabilities. In addition, GetResponse lets users decide whether their webinar will be password-protected or open to everyone.
GetResponse User-friendliness / interface
On the whole, Getresponse is pretty straightforward to use. Its interface was redesigned recently, and it’s now an uncluttered and intuitive affair.
It’s certainly easy enough to do all the basics in Getresponse: import contacts, create campaigns, set up autoresponders and check statistics. In particular, segment management is excellent.
However, Getresponse’s form designer and landing page creator tools could benefit from a bit of an overhaul — unlike most features of the product, they haven’t been improved much as part of the interface revamp. They are not particularly user-friendly.
In terms of how the Getresponse interface stacks up against those of its competitors, I would argue that Campaign Monitor is a bit more user friendly, and that the Mailchimp interface features a cleaner design. Aweber’s interface probably comes closest in terms of look and feel.
Traditionally, Getresponse’s main usability failing involved its email editor: it was clunky and buggy.
However, the new version of the email creator has improved things considerably — it’s got a cleaner interface, doesn’t crash, and it is easy to use. It’s probably not quite as good as those offered by some competing apps, but it’s perfectly acceptable.
GetResponse Support
The email support provided by Getresponse is available in 8 languages, which is commendable. These are: English, Polish, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, and Portuguese. In terms of the quality of Getresponse support, I’ve not had to use it very often (a good thing) but when I have, I’ve found it to be a bit of a mixed bag (less of a good thing).
Some of the live chat support I’ve received has been excellent, and I haven’t had to wait very long at all to chat with an agent. The 30-day free trial that Getresponse provides is fully functional and unlike some competing products, you don’t have to enter any credit card details to access it. You can start the free trial here Now. https://bit.ly/3jO0Tsx
Getresponse represents one of the more cost-effective ways to host and communicate with an email database — it’s priced competitively in its marketplace. It’s also one of the more interesting products of its kind, in that it provides email marketing, automation, landing pages, e-commerce, sales funnels and webinars all under one roof. It’s hard to think of any competing email marketing solution that offers this ‘all round’ proposition, and its free trial length of 30 days is generous too.
Disclosure: When you click on a link, in some cases I earn a commission from GetResponse with no additional cost to you whatsoever. In fact, I guarantee you get the best price deal and discounts on your chosen plan when you use my link. https://bit.ly/3jO0Tsx
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