iContact Versus Constant Contact

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It isn’t a difficult process to send an email. However, it takes a bit more finesse to create, send and then track the different types of targeted emails your business needs to drive customers to action and to generate real sales. Because iContact is web-based software, it is an attractive option for small businesses as well as large senders. It is an easy-to-use method for businesses to manage all aspects of their newsletter and email marketing programs.

How Does iContact Work?

iContact is a powerful software platform for email marketing. It is a great fit for most businesses, educational institutions and nonprofits. The easy-to-understand technology lets users with a variety of technical skill levels comfortably use the software to create persuasive email messages.

iContact pricing is reasonable when compared to comparable services. It offers a wide range of prices, from very low to high-end that are customizable to meet the volume of email traffic your business is generating. The amount of analytical data the service provides is arguably in the top ranks for email marketing services.

With the emphasis placed on social media interfacing in today’s email marketing services, iContact’s excellent social media marketing tools are top notch. The tools allow for integration right into the campaign design process.

You can set your system to automatically post to your Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn accounts. Enabling this feature in iContact allows your customers to easily share your campaigns with friends and across social networks. You can then use your iContact social media tracking tools to record how many people are interacting with your campaigns as word of your business spreads.

What Makes iContact Stand Out?

iContact lets users create emails and newsletter using either templates or HTML. It offers a variety of advanced solutions that can help in growing any business or nonprofit. Most email service programs offer tools to help keep growing email lists under control, but iContact’s SpamCheck™ tools reviews each message to make certain it will reach its target destination.

iContact offers a variety of reports that can help users to better understand how their email lists are performing. They can review reports generated automatically by iContact using data it collects from your business’s ongoing marketing campaigns.

With iContact Pro, any size business can reimagine the way they do marketing automation. Users of iContact Pro can schedule triggered messages which have been uniquely tailored to target the needs of each contact.

iContact’s drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to use. If your business engages in a high volume of email sending, you can take advantage of iContact’s capability to easily manage subscribers numbering 5 million or more.

Common Reviews of iContact

One of the more frequently cited positives mentioned in review of iContact is its ability to make creating and tracking email campaigns an easy undertaking. The customer support provided by iContact is also frequently mentioned as a positive aspect of the product.

Many brag on iContact’s ability to sort contacts into different groups. This feature helps in targeting specific audiences with customized messaging. The reports generated from tracking email are another often mentioned plus to this software. The ability to track which customers opened the emails, how many and who has forwarded the email, and data showing who did not open the email is a great asset to any business.

iContact is a capable software package for your business if you want to know if your targeted audiences value your messages. An additional bonus is the ability to resend a previous message, negating the need to recreate a message from scratch.

There have been negative comments made in reviews about the inability of customers to cancel the service. This problem seems validated by reports filed with the Better Business Bureau that point to difficulties in cancellation. All of these complaints, however, are now resolved.

Others have complained that the image editor doesn’t offer a selection of images, either free or through a subscription service. Other describe the editor as “rudimentary.” However, iContact allows importing of images from other programs such as Photoshop.

Is iContact for me?

If you are looking for a powerful tool to tackle the email marketing aspects of your business, iContact is certainly worth a serious look. Its easy-to-use format makes it perfect for small businesses or nonprofits that lack an in-house information technology department. There is an abundance of support options available on the website and through contact with customer service if needed.

As a small to medium business or nonprofit, you should be able to use the internet to your advantage. Email marketing campaign services is just one of the tools that can help your business move to the next level.

iContact is one of the better services available. By offering ease of use, reliable message deliverability and SalesForce integration as part of its package, it ranks as one of the better choices out there for any business looking to grow.

About the Author

Jeff Hindenach

Jeff Hindenach is the co-founder of Versus Reviews. He graduated from Bowling Green State University with a Bachelor's Degree in Journalism. He has a long history of journalism, with a background writing for newspapers such as the San Jose Mercury News and San Francisco Examiner, as well as writing for The Huffington Post, New York Times, Business Insider, CNBC, Newsday and The Street. He believes in giving readers the tools they need to get out of debt.

Constant Contact is one of the top-rated email marketing solutions and it is a ranking that is well deserved. The attention to detail that Constant Contact offers sets it above most of its competitors. Constant Contact provides email marketing software and services to a client base of over half a million users.

Its option for event registration and its contact list management options are some of the best features available. Constant Contact offers unique tools and a truly helpful support system that help shorten the learning curve for this software system.

Constant Contact provides detailed reports on rate of emails opened and forwarded, number of clicks and bounces. It creates reports that detail number of unsubscribes as well as the top performing links. There’s also a spam report.

Constant Contact’s reports are also integrated with Google Analytics. This allows for monitoring of readers’ traffic as a result of your email campaign.

How Does Constant Contact Work?

Constant Contact is an easy-to-use application but some of the tools may present some difficulties. Trying to import old email campaign materials into the software to edit and refresh for another release can be a bit tricky. But there are help options available to deal with these sticking points.

Some of the most helpful tools are the image-editing ones. You get the option to edit the saturation of an image or change the contrast. You can add a frame or not. These features eliminate the need to pay for other software to edit images.

What Makes Constant Contact Stand Out?

One of Constant Contact’s exceptional features is its event hosting tools. Constant Contact makes managing everything you need for the event easy, quick and organized. The email marketing service will create a separate email list of registrants for you. This allows you to contact them whenever necessary.

You can also include a link to accept PayPal payments for your event through Constant Contact.

As one of the most versatile email marketing services available, Constant Contact extends past its competitors by embracing surveys, deals, event marketing and social media opportunities.

Common Reviews of Constant Contact

Constant Contact enjoys descriptive terms such as “solid tool” and is frequently recommended for small businesses new to the email marketing world. Constant Contact is a good starting tool.

Email marketers and businesses that have already amassed an email contact list find Constant Contact to be a great option for their needs. Its ability to pull contact lists together and compile them into one organized, customized list is one of its favorite offerings.

Reviewers who use online customer management services like Salesforce tout Constant Contact as one of the best collections of email marketing management tools on the market. You can simply upload a spreadsheet or text file for automatic processing through Constant Contact’s management interface.

Constant Contact users sing the praises of the company’s customer support staff in online review forums. The main options praised as positives are the ease of navigation through the system and the easy-to-use organizing and sorting tools to manage contact lists.

In many reviews, the ready availability of helpful resources is frequently cited as a major positive for Constant Contact. The free workshops are a popular feature that allows users to also make connections with local consultants and advisers.

Is Constant Contact for Me?

Constant Contact is a great fit for companies or individuals who are looking for additional features that many of the other email marketing services don’t offer. Features such as great templates, multilingual templates, email archiving and premium image hosting are an extra plus offered by Constant Contact users.

Constant Contact has more of a “professional” feel to its templates and finished creations than many of its competitors. Constant Contact is a great choice for anyone planning newsletter or email marketing campaigns.

About the Author

Jeff Hindenach

Jeff Hindenach is the co-founder of Versus Reviews. He graduated from Bowling Green State University with a Bachelor's Degree in Journalism. He has a long history of journalism, with a background writing for newspapers such as the San Jose Mercury News and San Francisco Examiner, as well as writing for The Huffington Post, New York Times, Business Insider, CNBC, Newsday and The Street. He believes in giving readers the tools they need to get out of debt.