The Best Guide to Email Marketing for Small eCommerce Businesses you'll ever find

Looking for eCommerce email marketing tips for small businesses? You've come to the right place.
Emails are a marketing tool that has proven to be a gold mine for businesses that know how to use them optimally. In fact, small business owners on a budget can consider an email marketing solution with a free version and also look at paid versions so they can scale up as their marketing needs grow.

There are various email marketing platforms available to help you scale your small business. Email marketing software can help both big and small businesses plan, organize, automate, and track their internal and customer-facing email campaigns.

What makes a great eCommerce email marketing service? How do you choose an email marketing provider for your business? What other email marketing tools do you need? What really distinguishes most of these email marketing tools from each other?

This article provides answers to these various questions.

Email marketing for ecommerce provides a cost-effective method to reach a wide audience, making it an attractive option for companies of all sizes. It allows for quick communication and direct contact with customers. The right email marketing software is crucial for success, as it ensures email delivery.

A good email marketing software for small businesses should enable you to create highly engaging email newsletters with an easy user interface.

Here are some other features that you need to look out for when you're trying to choose the best eCommerce email marketing software for your small business.

Ease of Use

If you’re running a small business, there are a lot of things you need to pay attention to. You probably don’t have a lot of time to dedicate to learning the ins and outs of a complex new tool. An intuitive platform with a fast, easy-to-use email editor (and ready-to-go templates, preferably) that will optimize your email marketing efforts is your best bet for cutting down the time you spend on building email marketing campaigns.

Solid Deliverability

The spam folder is the last place you want your email to end up in! It defeats the goal of sending those emails in the first place. As you’ll see in our list below, some providers do a good job of avoiding spam filters, while others seem to be a bit more hit-and-miss.

Segmentation

Tools that include features like forms, tagging, and dynamically-generated groups will help you target your campaigns and make sure you only send to relevant subscribers.

Cost/ Fees

Software must be affordable to be accessible to small businesses. We considered whether a tool offered a free version or free trial as well as the overall cost and pricing structure of each platform.

Reporting

It doesn’t have to be super sophisticated (although there are tools that give you deep-level reporting if you really want it). Just something that will help you quickly see the open and click-through rates and get a feel for how your email marketing campaigns are performing.

Customer Reviews

How current customers rate and what they say about a company is one of the best ways to determine whether it’s right for your small business. We considered what customers had to say and how they ranked each company on our list.

Auto-responders and Automation Workflows

Because you don’t want to be manually sending a welcome email every time someone signs up for your service! Automation tools are an essential component of an email marketing strategy for ecommerce, enabling businesses to maintain consistent communication with their customers.

Auto-responders are an absolutely crucial part of small business email marketing (order confirmations, renewal reminders etc.) And if you want to take them to the next level, choose a tool that offers advanced automation, such as web-triggered campaigns and lead scoring.

Extra features

In order to stay ahead of the competition, many email marketing tools have added extra features such as landing page or website builders, live chats, scheduling software, CRM features, sms marketing, and more. As a small business, it might interest you to have all your tools under one roof, so be aware that some email service providers are more comprehensive than others (and that doesn't necessarily mean they're more expensive).

Now let’s take a look at the best email marketing services for small businesses, and how each one delivers against these criteria.

You can use the table above for a quick comparison. Below, we will go into more details on what makes each platform worthwhile.

Constant Contact is one of the largest and fastest-growing email marketing services in the world. It is also the easiest to use and the most beginner-friendly email marketing service. You can easily manage your email lists, contacts, email templates, marketing calendar, and more with it.

A standard account gives you access to unlimited emails, easy tracking and reporting, built-in social media sharing tools, a free image library, list segmentation, Facebook ads integration, and a powerful eCommerce integration for Shopify stores.

Their Email Plus accounts also come with powerful features like email automation, drip campaigns, surveys & polls, coupons, online donations, subject lines, and A/B testing which helps you send targeted emails to maximize your open rate.

Constant Contact offers unmatched customer support with live chat, phone calls, email, community support, and a vast library of helpful resources.

Aside from online training, they also offer physical live seminars across the United States. This allows small business owners to quickly learn the basics of email marketing and start using it to grow their businesses.

Constant Contact offers a 60-day free trial. After that their pricing starts as low as $ 9.99 per month.

SendinBlue is a complete SMS and email marketing tool for businesses. They are one of the fastest-growing email marketing platforms in Europe.

It is an extremely easy-to-use platform with excellent tools to create beautiful and highly engaging emails. Their intuitive drag-and-drop email editor is perfect for beginners with no experience in email marketing.

SendinBlue includes user-friendly marketing automation features that allow you to send transactional emails, create workflows for automatic follow-up emails, and segment users. It can also select the best time to send bulk emails using its AI algorithms to ensure the best email deliverability.

They offer a forever-free plan for unlimited contacts. Their free version lets you send up to 300 emails per day, but all your emails will have their branding.

Their paid plans start from $25 per month. You can also include SMS to your account, but the pricing will vary based on your sending requirements.

Their premium plan has been reviewed to include more advanced features like a landing page builder, live chat, sales CRM, and Facebook and Instagram ads integration. This means users now get more value for the same price.

SendinBlue also offers a separate bulk email marketing service that you can use to run automated or transactional emails from your WordPress website. You do not need this for email marketing campaigns, but it’s a nice feature to have if you have a large website, and you want automatic real-time content-based emails.

HubSpot is among the most well-known software in the CRM and email marketing space. Their email marketing service is free to start, and it comes with a lot of powerful automation features designed to help your business grow.

Because of the native integration with the HubSpot CRM, you can personalize your emails for each subscriber based on things like device type, country, list membership, or any other custom information you might have on the individual subscriber.

HubSpot comes with all the powerful features you’d expect from enterprise-level email marketing software such as send time optimization, high email deliverability, A/B testing, detailed performance analytics, marketing automation, drip campaigns, and more. You can use their easy drag-and-drop email builder and a selection of templates to create a completely custom newsletter that matches your brand’s personality and colors.

They offer an all-in-one marketing platform that includes email campaign creation, CRM, sales tools, an operation hub, and more.

A free account allows you to send 2,000 emails and store an unlimited number of subscribers. You can create custom signup and popup forms, build landing pages, manage and track your online ads, and more. It has all the tools you need to get started. If you need more advanced features, their paid plans start at $45 per month.

Omnisend is a powerful SMS & email marketing service for eCommerce businesses who are looking for an omnichannel marketing automation solution. They offer one of the most generous free email marketing plans because it includes all the powerful features like subscriber segmentation, A/B testing, performance reports, and even SMS notifications.

Their email builder is very easy to use and comes with a large selection of email templates, so you can create beautiful, on-brand campaigns. Once it’s set up, you can personalize the email using its powerful targeting and segmentation features.

Omnisend seamlessly integrates with all the popular website builders and eCommerce platforms like WooCommerce, Shopify, BigCommerce, and more. They also have integration with hundreds of other business tools like live chat software, help desk service, and more.

One of the best things about OmniSend is its pre-built eCommerce marketing automated strategies that are designed to help you drive more revenue. This includes automated emails like welcome email series, cart abandonment emails, cross-sell emails, and more.

What a lot of people love about Omnisend is that they also offer SMS functionality, so you don’t have to pay for separate software. Their SMS features allow you to send messages in two hundred and nine regions across the world.

Their free email marketing plan allows you to contact up to 250 subscribers, and their paid plans start at $16 per month.

When it comes to email marketing, Klaviyo is a game-changer. This feature-rich platform offers much more than just sending out emails—it's all about intelligent, data-driven marketing.

Features of Klaviyo

1. Deep Data Integration: Klaviyo easily syncs with your e-commerce platform, integrating deeply into customer data. This allows you to create personalized, targeted campaigns based on actual customer behavior.
2. Segmentation: With Klaviyo, you can segment your audience like never before. Purchase history, location, engagement levels—you name it, Klaviyo can segment it.
3. Automated Email Series: One-time emails are old news. Klaviyo's advanced automation tools let you create entire email series, guiding your customers through a personalized journey.
4. Performance Reporting: Klaviyo doesn't leave you in the dark. Its detailed analytics give you a clear picture of what's working and what's not, letting you optimize your strategy on the fly.
5. Website Tracking: Klaviyo goes beyond the inbox. By tracking customer behavior on your website, it helps you understand, engage, and convert visitors better.
6. A/B Testing: Want to know what email design works best? With Klaviyo's A/B testing feature, you can experiment and find out with certainty.
7. SMS Marketing: Klaviyo's not just for email. It also allows you to connect with customers through SMS marketing—a powerful tool in the modern marketing arsenal.

Advantages of Klaviyo

1. Personalization: Klaviyo takes personalization to the next level. Tailored emails based on customer behavior increase engagement and conversion rates.
2. Easy to Use: Klaviyo's user-friendly interface makes email marketing a breeze, even for beginners.
3. Scalability: Whether you're a small business or a large enterprise, Klaviyo scales with you. It accommodates growing customer lists and evolving marketing strategies with ease.
4. ROI Tracking: With Klaviyo, you can easily track the return on investment for each campaign. This means you'll always know where your marketing dollars are going.
5. Integration: Klaviyo integrates seamlessly with a wide range of e-commerce platforms, particularly Shopify, CRM systems, and other software. This makes data management hassle-free.

Klaviyo is free for up to 250 contacts, with paid plans starting at $20/month.

Drip is one of the eCommerce email marketing solutions that your small business needs. It is a powerful enterprise email marketing platform for eCommerce, bloggers, and digital marketers. They offer a wide range of tools to make email marketing easy.

What sets Drip apart from the competition are its key features like intelligent marketing automation tools, smarter email segmenting, split testing features, list groups, and a visual drag-and-drop editor for automation workflows. These features allow you to reach targeted customers in your email list to get more sales.

Support options at Drip include live chat support, webinars, automation training, detailed courses, free guides, and excellent documentation. Their email software offers seamless integration for all popular website builders including WordPress and WooCommerce. This allows you to easily add pop-ups or sign-up forms to your website and capture more leads.

The only issue is that Drip can be a bit expensive. The cheapest plan is $49 a month.

Moosend is a very affordable email marketing software. With a 30-day free trial period and a basic plan that starts at $7 monthly, this email marketing solution appeals to small to medium brands with unlimited emails for all subscription levels. In the free trial period, businesses can create marketing emails and utilize the platform’s various automation workflows. They can also create a landing page and use the form builder

This tool has a user-friendly and comprehensive drag-and-drop email builder/ editor. This makes it easy for email marketing beginners to customize everything from the basic templates to the detailed marketing automation templates. Alternatively, adding your own HTML code or building a plain text version of your email is also easy.

Also, Moosend offers A/B testing in the base tier and notable spam and delivery testing that significantly decreases the possibility of email campaigns being marked as spam. In fact, their website highlights a 98% sender reputation rate for their service users.

Moosend's paid plans start at $7 per month, but this is the entry option that can accommodate only up to 500 contacts. As your contact list grows, the rate also increases. However, it is still affordable with $26 for 2500 contacts, and $38 per month for 5,000 contacts.

Aweber is one of the oldest and best email service providers. It is suitable for those who based their businesses on the web marketing industry and are looking for a reliable tool while having a limited budget. They offer some of the best email marketing tools for small and medium-sized businesses to manage their email marketing.

With Aweber, you have access to ready-to-use HTML email templates, list management, auto-responders, A/B testing, live chat, phone support, email support, live webinars, and a vast library of tutorials and email tracking with detailed insights.

The software has other powerful email marketing features such as AMP emails, automatic RSS-to-email for bloggers, and tag-based subscriber segmentation.

AWeber offers limited free trials for up to 500 subscribers. After that, their pricing starts from $19/month. You can also signup for quarterly or annual plans to save even more.

GetResponse is another one of the best email marketing services for small businesses, offering triggered campaigns, automated segments, dynamic content, and tagging. But it also includes some very handy extra features, such as landing pages, CRM, and even webinars, which are part of its conversion funnel feature set.

It is a particularly economical and easy-to-use service. They have a free plan that can carry up to 500 contacts. Their pricing plan starts from $19 for 1000 contacts, $54 for 5000 contacts, and $79 for 10,000 contacts.

Mailchimp is one of the best email marketing services for small businesses because of its key features, ease of use, and affordability. Plus, it’s quickly becoming an all-in-one marketing hub.

In addition to email marketing software, you will now find a landing page builder, built-in customer relationship manager (CRM), marketing tools for social media, and even direct mail postcard marketing.

The email marketing software includes various features to help you manage a master contact list, create email campaigns, automate triggered email sends, segment your audience, and analyze the success of each campaign you send. It’s easy to build signup forms in Mailchimp and then embed them on your website and social media to streamline list building and lead generation.

What are automation tools, and how do they make the email marketing process easier?

Automated software allows you to send an automated email to certain users if they are following certain instructions or making specific actions. If you have a welcome email list, you'll send a welcome email to a new subscriber.

What is the difference between traditional email marketing messages and transactional messages?

Typical email marketing focuses mainly on communicating with people. An email will share details about your business, including promotions. The email can be sent to a subscriber list. A business will send a transactional message to the individual customer if this individual has taken a specific action. In most situations, this means making a purchase.

Can you use email marketing in conjunction with social media?

Many email services allow you to use your existing social networks to gain followers. Many providers allow a link between your campaign and social platforms, which will ensure your email is automatically redirected to Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. A social networking service allows you to collect your customers' contact information from email lists via pre-built Facebook sign-on pages. Check if emails are resonating on social networks and see how often the message has received a retweet on Twitter.

What is an email marketing strategy?

As with all marketing channels, there isn’t any single best email marketing strategy. ECommerce email marketing strategies can help your business achieve specific objectives by increasing brand recognition, increasing sales, or keeping the customer updated. Once you have identified your marketing objectives, you can build email automation templates or segmentations.

A robust ecommerce email marketing strategy should include re-engagement campaigns to win back inactive subscribers and reduce churn rates, ultimately contributing to long-term business success.

How do I know if my email marketing campaigns are working?

The best email marketing services have extensive reporting and analytics. To determine if your email marketing campaigns are successful, check the recorded data once an email is sent. The reports should indicate how many people received your email, the click-through rate, bounce rate, and other metrics.

How effective is email marketing for small businesses?

Email marketing has a high average return on investment (ROI) of $32 to $45 for every $1 spent. Success depends on finding the best provider, targeting your audience in the right way, and providing them with valuable content. It is affordable and easy to get started with any of the providers above.

Why is an effective email marketing strategy important?

E-mail marketing is an inexpensive way to market your products to your audience. Email advertising campaigns are great for increasing sales and customer retention while gaining trust.

Are there different types of email marketing?

Marketing emails can encompass a variety of topics but generally pertain to four types: newsletter, promotion, acquisition, and retention (or loyalty) emails. You can also consider them informational, behavioral (e.g., when a contact performs or doesn’t perform an action), and transactional, like receipts, confirmations, and password change request emails.

How much does email marketing cost?

Your email marketing cost will entirely depend on the number of subscribers you have, the number of total emails you send per month, and the email platform you use. On average, a small business can expect to pay around $20 – $300 per month given that they manage their own campaigns. If you use an email marketing agency, then your cost might be closer to $500 per month or higher.

What types of analytics do email marketing services provide?

Email marketing has become an extremely popular marketing method for businesses since it can be easily tracked. Email marketing services can provide specific information like who opened the email, whether they deleted the email instantly, and who e-mailed you back. They can even track conversions (tell you if the recipient of your email has bought something from you). You can dig deeper into these statistics by checking how many emails are opened each day and the demographics of people who use emails the most. All this data should help improve your campaigns' chances for success.

Can email marketing help with SEO?

Email marketing has no direct impact on SEO. However, it can help you get more traffic to your website which can lead to more shares and, sometimes, backlinks or mentions.

Google and other search engines use shares and mentions as social signals to rank websites. So indirectly, email marketing can help your website’s SEO rankings.

How can email marketing services help you grow and maintain your contact lists?

Email marketing services provide several methods for collecting and managing email addresses. All the software options integrate with your email lists. Some also offer a feature where you can embed your contact details on websites or social networks so your contact list can be built faster. Almost all email marketing solutions have tools that remove invalid email addresses or users who have unsubscribed from your newsletter from your list.

Does email marketing software integrate with any programs I already use?

Yes, it does. In fact, most email marketing services integrate with at least some popular business applications. The most common integrations are with Salesforce, WordPress, Shopify, and Adobe Commerce (formerly Magento). These integrations save you time and resources by automatically transferring content between your email marketing platform and your other software. Some providers also let you tap into their application programming interface to build custom integrations. We recommend using either Omnisend or Drip since they offer robust eCommerce marketing automation tools that seamlessly integrate with both Shopify and WooCommerce.

Also, most email marketing platforms have deep integrations with WordPress since it’s the most popular website builder on the planet powering over 43% of all websites. With that said, the best email marketing platform for WordPress are Constant Contact, Sendinblue, and HubSpot.

More and more people are reading emails on the go. That’s one of the biggest reasons why businesses need to invest in email marketing and a reliable service that gets the job done. Looking for the best email marketing solutions? We have inspected certain features, and have curated expert opinions, so you don't have to go through the stress of doing so.

If you’re a small business, a non-profit organization, or a new blogger, we recommend using Constant Contact. Their pricing is great, and the support team is absolutely top-notch. Their onboarding team will help you find success with email marketing right away.

If you run an eCommerce website, we recommend using either Omnisend or Drip because they offer the best eCommerce email marketing software. Their personalization and automation features are extremely powerful. A lot of our own business websites use Drip

If you’re a business owner who wants a powerful marketing automation tool that combines email marketing, SMTP bulk emails, and SMS messages, we recommend using SendinBlue. Their platform is easy to use, and they allow you to manage both email and SMS from a single interface. They also offer a fairly generous forever free plan which makes them the best free email marketing software.

If you’re looking for an all-in-one email marketing solution, we would suggest HubSpot. They offer a power suite of marketing tools including email marketing, CRM, sales tools, live chat, website builder, and more. Their free plan is great for lead generation because it lets you store unlimited subscribers.

However, we propose Mailchimp as the best email marketing software for small businesses overall. It offers features for everything from building a contact list and segmenting audiences to creating campaigns, automating drip emails, setting up triggers, analyzing results, testing A/B variations, and sending email blasts to your customers.

It’s also an affordable email marketing tool, as a small business can use it for free for up to 500 contacts and scale affordably to higher plans as they grow. Plus, it integrates seamlessly with hundreds of other business apps and has a form builder to create custom lead-generation forms to embed on your website and social media.