Today I would like to discuss two of the most popular email marketing software providers, Moosend and GetResponse. Both are great products – but which one is right for you?
In this Moosend vs GetResponse article, I will cover the main features and ideas that each product has to offer in order that you can make an informed decision about which service is a better fit for your business needs.
Email Marketing Platforms
It doesn't matter what online business you own, be it an eCommerce store, review blog or even a YouTube channel, being able to capture, nurture and build an email list of subscribers is crucial in building a brand.
An email list also allows for a secondary source of traffic, reminding potential customers, or subscribers about new products, articles or videos that have been released.
Marketing Platforms such as GetResponse or Moosend allow business owners to do all of this, through list management tools, automation flows, templates and designers.
Moosend Overview
Appearing around 2012, Moosend has been a silent runner, catering for those within the eCommerce space. Usually pitted against other platforms such as MailChimp for it's similarities in the space that they compete in.
In recent years they have grow more popular, as their offerings, features and tools have become more well known. With automations and features including;
- Automation Flows & Tagging
- Landing Page & Subscription Form Designer
- Email Templates
- Reports & Integrations
GetResponse Overview
Usually seen as one of the 'Big 4' GetResponse has been around since 2002, catering for marketers and bloggers. You will usually find GetResponse being compared with Aweber, ActiveCampaign or Maillite.
GetResponse have a number of features, including;
- Autoresponder & Email Flows
- Analytics & Reports
- Landing Page Designer
- Webinar Creation & Capture
- Conversion & Ecom Funnels
UI - Look And Feel
Platforms have to be user friendly, and easy to navigate to ensure that user actually enjoy using the site.
If you have an unintuitive design, you hide buttons or tabs in strange places and you make it difficult for people to find exactly what they are looking for.
Moosend
This particular platform has moved from the 'large', vibrant and bright style of navigation. With large buttons that indicate where you are going.
Moosend has a side menu, with each tab on the left hand side being large, clear. The left hand side menu will stay, no matter which tab you choose.
Within those tabs, once again the campaigns, automations or landing pages are fairly spaced out, with a fair amount of information and bright, colourful buttons to show how to create new ones.
Navigating, creating new automations or starting a new list is trouble free, and most users will find it simple to use.
GetResponse
For those who have use GetResponse before, you may be familar with their set-up and style of UI.
With each 'section' held within their own area, and only available via the main menu. Selecting any of the areas will then take you to the a separate screen that encompasses the whole page.
Once within the relevant section, the menu will close, and GetResponse keep their top header, with a few relevant quick actions.
As with Moosend, the areas are quite clear, though you do have to keep opening the menu to find your way to other areas such as campaigns or automations.
Automation
A feature that not all email platforms have, or utilise. Automation can be a brilliant way to send out complicated email sequences, send out different types of emails or even funnels leads into customers or slowly remove them from your account.
Both of these platforms offer automation, though GetResponse does lock their full automation behind a higher tier plan, that requires you to pay more per month.
Moosend
The Moosend automation designer is a little different from other designers I have used, including the GetResponse or ActiveCampaign creator.
There is no grid system or snap, and each action or decision simply sites below the other that kicked it off.
The page is clear, with a fair number of actions/decisions being shown on the page at a time, though the '27 actions pending' that constantly shows at the top of the page, and the other banner makes the page quite crowded.
To add a new action or conditional step is quick enough, with a huge number to choose from, including sending email alerts to slack, adding tags, subscribing to lists or filtering your contacts by their current weather conditions, waiting certain periods of time or deciding to split the flow to run A/B testing.
I found the designer super easy, and you can build out a fully crafted sequence only takes around 10 - 15minutes, even for really complex ones.
GetResponse
Using a 'standard' snap and drag template designer, you actually drag the elements you want onto the automation creator, and link them up as you go.
Every action or split option is available, again just being dragged onto a page allows you to then connect the dots.
If you are a 'basic' user, then you can only edit the pre-built templates that they offer.
The layout is better than Moosend, at least when it comes to how much you can see on a page, or how crowded the whole area is. With no banners or huge sections telling you to complete certain actions getting in the way.
Though I find the designer itself feels crowded and slow.
Designer & Email Templates
Certain industries require fancy looking emails, with images, rows, tables and graphics to help stand out.
For example an eCommerce store might want to run a 4th July Sale, or send a Christmas themed newsletter, creating them would probably require a designer, or hiring someone to help with this.
Having ready made templates removes that need, and of course extra cost.
Moosend
Looking through the template offering from Moosend, you will find around 60 different templates, covering a wide range of industries and template styles.
Their templates cover areas such as Black Friday, Sales, Articles, Food, Halloween, Promotional, Property and a ton more.
Each template is fun and interesting, with images and icons designed to enhance the viewers experience and to increase the number of clicks or reads on your emails.
Editing the emails and templates is easy, with Moosends designer being intuitive to use, much like the automation creator.
The whole designer is drag and drop, with a number of elements to choose from. You can spend a fair amount of time playing around with this.
The left hand menu stays, changing which area you see, either element or settings depending on the part you are trying to play around with.
Of course, you can just create a bog standard email, if you don't want fancy images or icons included.
GetResponse
Much like it's counter part, GetResponse also includes a large number of templates to pick from, with over 100 on offer.
They again range from largely graphical, image focused templates, to more product and action focused emails designs to use.
You can preview, and then choose any of these designs to ensure you are happy before you get to editing and changing them.
As with Moosend, the designer is drag and drop, though each element you click on replaces what you see on the right hand side.
Meaning if you want to add new elements (an image, or text), you actually have to click to get back to the original screen (which slows everything down quite a lot).
The actual designer itself is clunky, and it can feel like you are clicking on random areas to make some of the simple changes. It can feel like there is a lot of wasted space, and they could have used both a left and right menu (as with Moosend to be fair).
List Management
A huge and important part of having an email platform is that of the list management tools.
From being able to actually build a decent list (or multiple), removing the deadweight to tagging your subscribers to understand their actions.
Both of these platforms have the ability to tag, score and build email lists. Utilising other areas of their platforms to achieve these activities.
It's worth noting, you will need to pay extra to get access to tagging and scoring for GetResponse.
Landing Pages & Subscription Forms
A lot of email platforms now provide access to landing page designers and subscription