Quick link for you — if you want to learn more about why I choose ConvertKit over Mailchimp, read this blog post! It's what's in this email + more.

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Hey Reader,

Raise your hand if the only email platform you knew about when you started your blog was MailChimp.

Um, me too. Pretty sure that MailChimp, Emma and Constant Contact were the only platforms that I knew existed when I graduated from college in 2012.

BUT, there are better options for you.

I get it, people start with Mailchimp because it’s free… but it’s 2023 now, and there are other free or inexpensive platforms that will give you WAY more freedom to grow and build your list!

(If you want the FULL scoop, it's right here on the blog.)

First things first…

What Mailchimp ISN’T Doing for You…

Here are a few reasons why Mailchimp isn’t the best option for building and growing your email list:

01| It’s not providing you with leading technology

Simply put, MailChimp is outdated. Some of it is new, yes, but a lot of it has been built on top of older features and now it’s a bit of a hot mess when you're trying to figure out what’s working, how something is getting delivered, or the variety of ways you can actually share forms and grow your list.

Personally, I feel like as a platform that has a huge market share of users, spends a ton advertising, and has been around longer than many others… MailChimp should function significantly better than it is right now. Hot take, I know.

02| It’s not actually saving you money in the long run

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Bloggers love to point to Mailchimp as the newbie’s holy grail when it comes to email software providers. They tout its low pricing structure (yes, free), but hear me out.

MailChimp is NOTORIOUS for making you pay for any and all subscribers — EVEN IF THEY HAVE UNSUBSCRIBED. They call them “inactive subscribers.”

Meaning, you pay even if someone’s a contact but not a subscriber — you pay to house their emails in your account like an address book.

Instead, I’d suggest you sign up for a free plan of ConvertKit or MailerLite and start there instead. The functionality is much better for what you’ll need to grow, organize and email your list with ease.

03| It limits what you can do

Once you hit your subscriber limit and move on up to a paid user tier, their plans get tricky. You only get some functionality depending on which tiered plan you sign up for — for instance, a few have limitations on the number of steps you can use in a “customer journey.”

Uh, no, I do not have time for that.

Simply put, Mailchimp limits customer journey steps, which means you limit the number of ways you can customize the content experience of your subscribers. That’s a no-go for me.

04| It’s not actually helping you grow your list

While Mailchimp does have landing pages, this still doesn’t allow you to share and show forms in other places throughout your website (you know, embedded ones like on your blog).

You want to know how and where subscribers joined your list because this tells you what aspects of your website and marketing are working and producing conversions — and which aren’t.

05| It’s not creating a personalized experience for your subscribers

With no incentive email (like in ConvertKit), Mailchimp requires your new subscribers to send and click a confirmation email before ever receiving the freebie they signed up for.

In Mailchimp, you can’t tag where all of your subscribers came in from, so you can’t tell what marketing actions are actually supporting your strategy, and it makes segmentation difficult.

There are no link triggers, which allow you to track subscribers’ behaviors within your emails — and while they do have similar actions, they are broad and limited in scope.

Without tracking capabilities, how will you know if someone clicked the “Book a Call” link in any of your emails? How will you know who to follow up with? How will you know if anyone actually cares to view the blog you promoted??

06| It’s not saving you time when sending emails

Mailchimp’s email builder generally takes more time to create and “build” than if you were just putting together a ConvertKit email, which is more linear to create — more like a Google Doc. With ConvertKit, there’s less focus on design (like columns and spacing) and more on creating a clear, readable, and accessible message for all subscribers.

They also make it incredibly easy to set up on-brand email templates that are ready to go at the drop of a hat!

07| It’s not helping you easily sell something

ConvertKit’s Commerce platform helps you make a living as a content creator more easily than an outdated platform like Mailchimp. It makes it incredibly easy to set up a digital product or to sell/book a service online — like ebooks, paid newsletters, coaching services, or paid courses.

Their sales funnels are simple and easy to set up as well as monitor to view sales performance and customer behavior. The platform also helps you make sure you’re pitching the product to the right people by helping you exclude previous purchasers, organize your audience, and embed a “Buy Now” button on your website.

In a nutshell…

So, which email marketing tool is best for bloggers? My biggest beef with Mailchimp is that it’s touted for beginners because it’s free, but it doesn’t serve you in the long run. It’s hard to use well and they’re charging you for people who aren’t even subscribed to your list (she said while basically yelling…).

Want to learn even MORE about the pitfalls of Mailchimp as well as the benefits of other options that are available to you (like ConvertKit, MailerLite and ActiveCampaign just to name a few)? I expand on each of these points over on the blog.​

Read all about it here!

Got more questions (or a retort if you're a huge MailChimp fan lol)? Fire away — I’m all ears!

Let's Duett!

Allea

TLDR; Want to learn even more about why we choose ConvertKit over Mailchimp? We wrote all about it in this blog post!​