5 Best Factors To Consider When Selecting An Email Autoresponder.

In this article, I am going to show you the 5 best factors to consider when selecting an email autoresponder.

• If you are a beginner at email marketing, this is for you and it will save you a lot of time and money.

Why you need an email autoresponder makes deploying your email marketing strategy a breeze.

• This helps you put your business on autopilot.

Email marketing has the highest return on your investment (ROI), you  can read this article for more information written by litmus.com 

So, choosing the best platform for your autoresponder needs is a must.

• An autoresponder is the engine that drives email marketing.

The 5 best factors to consider when selecting an email autoresponder

1. Price
2. Ease of Use
3. Automation
4. Deliverability
5. Good Trial Period

Let me expand more on these factors so you can understand the importance of each and every one of them.

1. Price

Whether you are a beginner at email marketing or a solo email marketer, budget always plays a huge role in whether you will succeed or not.

Because of how that is important you will be glad to know that email marketing autoresponders come in different packages.

Some offer a free plan with pretty much all the features, that you can use to grow and manage your business.

Features like email marketing, Customer Relation Management (CRM), website builder, landing pages, reports and analytics, and support.

Free plans are often limited in features you can access but it also depends on the nature of your business, goals, and size.

You might not need to pay for an email autoresponder for a long time until such a time when you are fully established.

Because there are email marketing platforms that offer free plans that you can use forever as long as your subscriber count does not exceed the limit.

When you decide to upgrade you want to know that you are paying the best price for your email marketing service.

I will mention 3 and they are as follows: 

Convertkit

• This free plan will allow you to build an email list of up to 1 000 subscribers, send unlimited newsletters, create landing pages that they host for you, and sell using their commerce feature.
• You can read a detailed Convertkit review here!

AWeber’s 

• The free plan is the best so far it allows you access to all the features like automation, commerce feature, 24/7 support by chat, email, and phone if you like. You can build an email list of up to 500 contacts.
•  You can read a detailed AWeber review here!

GetResponse 

• Offers a free plan too that allows you to build an email list of up to 500 subscribers, send unlimited emails, create your own website using their AI website builder, create landing pages and signup forms.
• You can read a detailed GetResponse review here!

2. Ease of Use

• It is a known fact that everything presents itself as hard for the very first time but an email autoresponder has to be easy to use for beginners.
• That is why this is one of the most important metrics to take into account when choosing your email marketing platform.
• The design and layout need to be intuitive enough so you can get done with whatever tool you need to use.
• If a platform has a drag and drop editor to use for designing newsletters, landing pages, and websites.
• When you can easily find tools for email marketing like autoresponders, automation, and newsletters.
• If you can easily import your brand colours and your existing email list to the new email autoresponder.
• These are some of the reasons that qualify a few autoresponders as having ease of use and they are GetResponse, Convertkit, and Mailerlite.
• They all provide you with a free plan to begin your email marketing strategy.

3. Automation

•  This is what makes email marketing the best digital marketing strategy. You can set up different sequences using workflows that suit your business.
• The emails will be sent based on a particular condition having been met.
  For example, a welcome series can be one email or many emails that get sent when someone subscribes to your list.
• Successive emails will serve to inform the subscriber about your brand.
• Automation literally puts your business on autopilot. You can be freed to do other important stuff about your business.

Now you see why it is an important factor you should definitely look out for when picking your best email marketing service.

A few examples that allow you to access this tool on a free plan are AWeber and Mailerlite.

Other email software services have made this tool to be available on their premium plans.

4. Deliverability

While the purpose of sending an email is to get it delivered to the intended recipient's inbox.

•  For email marketing as a strategy to work for your business.

You need an email autoresponder that will deliver your emails to your subscribers' mailboxes as and when you send them.

This is the number one step in your strategy before you can begin to think of open rates and click-through rates.

While there are many factors that influence deliverability, it is worth checking where your email provider stands in regard to their deliverability rates.

This is often calculated as a percentage and the closer to 100% the better for your business.

It is obviously not feasible for all emails you send to be delivered because some email addresses may be fake.

So that would require you to verify email addresses and some email autoresponders have that as a built-in function.

Now, the email service providers that boast high deliverability rates are:

AWeber claims that they do not rely on external services to deliver your emails. They have their own in-house monitoring. This means they control everything end-to-end to ensure messages sent hit the inbox, not the junk folder.

GetResponse says …

Convertkit also says this about deliverability rates based on a report of June 2021…

This just proves to you how important deliverability is to your business.

5. Good Trial Period

• This will enable you to have a feel of the platform and test out its features before you move your list to them.
• That is if you have an existing list but for beginners, this is a very important factor to consider.
• There is good news for starters at email marketing, some providers give you a 14-day trial period.
• Personally, I do not think that is long enough for beginners unless you already have some experience with a different platform.
• So, I think a free plan is the best option for a beginner at email marketing. It allows you to learn the ropes of email marketing without running out of time.
• Some trial periods last 30 days and with the most lasting at 60 days and that is Constant Contact. 

For email marketing platforms that do not offer a free plan, they would want you to test the platform by allowing you to access all the features during the 14-day trial period.

If they offer you a free plan they will let you experience premium features for 14 days and some will give 30 days without upgrading. You can choose to upgrade or remain on the free plan.

GetResponse gives you a free plan and a 30-day trial period on their premium features. You can read more about GetResponse vs AWeber Free Plan Complete Comparison & Guide here.

• These 5 factors will help you choose your best autoresponder and you can start deploying your email marketing strategy without wasting your time and your money.
• There are many more factors you can consider but these will help you get up and running with email marketing and later on you can switch providers depending on your needs.

Why is email marketing important for beginners because it gives you the ultimate control over your business.

By building an email list you have a direct way of communicating with your subscribers.

• The money is in the list so goes the saying that is used, to sum up, email marketing.

This digital marketing channel brings so many advantages to your business and you can learn more about some of the main benefits of it in this article titled 17 Advantages Of Using Email Marketing In Small Businesses.

I have so far covered the 5 Best Factors to Consider when choosing an email autoresponder.

They are ease of use, good trial period, automation, price, and deliverability.

These form the backbone of what makes an email marketing responder the best or not.

I could have picked features as one of the factors but automation is already part of the features.

• And automation alone is a must-have in a platform if you want your email marketing strategy to pan out the best way it can.
• It is worth mentioning that most email marketing platforms do not ask for your credit card details upon signing up and the same goes for the free forever plans.

So, I hope this has been of value to you, and use these 5 factors as your checklist when next choosing your email autoresponder.

If you are a beginner at this craft this will save you a lot of time and money.

Thank you for taking the time to read this article.

I would be so glad to hear what your thoughts are on the 5 factors and what your own factors are down in the comments section.

You can get in touch with me about any questions you may have and as always please share this article with your nearest and dearest.