Who hasn’t heard the cliché ” the money’s in the list?” Like many, this saying has an element of truth to it. But it’s not just the hard selling Internet marketers with giant lists that can benefit from email marketing.
Just the facts? … Jump to Comparison Chart
You can be sure your competitors are using email marketing …
87% of marketers used email campaigns
Email Marketing Opportunities
Almost any affiliate or blogger will gain from having an email strategy. Email marketing can be used for …
- Staying in touch with your audience
- Marketing your content
- Funnel building for affiliate campaigns
- Direct affiliate offers
- Branding your website
As you can see, email marketing presents lots of opportunities to grow any online business.
Go to our affiliate marketing guide for more tips.
But … email marketing services can be expensive. It is easy to have a $50-$100/mo email marketing bill as a small blogger or affiliate marketer. Potentially much more than your hosting bill. This cost and the concern about a learning curve that wastes money has put many off from email marketing.
Free email marketing to the rescue!
Free Email Marketing Details
There are many email marketers that offer a free level of service. They do this to entice new business. These are not free 14 or 30-day trials (which all of the email marketing companies offer). These are totally free plans with no expiration. Email marketing companies know that many will outgrow the free level metrics and purchase a subscription. It is like an extended trial to them.
There will be limitations on the free plans. Typically the free plans will have restrictions like …
- Subscriber Count — Most email marketers will have a maximum number of subscribers in your list. If it is unlimited there will be a maximum number of emails you can send per month.
- Email Volume — Free plans will usually have a maximum number of emails you can send in a month. Some set a daily limit. If this is unlimited there will be a subscriber count maximum.
- Feature-set — Email marketing gets more and more sophisticated. Many of the service companies are also adding other marketing channels. The free email marketing accounts will usually have a limited set of features.
- Branding — Many of the free plans have branding messages on all of your outbound emails e.g., “Powered by Mailchimp.”
Even when these limitations are considered, free email marketing plans are a great value. They let you start building a list now, stay engaged with your subscribers and effectively use email in your marketing strategy from day 1.
We looked at every email marketing company we could find to see who had the best free service level. All of these also had a minimum feature set that included; drag&drop editing, auto-responders, list management, opt-in forms.
Best Free Email Marketing Providers
There are lots of email marketing service companies out there — most have a free trial. That is fine and gives you a chance to try their most advanced features. The problem is it is too short a time-period. Many are 14-days, some are 30-days. Between importing lists and creating new emails and campaigns, you blink and the trial is over.
We wanted to find the best “always free” email marketing companies for smaller blogs and affiliates. These free programs don’t expire and are ideal for …
- New marketers who want grow a list
- Affiliates with many sites and separate lists
- Smaller companies with < 2000 subscribers
- Sites that just need basic email marketing
These are the 21 best free email marketing companies. There should be a good fit for everyone.
1 — Benchmark
Product Features: Email newsletters & marketing
Emails per Month: 250
Subscriber Limits: unlimited
Free Service Link: Benchmark Free Plan Signup
Benchmark is the only email marketing service I know that includes an image editor in the email designer. This can come in really handy if you want to edit and image or add a bit of text to it. They also hit all the right buttons for the typical email marketing affiliate or blogger.
Benchmark Features
- Code editor for detailed tweaks or techies
- Templates by market and occasion
- Color schemes (like skins) to be consistent and complimentary
- A/B testing and lots of integrations
- Powerful drag & drop editor
Benchmark Email Designer Photo Editor
The free plan allows for unlimited subscribers but is pretty stingy on the monthly email allotment … just 250 emails per month.
Free Plan Details
- 250 emails per month
- Unlimited opt-in subscribers
- Basic drip campaigns
- Sign-up forms
- 10mb free Image storage
Premium Pricing: The Pro premium plan is $22/mo for an unlimited number of emails to 1,000 subscribers. The Pro plan adds a number of features
Who Should Use the Free Benchmark Tools?
Even though you can h