If you’re an eCommerce business owner, you must have heard of Klaviyo and MailChimp. They’re both top-tier tools that can seriously level up your game.
Choosing between them can feel like picking your favorite ice cream flavor. Both are delicious, but which suits your taste better? That’s exactly what we’re here to help you figure out.
We’ll break down what each platform offers so you can make a choice that feels just right for your business. Ready to get the scoop on Klaviyo and Mailchimp? Let’s find out.
Klaviyo vs Mailchimp: Similarities
Klaviyo and Mailchimp have many similarities, especially when you first compare them. Both platforms offer the basic features you would expect from an email marketing tool.
For starters, they both provide free trial plans that let users access email features. They also integrate with website builders and customer relationship management (CRM) tools, making it easier to connect with other business software.
While there may be small differences in how these features work, they are essentially the same. However, Klaviyo and Mailchimp also have key differences, which we will explore next.
Klaviyo vs Mailchimp: Differences
Before launching into the core differences between these ecommerce email marketing tools, it is important to note the differences stated are from long-term users of both platforms. With that in mind, let’s get to said differences.
No matter how experienced you are with email marketing, you might still need help from time to time. That’s when having good customer support, email support, and chat support becomes important.
Unfortunately, Mailchimp doesn’t do the best job in this area. They have useful documentation and offer twenty four hours email and chat support, but these are only available for paid plans. If you’re using the free plan, you can only get customer service for limited days.
Klaviyo, on the other hand, offers email support with all its pricing plans. They also provide chat support for those on paid plans, including the basic plan starting at $20 per month.
With Klaviyo, a single contact or customer on different email sending lists will be recognized by the platform as a single contact. On the Mailchimp platform, however, such a contact will be counted as multiple different contacts, depending on how many sending lists they feature in.
Subscription costs for access to premium tools are way cheaper on Klaviyo. This will be a relief for most eCommerce business owners who are just starting out. There are diverse offers to choose from, unlike Mailchimp where users have to pay the same premium price for total access.
4. Integration of Useful Tools
Mailchimp offers a wide range of useful Apps including Google Analytics, Canva, and video editing tools which are absent on Klaviyo. Alternatives to some of these are available on Klaviyo, but we all know premium apps are preferred.
5. User Experience and Interface
Mailchimp’s user interface has been widely applauded for its intuitive dashboard and email editor features. This goes a long way in helping users who are mostly eCommerce business owners perform tasks by just following prompts.
This explains why newbies often prefer the platform, not minding the potentially high cost. Klaviyo on the other hand needs foreknowledge of most of the integrated tools and apps for users to operate.
If your eCommerce store makes a lot of sales or you need to get as much data as possible for the nuances involved, Mailchimp has been proven to be the better platform when compared with Klaviyo.
The catch however is the feature being available only on the Standard plan and other premium plans. The predictive analytics covers a wide range of features like the expected date of customers’ next order, future spending, churn risk, and potential customers so you can create target ads.
Klaviyo on the other hand does not restrict its features to paid subscribers. However, your reach will be limited by volume and number of contacts. This plays well with eCommerce platforms that are just starting out.
These campaigns serve as reminders for both eCommerce store owners and customers. To access the abandoned cart campaign feature on Mailchimp, you will need to subscribe to a premium plan.
From there on, sending emails or series of emails to customers with high order value on their carts becomes a walk in the park. Klaviyo has pre-built abandoned cart flows you can easily optimize for your eCommerce platform.
Most users won’t see the abandoned cart campaign email templates right after integrating Klaviyo on their eCommerce platforms. Meanwhile, you can easily create some using dynamic product recommendations and personalized discounts.
The difference between the two platforms in the response time to customer complaints is clear-cut. From our actual tests on prompt responses, Klaviyo got back to us in less than 2 hours, while it took about 5 hours to get a response from Mailchimp customer support.
This could have been an isolated incident as users of both platforms agreed their requests and complaints were responded to timely by customer service.
To start with, both Mailchimp and Klaviyo have free plans, but with certain limits and restrictions as discussed earlier. To get the best of them, you will have to upgrade to paid plans.
The pricing tier for Klaviyo’s top plan is about twice as expensive as that of Mailchimp, as Mailchimp’s is usually about $9 less. Keep in mind that on both platforms prices increase as your demands and customer reach base increases.
Mailchimp allows users on the free plan to send 2500 emails per month to about 500 contacts, while free plan users on the Klaviyo platform can send up to 500 emails to 250 contacts.
For users on paid plans, Mailchimp allows 2,250,000 emails monthly while the most expensive plan on Klaviyo lets you send 1,500,000 emails per month to about 150,000 contacts.
11. Email Design and Templates
Klaviyo has a huge library of templates users can quickly and easily optimize to suit the intricacies of their customer outreach. In many cases, users do not need to edit them. Their template customization allowance is much more advanced, with features like product populating from feeds and product blocks.
Mailchimp on the other hand recently added a drag-and-drop template feature for editing which has been applauded for its easy use.
With these comparisons, the question now focuses on which of these software tools to adopt for email marketing campaigns.
We recommend new users and small businesses opt for Mailchimp for a comprehensive tool, while big eCommerce brands go for Klaviyo for its advanced analytics, personalization, workflow, and other features.
However, with respect to who the winner is on a head-to-head comparison, the obvious answer is Klaviyo by a mile and most eCommerce business owners will attest to this. Here’s a summary table to simplify their differences.
| Mailchimp | Klaviyo | |
| Automation | In-depth and robust | Straightforward |
| Free Plan | Restricted options | Wide range of free tools |
| Cost | Relatively cheap | Expensive |
| Monthly Emails (Free Plan) | 2500 | 500 |
| Email design/templates | Easy drop templates | A wide library of templates |
| Ease of Use | Easier for new users | Steep learning curve |
| Analytics | Basic analytics | In-depth analytics |
| Best For | Basic email marketing | eCommerce Businesses |
| Pricing | Email list based | Subscriber count based |
What’s more, Klaviyo lets users pick a pricing plan at different costs so each user can get a premium plan at their budget, while Mailchimp requires users to pay a uniform amount to get premium features.
So, if you are a new eCommerce business owner or an existing one looking to migrate to a long-term platform, Klaviyo is the better choice.
Also Read – Best Email Subject Line Ideas for Ecommerce
Conclusion
Klaviyo and MailChimp have a wide range of integrated tools and features for eCommerce business owners to use.
The most important thing is to ensure you choose a platform that meets your campaign needs while making allowances to allow smooth migration to another platform should the need arise. If you are looking to migrate to Klaviyo or just scale your eCommerce business with Email and SMS marketing Book a FREE discovery call with us today to see how we can help.
