Summary
Since most of the email marketing tools on the market today are lacking in features, usability, and team collaboration workflows (i.e. Pardot!), we decided to put together this brief pros and cons list of a few noteworthy options that might be better for your email production and email marketing efforts.
In this post we’ve summarized a few of the top email builders that we’ve researched or used. These aren’t just email design tools, but online tools/services/products suitable for rapid and collaborative email production by your marketing department.
We’ve had favorable personal experience with Stripo, so we’ve used that platform as the standard for feature comparison.
Instead of showing all pricing options, we’ve only shown the most likely price that a typical mid-sized or large organization would pay annually (for smaller organizations most services offer cheaper plans, so you might be able to start at lesser cost).
The order of the services shown in this list are more or less based on highest price to lowest price, based on typical options.
Knak
PROS
- feature rich
- good for workflows and enterprise features
- enterprise security
- direct to Pardot integration for email & landing pages
- audit changes with version history and restore points
- multi-brand management
- AMP support
- preheader/preview text
- integrated Litmus testing
- landing page builder
CONS
- no HTML view (on roadmap)
- SSO is enterprise plan only
- Canada (probably not a negative, but you never know)
PRICING
- expensive @ $15K/yr for 5 users, $25K/yr enterprise
SUMMARY
- probably the tool/service of choice if your organization is large enough and/or doing enough email marketing to justify the cost
Dyspatch
PROS
- features similar to Stripo
- approval workflows
- conditional data
- AMP support
- integrated Litmus testing
- localizations
CONS
- not clear if supports enterprise security
- blocks structure may prove to be difficult to work with (unknown at this time)
- uses DML Dyspatch Markup Language rather than standard HTML
- we asked a simple question on their web chat twice and never got an answer
PRICING
- $5,389/yr limited to 100 templates
SUMMARY
- may be good but we haven’t tried it yet, we would need to test it out for a fair comparison
- their website doesn’t provide enough information about product features
Chamaileon
PROS
- features similar to Stripo
- sophisticated access control with user roles
- asset management (email content blocks, images)
- simultaneous editing (like in google docs)
- import your existing email HTML and tweak it with their builder
- workflow support for teams of any size
- integrated Email On Acid testing
CONS
- SSO +$500/m
- copy/paste HTML to Pardot (no direct integration)
- no AMP support
- Hungary (probably not a negative, but you never know)
PRICING
- $2500/yr 5 users [$7500/yr including SSO]
SUMMARY
- looks like a good product if you don’t need AMP
- we would need to test it out for a fair comparison
Stripo
PROS
- split editor and HTML pane and CSS pane so can edit HTML and see the result in real-time
- global presets for headings, buttons, links, header, footer, etc.
- mobile specific settings
- AMP support
- preview mode with mobile view
- 800+ free designed templates
- import your existing email HTML and tweak it with their builder
- code validator
- Version History and Template Recovery
- synchronized modules between projects
- VML buttons for Outlook
- preheader/preview text
- automated product cards
- user roles
- brands per project
- export emails to Gmail and Outlook
- UTM-parameters applied to links
- copy and share your own saved modules to another projects in the Agency organization
- good support
CONS
- no SSO until Q3 2022
- copy/paste HTML to Pardot (no direct integration)
- Ukraine (probably not a negative, but you never know)
PRICING
- $480/yr
SUMMARY
- we have had good success with this product
- easy to learn and use, with enough features for most smaller to mid-sized orgs
- the split editor where you can edit HTML/CSS and see the result in real-time is fantastic, maybe a game changer
Stensul
PROS
- annotated comments
- approval workflows
- integrations with project management tools: Asana, Wrike, and Workfront
- brand compliance features like guardrails and permission levels
CONS
- targeted at enterprise
- no pricing available
- requires API to send HTML to Pardot
- no AMP support
PRICING
- no pricing available
SUMMARY
- can’t compare since no pricing and haven’t tried it
Feel free to reach out if you have any questions, or just want to discuss email production options.
References & Credits
Author | Jeff Kemp
As Founder and Principal Consultant of Optimal Business Consulting, a U.S. based Pardot Marketing Automation Consulting Agency and Salesforce Partner, I lead our growing team by helping organizations to implement, optimize, and maintain their existing or new Pardot platform with Salesforce using Marketing Automation and Lead Management best practices and proven methodologies.
More about Jeff
As a seasoned technologist Jeff has 30 years experience in marketing & sales and 6 years as a certified Pardot Consultant. Jeff is a data-driven “Strategic doer” with a unique blend of effective STRATEGIC PLANNING combined with many years of successful hands-on TACTICAL EXECUTION in Marketing, Marketing Automation, Sales/BusDev, Web Technology, SEO, Analytics, Operations, and Business within several industries and formerly holding several high level positions in marketing and sales.
A major aspect of Jeff's experience is a strong understanding of gathering business process requirements (current state vs. future state) and creating a viable roadmap to future state implementation utilizing best practices and taking into consideration the client's current data structure and lead management processes.
Strategic. Tactical. Adaptive. Knowledgeable. Capable.
Download Jeff's PDF Bio
See our About page for even more.
