Have you seen the movie, “The Wrath of the Titans”?
If you are wondering as to what this question has to do with auto-responders, then let me explain. The war of the auto-responders have been very similar to the war in “The Wrath of the Titans”. Both the parties fight it out with all their might and strength. But in the end you really can’t pass on a judgement as to who won the war.
It is the same with auto-responders. You might be using one of them and loving them for all the features that they offer. But when you set out to compare it with another auto-responder, you would just not be able to say, which one is better. Ultimately it gets onto the comfort-ability factor – which of them are you comfortable using and that goes onto become the winner.
Auto responders have been an integral part of an internet marketing business and list building. The end objective of most campaigns is list building and this in turn means the need for a reliable resource to store and access all the emails that you have captured. And it is here that the war begins.
We have been with Aweber for more than 8 years now and not once did we feel the need to change them, thanks to all the amazing features and the comfort factor that they have always given us. And with them evolving over the last couple of years with the many features that they have added, we have more reasons to stay with them than to leave them.
3 New Exciting Features at Aweber
About a couple of weeks back, Aweber introduced 3 new features to their platform. And this was a straight hit at Get response. Because these were some features that people would boast about when it came to comparing Aweber with Getresponse. By introducing these features, Aweber now has the upper hand and Getresponse will have to do something new, if they want to compete with Aweber.
Free Trial Option
Aweber had a $1.00 option earlier. Instead of the $19.00, you could get your first month for only $1.00. Last week they scrapped this option and introduced the trial offer.
You can now try out all the features of Aweber absolutely free for the 1st month. While this is not a feature that I will ever die for, a lot of people prefer a trial option to a $1.00 option. And if you are one of those, then here you have it. Try them out.
List Importing with re-confirming
Aweber had a very strict policy around double-optins. Hence if you imported emails into Aweber, the subscribers had to reconfirm before they could be added to your list. This essentially meant losing about 35-40% of your list. For anyone wanting to move their lists to Aweber, this was a deterrent.
So, with the introduction of this new feature this problem has been taken care off. Now you can import your lists into Aweber without having your subscribers to re-confirm. This is a welcome feature and will be a good enough reason for people to join Aweber now.
Follow up Stats on the Mobile App
Aweber had introduced a mobile app a few months back. You could use this app to do a lot of things including checking your stats, checking your broadcast status, checking your subscribers etc. With the new feature, you can now check your follow up stats as well on the mobile app.
Aweber also has a helpful app called Atom, that helps you add subscribers on the go.
All of the above features were introduced on the basis of the feedback that they had received. That shows their responsiveness to customer feedback and this is one of the biggest reasons why I decided to stay with Aweber.
We have had accounts with Getresponse, iContact and Constant Contact as well. But when it comes to an overall score, Aweber was the best of the lot and hence our decision to stay with them.
So here are 10 reasons why we feel, Aweber is the best of the Auto responders and why we recommend that you should go with them.
Aweber Vs Getresponse – A Comparison
Aweber and Getresponse are amongst the best auto-responders available today. Fans of each argue that theirs is the best. We used Getresponse for almost 6 months along with Aweber, but ultimately we decided to let go off Getresponse.
So the obvious question is what did we do with the emails that we had in Getresponse. We imported that into Aweber. Though we could only retain about 65% of the list due to Aweber’s double optin policy, we were pretty happy with it because we were back with the service that we loved using.
So why do we love Aweber and what features do we think are better at Aweber Vs Getresponse?
Excellent Customer Support
I just love the customer support guys at Aweber. They are responsive and are available to help with just about anything. I once accidentally deleted 4 lists from my account and I just did not know what to do. I wrote to them and in 3 hours flat, my lists were back where it was.
These guys are very helpful and polite and makes you feel like a king (you remember the “Customer is the king” quote). One of the biggest reasons for us to stay with them! We would any day prefer the customer support of Aweber Vs Getresponse.
3rd party Integrations
Aweber has the best and the widest range of 3rd party integrations available. Most apps, plugins and software have integrations with Aweber. Compare it with Getreponse and you will realize that Get Response doesn’t stand anywhere near Aweber in terms of the integration of your mailing lists with 3rd party tools.
Wide range of Optin Templates
If you are designing an optin form and don’t want to spend too much time doing it, you can just pick one of the out-of-box template at Aweber and just go with it. With a wide range of templates to choose from, Aweber stays clearly ahead of Get Response. The number of templates at Get Response is very less and the designs look a little outdated.
These templates are all responsive templates and can be embedded wherever you want.
Simple Dashboard With Quick View of Important Information
Aweber has a very simple dashboard without too many overwhelming information squeezed into a single page. You can see the stats of the latest couple of broadcasts and you can also see all your lists along with the subscriber count information of each of these lists on the dashboard itself.
This information is all that you will need when you login to your account and Aweber does it well to organize that on your home page dashboard.
Creating and Maintaining Lists
I find creating lists very easy with Aweber. There is a smooth step-by-step flow of actions involved in creating a new list. You don’t have to search around for options like deactivating double optin or, changing the from email address etc. like in Getresponse. While some argue that Get Response is better with this feature, I disagree.
For a newbie, Aweber is the simplest and easiest to use. And for an experienced, Aweber will save you a lot of time because of the smooth flow of operations.
Email Auto-responder and Broadcast Statistics
Analytics and statistics is one of the most important aspects of email marketing. And this is where most email marketing services fail. Only a few of the auto responders out there have detailed statistics available. Aweber and Getresponse both are extremely good with this and provide very detailed statistics like open rates, click thru rates, subscriber acquisition over time etc.
Both Auto responders are tied on this metric and both do a good job as well. But what I like about Aweber is the simplicity to access the information. You have a simple dashboard with everything in there. All that you need to do is just click on the relevant link and you have the information.
Conclusion – Who Wins!
Calling it a win would not be the right thing. But from a personal experience standpoint, I am of the opinion that Aweber is one of the best yet the simplest auto responders around.
I have always been a fan of simplicity. The more complicated things become, the more overwhelming it is. And something that is overwhelming is never duplicatable. So, if I am doing something that is doing a lot of good to me and you cannot repeat that just because it is not easy to follow, then the entire concept is setup for failure. It is here that monopoly starts.
You want to keep your business simple. And Aweber will not disappoint you on that.
Go ahead and get your FREE trial today!
Aweber
$19.00
Pros
- Simplicity
- Lots of Features
- Detailed Statistics
- Lots of Templates
- Unbeatable Support
Cons
- Dashboard Presentation