ConvertKit Review - The Newsletter Tool for Bloggers Coders
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ConvertKit is a relatively new player on the email marketing software scene. Their product targets professional bloggers, podcasters, course creators and YouTubers. They want to help creators connect with their fans, and earn a living through the use of email marketing.
It sounds like it could offer some pretty cool niche features that would appeal to such a target group. Let's find out if this is actually the case in this ConvertKit review!
You might have checked out the ConvertKit reviews offered by users online, only to find a bit of a mixed rating. Our review of ConvertKit is based on a methodical approach and uses our practical experience and knowledge of dozens of other simple and advanced marketing automation tools.
ConvertKit Review: Summary
An interesting niche feature is that you can sell digital products and subscriptions, not something available on many other email marketing platforms.
On paper, they appear to have really advanced features (e.g. landing page editor, email automation templates, digital products online store, etc.), but how do ConvertKit actually perform? We’ll also see whether their claim that their system is “easier to use than Mailchimp”, is true.
Let’s take a close look at ConvertKit and its features!
- ConvertKit Review
ConvertKit Screenshots
ConvertKit Pricing
300 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Free plan doesn't include automations or reports.
300 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
1,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
3,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
5,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
10,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
25,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
55,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
105,000 Subscribers
unlimited emails
Discounts available for yearly plan.
When you purchase a paid plan, they’ll migrate your lists into their system at no extra cost.
You can always check our pricing comparison tool to see how ConvertKit stack up against the competition. Or check our pricing guide to find out how each plan’s features vary.
Pros and Cons
- Pros
- Cons
Pros
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Landing page editor
ConvertKit lets you create simple landing pages, even if you don’t have your own website. This can be very convenient for social media campaigns. There are plenty of attractive landing page templates, and it’s a big plus that you can use your own custom domain, even on the free plan.
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Flexible user-subscription management
The tagging system makes it as easy as pie to add and remove subscribers from workflows. This feature won ConvertKit a place on our list of the best email marketing services for Shopify.
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Good deliverability
Their deliverability rates have been consistently very good in our tests.
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Offer paid newsletters
ConvertKit helps you to monetize your newsletters by charging your readers for a copy of your newsletter. This can be a good way to add another revenue stream to your business. They also offer a “tip jar” feature, which gives your audience the chance to tip your content, which we think is a pretty cool feature!
Is ConvertKit the right newsletter service for you?
- Recommended if:
- Not recommended if:
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You want to run ultra-targeted campaigns
With ConvertKit’s flexible tagging and segmentation system, you can run laser-focused automated campaigns to very specific groups of contacts. Its inbuilt landing page editor also allows you to manage end-to-end campaigns within the one tool.
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You want to sell digital products +/ subscriptions
Looking to sell ebooks, music, images, courses or other digital products? This unique feature from ConvertKit is a great addition for creatives. You can connect your own custom domain, and adding products is really simple. This feature is available on the free plan. You’ll simply be charged a 3.5%+30c transaction fee once you start selling products.
Rating Details
How to use ConvertKit
ConvertKit is well known for its extremely user-friendly nature. So easy that once you sign in to your ConverKit platform, you are instantly presented with a “quick actions” toolbar on the right-hand side. Here you have the option to create a broadcast, form, landing page, snippet, or email template. Within Convertkit the term “snippet” refers to a reusable block of content designed to help you save time when your creating email campaigns.
To create an email campaign, select the “Broadcast” option. From here you are taken to a very basic email editor, which, as we mentioned earlier, could easily be mistaken for a basic plain text editor. Within the email editor, you will have the option to switch between the legacy editor and the new editor, although there’s no big difference between the two. In terms of email templates, it’s safe to say Converkit is very limited. You only have a total of 9 templates to choose from, one of which is a ‘text only’ option, the rest of the email templates are on the basic side. Alternatively, if these templates don’t suit your email marketing strategy, you can import your own custom HTML. You can edit email templates from the dashboard, by clicking ‘email template’ from the quick actions tab.
ConvertKit’s landing page editor
How to create a landing page with ConvertKit:
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- Click on the “Landing Pages & Forms” tab within the ConvertKit dashboard.
- Next, you’ll see a “create new” CTA, once you’ve clicked this you’ll be asked how you want to gather your subscribers, here you’ll be asked which landing page template you want to use, and luckily for you, there are over 50 templates for you to choose from.
- Now you can choose the landing page design that suits your marketing needs, whether that’s for Newsletters, Webinars, Profiles, etc.
- Then once you’ve found the landing page template you like, click “Choose” to start editing the design. Now you can add your content, branding, imagery, etc.
- You can preview your landing page before publishing it to make sure you’re happy with the overall layout and design.
- Once you are happy with the overall feel of it, click “Save & Publish.” Then you’ll be able to choose your domain name for your landing page.
- Later, if you need to go back and edit your chosen domain, landing page URL, or SEO settings, you can access and update all of this within the “Settings” tab.
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ConvertKit’s Deliverability
ConvertKit’s email deliverability rates have always been pretty stable in our deliverability tests, their results have ranged from 80% to mid-nineties in our last five tests. In our most recent test, they scored 91.3% which is their best score since October 2021. They were one of the providers who were most likely to end up in Gmail’s main inbox, with 78% of their emails ending up there. The future is looking bright for ConvertKit’s deliverability.
Conclusion
There are several areas where ConvertKit does quite well. For example, support is quick, friendly and effective, we can’t complain here. We also liked the flexibility when managing subscribers via its tagging system. This is certainly something bloggers (and digital marketers) can take full advantage of whilst targeting communications to their audience (hence why we listed it as one of our Mailchimp alternatives).
ConvertKit comes with a landing page editor that will let you collect subscribers even if you don’t own a website, which is great for social media campaigns. Their new commerce feature, which allows you to sell digital products and subscriptions, is pretty cool, and not something you’ll see in other email marketing tools.
However, ConvertKit is only really effective when you are using the paid option, therefore it can get expensive pretty quickly. For this reason, we’d strongly suggest that you check out some ConvertKit alternatives before choosing them as your next email marketing platform.
FAQ
They use Amazon Web Storage (AWS), which has server locations in the USA and many other locations around the world. Their email servers they use are from Mailgun – they are based out of Illinois and Virginia.
Despite the claim, we wouldn’t say ConvertKit was better than Mailchimp. Their email editor lets them down, and they just don’t have as many features as Mailchimp. You can see our full ConvertKit vs Mailchimp comparison for more information.
Yep! As long as you’re managing less than 1,000 subscribers, and you don’t need access to any of the features available in the Creator or Creator Pro plans, you can stay on the freemium plan for as long as you like.
ConvertKit is a legit email marketing service for small businesses and creatives. It safely stores your customer data and offers a secure way to manage your subscribers and send out email campaigns.
ConvertKit’s deliverability is consistently very good according to our bi-annual deliverability tests. It currently sits among the top 3 providers.
ConvertKit Alternatives
You can see why ActiveCampaign is our top ConvertKit alternative in this detailed comparison.
Not sure that ConvertKit is right for you? Use our Smart Finder to see which newsletter tool matches your requirements.
The authors
Learn more about us
We keep our content up to date
19 July 2023 - Email deliverability section added
07 Nov 2022 - General update
17 March 2022 - Added note about legitimacy
15 Nov 2021 - Added lower tier pricing for up to 300 subscribers
07 Oct 2021 - Score increased due to excellent deliverability rates
17 May 2021 - General update
19 Aug 2020 - New video review added
15 Apr 2020 - Prices updated to include free plan
1 Feb 2019 - Review updated
7 Jan 2019 - Deliverability rating updated
20 Mar 2018 - Deliverability rating added
06 Jul 2017 - Added FAQ about server location
27 Jun 2017 - Initial Tests & Review
Our Methodology
This review has been written and researched following our EmailToolTester methodology.
Our Methodology
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