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Everything you need to know about picking the best email marketing vendor. Download now to explore key features, ROI assessments, and more.
How to Evaluate ESP Vendor Capabilities for E-commerce
To say e-commerce is a growing sector is to undersell the phenomenon. Reporting shows that, in 2022, 19% of global retail sales were generated by e-commerce. By 2027, that number is projected to hit 25%.
With that kind of cash influx, more and more ESPs are evolving to support e-commerce-focused businesses. This is partly because one-size-fits-all ESP options are often limiting in terms of their feature depth, technical flexibility, and ability to consistently deliver an exceptional customer experience (CX). Particularly for companies serving a large global audience, traditional ESPs no longer cut it.
Examples of gaps that the latter group addresses far better than their traditional ESP counterparts include:
Cart abandonment recovery via email retargeting
Advanced audience segmentation based on buying activity
Production recommendation and notification delivery
Automated follow-up emails based on trigger actions
Extensive reporting and analytics abilities
These capabilities are core to any e-commerce retailer’s success (we’ll do deeper on each a bit later in this guide). When augmented by automated workflows and content templates, business leaders can leverage them to:
Incentivize shoppers to complete purchases
Group customers accurately based on various criteria
Offer personalized recommendations to elevate the CX
Boost both immediate and long-term revenue
Grow customer engagement and drive repeat business
On top of all that, e-commerce ESPs save companies of all sizes an enormous amount of time and money. As a result, they can lower costs, improve daily margins, and increase their income substantially. With the sky-high demand for excellent online shopping, the need for ESPs that can keep up will trend in the same direction.
Getting your voice heard: The importance of e-commerce deliverability
Before discussing more granular content and automation-related features, it’s important to highlight the most important part of any email campaign: deliverability.
It’s not as simple as pushing send and waiting for audience engagement to trickle in. As of June 2023, the average reported email deliverability rate was 85.7% across all platforms. This means over 14% of emails never hit a consumer’s inbox. During high-traffic times of the year, such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) sales, subpar deliverability can have severe consequences on brand reputation and bottom line.
To benchmark your current email deliverability performance, here are some ballpark figures to keep in mind:
An email deliverability rate of 89% is considered decent
An email deliverability rate above 95% is excellent
If your deliverability rate falls below 80%, it’s considered poor
When shopping around for an ESP, a great deliverability rate and track record should be at the top of your wishlist. But it doesn’t necessarily boil down to one number. An ESP’s ability to steer your emails clear of a consumer’s spam folder or the promotions tab will ensure your messages have a higher open rate and, consequently, a much better chance of generating engagement.
Beyond this crucial capability, here are some indispensable features your ESP should rate highly for.
5 foundational email marketing features for e-commerce businesses
5 advanced features for modern e-commerce businesses to consider
The truth about pricing tiers of leading ESPs
There are dozens, if not hundreds, of potential ESPs serving clients around the world. Due to rapid technological innovation and democratization throughout the past decade, the vast majority allow you to accomplish the basics to some degree of satisfaction.
Internal questions you should ask before choosing an ESP that can help here include:
How many team members will actively use or need access to the platform?
How many recipients will be targeted by campaigns right away?
What is your target audience growth potential? How will that impact send volume?
Which region(s) are your customers in? Which compliance boxes must be ticked?
What is the realistic quarterly or yearly budget allocated to email marketing overall?
Answering these and other questions will help you pinpoint how much you should spend. A freemium tier may be enough for smaller organizations to get you started in the right direction. For more mature companies, you’ll have different pricing structures available to you, including scalable tiers that evolve alongside your growth and expansion.
Whether pricing tiers are built around bundled features, the number of active seats or premium users, or email send volume, it’s important to look beyond the upfront startup costs and think long-term. Your ESP must add value beyond financial gains, which can include saving you time and related expenses with an easy-to-use UI and simple integration with your existing e-commerce platform.
Your email marketing should be an asset, not a deterrent, to increasing sales, thus enhancing your overall ROI.
Assessing your potential email marketing ROI
Though it’s tempting to focus solely on the bottom line, business leaders weighing different ESP options must balance pricing considerations with the possible return a boosted email marketing machine can deliver.
To make an informed decision, it’s vital to combine all the pieces and determine which elements are dealmakers or breakers. For example, an ESP that offers advanced segmentation and top-tier content personalization may serve you best in your marketing campaigns. At the same time, other companies may be willing to trade in some of that feature muscle for more robust reporting suites.
Other elements of an ESP that should factor into your purchase choice are:
Customer service and support, both its scope and reputation
Self-serve educational resources and documentation
Best practice tutorials and quick-start guides for new users
Cybersecurity and downtime track records
Number of existing customers the ESP serves in your vertical
All the features and support in the world can’t compensate for a low glass ceiling for expansion and customer acquisition. Choosing an ESP that can evolve alongside your business instead of holding you back is the most significant step you can take down the path to success.
The power of Bird’s e-commerce email marketing
By ticking all the feature and capability boxes listed in this guide, you can be confident that an ESP can support your e-commerce business as it strives for exponential growth and global expansion. As a globally recognized email and communications provider, Bird streamlines the email marketing process for e-commerce retailers worldwide.
Customers like Uber, Google, and Facebook choose Bird because we deliver:
Signup forms to grow your subscriber base and ensure your outreach is expected and compliant.
Exceptional email reliability with over 6 trillion emails sent annually
Unrivaled scale delivering almost 40% of all commercial email worldwide
Unrivaled data insights that leverage competitor tracking and gives granular visibility into delierability
Ease of integration with native integrations to CRMs, ecommerce platforms, any all the tools you use.
Intuitive automation allowing you to build dynamic marketing journeys without the need for a developer.
Faster design options using a templated system that’s represents for your brand
If you’re looking for an ESP that will support your e-commerce brand every step of the way as you become a worldwide sensation, Bird is an easy choice.
See the difference first-hand—book a personalized demo and an audit of your email marketing system.
