You are already convinced that your email marketing strategy is crucial to your marketing mix, but you haven’t yet chosen a solution to design your email templates. Regardless of your industry, it is essential to choose the email design method that best meets your specific needs.
is crucial to your marketing mix, but you haven’t yet chosen a solution to design your email templates. Regardless of your industry, it is essential to choose the email design method that best meets your specific needs.
This article will help you get a clearer picture of the different types of editors on the market, as well as target your needs and the email marketing solutions that will best meet them. From editors integrated into your Marketing Automation solutions to Email Builders, and even marketing agencies, the experts at Dartagnan are here to help you make the right decision. Let’s dive into the review of email editors.
Email Editors Integrated into your marketing automation solutions: An all-in-one solution
How does it work?
Your Marketing Automation solutions typically include built-in features for designing your email marketing campaigns. Some of the most well-known solutions are Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Mailchimp, Adobe Campaign, Splio, Selligent, and Emarsys.
Who is it for?
Integrated email editors are often chosen by large enterprises and mid-sized companies that seek to centralize and automate their marketing efforts. They are particularly suitable for marketing teams managing complex campaigns that require coordination across multiple channels and in-depth analysis. These solutions are often favored in sectors such as finance, technology, retail, and media, which find these tools valuable for managing large customer databases and personalizing communications on a large scale.
Pros 👍
- Centralization of efforts: All marketing tools are grouped into one interface, simplifying campaign management.
- Task automation: These platforms offer automation features, reducing the need for repetitive manual tasks and increasing your speed of action.
- Integrated analytics and reports: Users can track the performance of their campaigns in real-time with detailed analytics and customizable reports.
- Advanced segmentation: The platforms allow for very precise audience segmentation, improving the personalization and relevance of messages.
- Integration with other tools: They can often integrate with CRMs, sales platforms, and other tools, creating a unified marketing ecosystem.
Cons 👎
- Limited features: Integrated builders are often basic solutions with restricted functionalities. The quality of your Marketing Automation solution does not guarantee the quality of your Email Builder.
- Compatibility issues: In 90% of cases, you have no control over the mobile version of your campaigns. However, mobile is the most common display device among your B2C audience across all sectors.
- Degradation of brand image: If you need impactful campaigns, these tools are not the answer. It is quite difficult to implement all your brand elements, and almost always impossible to produce more dynamic or interactive campaigns.
- Lack of agility: Dependence on routing teams for any modification, lack of collaboration, validation, or testing features. In short, it is difficult to maintain autonomy and responsiveness in this type of environment.
In Summary
Logic would suggest using the Email Builder integrated into the Marketing Automation solution you have already paid for. However, this logic only holds if your email strategy is solely focused on engaging your database. The core function of these solutions remains, above all, the management of your databases, data orchestration, routing, and statistics. If you value your brand image and want to push creativity, personalization, and quality, this type of builder is rarely sufficient and will need to be supplemented by another solution.
Having your emails designed by agencies
How does It work?
You create your campaign briefs based on your needs and hire a specialized agency to design your emails. You will still need to manage the implementation of your campaigns in your routing tools.
Who is it for?
Outsourcing email production was a common practice for companies that:
– Needed custom emails with impactful designs.
– Lacked in-house expertise to design them.
Today, several market solutions offer teams and email professionals the opportunity to bring production back in-house without needing advanced technical skills. In this context, these tools handle all operational production. Agencies can remain valuable for specific development, technical innovations integrated into the email, or strategic advice and repositioning on overall email strategies.
Pros 👍
- Specialized expertise: Access to a team of marketing experts with in-depth sector knowledge and best practices.
- Integrated strategy: Development of a comprehensive marketing strategy aligned with business objectives and brand vision.
- Creativity and innovation: Ability to develop creative and innovative campaigns that captivate the target audience.
Cons 👎
- High cost: Hiring an agency is undoubtedly expensive, especially if you have a large volume of campaigns to manage.
- Lack of responsiveness: Briefing, design, feedback, corrections, validation, integration, variations. Relying on external agencies is very time-consuming and often results in relatively long production times compared to market demands, lack of responsiveness, and thus limited performance.
In Summary
Regardless of your scope, outsourcing your email production is mainly recommended for specific needs: highly innovative services for specific actions, ultra-personalization, strategic advice, and training. The landscape of email solutions today is varied enough to allow you to handle a significant portion of your production in-house, optimizing costs and improving performance.
Standalone email editors: The solution for custom email marketing campaigns
How does it work?
Standalone email editors (refer to the functionality page that mentions the feature) are email creation tools that allow users to design emails without coding skills. Not to be confused with routing solutions, these builders offer a visual interface where users can drag and drop design elements, insert images, and format text while previewing their campaigns live. Specifically designed for campaign design, they feature a wide range of functionalities that enable you to create dynamic, interactive, and impactful email marketing campaigns for your audience. Some of these solutions include Stripo, Beefree, and, of course, the Dartagnan email editor (features page).
Who is it for?
These types of email editors are particularly suited for users without advanced technical skills. Intuitive and accessible, they are ideal for CRM and marketing teams that value both their brand image and productivity. Their budget varies depending on the quality of the builder and the functionalities they offer.
Pros 👍
- Ease of use: Equipped with drag-and-drop and WYSIWYG editors, these solutions allow you to design your email campaigns without any specific technical skills.
- Impactful design: With advanced features or perfectly crafted templates, some of these email builders offer a wide range of options to showcase your brand and create memorable emails for your audience.
- Workflows and processes: With a well-thought-out user experience, some builders also provide features (organization, validation, duplication) that save you precious time (corresponding functionality page).
- Visual consistency: By implementing your brand elements within the designer, you can deploy your brand identity across all your campaigns, ensuring the coherence of your brand universe.
- Email compatibility: You also have the ability to test email compatibility across different email clients to ensure an optimal user experience.
Challenges 👎
Cost: The entry price for some solutions can be high, justified by the advanced features they offer. This cost will be in addition to the investment you have already made in your routing solution.
Range of features: The financial criterion will also determine the quality of your builder and the richness of the functionalities available. For less expensive builders, you may face issues with campaign personalization, a lack of agility, and a risk of standardization due to rigid and widely used templates.
Compatibility issues: Again, not all builders are equal. For some of them, you may struggle to fully control the mobile version of your campaigns, leading to display and performance issues.
Deploying your brand guidelines: Implementing your brand elements and designing an Email Design System may require a preliminary phase of reflection and co-design to ensure you reap all the benefits of these solutions.
Dependency on the provider: Depending on the chosen solution, the functionalities and performance of your campaigns may rely on the provider’s updates and support.
In Summary
Standalone email editors are perfect for companies that need to both industrialize their email production and create emails with impactful designs. However, not all builders are equal. Pay attention to the extent of their functionalities, their agility in managing responsiveness, the design of their interface, and their capabilities in managing your personal spaces.
And there you have it! We hope this comparison of email editors helps clarify things for you. Stay tuned next week as we explain why choosing the Dartagnan Email Builder is always the right choice!