ACTIVECAMPAIGN VS. MAILCHIMP

Your business isn’t basic, so maybe it’s time to leave basic emails behind?

What used to work in the past isn’t enough anymore. The days of impersonal, bulk emails are behind us — today’s customers expect so much more. You need to create unique experiences that make every customer feel like your best customer. Mailchimp can't do that – but with Customer Experience Automation, ActiveCampaign can.

ActiveCampaign

Plan Type:

Lite

Contacts:

500 (unique)

Emails/month:

Unlimited

Setup Cost:

$0

  • Email Marketing
  • Advanced Automation
  • Phone Support
$9
per month - paid yearly

Mailchimp

Plan Type:

Essentials

Contacts:

500*

Emails/month:

500,000

Setup Cost

$0

  • Email Marketing
  • Basic 1-step Automation
$9.99
per month - paid monthly *Contacts on multiple lists count as multiple contacts.

Designed for growing businesses

  • Easy drag-and-drop email builder (plus powerful segmentation)
  • A visual automation builder that easily lets you automate with just a few clicks
  • An intuitive CRM to manage every part of your business
  • Free support, training, and migration — from a real person
  • Take action with clear and insightful reports

What happens when Mailchimp isn't powerful enough to run your business?

Sure, Mailchimp is a fine choice for simple, one-off emails, but you can’t get true customer engagement by sending your customers the exact same messages. Customer Experience Automation lets you create a totally unique experience for every single customer — which is how you build lasting relationships that grow your business.

Don’t just automate your processes, activate your entire customer experience.

Powerful features, minus the headaches.

Feature

AC Plus Plan

Mailchimp Standard Plan

MARKETING AUTOMATION

Multi-Step Automations

Send emails based on different customer actions or events, without lifting a finger.

Powerful Segmentation

Use lists, tags, and custom fields (automation, email, and purchase actions) to group your customers—then send them content based on their interests.

Contact Tagging

Tags let you group, sort, send, and automate. They’re like attaching a sticky note to your contacts.

Website Forms

Automation Workflow Recipes

Pre-built automations to help you get started building common workflows. *Our library contains more than 200 recipes to get you started; Mailchimp has about 25.

Lead & Contact Scoring

Track engagement so you can reach out precisely when each prospect is ready to buy.

Dynamic Automations

Use multiple goals and go-to actions to create flexible workflows and send each contact down a unique path.

Start/Stop Automation

Use automation to send contacts into—or remove them from—another automation workflow.

Automation Goals

Set specific marketing goals, and change the flow of an automation once your goal is achieved.

Automation Map

See how your automations connect to each other, so you can easily update your marketing, adjust your strategy, and map out new automations.

Automation Split-Testing

Test which path in an automation performs better in real-time, and learn more about your customers.

SMS Automation

Send a text message to contacts within an automation.

Site & Event Tracking

Track visitors across your website to see which pages they visit and which actions they take.

EMAIL MARKETING

Drag & Drop Email Designer

Email Templates

Split Testing

A/B test campaigns to learn what content works best.

Dedicated Email Deliverability Specialist

A real human will check your email and be sure it’s compliant before sending.

Drag & Drop Conditional Content

Put different messages in front of different people based on specific rules. *Mailchimp requires coding.

SALES AUTOMATION

Flexible CRM

Give customers a personalized experience across their entire lifecycle.

Mobile CRM

See how campaigns are performing on the go with an easy-to-use mobile app.

Pipeline Management

Stages

Manage your Sales process in clearly defined steps from start to finish.

Deal Creation & Management

Task Management

Loop in team members to call, email, or otherwise manage a customer deal.

Lead and Deal Scoring

Assign scores to each customer deal as they interact with your site, emails, etc. and understand how likely they are to purchase.

Win Probability

Machine learning generates a percentage field on each deal, telling you how likely that deal is to be won.

CONVERSATIONS & MESSAGING

Conversations Inbox & Live Chat

Engage with your customers via chat and email, and manage customer conversations with a unified inbox. *Can be purchased as an add-on to any ActiveCampaign plan.

Conversations Mobile Messaging App

Receive push notifications via mobile app when a chat or email is received.

SMS Marketing

Subscribe your contacts by SMS when they send a keyword to a phone number.

Team Notifications

Get notified via email when certain customer actions/activities happen.

INTEGRATIONS

Shopify Integration

Connect multiple Shopify stores with a Deep Data integration.

Ecommerce

Connect WooCommerce, Square, and BigCommerce stores to your marketing and sales automation platform.

Site Tracking via WordPress

Set up site tracking as well as the basic WordPress integration functions.

Salesforce Integration

Facebook Custom Audiences

Support

Free Onboarding & Migration

Study Hall

Learn with others at one of our global in-person training sessions, where you get 1:1 time with our Education team.

Free, High-quality Training

With guides, videos, email, and phone training, you can get started fast.

Make it a hassle-free switch

Try ActiveCampaign for free

Instant set-up. No credit card required.

What sets ActiveCampaign apart from Mailchimp?

Contact Management

ActiveCampaign contact management is contact-based, not list-based. That means you can create as many lists with as many segments as you want – and never have to double-pay for contacts (like on Mailchimp).

Campaign Designer

Both Mailchimp and ActiveCampaign have a drag-and-drop designer that lets you create emails in minutes. But customers expect more these days than an email with their name in it, so ActiveCampaign isn’t just a Mailchimp alternative. You can use no-code dynamic content, so each person gets personalized messages with exactly what they want to see.

Marketing Automation

Automation lets you get your valuable time back in just a few clicks. Create automations to manage almost any part of your business – contact onboarding, sales follow-ups, welcome messages, and anything else you can think of. ActiveCampaign's drag-and-drop visual automation builder makes automated marketing as easy as reading a chart.

A Real CRM to Manage Sales

When Mailchimp says "CRM," it just means "a list of contacts." The ActiveCampaign CRM is more than just a tool. It’s a partner for your business. No more sifting through notes or your email inbox, because the details are handled for you. Our CRM manages every part of your sales process — so you can focus on what matters: Your customers.

Support when you need it

Why not get a great tool with unparalleled support and options for one-on-one training any time you want it? We’ll move you over for free — your contacts, tags, email templates, and automations — so you can get up and running fast. We’re always here to give you what you need to be successful.

We’ll move you from Mailchimp for free

You never need to worry about getting started. We’ll get you up and running fast.

When you get  free migration , we import:

  • Your lists, contacts, custom fields, and tags
  • Your automation workflows
  • Your opt-in forms
  • Your email templates
Request your migration

Make it a hassle-free switch

Try ActiveCampaign for free

Instant set-up. No credit card required.