eCommerce Email Champion · 9.4/10
Klaviyo — free up to 250 contacts, plans from $45/mo
Built for Shopify · Email + SMS · Predictive analytics · 350+ integrations
Picking an ESP, setting up automations, writing your welcome series, and the metrics that actually matter. Klaviyo vs Mailchimp vs ConvertKit compared.
An email list is the one audience you actually own. Your social following can vanish with an algorithm change overnight; your email list goes wherever you go. But "build a list" isn't really one task — it's an ESP decision, a deliverability decision, and a content decision, all tangled together, and most people only think about the last one.
Pick the wrong ESP and you'll spend the next year fighting the tool instead of writing emails. Picking the right one means matching the platform to where your business actually lives — an eCommerce store, a content business, or a service business each pull toward a different winner.
There's also a compounding effect most people underestimate: a list built on a clean welcome series and proper authentication from day one keeps paying off for years, while a list built carelessly on a tool that doesn't fit eventually needs to be rebuilt from scratch anyway. The hour you spend getting the foundation right now is the cheapest hour of email marketing you'll ever spend.
All three send email well. The real difference is who they're built for.
| ESP | From | Free Tier | Best For | Automation Depth | SMS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Klaviyo | $45/mo | Up to 250 contacts | eCommerce, Shopify-native stores | Deep, revenue-attributed flows | Yes, built in |
| Mailchimp | $13/mo | Up to 500 contacts | General newsletters, small business | Moderate | Add-on |
| ConvertKit | $9/mo | Up to 10,000 subscribers | Creators, writers, course sellers | Tag-based, simple to learn | No |
The comparison table tells you the numbers. This is what it actually feels like to run campaigns and flows on each one.
A list with zero people on it is just a feature you haven't used yet. These steps get someone real onto it.
All three scale by contact count. Here's roughly where the bill lands as your list grows.
| ESP | Up To 500 Contacts | Up To 5,000 Contacts | Up To 25,000 Contacts |
|---|---|---|---|
| Klaviyo | Free (250 cap) / ~$45/mo | ~$100/mo | ~$385/mo |
| Mailchimp | Free | ~$75/mo | ~$300/mo |
| ConvertKit | Free | ~$45/mo | ~$119/mo |
Running a Shopify store and want flows tied directly to revenue — Klaviyo. Running a small business with general newsletter needs and a tight budget — Mailchimp. Building an audience as a creator or course seller — ConvertKit, built specifically around that use case.
Whichever you choose, the welcome series and authentication setup matter more in year one than any feature comparison.
Read The Full Klaviyo vs Mailchimp ComparisonWorth starting from subscriber one — a welcome series and a handful of automated flows work the same whether you have 10 subscribers or 10,000. The earlier you build the habit and the list, the more compounding value you get from it.
It varies heavily by industry, but a healthy click rate generally sits in the low single digits to low teens depending on your niche. Track your own trend over time rather than chasing an industry benchmark that may not reflect your audience.
Not necessarily — Klaviyo bundles both natively, which is one reason it's popular with eCommerce stores. Mailchimp and ConvertKit treat SMS as a lesser add-on or skip it, so if SMS matters to your strategy, weigh that heavily in the ESP decision.
Yes — most ESPs support CSV import/export, and dedicated migration tools exist for the popular routes. Just be aware that some platforms require re-confirmation of consent depending on how your original opt-ins were collected.
It depends heavily on your traffic and offer, but a healthy signup-form conversion rate often sits somewhere between 1-5% of visitors who see it. Track your own trend over time — a steadily climbing rate matters more than hitting an arbitrary industry number.
Write your own whenever possible. A generic templated lead magnet rarely matches your specific audience's actual problem, and subscribers who feel misled by a low-effort freebie unsubscribe (or worse, mark you as spam) faster than ones who got real value upfront.
A sunset flow automatically re-engages subscribers who've stopped opening your emails, then removes the ones who still don't respond — protecting your deliverability by keeping the list focused on people who actually want to hear from you.
This guide covers the setup framework — our category page covers current pricing, automation depth, and deliverability scores across every ESP we've reviewed.