Emma (opens in a new tab) is an email marketing platform (opens in a new tab), designed not just for sending stacks of emails, but also for building relationships. It falls under the CM Group, established in 2017 out of Nashville, Tennessee, which is also the parent company of Campaign Monitor, Liveclicker, and Selligent among many offerings. Drawing on her experience in email marketing, Emma sends around 180 billion emails annually for her 70k customers. Notable clients include Yale, Liberty Tax, Texas A&M University and Orangetheory Fitness.

Packages and prices

Emma has a three-tier paid price structure. Although there is a free demo, there is no free trial or free tier.

At the bottom is the not so aptly named Pro (opens in a new tab) tier, which starts at $99/month for 10,000 contacts on an annual contract. Notable features include a drag-and-drop email editor, pre-send email testing, real-time reporting and analytics, and segmentation tools for segment-tailored emails individuals of the audience. It is limited to 5 users with only 2 role types and 1 workflow.

Going up a level brings us to the best named More (opens in a new tab) tier, which starts at $159/month for also 10,000 contacts and an annual contract. It has all the bottom tier features and adds a landing page builder, custom event-based automations, technical integration setup, and trending reports. Perhaps most importantly, it supports 25 users with 5 role types and unlimited email automation workflows.

Upstairs is Emma’s HQ (opens in a new tab), which raises the price to $299/month for 10,000 contacts and the annual contract (as an aside, we wish this plan had included more contacts, which are available for an additional fee and custom quote). This highest plan has all the functions of the lower two tiers and supports unlimited users with 6 types of roles. Additional features include an approvals dashboard, template style lock, activity dashboard, and private label.

While the lowest plane lacks some, the top two tiers have 1:1 integration support.

Features

Emma is designed to take email marketing to the next level, through its comprehensive set of tools. It starts with the Emma HQ platform, which integrates campaign management, model sharing controls and an activity dashboard. This allows you to track the performance of a campaign, for metrics like number of emails sent, percentage of clicks, and audience growth.

There is also an email editor, which helps create eye-catching emails that grab attention. It is easy to use, as it is a drag and drop interface. Moreover, emails can be designed in such a way that they also look great on a mobile platform.

Support

Support for Emma is lacking if you need a direct connection as they have a sales phone number, but conveniently there is none if you need to speak to someone for assistance. product help (However, to be fair, plans are listed under features as “Email and phone” customer support). There was also no direct support portal, but we found a chat box although it starts with automated support, making it the only option if you have a direct question. We find this somewhat ironic because on the Contact Us page it says “We’d love to connect”.

When it comes to self-help content, there is absolutely no shortage. This includes a blog, webinars, guides, product news, videos and even a recorded introductory webinar which has the lovely Emma 101 designation. The guides are well done with targeted content for a particular industry such as “10 Email Campaigns Universities Should Send This Fall.”

final verdict

While many services can promise to kick your email marketing up a notch, Emma can actually deliver. We like the built-in email editor that can also be optimized for a mobile browser, the well-designed dashboard for analyzing a campaign’s performance, and the initial pricing. We also note shortcomings, such as the lack of a free trial, our difficulty finding the phone number for support and the lack of a trouble ticket portal, and the limited number of contacts for the price included. . Our criticisms aside, for an organization looking to increase their email marketing efforts, this Emma platform is an easy choice to recommend.