Sendlane Review: Features, Pricing, & Alternatives

Sendlane is a strong email marketing and automation platform best suited for data-driven businesses. It excels at advanced segmentation and analytics, but its complexity can be problematic for beginners.

Our detailed Sendlane review explains its features and limitations.

SMB Guide’s Verdict for Sendlane

Overall, this is a powerful and user-friendly marketing tool and rated it a 8.3 out of 10. It’s got strong marketing automation and is easy to use.

Its overall score suffered as a result of the loop involved with “activating” the account, where I would log in to the account, get asked onboarding questions, and be sent right back to the login.

That was frustrating and really affected the overall user experience, even though I found the software easy to use. It is an expensive platform and may not have the range of integrations found in other tools.

Factor	Rating (out of 10)
Pricing & Plans	7
Marketing Automation Capabilities	9
Email Builder	9
Personalization & Customization	9
Campaign Performance Tracking	9
User Interface and User Experience	8
Integrations and Compatibility	7
Customer Support	9
SMB Guide Rating	8.3

In this review of Sendlane, I’ve followed SMB Guide’s detailed criteria for evaluating the marketing automation software.

Pricing & Plans

There are no divided Sendlane plan tiers. Instead, you’re charged based on your email volume and SMS credits. The minimum plan offers 500,000 emails for $500 a month with annual billing and $600/month with monthly billing.

The free trial account, available for 60 days, is limited to 100 subscribers and 500 email sends.

Price

• $500 to $99,000/month depending on number of monthly email sends and SMS credits

Features

• Starting at 500,000 emails
• Unlimited contacts
• Reviews included for free
• SMS credits start at 2,500 credits for $23/month

Plans scale up based on your monthly email volume, with additional fees based on the monthly SMS/MMS credits. 

Who it’s for: Large businesses that want to take advantage of email marketing and SMS or MMS marketing.

Marketing Automation Capabilities

Sendlane is known for its ability to create and manage complex marketing workflows with branching and conditional logic. You can set up sophisticated automation sequences that respond dynamically to various user interactions and conditions.

Campaigns adapt and respond based on user behavior, preferences, and engagement level. For instance, if someone clicks a certain link in an email or visits a particular page on your website, Sendlane can automatically adjust the remaining steps in the workflow for a high level of customization.

This means everyone on your list gets content that’s the most relevant to them, increasing the likelihood of engagement and conversion. 

Trigger options include:

• User Behavior: Actions such as link clicks, email opens, or website visits
• Time-Based: Schedule actions to occur at specific times or intervals. 
• External Event: Integrate with other platforms so that when a user takes action (places an order, submits a form, etc.), you trigger a workflow.

Though focused mainly on email marketing, the platform does offer SMS marketing so you can extend your workflows beyond email. 

Using attributes and behaviors, you can use dynamic personalization to personalize your email content throughout the automated workflows.

Email Builder

Sendlane gives you a wide range of professionally designed email templates for various purposes, such as newsletters, promotional offers, and customer engagement campaigns. You can create visually appealing emails without needing extensive design skills.

Since they cover many industries and use cases, you have a solid foundation for any email marketing campaign.

The drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to customize your emails as needed. You can modify layouts, add images, adjust text, and add buttons or other elements to tailor emails to your needs.

This approach ensures even those with limited technical skills can create polished and professional emails.

But, if you prefer more control over your designs, Sendlane also provides direct HTML editing capabilities so you can code custom email templates from scratch.

The templates are responsive, so they’re appealing regardless of screen size. You can preview the emails to see how they look across clients and devices. Plus, Sendlane offers spam testing tools that analyze emails for potential deliverability issues.

By spotting problems that could be flagged as spam, you increase the chance your emails will reach the intended inboxes.

Personalization & Customization

Sendlane supports dynamic content insertion so that you can tailor email content based on recipient attributes, behaviors, or segmentation criteria.

You can customize everything from images, text blocks, and call-to-action buttons to display differently based on the recipient’s profile or past interaction. Every recipient gets messages that are most relevant to them to push engagement and conversion rates higher.

You also have a versatile set of merge tags for personalizing your email content with recipient-specific information, such as names, locations, purchase history, or custom data fields.

You’ll have more personalized and humanized communication to enhance brand image and connection.

You can create segments based on a wide range of options for more precise targeting. These include demographic information, purchase behavior, engagement levels, and more.

These are dynamic and updated as new data comes in, so everything remains accurate and effective over time.

Campaign Performance Tracking

You get real-time reporting dashboards to see campaign performance as it unfolds. You can see things like open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and return on investment (ROI).

You can also set and track specific campaign goals, such as lead generation or revenue generation. Tracking progress toward these goals lets you measure campaign effectiveness so you can adjust strategies and maximize outcomes.

The platform also includes split-testing tools to compare subject lines, content variations, send times, and more. You’ll get detailed insights on test results to better understand the elements that resonate with your audience.

Sendlane integrates with third-party platforms like Google Analytics to get more comprehensive data on campaign performance for a more holistic view of your marketing efforts.

Leveraging combined insights can help you make better decisions.

User Interface and User Experience

When you first create an account, you’re prompted to answer a few questions about your business – your role, your current email provider, your current SMS provider, and current review provider.

I did this and submitted it, then was prompted to log in to my account again. It got stuck in a loop.

So then, I thought, “Okay, I’ll create another account with a different email address.” I signed up again, got the email, clicked the button in the email to “set up my account,” and was sent back to the sign-in page.

Then, I went back to sign in and received an error message saying the account hadn’t been confirmed.

So, I had to contact customer support via live chat to activate the original account (which I don’t understand because I got to the set-up questions for the first one), and everything worked fine from there. It was a pain, especially for someone like me who is fairly tech-savvy.

Once I sorted it out, I found the user interface intuitive and easy to use, so hopefully, this was the result of a tech bug that will be fixed. I did dock the overall score for this category due to the snafu getting started, though.

It’s cool that you can customize your dashboards and shortcuts to access the things you’ll use the most quickly. That way, you spend less time navigating through menus.

Integrations and Compatibility

Sendlane integrates with CRMs, e-commerce platforms, social media channels, and analytics tools. Options include: Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoho CRM, Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce, and more. 

APIs are available for custom integrations. If you have a developer or want to hire one, they can use the API to build integrations with other business tools and services.

This allows you to tailor your marketing automation setup to meet specific needs so Sendlane can work within your tech stack.

Customer Support

Sendlane offers multiple customer support channels, including live chat and email. You can get help quickly using either of these options, but live chat is faster.

You also have access to a knowledgebase where you can search to find answers yourself, if you’d rather try your hand at solving the issue on your own. The support documentation is helpful. Plus, you can schedule a live demo if you want to see things in action first.

When I reached out for help with my issue that I discussed in the user experience part of this review, I got an agent within a couple of minutes, and the issue was solved within a few minutes after that.

They were prompt and professional.

Sendlane — Unique Features

Sendlane uses machine learning algorithms to optimize send times and improve deliverability. The algorithms use past campaign performance and recipient behaviors to determine the best times to send emails for maximum impact.

This ensures your emails are more likely to be opened and acted upon, thereby improving overall campaign effectiveness.

What the Experts Say About Sendlane

• G2 rating: 4.7/5 (65 reviews)
• GetApp rating: 4.2/5 (34 reviews)
• Capterra rating: 4.2/5 (34 reviews)

Advanced automation workflows allow you to send emails in response to a range of subscriber behaviours which is a plus. There are a few integrations, but they aren’t as advanced as those offered by main competitors. I’m confident that this will improve with time.

Rahul R., Chief Technology Officer – Verified Capterra review

We have found that Sendlane provides the best bang for the buck and overflow of value for the price point. From the software to customer support, Sendlane provides tremendous value and we’re happy to provide a GREAT review for the tremendous value they continue to bring to the table.

Romano M., COO – Verified Capterra review

Sendlane Alternatives

Not quite sure Sendlane is right for you? Take a look at these other options:

Klaviyo

Klaviyo is a marketing automation platform similar to Sendlane. It’s known for its seamless integration with ecommerce platforms. While both platforms excel in data-driven marketing with highly granular segmentation and automation capabilities, Klaviyo is better suited for smaller businesses.

It offers a free plan for up to 250 active profiles and 500 monthly email sends, while Sendlane pricing starts at $500/month. Klaviyo is better for e-commerce-focused businesses seeking deep integrations and customer insights, and Sendlane is best for larger data-driven companies looking for strong automation and reporting tools.

Get started with Klaviyo for free

Omnisend

Omnisend is designed specifically for e-commerce, offering integrations with many popular platforms like Shopify and BigCommerce. It is well known for omnichannel marketing, allowing users to manage campaigns across channels from one place.

It’s user-friendly, but advanced features may be limited compared to more specialized platforms. There’s a free plan for up to 250 contacts and 500 emails a month, with 500 web push notifications and 50 published Shopify reviews.

Get started with Omnisend for free

Other options: Best Sendlane alternatives

Mailchimp

Mailchimp is ideal for small to medium-sized businesses and beginners seeking an all-in-one marketing platform with a user-friendly interface.

Mailchimp pricing starts at $20/month after a 30-day trial for up to 500 contacts and 6,000 emails each month. Mailchimp is better for businesses that need basic automation and data analytics.

Start your free trial of Mailchimp

Getting Started with Sendlane

Sendlane offers a comprehensive suite of email marketing and automation features that cater to the needs of modern marketers. Its advanced behavioral automation, deep data integrations, user-friendly interface, and quality customer support make it a great option for marketers who need to boost engagement to reach their business goals.

FAQs

Related reading:

• Sendlane vs. Klaviyo