Why should we pay a recurring fee for MageMail instead of a one-time extension purchase?
I get asked the question from time to time: “why should I pay a monthly recurring fee for MageMail when there are one-time purchase extensions out there that do the same thing?”.
I’d like to address this by first mentioning that we all know that email is a significant driver of revenue. It’s no secret that email dwarfs social, banner ads, affiliate marketing and many other marketing channels in terms of generating revenue.
This is why, at the higher end of the market, there are vendors charging $30k to $50k for installation fees alone, on top of $5k+ monthly service fees. And their customers are still seeing great returns on that investment!
Obviously, with MageMail, my goal is to offer those same capabilities (and, in fact, even more features than many larger vendors) to every merchant regardless of their size.
But the point is that there is a lot of money to be made in email.
Now, to answer the question. The short answer is that you’re going to make more money. Simple as that. Even though you’re going to continue paying for MageMail over time, the additional income that it will generate will more than cover those fees.
I recently looked at one of my customers who switched over to MageMail from another popular extension that handles follow-up email. In comparing a six-month period, I saw that MageMail generated twice as much revenue as the other extension. This merchant was in the $500k to $1m annual revenue range, and MageMail generated ~$3300 per month as compared to ~$1600 per month.
Over a 24 month period, the difference in revenue between the two options is $40k. That’s the opportunity cost of going with these other extensions. And that doesn’t even begin to factor in the incremental revenue from new features that will continue to be developed over the next 24 months.
MageMail performs better because I’m specifically focused on building features that optimize for sales. That’s the reason why I have features like auto-login, and a very tight coupon code integration, and a responsive email template out of the box. It’s the reason why I continue to do subject line testing on an ongoing basis to find insights that can be applied back to your email program.
Let’s also talk a little bit about support and the difference in installation / setup times that you can expect between the two options. You’re going to want to budget anywhere from 20 to 30 hours for installing the extension, reading the documentation, configuring it, building your email templates, writing email copy, and testing.
This doesn’t even begin to factor in the amount of time and frustration that you will spend if you run into a bug. Triggered email tends to be complex to troubleshoot because many things are happening in the background and based upon conditions that vary from one moment to the next based upon dynamic data.
I’ve had a number of customers with scenarios like:
- Email just stops sending and no one realizes it for weeks or months
- Something goes haywire with quotes data and a huge backlog of abandoned cart emails go out by accident
- Email templates break
- And a lot more fun stuff…
MageMail is a done for you service. You’re going to spend a few minutes installing the extension, and then a bit of time discussing some of the particulars of your email program such as what incentive structure you’re comfortable with, and you’re going to be off to the races having spent less than an hour of your own time.
If you have any questions, I’d love to speak with you further.
