The ultimate Wix email marketing guide for 2023

If you want to reap the benefits of email marketing this year, then this Wix email marketing guide is for you.

As a business owner, you want to invest your dollars in marketing channels that give you high returns. You want to attract new customers and keep your existing customers coming back for more. Surely, you don’t want to invest your time or resources into anything that isn’t going to deliver results.

Email marketing is not only cost-effective but also delivers one of the highest ROI of all marketing channels.

In fact, a survey revealed that email marketing was the top performing marketing channel in 2022.

However, ROI isn’t the only reason for investing in email marketing. It can also help you build brand credibility, increase recognition, improve sales, and build strong customer relationships.

In this blog post, you will learn more about the Wix email marketing tool and some popular alternatives available in the market.

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Does Wix have an email marketing feature?

If you are looking for email marketing services to promote your business, there are quite a few available in the market.

Luckily, most of the popular platforms also offer free versions.

We agree that these free versions offer limited functionality, but it is enough for you to figure out how these platforms work.

One such option is the Wix email marketing tool.

Ascend by Wix is not just an email marketing tool but an all-in-one business solution. It not only helps you create professional email campaigns, but also offers many other features like videos, live chat, invoices, and lead captures to make life easier for you.

The intuitive email editor and UX are perhaps the biggest draw for this Wix email marketing tool.

However, the email marketing features are quite basic, to say the least.

If you are a beginner, then this tool may work for you, especially if you want to create an email drip campaign. Creating newsletters is also quite easy and can be done in just a few clicks.

Moreover, Wix gives you suggestions on the best CTA placements to make your email marketing campaigns even more effective.

But if you need more advanced features, then you may need to look for other email marketing software.

Also, if your website is built on platforms other than Wix, such as Shopify, then this email marketing tool is not going to work for you.

Does Wix have a free email marketing plan?

Yes, Ascend by Wix does have a free email marketing plan.

The free plan allows you to run 3 email marketing campaigns with up to 5,000 emails a month.

This is a very small number, especially if you have a large consumer base. However, if you have just launched your Wix store and have a short customer list, this can help you test out how email marketing works.

You can get the word out about your website by creating emails using a wide array of beautiful templates. You can customize the design per your preference and add your own content to better represent your brand.

Besides a small allowance, the free plan has another downside—the emails you send will have Wix branding.

If you don’t want the Wix branding, you can upgrade to any of their paid plans:

• Ascend Basic
• Ascend Professional
• Ascend Unlimited

Here’s more information about Wix email pricing.

Here are the features of the paid email marketing plans by Wix.

Ascend Basic

The Basic plan allows 5 email campaigns and 9,500 emails per month.

Here are the key features it offers:

Ascend Professional

This plan includes 20 email campaigns per month and up to 50,000 emails.

Check out the features below:

Ascend Unlimited

The Unlimited plan allows an unlimited number of email campaigns and you can send up to 1,000,000 emails.

Here are the key features it offers:

What features does Wix Ascend offer?

If you are familiar with Wix, using Ascend will be easy for you. 

Let’s discuss some of the features offered by Wix Ascend briefly.

Email editor

When it comes to usability, the Wix email editor passes with flying colors.

The editor is extremely user friendly and helps you create stunning emails in a matter of minutes.

Create your own emails or choose from several professionally-designed email marketing templates. You can play with fonts, colors, images, and videos just by dragging and dropping them in the editor.

The email templates are beautiful, modern, and mobile-friendly. However, there aren’t many options to choose from, but the available templates are very easy to customize.

Email automation

Wix offers email automation, but only at a basic level. You can set up automatic email campaigns to inform customers about a lot of things, from discounts to upcoming events.

Use the “Automated Emails” feature on your Wix website to set up autoresponders, whether it is to invite customers or to thank them for making a purchase.

You can also set up the time you want the emails to be sent, such as 1 day after a customer has taken a specific action. And you can configure whether you want to send the email once or many times during the day.

However, if you want advanced automation for your email marketing campaigns, there are much better email marketing tools available in the market.

Reporting

Wix email marketing tool comes with integrated analytics that helps you track the performance of your email marketing campaigns. You can track several metrics, such as clicks, open rate, and delivery rate.

However, the tool only offers basic reports. If you are looking for more advanced reports, then this email marketing tool is not the right choice for you.

List management

Adding contacts to the Wix email marketing tool is quite easy.

You can add contacts:

• Manually
• By uploading a CSV file
• By connecting to your Gmail account

However, there is one advantage that the Wix email marketing tool has over other email marketing platforms. And that is, the integration between the Wix website and the email marketing tool means that both use the same contacts.

So, all your contacts, including ecommerce customers and new sign-ups are stored in one place.

There’s more.

Wix automatically assigns a label to each contact, such as “Customer” or “Contacted Me.”

This makes managing your email marketing campaign easier. You can send welcome emails, monthly newsletters, or special discounts to customers.

Multiple labels can be assigned to further segment your contacts. You can also automate this step through the automation feature.

However, there is no other way to segment your contacts apart from these labels.

Other features

Apart from the ones mentioned above, Ascend by Wix email marketing tool has other features, such as:

• Language: The email editor is available in nearly 19 languages.
• Live chat: You can add a live chat feature to your website and even manage chats through the mobile app.
• Support: Phone and priority support are available to customers on the Ascend Unlimited plan. Unfortunately, such support is not available on other plans. If you are on another plan, you will need to submit a ticket online in case you face an issue.
• Social media: You can create and share social media posts right from the Ascend dashboard.
• Bounce management: The tool automatically adds rejected emails and hard bounces to the “Bounced” group under “Contacts.” These contacts don’t receive any future emails, ensuring your emails go only to users who are interested in your brand.

Why should you look for Ascend by Wix alternatives?

Wix email marketing tool is no doubt an affordable option. But is it powerful enough to run successful email marketing campaigns?

Unfortunately, it’s not.

There are many other platforms with a lot more features and functionalities that can better support your email marketing campaigns.

Here are a few reasons why it is a good idea to look for other Wix alternatives for email marketing.

1. Email features are quite basic

The Wix email marketing tool allows you to create your own emails from scratch or use a premade template. The drag-and-drop feature makes creating emails easy.

That’s about it.

You can’t A/B test your emails or check the spam score before sending. This means that there is a high chance your emails end up as spam or don’t deliver the results you expect.

The number of emails allowed on the Basic and Professional plans is not very high. 

For instance, you can send 9,500 emails on the Basic plan and 5 email campaigns are allowed. That means that you can only send about 1,900 emails in each email campaign, which is not very high.

2. Not enough email templates

You can find some beautiful templates on the Wix email marketing tool. Plus, the templates are pretty easy to customize as you can change the background, layout, colors, and style to match your brand.

The templates available on the Wix email marketing tool includes:

• Newsletters
• Promotions
• Event invitations
• Discounts and special offers
• Sales announcements
• Blog updates

So, what’s the biggest downside?

Sadly, there are only about 20 templates to choose from.

That’s quite less, considering that many other platforms offer hundreds of templates.

3. Not enough segmentation and automation features

Email automation helps you better engage with your customers. Since automation runs in the background, it frees up a lot of time for you to attend to other valuable tasks.

However, the Wix email marketing tool does not offer a lot of automation features. For instance, there are just 7 automation options available on the Ascend Basic plan.

Segmentation is necessary to send more targeted and personalized emails to your customers. However, the only way to segment customers on the Wix email marketing platform is to use labels.

There is no way to segment customers on the basis of demographics, buying habits, or other factors offered by many other platforms in the market.

4. Not specific enough analytics and email campaign metrics

If you want to run a successful email marketing campaign, you need to track several metrics to determine your campaign’s performance. However, with Wix Ascend all you can measure are clicks, open rate, and delivery rate.

That is not enough.

Another downside is that the dashboard does not show real-time data. Email marketing statistics may take a few hours to display.

If you want to make marketing or advertising decisions, you have no other option but to wait.

Other platforms in the market offer much more detailed reports and valuable insights into the performance of your marketing campaigns. 

You can track advanced metrics, such as revenue and engagement, and even create segments for your most interested subscribers.

5. Limited customer support

If you are on the Wix Ascend Basic or Professional plan, you will need to raise a ticket online for any issues or use the callback service. Of course, you can always use the Wix Help Center for information on common issues. 

For anything else, there is no option but to wait for the customer support team to respond.

Only customers on the Unlimited plan are given VIP Support, which includes phone support as well as priority support. However, even this high-priced option does not offer live chat, which is available on other platforms available in the market.

What are the best Wix Ascend alternatives?

If you are looking for Wix email marketing alternatives, here are some worthy platforms you must try:

1. Omnisend

Omnisend is one of the best email marketing platforms available in the market, making it an excellent Wix Ascend alternative.

There are 2 integrations available for your Wix website:

• For Ecommerce stores, you have the Omnisend email marketing and SMS app. You can create stunning email and SMS marketing campaigns as it comes with 20+ pre-built marketing automation options to help you automate and personalize your messages.
• For bookings and reservations, you have the Booking Emails & SMS app. Personalize booking messages and notify customers whenever bookings are confirmed, rescheduled, canceled, or approaching.

Omnisend is an all-in-one email and SMS marketing tool that automates your marketing across the entire customer journey. With Omnisend, you can reach the right audience, with the right message at the right time.

Engage your customers with readymade email templates and newsletters. Capture and grow your contact list with popups and landing pages.

Boost sales and conversions with pre-built automation, such as automated welcome emails, order confirmation emails, abandoned cart workflows, and so much more.

Omnisend allows you to engage your audiences across multiple channels using a single automation workflow that includes SMS, emails, and push notifications.

Sync to Facebook and Google to create retargeting ads, delivering an immersive customer experience.

If your goal is to drive engagement and sales, there is no better Wix email marketing alternative than Omnisend. It is, without a doubt, one of the best Wix apps for your ecommerce business.

2. Privy

Another great Wix email marketing alternative is Privy, a cloud-based email marketing platform. It is a fantastic option for small ecommerce businesses to create effective email and SMS marketing campaigns, capture new leads, and promote new products.

Privy lets you create custom campaigns with ease, thanks to its drag-and-drop capabilities. Engage visitors through signup games, pop-ups, landing pages, and embedded forms.

Send targeted messages and offers to shoppers to boost sales and lower cart abandonment rates. Segment your customer list on the basis of country, orders, cart value, reward points, and more to drive personalization and a more positive user experience.

3. Klaviyo

Klaviyo is a great Wix email marketing alternative for beginners and the campaigns are super simple and easy to set up.

Use the suite of email and SMS templates to automate personalized messages, such as cart reminders, discount offers, price-drop alerts, and other useful recommendations.

Klaviyo stores and analyzes transactional and behavioral data to help you create highly targeted and customer-centric messaging. You can use this data to segment your audiences, creating targeted campaigns that are extremely effective.

With Klaviyo, you can automate email workflows easily for order follow-ups, abandoned shopping carts, and more. In-depth reporting features help you measure the performance of your campaigns with ease.

Conclusion

According to a report, 84.3% of people check their emails at least once a day. Email marketing, therefore, gives you amazing opportunities to get your brand in front of people.

Wix email marketing is a good option if you are a beginner and new to email marketing campaigns. 

It is great to test the waters, but if you want to launch an effective and successful email marketing campaign, you should consider using Wix email marketing alternatives like Omnisend for better results.