Constant Contact vs Braze: Choosing the Right Marketing Automation Platform for Your Business

As a Marketing Manager, choosing the right marketing automation tool is crucial for your campaign success. In this comprehensive comparison, we'll examine two popular solutions: Constant Contact and Braze. We'll explore their features, recent updates, ideal use cases, and more to help you make an informed decision for your marketing needs. 📊

Key Feature Differentiation

Constant Contact Features

Constant Contact offers a robust set of email marketing features tailored for small to medium-sized businesses. Its intuitive drag-and-drop editor allows for quick creation of visually appealing emails, even for those without design experience. The platform provides a variety of customizable templates, making it easy to maintain brand consistency across campaigns.

One standout feature is Constant Contact's event management tools. Users can create and manage online registrations, send invitations, and track attendees—all within the same platform. This integration of event marketing with email campaigns sets Constant Contact apart, especially for businesses that frequently host webinars or local events.

Constant Contact also offers basic automation capabilities, allowing users to set up welcome series, birthday emails, and abandoned cart reminders. While these automations are not as advanced as some competitors, they cover the essential needs of many small businesses. The platform's social media integration enables users to manage and schedule posts across multiple platforms, providing a centralized hub for multi-channel marketing efforts.

Braze Features

Braze positions itself as a comprehensive customer engagement platform, offering advanced features for large-scale, data-driven marketing campaigns. At its core, Braze provides sophisticated multi-channel messaging capabilities, allowing marketers to reach customers via email, push notifications, in-app messages, SMS, and more. This omnichannel approach enables seamless customer experiences across various touchpoints.

One of Braze's standout features is its Canvas flow tool, which allows marketers to create complex, multi-step customer journeys. With Canvas, users can design highly personalized campaigns that adapt in real-time based on customer behavior and preferences. This level of dynamic personalization is particularly valuable for enterprises with large, diverse customer bases.

Braze also excels in its data capabilities, offering robust APIs and SDKs for deep integration with other tools in a company's tech stack. The platform's Currents feature allows for real-time data streaming, enabling marketers to act on customer data as it's generated. This real-time processing power, combined with Braze's advanced segmentation tools, allows for highly targeted and timely marketing initiatives.

Recent Feature Updates

Constant Contact Updates

Constant Contact has recently introduced several updates to enhance its platform's functionality. One significant addition is the improved AI-powered subject line generator, which helps users create more engaging email subject lines. This feature uses machine learning algorithms to analyze past campaign performance and suggest subject lines likely to improve open rates.

Another notable update is the expansion of Constant Contact's e-commerce integrations. The platform now offers deeper connections with popular online store platforms, enabling more seamless data flow between shopping carts and email campaigns. This improvement allows for more targeted abandoned cart emails and product recommendation features.

Constant Contact has also enhanced its reporting capabilities, introducing more detailed analytics dashboards. These new reports provide deeper insights into subscriber engagement, helping marketers make data-driven decisions to optimize their campaigns. While these updates are valuable, they still lag behind the more advanced analytics offered by enterprise-level platforms like Braze.

Braze Updates

Braze has rolled out several significant updates, further solidifying its position as a leader in customer engagement platforms. One of the most impactful recent additions is the introduction of Braze Alloys, an ecosystem of technology partners that extends the platform's capabilities. This update allows for easier integration with a wide range of third-party tools, enhancing Braze's flexibility and customization options.

Another key update is the enhancement of Braze's AI and machine learning capabilities. The platform now offers more sophisticated predictive analytics, including churn prediction and optimal send time features. These AI-driven insights help marketers proactively address customer retention and improve campaign performance.

Braze has also expanded its data management capabilities, introducing new features for data governance and privacy compliance. This includes enhanced tools for managing user consent and data retention policies, which are crucial for businesses operating in regions with strict data protection regulations like GDPR and CCPA.

Target Users and Ideal Companies

Constant Contact Ideal Users

Constant Contact is particularly well-suited for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) that prioritize ease of use and straightforward email marketing capabilities. The platform's user-friendly interface and intuitive design tools make it an excellent choice for businesses with limited technical resources or those new to email marketing.

Ideal users of Constant Contact often include local retailers, service providers, and non-profit organizations. These entities typically benefit from the platform's event management features and basic automation capabilities. For instance, a local bakery might use Constant Contact to send weekly newsletters, promote special events, and automate birthday discount emails to loyal customers.

Companies with up to 50,000 subscribers find Constant Contact's pricing and feature set most appropriate. The platform is particularly valuable for businesses that host regular events or webinars, as its integrated event management tools streamline the process of promoting and managing these activities alongside email campaigns.

Braze Ideal Users

Braze caters to larger enterprises and rapidly growing mid-market companies that require sophisticated, data-driven marketing automation across multiple channels. The platform is ideal for businesses with complex customer journeys and large, diverse user bases that demand highly personalized communication strategies.

Typical Braze users include e-commerce companies, mobile app developers, and large B2C brands. These organizations often have dedicated marketing teams and data analysts who can fully leverage Braze's advanced features. For example, a global retail chain might use Braze to create personalized omnichannel campaigns based on customers' in-store and online behaviors, leveraging real-time data to drive engagement.

Companies with millions of users or customers are best positioned to benefit from Braze's scalability and advanced segmentation capabilities. Industries that heavily rely on mobile engagement, such as fintech, gaming, and media streaming services, find particular value in Braze's robust push notification and in-app messaging features.

Best and Worst Use Cases

Constant Contact Excels

Constant Contact shines in scenarios where simplicity and ease of use are paramount. It's particularly effective for small businesses running straightforward email marketing campaigns. For instance, a local boutique using Constant Contact can quickly create and send visually appealing newsletters showcasing new arrivals or seasonal sales, without needing extensive technical knowledge.

Another area where Constant Contact excels is in event marketing. Its integrated event management tools make it ideal for businesses or organizations that frequently host workshops, seminars, or local events. A non-profit organization, for example, can efficiently manage email invitations, registrations, and follow-ups for fundraising events all within the same platform.

Constant Contact also performs well for businesses with a primary focus on email marketing who don't require extensive multi-channel capabilities. It's particularly suitable for companies looking to maintain regular communication with a subscriber base of up to 50,000, providing enough features to create engaging email content without overwhelming users with complex options.

Braze Excels

Braze excels in complex, data-driven marketing scenarios that require sophisticated personalization and multi-channel engagement. It's particularly effective for large-scale mobile app engagement strategies. For instance, a global ride-sharing app using Braze can send highly targeted push notifications based on user location, time of day, and past behavior, significantly improving user retention and engagement.

Another area where Braze shines is in creating intricate, multi-step customer journeys. E-commerce companies can leverage Braze's Canvas feature to design complex campaigns that adapt in real-time based on customer actions. For example, an online retailer could create a series of personalized touchpoints across email, SMS, and in-app messages to guide a customer from browsing to purchase, with each message tailored based on the customer's interactions.

Braze is also excellent for businesses requiring deep integration of customer data across various platforms. Its robust API and data streaming capabilities make it ideal for companies looking to unify customer data from multiple sources and act on it in real-time. This is particularly valuable for businesses in fast-paced industries like fintech or gaming, where real-time responsiveness can significantly impact user engagement and retention.

Limitations

Constant Contact's primary limitations lie in its advanced automation and multi-channel capabilities. While it offers basic automation features, it lacks the sophisticated workflow builders found in more advanced platforms. This can be restrictive for businesses looking to implement complex, behavior-driven marketing strategies across multiple touchpoints.

The platform also has limited capabilities when it comes to advanced segmentation and personalization. While it offers basic segmentation options, it may not suffice for businesses requiring highly granular targeting based on complex user behaviors or attributes. Additionally, Constant Contact's reporting and analytics features, while improved, still lag behind more robust enterprise solutions.

Braze, on the other hand, may be overwhelming for smaller businesses or those with limited marketing resources. Its advanced features often require a significant investment in time and expertise to fully utilize. The platform's pricing model can also be prohibitive for smaller organizations or those with budget constraints.

Another limitation of Braze is its learning curve. The platform's extensive capabilities and customization options can be daunting for new users or teams without dedicated technical resources. This complexity might lead to underutilization of the platform's full potential in organizations that lack the necessary expertise or time to fully explore and implement its features.

Data Integration Capabilities

Constant Contact Integration Features

Constant Contact offers a range of integration options, though they are more limited compared to enterprise-level solutions. The platform provides native integrations with popular e-commerce platforms, CRM systems, and social media networks. These integrations allow for basic data synchronization, such as importing contact lists or connecting with online stores to track purchase behavior.

The platform's API, while functional, is somewhat basic in its capabilities. It allows for essential operations like managing contacts, creating and sending campaigns, and retrieving basic reporting data. However, it may not be sufficient for businesses requiring real-time, bi-directional data flow or complex data transformations.

In terms of data warehouse support, Constant Contact's capabilities are limited. While it's possible to export data for analysis in external systems, the platform doesn't offer native integrations with major data warehouse solutions. This can be a significant drawback for businesses looking to incorporate email marketing data into their broader data analytics strategies.

Braze Integration Features

Braze offers robust integration capabilities designed to support complex, data-driven marketing strategies. The platform provides a wide array of pre-built integrations with major marketing, analytics, and customer data platforms. These integrations enable seamless data flow between Braze and other tools in a company's tech stack, facilitating a unified view of customer data.

Braze's API is particularly powerful, offering extensive capabilities for real-time data synchronization and advanced operations. It supports bi-directional data flow, allowing for both the import of customer data into Braze and the export of engagement data to other systems. This API flexibility enables businesses to create custom integrations tailored to their specific needs.

In terms of data warehouse support, Braze offers strong capabilities. The platform's Currents feature allows for real-time streaming of engagement data to major data warehouse solutions like Snowflake, Google BigQuery, and Amazon Redshift. This enables businesses to incorporate Braze data into their broader analytics and business intelligence workflows.

For businesses looking to enhance their data integration capabilities, especially when working with these marketing automation tools, Census offers powerful solutions. Census specializes in reverse ETL, enabling seamless data synchronization between your data warehouse and various SaaS tools, including both Constant Contact and Braze. This can significantly improve data accuracy and enable more sophisticated marketing strategies by leveraging Census alongside these platforms.

Pricing Models

Constant Contact Pricing

Constant Contact offers a tiered pricing structure based primarily on the number of contacts in a user's account. This model makes it relatively straightforward for small to medium-sized businesses to predict their costs as they grow. The platform typically offers two main plans: Email and Email Plus.

The Email plan includes basic email marketing features, customizable templates, and basic reporting. Pricing starts at around $20/month for up to 500 contacts, with incremental increases as the contact list grows. The Email Plus plan, starting at about $45/month for up to 500 contacts, includes additional features like automated email series, event marketing, and online donations.

Constant Contact also offers nonprofit discounts and prepay discounts for longer commitments. While this pricing model is transparent and scalable for smaller businesses, it can become less cost-effective for companies with very large contact lists or those requiring more advanced features.

Braze Pricing

Braze employs a more complex, customized pricing model tailored to enterprise needs. Unlike Constant Contact, Braze doesn't publicly disclose its pricing, instead opting for a 'contact for quote' approach. This reflects the platform's focus on larger businesses with more diverse and complex requirements.

Braze's pricing is typically based on several factors, including the number of monthly active users (MAUs), the channels used (e.g., email, push notifications, SMS), and the specific features required. The platform often uses a 'point-based' system, where different actions consume different numbers of points from a monthly allotment.

While this model allows for flexibility and customization, it can make budgeting more challenging, especially for businesses new to enterprise-level marketing automation. Braze's pricing generally starts in the tens of thousands of dollars annually, reflecting its positioning as an enterprise-grade solution.

Evaluation Criteria

When choosing between Constant Contact and Braze, Marketing Managers should consider several key factors:

1. Company Size and Resources: Constant Contact is more suitable for small to medium-sized businesses with limited technical resources, while Braze is designed for larger enterprises with dedicated marketing teams.
2. Marketing Complexity: If your needs are primarily email-focused with basic automation, Constant Contact may suffice. For complex, multi-channel campaigns with advanced personalization, Braze is the better choice.
3. Data Integration Needs: Companies requiring deep integration with other systems and real-time data processing should lean towards Braze. Those with simpler data needs may find Constant Contact adequate.
4. Budget: Constant Contact offers more predictable, lower-cost options suitable for smaller budgets. Braze's enterprise pricing model is more appropriate for larger marketing budgets.
5. Scalability: Consider your growth trajectory. Braze offers more room for scaling sophisticated marketing operations, while Constant Contact may have limitations for rapidly growing companies.
6. User Experience: Constant Contact prioritizes ease of use, making it ideal for teams without specialized technical skills. Braze's power comes with a steeper learning curve.
7. Customer Support: Evaluate the level of support offered. Constant Contact generally provides more accessible support for smaller teams, while Braze offers more specialized, enterprise-level support.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the choice between Constant Contact and Braze largely depends on your company's size, marketing sophistication, and growth trajectory. 🚀

Constant Contact is an excellent choice for small to medium-sized businesses looking for a user-friendly, cost-effective solution primarily focused on email marketing and basic automation. Its strengths lie in its simplicity, integrated event management tools, and predictable pricing model. It's particularly well-suited for local businesses, non-profits, and companies with limited technical resources who want to run effective email campaigns without a steep learning curve.

Braze, on the other hand, is the go-to platform for large enterprises and rapidly growing companies requiring sophisticated, data-driven, multi-channel marketing capabilities. Its advanced features in personalization, real-time data processing, and complex customer journey mapping make it ideal for businesses with large, diverse customer bases and dedicated marketing teams. While it comes with a higher price tag and steeper learning curve, Braze offers the scalability and depth needed for comprehensive, enterprise-level marketing strategies.

Ultimately, the decision should align with your specific marketing needs, technical capabilities, and long-term business goals. For businesses looking to bridge the gap between these platforms or enhance their data integration capabilities, solutions like Census can provide valuable support in leveraging your customer data effectively across your chosen marketing automation tool.