Email might not be the flashiest of marketing tools, but it’s tried and true. Research shows that email marketing campaigns have an average return on investment of $36 for every $1 spent, making it one of the most cost-effective marketing channels.
It’s a relatively low-effort marketing tool, too. With email automation and AI email marketing tools, you can write and send campaigns with just a few clicks.
A bulk email service gives you the power to run smart, scalable bulk email campaigns that can drive traffic, increase customer loyalty, and boost revenue—all while keeping your costs low. Read on to learn if it’s a good fit for your business.
What is a bulk email service?
A bulk email service is a platform that allows you to send bulk emails to a large volume of contacts, with features to help you segment your audience, create eye-catching designs using templates, and stay compliant with national and international laws. Think of the mass emails businesses often send: newsletters, transactional emails, product updates, shipping notifications, or promotional emails. In ecommerce, a bulk email service can play an essential role in promoting your products and turning one-time shoppers into engaged subscribers. A bulk email service can help remove the manual aspect of managing consistent communication with your audience, from sending monthly product tips to subscriber-only offers.
What to look for in a bulk email service
- Segmentation
- Deliverability
- Automation
- Analytics and reporting
- User-friendliness
- Compliance
- Integration
Leveraging the right bulk email sender can be one of the most powerful email marketing tools for brands that want to grow efficiently and maintain customer relationships. Look for these essential features:
Segmentation
Email segmentation, or dividing your contact list into smaller groups based on behaviors, demographics, or purchase history, allows you to send targeted messages. A good mass email service automates this process by segmenting contacts based on specific actions, like purchases, email opens, or link clicks, so you can send relevant content without manually sorting through your database.
Deliverability
A trusted bulk email provider will help ensure your messages actually reach your customers’ inboxes rather than their junk or spam folders (deliverability versus just being delivered). This includes verifying that your emails come from a legitimate source (called domain authentication), which tells email platforms like Gmail that you’re a real business, not a spammer.
The service also helps maintain your sender reputation by tracking how often people open, click, or mark your emails as spam. All of this improves the chances that your emails land in front of the right audience, in the right folder, at the right time.
Automation
Email automation means your marketing emails are sent at the ideal time without manual effort. You can schedule recurring newsletters, automate promotional emails during sales, or trigger transactional messages like order confirmations. You can even dig deeper into automation features like:
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Autoresponders. Automatically reply to actions, like signing up or placing an order.
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Drip sequences. Send a series of timed emails to guide users through a journey, like onboarding or a post-purchase follow-up.
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Dynamic personalization. Customize content like names, product suggestions, or images based on each subscriber’s behavior or data.
Analytics and reporting
To improve your mass email campaigns, you need to track engagement metrics to learn what is and isn’t working. A great bulk email service will track key email metrics—like open rate, click-through rate, revenue generated, and unsubscribes—to help you optimize your campaigns. Plus, features like A/B testing let you experiment with different versions of your emails, changing elements like headlines, images, or calls to action, to see what resonates best with your audiences.
User-friendliness
Not a developer or designer? That shouldn’t be an issue with many bulk email services. The best bulk email marketing services offer a drag-and-drop editor, customizable templates, and an email template library. Look for a platform with mobile-ready templates, a clean dashboard, and features like signup forms. These tools save time, reduce the learning curve, and make it easy to scale your email campaigns as your business grows.
Compliance
As with any advertising, bulk email marketing comes with legal responsibilities. Your email marketing platform should support crafting emails that are compliant with regulations like CAN-SPAM (US), GDPR (EU), and CASL (Canada). This includes managing opt-ins, email verification, unsubscribe links, and providing a valid way for recipients to contact you, such as a physical mailing address or customer support email. Staying compliant protects your business from penalties and builds trust with subscribers.
Integration
Integrating your bulk email service with an ecommerce platform like Shopify, customer relationship management (CRM) software, and analytics tracking tools allows for richer data and streamlined marketing efforts. For example, syncing purchase data from Shopify enables automated follow-ups, while CRM integrations help personalize messages using customer-specific data. These integrations save time, reduce manual work, and allow you to deliver more targeted email campaigns.
8 best bulk email services
Bulk email marketing software makes it easier to send messages to large groups of customers at once, whether you’re announcing a sale, sharing a newsletter, or sending transactional emails.
Here are the eight best bulk email marketing services:
1. Shopify Email
Shopify Email is a built-in email marketing tool for businesses using Shopify. It lets you create, send, and track emails directly within the Shopify platform without external integrations. Its email editor includes pre-made templates that you can customize by adjusting layout, colors, fonts, and images. Additional tools support audience segmentation, message personalization, and performance tracking. You can also send test emails to preview how messages will appear before sending them to your full subscriber list.
Pricing: Shopify Email is free for your first 10,000 emails a month, then $1 for every additional 1,000 emails.
2. Mailchimp
Mailchimp is known for its ease of use and approachable design. Its extensive template library lets you quickly create professional-looking campaigns without design experience. The platform also includes tools for SMS marketing and building landing pages, along with tools to track your email marketing revenue. Generative AI tools help you write content and analyze performance, making it easier to optimize campaigns without a steep learning curve.
Pricing: Mailchimp’s standard plan comes with a 14-day free trial, and is then $20 a month.
3. MailerLite
MailerLite is a free bulk email service. You can send up to 12,000 emails per month to as many as 1,000 subscribers using its free plan. This free tier gives you access to useful features like builders for pop-ups, surveys, quizzes, and landing pages. Paid plans unlock additional functionality, including newsletter templates, auto-resend campaigns, and more advanced customization options.
Pricing: MailerLite is free for up to 12,000 emails a month. Paid plans start at $10 per month.
4. Klaviyo
Klaviyo offers robust automation tools to help businesses scale their email marketing efforts. The platform includes pre-built templates, like bulk emails for price drop and back-in-stock reminders, advanced audience segmentation, and A/B testing features to help build and optimize bulk email campaigns. With its additional automation features (like send time optimization and product recommendation tools), it may be a better fit for larger brands looking for enterprise-level email marketing capabilities.
Pricing: Klaviyo is free for less than 250 subscribers. Paid plans start at $20 per month and support more subscribers.
5. Omnisend
Omnisend is one of the top-rated email marketing platforms in the Shopify App Store, built to support high-volume, ecommerce-focused email campaigns. It includes pre-built, automated email workflows for key customer touchpoints like cart abandonment and welcome emails for new subscribers, win-back and reactivation emails for at-risk customers, and requests for feedback or product reviews. These templates are user-friendly, with preset subject lines and messaging, making it easy to launch bulk email campaigns.
Pricing: Omnisend is free for up to 250 contacts and 500 emails a month. Paid plans start at $16 per month if you have up to 500 contacts.
6. Brevo
Brevo blends scalability and ease of use. Its dynamic content blocks make it simple to create personalized emails at scale and deliver them quickly. For example, you can use one email layout to create multiple personalized emails for each subscriber with their information automatically filled out by the platform, like order totals and a list of what they purchased. Brevo also includes a built-in CRM to manage large contact lists and ensure high deliverability.
Pricing: Brevo is free for up to 300 emails a day. Paid plans start at $8.08 per month.
7. Moosend
Moosend offers unlimited email sends on all plans, strong deliverability, and compliance with regulations. Users can create campaigns using customizable, responsive templates. Built-in spam testing helps reduce the risk of landing in junk folders, while pre-built workflow recipes and a fast email API to send many emails quickly and efficiently make campaign setup simple. Moosend also includes real-time tracking and audience management tools to help you monitor performance and stay organized.
Pricing: Moosend is free for 30 days; plans start at $9 per month.
8. ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign is a bulk email platform with tools for building multi-step automated workflows, segmenting large subscriber lists, and sending personalized messages at scale. It includes email autoresponders for timely delivery and tagging and segmentation features for targeted messaging. Users can set up internal notifications to trigger team follow-ups and use built-in analytics to track metrics like open rates and conversions. The platform also offers CRM integration, subscription forms, and landing pages to support broader marketing and lead generation efforts.
Pricing: ActiveCampaign offers a 14-day free trial, with plans starting at $15 a month.
5 best practices for sending bulk emails
- Segment your audience
- Use a verified sending domain
- Optimize subject lines and preview text
- Design for mobile first
- Track key metrics and iterate
To ensure you're optimizing your bulk email marketing, follow these core best practices:
1. Segment your audience
Use list management tools within your email marketing platform to organize and group your contacts based on shared traits such as behavior (e.g., link clicks, past purchases), location, or purchase history. These tools help you automatically update segments as customer data evolves. By segmenting your audience, you can send more personalized emails, including the recipient’s name, recommending products based on past purchases, referencing local events or store locations, or tailoring subject lines to reflect browsing history.
2. Use a verified sending domain
Authenticate your domain with Sender Policy Framework (SPF), DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM), and Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) to protect your sender reputation and reduce the risk of emails landing in spam folders. This tells email providers that your messages are legitimate and coming from a trusted source.
For example, instead of sending emails from a generic address like yourstore@gmail.com, use a verified domain such as newsletter@yourstore.com. Most bulk email services offer guided instructions and generate the necessary records for you to copy and paste into your domain’s Domain Name System (DNS) configuration.
3. Optimize subject lines and preview text
Your subject line and preview text are the first things subscribers see, playing a key role in whether your email gets opened. Most email platforms let you A/B test two or more versions by sending each to a small portion of your list and automatically sending the better-performing one to the rest. For example, you might test “Don’t miss our summer sale ☀️” against “Save 30% this weekend only” to see which gets a higher open rate.
4. Design for mobile first
Mobile devices account for over half of all web traffic, so making sure any design works on a phone is crucial. Use responsive design techniques that optimize for mobile and a drag-and-drop editor to make sure your emails appear correctly across devices. Designing for mobile first helps prevent issues like cut-off headlines, oversized images, or broken formatting that can impact your user flow.
5. Track key metrics and iterate
Use email tracking tools to monitor key email metrics such as open rate, engagement rate, and click-through rate. These insights help you understand how your contacts are interacting with your emails and identify areas for improvement. Setting a schedule to review metrics can help you stay organized and strategic, rather than reacting to each analytics report.
For example, you may have a great open rate for a campaign, indicating your subject line is working, but engagement drops off, indicating you can experiment with optimizing the body of the email for the next campaign.
Bulk email service FAQ
What is the best bulk email service?
The best bulk email service depends on your business size, goals, and platform needs. For ecommerce brands already using Shopify, Shopify Email offers seamless integration with no extra tools required. If you’re looking for advanced automation and segmentation, platforms like Klaviyo or ActiveCampaign may be a better fit. Businesses that want a simple, free option to start with might prefer MailerLite or Brevo.
Is there a free bulk email service?
Yes, Shopify Email, MailerLite, Brevo, and Moosend offer free plans or trials to help you get started. These free plans typically come with basic features like drag-and-drop editors, automation, and segmentation, making them a solid choice for smaller lists or testing out a platform before committing.
How much does it cost to send bulk emails?
The cost of sending bulk emails depends on the platform you choose, your subscriber count, and how many emails you send each month. Many providers offer affordable entry points, with options to scale and add more advanced features as your business grows.
