Case Study: How to Change an ESP and Pay 6 Times Less

When switching to a new provider, marketers have to consider many issues: how long will migration take, will we need developers, how easy will onboarding be, have we made the right choice?

Our client, a marketing agency, migrated from MailChimp to Yespo CDP and went through all switching stages. Now we would like to share their experience.

Company

Our client is a marketing agency that focuses on online promotion. They help small and large businesses with site audits, advertising, marketing strategies, and more. The company offers individual solutions to every client and does their best to increase their online sales. They also run a school for Internet marketers and have a blog where you can find useful marketing content.

Problem

The company had been using MailChimp as an email service provider for 7 years. But in 2020 they decided to change the platform for several reasons:

• High price. They paid about $200 for 25K contacts. The price was constantly growing because of the dollar exchange rate and changes in MailChimp's pricing plans.

• Confusing interface. To manage even a simple task, they had to look for a guide or video as the interface logic was unclear.

Before moving to another ESP, the company defined goals and set priorities for their email marketing strategies. They did comparative research of different services, analyzing solutions, prices and support level. As a result, they chose to move to Yespo CDP.

Primarily, the client was afraid of the overload, but two months turned out to be enough to complete the whole migration process.

Read a full guideline on how to migrate to our service from other platforms.

Task

The main task was to move to a new domain and transfer all data:

• 25K contacts. A part of them received regular campaigns, and another part received occasional campaigns.
• About 40 emails with lead magnets.
• Series of welcome emails.

Solution

Step 1. New Domain

When the company started with email marketing, Double Opt-In wasn’t an official requirement by their service provider and they never received any instructions on it. But after they reached 10K subscribers, something went wrong. MailChimp notified them that they didn’t have email confirmation and temporarily blocked the account.

After the implementation of DOI and long correspondence with MailChimp, the service unblocked the account and the agency resumed email sending. But they started to have problems with domain reputation. Many of emails landed in Spam, and the company didn’t understand why.

That’s why when changing the service provider, they decided to change a domain as well. What’s more, initially they had one domain for both internal correspondence and marketing campaigns to subscribers.

The agency created and verified a new domain following our guideline on DNS record change. Note that at this step you’ll need a programmer who will add the necessary records to the server.

Step 2. Transfer of Emails

After registering a new subdomain and creating an account in our platform, the company transferred emails with lead magnets. The only things they needed for this task were a list of emails with lead magnets and a new email template created in our platform.

Three of agency's marketers completed the task in two weeks despite the fact that they were also engaged in other projects.

We took an email template from Stripo, exported it to our platform and filled it with content.

Step 3. Setting an Email Series

Together we created two email series: for new subscribers and existing subscribers. So far the company sends one welcome series for all subscribers, but plans to create different series for different types of lead magnets.

Step 4. Creating Subscription Forms

The company had previously used MailChimp Forms by Mailmunch. They let easily set up integrations for forms with lead magnets. In addition, they had a general API-integrated subscription form.

With our platform, they created their own subscription forms. The agency integrated them via API with the help of Yespo's programmer. They assigned different typeforms for different lead magnets, which enabled them to launch the corresponding series, and ended up with a form with 5 fields:

• Form title;
• Form text:
• Button text;
• form-type;
• GTM value (to track the result).

After, they set forms for about 40 lead magnets.

Step 5. Contact Base Transfer

Base export from MailChimp turned out to be the hardest part. Transferring the base, turning off payments and deleting an account turned out to be a long process. Note that it can take up to 24 hours to export contacts, so don't wait until the last day before a new monthly payment.

Before uploading your base to a new service, we’d also recommend you validate it to get rid of invalid contacts.

Step 6. Contact Import and Email Campaign Launch

Sending the first campaign from a new subdomain is always disturbing. Prior to the launch, the company contacted our support for consulting on the domain warmup. We split the contact base into parts, including new subscribers and raised the sending volume steadily.

It took the agency a week to send the first email to all contacts. They keep on sending emails to segments and not to the whole base because even one spam report can hurt the domain reputation.

Results

The migration hasn't affected the agency's email marketing strategy. They proceed with the same routines; the work process became more convenient.

• More options for email design.

The design of the company's digest has gotten better. In Yespo CDP, clients aren’t limited to the block editor and edit templates in HTML. Our editor also has numerous special features such as a rollover and AMP.

• High-quality support.

Our support helps the client a lot with the subdomain settings at the very beginning of our cooperation. We keep on helping, answering all questions as soon as possible.

• Reduced cost.

MailChimp’s expensive plans were one of the reasons for the client's migration. Now they’re paying 6 times less.

Summary

Don’t be afraid to change the service if needed, even if you’ve got used to it. The migration process can be easier than you think.

Before moving, consider all pros and cons and consider challenges you may face. Study alternative platforms, check user reviews, request a demo and ask for a trial period: these steps will make you find the service that will fit your needs and requirements.

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