Every year billions of insects are lured to their deaths.

Attracted by sights, scents, and even the promise of a mate.

Carnivorous plants make a living of being exceptional at this.

The venus flytrap secrets nectar. And unsuspecting victims lap up the sugary delight…

Only…

SNAP!!

And it’s game over!

Maybe it’s not quite being lured to your death (or at least I HOPE it’s not!)…

But there’s certainly a game of attraction that email service providers play.

And their own sweet nectar is the offer of sending emails to your list… FOR FREE!

Just about every email marketing system out there offers a free tier.

It’s alluring to go with a free option. Especially when starting an online business.

And it can hard to know what features you might need…

So you’d be forgiven if you didn’t realise that some platforms have CRITICAL limitations in their free versions.

One commonly-used platform doesn’t even support basic automations on its free tier.

That means you can’t even send a welcome email when someone subscribes to your list!

That’d be a dealbreaker for me.

And free tiers, really aren’t free…

Because you give away advertising space in every single one of YOUR emails.

You’ve seen the little “MailChimp” or “ConvertKit” logos at the bottoms of emails, right?

To me, this looks unprofessional. And it’s yet another thing to distract your subcribers.

Why even put this distraction in front of them in the first place?

Why even open up the possiblity for them to wonder things like…

“Why are they using MailChimp and not ConvertKit?”

Or, if they’re in the know, they may be wondering why you’re NOT paying 20 or 30 bucks a month for an email service provider.

Are you too cheap? Or broke?

Those AREN’T usually confidence-building signals to our prospective customers!

So… I’d prefer to ditch that distraction altogether.

Perhaps the MOST significant reason to NOT go for a free tier is… lack of support.

The free options I’m aware of, only offer support via a knowledge base.

So you can search for help yourself.

Then there’s always Google and YouTube at the ready.

But if something isn’t working right… and you can’t find an answer yourself… you’re stuck.

What’s it going to be like if there’s a problem that’s severly hampering your email marketing… and there’s no one to call?

It’s one of the BIGGEST reasons I chose to pay for my email platform. Even when I was starting out. And was making no money from my email list.

Budgeting from the start for this expense means it’s a normal part of doing business for you.

Is the couple of hundred dollars you might save worth the pain… when you discover the free tier doesn’t do something basic you now need?

If I was picking an email system to start with today…

I’d be looking at my likely needs for 1-2 years down the track. And making my decisions based on those.

It’s of course simpler to stick with the same email platform for the long haul.

And this comes with a nice benefit of being better for your email deliverability.

So… doing a little forward-planning can help ensure you AREN’T going to be missing the features you’ll need.

Email marketing is a critical part of your business. It deserves the investment.

And at $10-$30 per month to start out… I reckon it’s worth it.