With the removal of the Mailchimp for Shopify integration, we’re having a lot of conversations around how Hive compares to Mailchimp as an ESP for Shopify. While you can continue to use Mailchimp and Shopify together with a workaround integration, we think (with a very conscious bias) that it’s probably best to bite the bullet and switch your email marketing over to an ESP that fully integrates with Shopify.
Related: Hive vs. Mailchimp for Ecommerce
After chatting with customers who’ve recently moved from Mailchimp to Hive, we put together this list of the key pain points that Hive addresses where Mailchimp misses the mark.
Easy integration
This one’s a no-brainer–while you can continue using Shopify and Mailchimp together with a third-party integration, you’re opening yourself up to a few risks. Since there’s data moving through three platforms instead of two, it’s more likely that customer information won’t be synced reliably. If you send infrequent email campaigns to your whole list, there’s not too much to worry about, but if you send automations based on real-time customer behaviour as well as campaigns to consistently updating segments, you’ll probably want to cut out the middle man.
Trustworthy automations
With Hive’s direct Shopify integration, you can easily see what automations are triggered off what customer actions, and simply track it back to Shopify. With a third party integration, the interaction becomes a little less transparent. It’s harder to see what data is coming in from Shopify and reliably check it within Mailchimp when they don’t directly integrate.
Flexible without extra costs
It’s likely that you’ll want to connect your ESP with more than just Shopify, depending on which platforms you use to power your business. The good news: with Hive, you can have subscribers in multiple segments across all kinds of sources that sync to one user profile (so your plan only counts each subscriber once). Even better, the list size that indicates which plan you’re on only includes subscribed contacts. We don’t believe in charging extra for customers you don’t actively message.
Related: Migrating from Mailchimp to Hive in 3 Easy Steps
A recent update from Mailchimp included the following: “But those customers that unsubscribed and that customer that attended your event but never opted in to your newsletter? They’ll be in your audience now too.” With Mailchimp’s list system and confusing switchover to audiences, not only do you have to pay for individual audiences, your list size also includes unsubscribes.
Visibility into subscriber engagement
With Hive, subscriber engagement is front and center. Right on the dashboard, and every time you send an email, you get full visibility into how your customers are moving in and out of engagement levels. With engagement top of mind, it’s easier to craft smarter messaging that speaks to your customers’ needs.
Mailchimp gives limited holistic visibility into your subscribers’ engagement, with seemingly arbitrary star ratings that denote engagement level. When looking at your whole list, it’s almost impossible to tell who’s most active, who’s at risk of slipping away, and who just isn’t engaging with you anymore.
Wrap Up
If you’re frustrated by the removal of the Mailchimp for Shopify integration, we definitely feel you, and we know that finding an alternative for Mailchimp that has the right amount of flexibility can be a pretty big undertaking. If you’d like a demo of Hive to see if it’s right for your business, feel free to get in touch: hello@hive.co.