When it comes to email marketing software, Klaviyo and Dotmailer are two of the top choices used by small businesses and e-commerce companies. Choosing the right platform is crucial since email marketing can have a profound impact on customer acquisition, engagement, and retention.
For this Klaviyo vs Dotmailer comparison, we will evaluate the two platforms across eight categories: market position and popularity, ease of use, design and customization, features and functionality, performance, customer support, and community, pricing, and reviews and reputation.
Our goal is to provide business owners and marketers with a comprehensive, objective comparison that highlights the strengths and weaknesses of both platforms to help you determine which solution is the best fit for your business goals and email marketing needs.
1. Understanding the Basics
Klaviyo was founded in 2012 by Andrew Bialecki and Ed Hallen. It quickly became one of the most popular email marketing and automation platforms designed specifically for e-commerce companies. With over $100M in funding and a customer base growing by over 50% year-over-year, Klaviyo has cemented itself as an email marketing leader.
Dotmailer was launched in 1999 by co-founders Tink Taylor and Simon Williams. As one of the early innovators in email marketing software, Dotmailer has focused primarily on customers in Europe. Recently acquired by CM Group, Dotmailer leverages the experience of its long-time founders to offer robust email marketing automation features to over 6,500 businesses worldwide.
Both platforms have strong standing based on funding, customer traction, and market longevity. As industry staples, they offer the reliability that comes from experience along with innovation from consistent product development.
2. Features and Functionality
Automation
Klaviyo
Klaviyo offers a robust set of automation tools and workflows that help e-commerce businesses personalize messaging and create customized journeys for each customer segment. Some key features of the popular marketing automation software include a drag-and-drop workflow builder to easily create multi-step automation based on customer behaviors or attributes.
There are real-time order updates to trigger post-purchase flows automatically when a transaction occurs. Klaviyo also has intelligent segmentation that dynamically groups users based on profiles, behaviors, purchases, location, custom metrics, and more.
Additionally, there is ready-made automation for common e-commerce scenarios like abandoned carts, recently viewed products, repeat customers, and new subscribers. With Klaviyo, even non-technical users can set up sophisticated workflows to nurture leads, drive conversions, and retain customers.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer provides visual automation tools and pre-built templates so both novice and experienced marketers can create effective email campaigns.
Capabilities include automated programs using drag and drop builder or point-and-click creation, triggers based on opening emails, clicking links, multiple purchases, custom field values, and other attributes along with dynamic content and personalized messaging within automation based on customer data and preferences.
There are also welcome series, birthday messages, abandoned browse, re-engagement series, and more campaign templates. While the interface differs from Klaviyo, Dotmailer still empowers marketers to orchestrate personalized automation workflows with minimal technical skills required.
Winner: Klaviyo
With more robust segmentation options, real-time order-based triggers, and a longer list of built-in automation tailored to e-commerce, Klaviyo edges out Dotmailer when it comes to the platform’s overall automation capabilities. Both are strong solutions, but Klaviyo seems optimized for the more sophisticated needs of complex product-based businesses.
Email Templates
Klaviyo
Klaviyo offers hundreds of professionally designed, customizable email templates that serve the needs of all types of e-commerce businesses. Templates are organized by category, such as an abandoned cart, browse abandonment, win-backs, welcome series, etc.
Drag-and-drop editing makes it simple to tweak templates by adding/removing/rearranging elements and personalizing content with placeholder variables. Images, text, buttons, and other elements can be restyled quickly as well. Klaviyo also allows creating templates from scratch for those desiring more creative freedom.
Dynamic content blocks take the guesswork out of personalization by automatically pulling in relevant customer data. With the option to save templates, reuse them, and create full email campaigns right within Klaviyo, email creation is streamlined for e-commerce marketers.
Dotmailer
The Dotmailer template library includes hundreds of responsive, mobile-optimized templates for welcome series, special offers, re-engagement campaigns, win-back series, and more. Drag-and-drop editing empowers customization of layouts, images, and text per user preferences.
Dynamic content fields enable personalization with customer data, while split testing allows template A/B testing to improve performance. Dotmailer also provides tools to create new templates from scratch or upload customized HTML templates designed externally.
The template builder instantly shows mobile previews to ensure emails render perfectly across devices. For e-commerce businesses, Dotmailer has everything required to design on-brand, effective templates that drive conversions across the customer lifecycle.
Winner: Tie
With seemingly identical features for building, editing, testing, and customizing professional email templates out of the box, both Klaviyo and Dotmailer offer robust capabilities to meet the needs of most e-commerce marketers. The specific templates differ, but the functionality is on par. For core template design and customization tools, this one is just too close to call.
Segmentation
Klaviyo
Klaviyo enables highly advanced e-commerce customer segmentation with dynamic groups that automatically update based on intelligent filters. Segment users by predicted lifetime value, average order value, money spent, products purchased, order frequency, cart abandonment, and hundreds of other traits.
Combine attributes to create highly targeted groups for personalized messaging. Klaviyo makes it easy to segment cold traffic vs repeat customers, high spenders, at-risk churn users, loyal advocates, or niche customer bases. Location, traffic source, page views, custom metrics, user scores, and machine learning further empower granular segmentation schemes.
Create VIP groups automatically, showcase best customers on leaderboards, segment by real-time user activities, and adjust groups “on the fly” within email campaign creation.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer provides deep segmentation capabilities based on consumer behaviors, user profiles, purchase history, on-site activity, and CRM data. Filter contacts by attributes like order spend, purchase dates, subscription status, order numbers, content downloads, page views, and similar engagement metrics.
Location, age, gender, social activity and lifecycle stage (visitor, lead, customer) also facilitate segmentation. Send timely, targeted emails like win-back campaigns to re-engage lapsed customers. Welcome new users and reward loyal buyers for ongoing activity and value.
Create tags to label users for easier campaign targeting, and use multiple segments within one campaign. While Dotmailer packs robust segmentation tools, they currently lack the predictive intelligence and machine learning of Klaviyo.
Winner: Klaviyo
With broader segmentation options based on predicted lifetime value, machine learning insights, granular e-commerce details, and a more automated approach, Klaviyo offers a slight edge for those needing extremely customized, data-savvy customer segmentation. Dotmailer still impresses, but Klaviyo’s versatility and intelligent predictive segmentation win out here.
Analytics
Klaviyo
Klaviyo packs robust email analytics to inform campaign optimization. Track open rates, clickthrough rates, and bounce rates for every campaign and individual message. Analyze performance by device type, location, user segment, and more.
Gain insight on your most engaged subscribers and campaign influencers driving traffic and conversions. Learn which subject lines, from names and design versions test best per audience. Dive into metrics for individual links, assets, and dynamic content.
See revenue attribution by traffic source and campaigns driving sales via custom conversion metrics. With custom dashboards, chart builders, cohort analysis, flow visualization, and scheduled reporting, data is easy to digest and act upon. Klaviyo’s predictive analytics tools also provide predicted customer lifetime value, as well as recommendations to improve deliverability, open rates, and more.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer’s integrated analytics showcase email campaign performance across opens, clicks, bounces, spam complaints, unsubscribed, and more. Benchmark metrics over time, by campaign, list, and segment.
Discover your most engaging subject lines, assets, landing pages, and calls to action. View device, browser, and location data plus subscriber activity like email links clicked and pages visited after the email is sent.
Integration with Google Analytics showcases email’s impact on site traffic and goal conversions. While Dotmailer equips businesses with campaign analytics essentials, Klaviyo seems better optimized for the depth of data e-commerce marketers depend on for precise optimization.
Winner: Klaviyo
With deeper e-commerce data, revenue attribution, and predictive recommendations tailored to email marketing, Klaviyo wins for analytics. Dotmailer still produces core campaign analytics, but Klaviyo goes further to help high-volume customers continually improve email performance. For metric-driven e-commerce brands, Klaviyo has an edge.
Unique Features
Klaviyo
Some unique benefits Klaviyo provides include predictive models that “learn” customer habits to determine the next best actions. This allows sending hyper-targeted emails based on individual user propensity to purchase, predicted lifetime value, and projected churn risk.
There is also a built-in A/B testing capability on email campaigns with statistical significance determined automatically to continually optimize content for improved conversions. Klaviyo also has ratings and reviews tools to showcase UGC, encourage happy customers to leave positive reviews and resolve issues with dissatisfied shoppers.
Additionally, there is text message marketing fully integrated with email for omnichannel campaigns to extend reach and engagement via SMS capabilities. Further, Klaviyo provides social proofing features like daily leaderboards to tap into consumer psychology around scarcity, surrounding opinions, and peer validation.
Dotmailer
Unique advantages offered by Dotmailer include campaign builder functionality for easy WYSWIG creation of multi-step drip campaigns with various follow-up sequences. There are also automated recommendations for campaign timing based on open and click rates of previous sends, which provide suggested best times and days to email segmented groups.
Additionally, Dotmailer offers integration with CM Group’s expanded suite of marketing products for cross-channel attribution and full-funnel optimization. There are even email copywriting and graphic design services available as add-on managed services to create on-brand, high-converting email assets.
Winner: Klaviyo
With more robust predictive models and machine learning, built-in testing, and text message marketing, Klaviyo edges out Dotmailer for the most unique, value-driving features. However, Dotmailer’s creative service offerings could appeal to resource-constrained e-commerce firms needing professional design help.
3. Ease of Use
Klaviyo
Klaviyo’s intuitive dashboards and clean, modern interface make onboarding and navigating the platform simple. Getting started quickly is easy with helpful in-app popups, dedicated support reps to walk new users through initial setup, and pre-built automation ready to activate post-integration.
Klaviyo email creation leverages drag-and-drop templates, customizable elements, and dynamic content blocks that populate personalized subscriber data automatically. Segmentation options and campaign targeting require no coding, while predictive models surface individualized insights automatically to guide messaging strategy.
Robust analytics, easy reporting subscriptions, and optimization recommendations further simplify effective email execution for users at any skill level. With an intuitive interface guiding users every step of the way, Klaviyo customers can drive results regardless of email marketing experience.
Dotmailer
The Dotmailer platform delivers ease of use with a clean, logical UI design and robust educational resources to develop digital marketing skills. Users access documentation libraries covering email creation, automation setup, dynamic content, integrations, deliverability practices, and more. Live chat, phone, and 24/7 community forums assist when needed.
Drag-and-drop newsletter builders, campaign wizards, customizable templates, and segmentation shortcuts minimize the learning curve for new users. Marketers can leverage Dotmailer’s intuitive tools and self-service help options to begin sending and personalizing emails quickly.
For individuals needing more guidance, Dotmailer offers tailored onboarding packages and dedicated account management options at an added cost.
Winner: Tie
With similarly modern interfaces, pre-built templates and automation, drag-and-drop editors, educational materials, and different premium support packages, both platforms enable users of varying skill levels to create targeted, effective email campaigns with relative ease. For most use cases, Klaviyo and Dotmailer are on par regarding general platform usability and approachability.
4. Email Deliverability
Klaviyo
Klaviyo prioritizes deliverability through proprietary infrastructure and strategic partnerships with major ISPs. Its dedicated IP addresses boast stellar sender reputations for inbox placement. Automatic list cleansing, suppression list updating, and email verification maintain high-quality contact databases. Granular analytics track critical inbox metrics like spam complaints, blocks, bounces, and opt-outs.
Klaviyo surfaces clear recommendations to improve deliverability based on historical campaign performance. For high-volume customers, its Deliverability Gravity feature offers deliverability consultants, ISP relationship experts, and custom solutions to maximize effective email reach.
With proven results across 2 billion emails per month, Klaviyo customers reap the benefits of an optimized, well-connected email-sending infrastructure.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer similarly invests heavily in deliverability through sender authentication, whitelist services, daemon suppression, and real-time traffic analysis. Customers access detailed visibility into blocks, spam complaints, and opt-outs at the domain, campaign, and individual levels.
Active deliverability monitoring flags issues early while automated warming procedures ensure safe sender reputation buildup.
Hands-on deliverability consultants offer personalized advice and execution support when needed. Additionally, Dotmailer participates in industry working groups spearheading efforts around inbox standards and best practices. For most use cases, Dotmailer provides the requisite tools and infrastructure to reach the inbox consistently.
Winner: Tie
With advanced deliverability capabilities fueled by strong sender reputations, strategic ISP partnerships, inbox monitoring, automated optimizations, and premium consulting, both Klaviyo and Dotmailer enable marketers to deliver emails reliably at scale.
Each platform offers comparable infrastructure and features to maximize effective recipient reach and engagement. For core needs, this deliverability battle results in an even draw.
5. Customer Support and Community
Klaviyo
Klaviyo emphasizes superior customer support through multiple channels including live chat, email, phone, and priority ticketed support. All plans receive access to these options along with an assigned Customer Success Manager for more personalized, high-touch guidance.
Klaviyo also hosts a private online community called Klaviyo-U for training webinars and peer knowledge sharing. Public groups like the Official Klaviyo Small Business Community on Facebook further enable informal community support.
With continuity from the same human representatives, prompt responses within 24 hours or less, and diverse self-service resources, Klaviyo makes it easy to find answers without excessive effort or delays.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer provides customer assistance through live chat, email tickets, and phone across all paid plans. Business & Enterprise customers unlock faster response times and dedicated account managers. Additionally, Dotmailer’s Help Hub features comprehensive support articles, educational ebooks, and how-to videos for self-guided learning.
The Dotmailer Insiders Facebook group also allows community members to interact, share best practices, and collectively troubleshoot challenges. While Dotmailer checks the boxes on standard support offerings, Klaviyo edges them out in channel accessibility, continuity, and resources for smaller businesses lacking enterprise-level contracts.
Winner: Klaviyo
With stronger continuity through assigned CSMs, faster response times, and more robust free resources and networking opportunities, Klaviyo delivers slightly better overall support—especially for smaller customers. Both platforms offer community forums for advice, but Klaviyo’s customer-centric approach wins over Dotmailer’s more scaled tiering of services.
6. Integrations
Klaviyo
Klaviyo connects with hundreds of critical platforms via Zapier and custom integrations. Sync data bidirectionally across all major e-commerce platforms like Shopify, BigCommerce, Magento, and WooCommerce. Integrate CRM/databases such as Salesforce, HubSpot, Microsoft Dynamics, and Marketo for consolidated customer information.
Real time data integration allows you to leverage behavioral data from analytics tools like Google Analytics, Segment, Heap, and Mixpanel to inform messaging and supercharge your email marketing strategies.
Bring in SMS insights from Twilio, Messenger apps like Facebook and WhatsApp, and reviews from platforms like Yotpo and Judge.me, and enrich contact records from tools like Sage for smart consumer data. Data migration is also possible from any of your owned marketing channels. With an API and SDL for building custom connections, Klaviyo integrations provide comprehensive data syncing.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer offers 200+ integrations through Zapier plus APIs to centralize data across platforms. Connect e-commerce backends like Shopify, Magento, and WooCommerce to activate online store data within email campaigns. Sync CRMs like Salesforce, HubSpot, and Pipedrive to combine subscriber activity across marketing channels.
Integrate analytics tools such as Google Analytics and Facebook Pixel to track email attribution across websites. Leverage integrations with SMS providers, chat tools, and social platforms for omnichannel engagement insights. While core channels are covered, Klaviyo seems better optimized for the e-commerce ecosystem specifically.
Winner: Klaviyo
This Klaviyo Dotdigital comparison shows that Klaviyo is the winner. With comparably robust connector options but more tailored integrations for key e-commerce platforms, Klaviyo is best for accommodating the data-syncing needs of complex product-based businesses. Both platforms cover the basics well, but Klaviyo has a slight edge in centralized data for online selling use cases.
7. Pricing
Klaviyo
Klaviyo offers a free plan covering up to 500 contacts. Paid tiers scale from the $45/month Email plan up to Enterprise pricing through custom quotes. Standard features focus on e-commerce, including unlimited contacts, emails, workflows, metrics, and 24/7 support.
Add-ons like Reclaim for win-backs and Global for multi-currency support cost extra. Klaviyo lacks user-based pricing, making it better suited for sending high volumes rather than managing many platform users. But advanced features come included without unpredictable fees. For fast-growing e-commerce brands, Klaviyo provides transparency and value at scale.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer grants 5,000 free contacts for 30 days and then charges per contact thereafter. Packages cover 10,000 to 100,000+ contacts for growing businesses. Entry-level plans have limited user seats and pay extra for features like dynamic content, multi-currency support, or the Dotdigital engagement cloud. Mid-market plans cost more but remove user count restrictions.
Enterprise options provide VIP services and priority support. While Dotmailer suits basic email needs upfront, unpredictable costs often hit as businesses scale if proper packages weren’t selected initially. But more tailored enterprise plans are available if needed.
Winner: Klaviyo
With free contacts and emails even at the lowest tier, no user seat limitations, and all features included in transparent pricing, Klaviyo wins for the best value, especially for mid-market business to business and e-commerce brands scaling their communications and content strategy.
Dotmailer’s wider range of pricing accommodates early-stage and established enterprise firms well but may cost growing organizations more over time as limits are reached unless packages are planned carefully or upgraded proactively. So Klaviyo takes the trophy for simpler, more predictable pricing aligned to scaling ecommerce companies.
8. Reviews and Reputation
Klaviyo
Klaviyo’s custom platform earns strong reviews across criteria like ease of use, automation features, integrations, deliverability, and support. Users praise the modern interface, intuitive workflow builder, and comprehensive analytics for optimized email execution. Many reviewers switched from competitors to
Klaviyo specifically for the platform’s segmentation capabilities and dedicated e-commerce focus. Common downsides cited include the inability to group contacts, the learning curve for advanced metrics, and the lack of email personalization compared to more generalized ESPs.
But most reviewers rate Klaviyo as a top choice for scaling e-commerce email marketing and SMS. With a 4.7/5 average across platforms like G2, Capterra, and GetApp, Klaviyo enjoys positive feedback, especially from growing mid-market brands.
See Klaviyo’s reviews on G2, Capterra, and TrustRadius.
Dotmailer
Dotmailer garners positive reviews for email deliverability, campaign design functionality, automation features, and integration ecosystem. Users highlight top-notch deliverability, a wide array of integrations, campaign builder flexibility, and strong analytics as major assets.
Less favorable feedback notes Dotmailer lacks more advanced predictive models of some competitors, charges extra for certain capabilities, and must be integrated properly initially to avoid rework enabling enterprise use cases.
Most critiques seem tied to the scaling needs of larger brands. However, reviewers still rate Dotmailer highly for core email execution, flexible enterprise packages, and delivering great developer support. With a 4.4/5 average, Dotmailer satisfies the majority especially at mid-size.
Winner: Klaviyo
With higher average review scores and greater positive feedback for the nuanced needs of high-volume e-commerce, Klaviyo edges out Dotmailer slightly for reputation and recommendation from the user community.
Dotmailer still impresses as a marketing tool, usually drawing criticism just for capabilities beyond typical use cases. Both are great options, but Klaviyo takes the award based on peer experiences specifically for robust product marketing needs.
9. FAQ’s
Klaviyo FAQs
- How much does Klaviyo cost?
Klaviyo offers a free plan for up to 500 contacts. Paid plans start at $45/month for up to 10,000 contacts. Pricing scales up based on contacts, with custom enterprise quotes available. All features are included without add-ons. - Is Klaviyo GDPR compliant?
Yes, Klaviyo helps businesses follow GDPR around data privacy and security protocols for EU data subjects. Consent tracking, data deletions, compliance documentation, and managed services can be leveraged. - Does Klaviyo offer SMS capabilities?
Yes, Klaviyo enables SMS messaging directly integrated with email campaigns for omnichannel coordination. SMS is available on Growth and Enterprise plans.
Dotmailer FAQs
- How does Dotmailer pricing work?
Pricing starts at $0 for 5,000 contacts for 30 days then $99/month for up to 2,500 contacts. Packages range up to millions of contacts with costs scaling based on sends, contacts, and features. - Can I integrate my CRM with Dotmailer?
Yes, Dotmailer offers 200+ integrations including CRMs like Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoho, and Microsoft Dynamics to centralize data across channels. - Is Dotmailer compatible with Shopify and WooCommerce?
Yes, Dotmailer integrates directly with major e-commerce platforms like Shopify and WooCommerce via plugins to activate online store data.
Final Thoughts
Choose Klaviyo if…
Klaviyo is an excellent choice for e-commerce brands sending high email volumes or needing advanced automation and analytics. It shines through advanced predictive modeling, granular metrics, and deep platform integrations to centralize online store data.
The pricing structure also scales better for fast-growing mid-market product sellers. So if you are running a Shopify store, already send lots of emails, and want robust machine learning capabilities, Klaviyo is likely the best fit.
Alternatively, consider some Klaviyo alternatives to give yourself a broader view of which email marketing platform may be the ideal fit for you.
Choose Dotmailer if…
Dotmailer can be ideal for generalized business use cases outside core e-commerce, such as service companies. It offers flexible packages to accommodate needs across company stages while providing enterprise-grade deliverability.
Dotmailer also enables more customization for complex omnichannel environments. So B2B or brick-and-mortar organizations with diverse data sources may derive more value from Dotmailer’s enterprise packages and broad cross-channel feature set.
Determining the right email software depends entirely on your company’s unique needs and priorities. Both platforms enable effective email execution in different ways. Weigh your budget, desired features, analytics needs, and future ambitions to decide on the best platform now…and for years to come. If you have any additional questions, please ask them in the comments below!