Chatbot vs. Email Marketing: Which Platform Works Best to Grow Your Business?

Chatbot vs Email Marketing:

A chatbot is an automated messaging tool that interacts with users in real-time, while email marketing involves sending targeted promotional messages to a list of subscribers via email.

Your business is looking for a way to connect with your prospects, deliver valuable information, and nurture leads towards conversion. You’ve narrowed your options down to two: Chatbots and emails. But now you’re stuck — how do you decide which one is best for your business?

Instead of racking your brain trying to figure out which one is best for your business, we can help you end the chatbot vs. email marketing debate. On this page, we’ll look at:

• How chatbots and email marketing are the same
• How chatbots and email marketing are different
• Pros of chatbots
• Pros of email marketing

Keep reading to learn more!

Chatbot vs. email marketing: How are these the same?

When looking at email marketing vs. chatbots, you’ll find these methods of connecting offer some of the same things for your business. Here are a few similarities between these two strategies:

Chatbots and email marketing offer personalization

When looking at a chatbot vs. email marketing, you’ll find that both strategies offer some degree of personalization. Personalization is a crucial component to helping your business attract and convert qualified traffic. Many companies try to catch your audience’s attention, so you need to keep your information focused on what interests them most.

Personalization enables you to deliver information that matters most to your audience, so they’re more likely to engage with your business. With chatbot marketing, you can personalize your audience’s experience by providing them with options that decide the conversation’s path. In this example from Domino’s, you can see how their chatbot, Dom, enables users to choose how to converse with the bot.

    As for email marketing, you can focus on sending information most relevant to your audience by segmenting your subscribers based on their interests. You can also personalize emails by adding touches like the subscriber’s name to make the email more relevant.  

Chatbots and email marketing offer automation

Whether you choose chatbot marketing or email marketing, you’re going to get automation from both.

Chatbots are built on automation. You program these bots to give automated responses based on what users ask. It enables you to create a conversational flow that makes it easy for your audience to get answers to simple questions.

You can also automate email marketing. With email management software like MyEmailFX, you can set up emails to send to subscribers at the right time. From general sale emails to abandoned cart emails, this automation makes it easy for you to engage subscribers.

Chatbots and email marketing help nurture leads and increases sales

When looking at email marketing vs. chatbots, you’ll find that both options enable you to nurture leads and increase sales. With bot marketing via a chatbot, you provide shoppers with critical information and answers to their questions. You can use your chatbots to help people get to know your brand.

Also, chatbots allow you to provide that last little bit of information your audience needs to convert. Email marketing, on the other hand, enables you to put yourself directly in front of your audience in their inbox. You can send them tailored promotions that help you nudge them towards converting.

Chatbot vs. email marketing: How are they different?

While chatbot and email marketing share a lot of features, they also differ greatly. Here are a few differences between chatbots and email marketing:

Chatbots involve conversation; email marketing involves telling

When you look at email marketing vs. chatbots, you’ll find that how you communicate with your audience differs significantly. With chatbots, your marketing takes a conversational approach. Your audience asks questions or gives information, and the chatbots respond as if your audience is talking to a customer service representative.

Additionally, people tend to reach out and start the interaction with chatbot marketing.     Email marketing is more about telling your audience about your industry, business, and products rather than having a real-time conversation about it. You connect with people interested in your business and get them to see the value in your brand with relevant content, whether it’s a promotion or an article.

Generally, chatbots are more reactive, while email marketing is more proactive.

Chatbots involve responding to queries; emails focus on responding to interests

When looking at chatbot vs. email marketing, you’ll find that chatbots focus more on responding to queries, whereas email focuses more on responding to interests. Chatbots are reactive, so they typically only come alive once the user initiates the conversation. They can sometimes be triggered by a user’s actions, like abandoning a cart, but typically the shopper reaches out.

Users will inquire about information and reach out through the chatbot to get the answers. It’s important to note, though, that chatbots do include some element of promotion. If a user knows they want a floral dress but doesn’t know which one, the chatbot can help them find product listings relevant to what they want.

There is some promotion involved with chatbots, but generally, the focus is on providing information to queries. Email marketing, on the other hand, focuses more on user interests. Whether it’s a new email newsletter, new product, or new blog post, email marketing will focus on delivering relevant material that educates leads while also nudging them towards conversion.

This strategy focuses on getting leads to think about your brand and move towards conversion.

Chatbot vs. email marketing: Chatbot pros

Now that we’ve covered the similarities and differences between chatbots and email marketing, it’s time to look at the pros of using each platform. First, let’s look at the pros of using chatbots.

Increase sales

When you’re debating between chatbot marketing or email marketing, consider that chatbot marketing is beneficial for increasing conversions. Ecommerce stores that created an abandoned cart chatbot through Facebook Messenger saw a 7-25% increase in revenue for their business.

By engaging with these prospects through chatbots, companies can increase sales for their business and recover potentially lost sales. On top of that, 55% of businesses using chatbots have generated more qualified leads. By attracting more qualified leads, your business is more likely to earn conversions.

Fast response

When someone has a question, they want an answer to their query fast.

Imagine asking a simple question like “What are your hours of operation?” or “How much is shipping?” and waiting hours to get a response. It would leave you feeling discouraged and could turn you away from a business. With a chatbot, though, you can provide that answer quickly, improving your speed to lead.

Chatbots enable you to provide fast responses to common queries, so people can get information and get on their way. It allows you to provide a better customer service experience, which can ultimately translate to increased sales.

Constant accessibility

One of the most cited benefits of chatbots is the 24-hour service. Whether someone has a question at four in the morning or afternoon, chatbots are available.

When you add that chatbots can resolve almost 80% of customer inquiries, you can feel confident that your chatbot will answer most of your audience’s questions whenever they ask them. These bots enable you to deliver customer service at any time, which means shoppers don’t need to wait until business hours to get a response. You can send shoppers on their way to complete their checkout and drive more sales for your business.

Desired usage

When looking at email marketing vs. chatbots, you’ll find that a pro for chatbots is that people like interacting with chatbots. In fact, 55% of people prefer talking to a business through their chatbot. When your audience likes talking to your company through chatbots, it makes chatbots a desirable option for engaging these prospects.

Chatbot vs. email marketing: Email pros

Now that we’ve looked at the chatbot marketing pros, it’s time to look at the pros of using email marketing:

People actively check email

When you’re debating between chatbot marketing or email marketing, you’ll want to consider the fact that people actively check their email. According to the Adobe Email Usage Study, people spend over three hours a day checking work emails and over two hours a day checking personal emails — totaling 5 hours each day! With people checking their email so frequently, you have an excellent opportunity to reach them.

They’re more likely to see your message, and if you create an engaging subject line, open it, too. Not to mention, people prioritize checking their emails, too. At least 58% of adults check their email first thing in the morning.

As a result, you can get them thinking about your brand from the moment they wake up.

More accessible

Another benefit of email marketing is accessibility. When you use chatbots, you’re limited to your website and your social media profiles. While people may interact with your chatbot on your website, they won’t interact with your chatbot on your social media profiles if they don’t have one or don’t use a particular platform.

It’s not as accessible to your entire audience. On the other hand, email is more accessible because nearly everyone has an email account. Over 3.8 billion people have an email account.

When you compare that to Facebook’s 1.8 billion users, you can see the advantage in trying to reach people through email.

More opportunities to “wow”

When you’re trying to get leads to convert, you make every effort to “wow” them. You want them to have a positive experience with your brand, so they ultimately choose your business. With email marketing, you have a lot of room to get creative and engage your audience.

You can design emails that your subscribers want to open. Whether you use brightly colored GIFs or interactive elements, you want to take a unique approach with your emails. You can get creative with your emails like Harry’s did in the example below.

Easy to share

One of the most significant benefits of email marketing is that it’s easily shareable. When you send emails with great deals, your subscribers will likely share them with their friends and family. Email platforms make it easy for people to forward emails to interested parties.

As a result, you can earn more sales and subscribers for your business. It’s a great way to help your business grow online.

Great return on investment (ROI)

When you look at the chatbot vs. email marketing debate, one of the most critical areas to look at is the return on investment (ROI). You want to invest in methods that will give you an excellent ROI for your business. Email marketing has one of the best ROIs of any marketing strategy.

For every $1 spent, you can earn up to $44 in return — an ROI of 4400%! This strategy is great if you’re looking to boost revenue for your business.

We foster and form long-term partnerships so that your business has long-term results.

Over 90% of WebFX clients continue partnering with us into year 2 of their campaign.

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Chatbot vs. email marketing: Which is best?

Now that we’ve looked at email marketing vs. chatbots, you’re probably wondering which one is best for your business. Realistically, you don’t need to choose between one or the other. Both marketing strategies offer significant benefits to your business and can help your company grow online.

Both strategies enable you to directly connect with your audience and help them interact with your brand. Realistically, you can use these strategies together to create multiple touchpoints for your audience to connect with your business.

Need help setting up chatbot marketing or email marketing?

If you’re opting to take a side in the chatbot vs. email marketing debate, we can help you set up your campaign regardless of what side you choose. We have a team of over 500 marketing experts that know everything about digital marketing and can help you get started. As a full-service digital marketing company, we offer everything from social media marketing services to email marketing services.

With over a decade of experience, we’re a trusted partner for all your marketing needs. We can help you set up chatbots, design your emails, and more! Want to build a better online presence for your business?

Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist!