If you’re looking for a way to test new marketing options, the ActiveCampaign free trial may be right for you.
ActiveCampaign is an email marketing and CRM platform for small and mid-sized businesses, focusing on automation.
Here’s what you should know to decide if ActiveCampaign is the right choice for your needs.
- Is ActiveCampaign Free or Paid?
- Does ActiveCampaign Have a Free Trial?
- What Comes With the ActiveCampaign Free Trial?
- How To Claim an ActiveCampaign Free Trial
- Does ActiveCampaign Automatically Charge Users After the Free Trial Ends?
- Can You Cancel ActiveCampaign After the Free Trial?
- Is ActiveCampaign Worth Paying For?
- Other Ways To Save on ActiveCampaign Pricing
- Other Free Trials To Check Out
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Wrapping Up
Is ActiveCampaign Free or Paid?
ActiveCampaign is a paid service with four pricing tiers.
The Lite tier is primarily emailing automation, while the Plus and Professional levels add marketing options.
Meanwhile, Enterprise is for larger companies and mainly introduces customization for individual companies.
Does ActiveCampaign Have a Free Trial?
Yes, ActiveCampaign has a free trial.
This trial showcases the features available in the company’s Professional tier, the primary tier most customers look at.
You may lose some features you’re interested in if you move to the Lite or Plus tiers after your trial.
How Long Is the ActiveCampaign Free Trial?
ActiveCampaign offers a standard 14-day trial to test out their systems.
They allow extensions on a case-by-case basis, though you’ll have to talk to your account executive or their support team to get this.
It’s more likely to grant straightforward extensions for tasks like finishing up a planned email campaign.
Does ActiveCampaign Require a Credit Card To Activate a Free Trial?
No, ActiveCampaign does not require a credit card if you want to use the free trial.
If you end your trial period without upgrading to one of their tiers, you lose access to the features instead of automatically subscribing to the service.
We like this setup because automatic purchasing isn’t customer-friendly.
How Much Is ActiveCampaign After The Free Trial?
Like most automation companies, ActiveCampaign has several pricing tiers.
All tiers charge yearly.
- Lite level is $29/per month
- Plus tier is $49/per month
- Professional tier (which most businesses care about) is $149/per month.
Lastly, the Enterprise tier has custom pricing depending on how much you want to use the service.
While exact pricing varies, users report up to $499 at this level.
What Comes With the ActiveCampaign Free Trial?
ActiveCampaign’s free trial is essentially the Professional tier.
In practical terms, the free trial shows off its full capabilities rather than hiding behind a payment wall.
Features You Can Test With a Free Trial
Here are some features you can test with a free trial.
1: Predictive Content
ActiveCampaign lets you create predictive content for email marketing.
In doing this, you can create up to five versions of copy within an email.
The system picks between these on a per-user basis, using their past behavior to estimate what’s likely to make them click again.
That leads to a better conversion rate than you can achieve with only segmentation and personalizing.
2: Content Scoring
Content scoring is a way to categorize and evaluate potential leads.
You can measure things like contact interests, engagement with emails, and the likelihood of converting.
Content scoring is usually inaccurate at first, but once you get enough data, it can be an extraordinarily accurate predictor for sales.
3: Drag & Drop Email Builder
ActiveCampaign tries to be user-friendly, which means minimizing any complex coding.
The drag-and-drop email builder makes it possible to create a wide selection of emails with minimal time and effort.
4: Abandoned Cart Automation
Abandoned cart automation is a way to reach out to customers who leave a site without buying.
Even a small increase in lost conversions can be a lot of money.
5: Conversion Attribution Reports
Conversion attribution reports measure how a customer converts and what convinces them to buy from you.
These can summarize trends up to a year back, showing you where to focus marketing efforts, and identify areas that could use improvement.
ActiveCampaign Free Trial Limitations
The 14-day trial is standard for the industry, but it also limits you to 100 contacts and up to 100 emails.
That’s possibly too low to see their performance before your trial ends.
Remember, only 2% to 5% of most email types convert, so you can expect only a literal handful of conversions while testing ActiveCampaign.
Email open rates can vary, but the more people who open them, the better.
Is ActiveCampaign Customer Support Included With Free Trials?
Yes, you can contact either the normal account team or, if available, a dedicated account executive.
How To Claim an ActiveCampaign Free Trial
If you want to start a free trial, navigate to ActiveCampaign’s website and click on their free trial links.
These are scattered around the site, but for quick access, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and check the lower right.
From there, enter an email address and follow the prompts to create an account so you can claim their free trial.
How Do I Get the Most From My ActiveCampaign Free Trial?
Look at the specific options they offer and write down which of them you think could help your business.
When you start the trial, test those systems, and mark down whether they seem to offer an improvement.
You should have an email list before you start using ActiveCampaign.
If you need help with this, check out our guide on how to build an email list.
How Can I Make My ActiveCampaign Free Trial Longer?
The only way is to make a request to ActiveCampaign and ask staff for an extension to finish up specific tasks.
They do not guarantee to accept all requests for extensions.
Does ActiveCampaign Automatically Charge Users After the Free Trial Ends?
Assuming you don’t get an extension of your ActiveCampaign free trial, you might be worried about a surprise fee once the 14-day period comes to an end.
The quick answer is an emphatic no.
In fact, ActiveCampaign does not require credit card details and doesn’t even have a way to automatically charge you unless you add your payment information at some point.
Can You Cancel ActiveCampaign After the Free Trial?
Yes.
If you have an active account, you can go to your account and navigate to the Billing & Upgrade section.
From there, click Update, then click the cancel button.
They’ll ask about scheduling a one-on-one session to discuss your reason for leaving, but you can skip that.
However, remember that ActiveCampaign does not offer refunds unless required by law, so you’ll lose whatever time you already paid for.
How To Cancel an ActiveCampaign Free Trial
The easiest way to cancel a free trial for ActiveCampaign is by letting it expire.
Since it’s only a 14-day trial to start with, you can shut everything down, stop logging in, and forget about it.
After all, as noted above, you won’t have to worry about any automated payments being taken from you.
How To Remove Card Details From ActiveCampaign
You can remove card details if you are the Primary Account Admin.
Other users on the same account cannot access this information.
Editing the card details is similar to canceling.
After clicking on your name in the lower left part of the screen, you can navigate to the Billing & Upgrade button, click on Update, and adjust information as appropriate.
They do expect you to keep at least one card active while you have an account, though.
Is ActiveCampaign Worth Paying For?
ActiveCampaign is among the best email marketing platforms if you have a small or midsize business.
While they technically have an Enterprise option for larger companies, they aren’t set up to handle larger marketing teams.
If you want in-depth information, check out our ActiveCampaign review.
In summary, most businesses who use ActiveCampaign like it a lot.
It’s a great platform for people who want to get results with as little need for training as possible.
Small businesses often have less time to spend on marketing, so anything that helps with automation is generally good.
ActiveCampaign focuses heavily on email, but also offers support in categories like Facebook automation.
It will sync with the social media platform’s ads account, allowing you to add subscription forms to your Facebook page or post campaigns to your timeline.
Moreover, there are several additional integrations with key eCommerce platforms, like WooCommerce, Shopify, and BigCommerce, among others.
As with Facebook, such integrations streamline various core tasks, making these essential sites less time-consuming to leverage.
However, getting the most from ActiveCampaign requires engaging with features like content scoring.
Moreover, ActiveCampaign isn’t the best choice for every company.
For example, ConvertKit is similar to ActiveCampaign but better for bloggers.
In particular, ConvertKit’s email automation marketing is advantageous for prospective blog subscribers, while integrations with platforms like WordPress are another standout feature for bloggers.
What To Expect From an ActiveCampaign Subscription
ActiveCampaign focuses on a four-party system for customer journeys.
That includes reaching new audience members, nurturing relationships to bring them through the process, converting them into paying customers at the right time, and further improving content to maximize future performance.
What Is a Free Alternative to ActiveCampaign?
If you’re looking for a more affordable alternative to ActiveCampaign, consider Mailchimp.
They send billions of emails, and by analyzing the data from that, MailChimp offers phenomenal insights and recommendations.
However, keep in mind that Mailchimp does focus more on email than ActiveCampaign, which may be better or worse depending on your business model and specific requirements.
Other Ways To Save on ActiveCampaign Pricing
In addition to your free trial, you have a number of options to try and get a discount on ActiveCampaign if you need one.
ActiveCampaign Promo Codes
ActiveCampaign occasionally offers promo codes that you can use to get a set amount off of your payments.
These can be a percentage, such as 20% off one month’s payment or a flat discount on a month’s payment.
These ultimately aren’t a lot of money for healthy businesses, but every bit of money you save helps.
ActiveCampaign Discounts
ActiveCampaign offers a flat 20% discount for qualifying nonprofits.
New accounts can contact their sales team to ask about this while existing accounts can talk to the regular support team.
Providing proof of nonprofit status is necessary, so expect to provide documentation.
ActiveCampaign Black Friday & Cyber Monday Specials
ActiveCampaign often participates in Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers, along with much of the rest of the technology industry.
The exact offer can vary but typically includes 40% to 50% off several months or a yearly subscription.
Is There an ActiveCampaign Student Plan?
No, ActiveCampaign does not have any special offers or deals for students.
Other Free Trials To Check Out
If ActiveCampaign doesn’t sound right for you, here are some other free trials to consider.
Unbounce Free Trial: Overview
Unbounce is a platform that focuses on building landing pages to help convert traffic better.
You can test it out with an Unbounce free trial, but the thing to remember here is that it’s best for companies who are doing fine on email and need to focus more on the parts that follow.
Pipedrive Free Trial: Overview
Pipedrive is a sales pipeline tool.
Notably, it includes an editable visual sales pipeline to help you fully understand your sales process and test options to get results.
A Pipedrive free trial is available, though it’s best for companies with larger and more complex sales processes.
Companies with simple setups don’t need this.
Google Meet Free Trial: Overview
Google Meet is a video conference system that’s good for one-on-one discussions and presentations.
This is a good option if you want to present things to customers directly, but it’s only effective if you already have a good marketing campaign to attract them.
The Google Meet free trial is a good way to test its features.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here are some common questions people have about ActiveCampaign.
Why is ActiveCampaign better than Mailchimp?
ActiveCampaign is better than Mailchimp because it automates more of the marketing process.
Mailchimp is better for bulk email, but for smaller companies, a single system that handles more marketing is usually more valuable.
What is similar to ActiveCampaign?
Similar platforms include HubSpot’s marketing hum, Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Constant Contact, GetResponse, and SendX.
There are plenty of marketing platforms available these days, and it’s worth checking out your options.
Wrapping Up
ActiveCampaign is a great choice for small and medium-sized businesses.
While there are several alternatives, ActiveCampaign delivers on its user-friendliness, focus on automation, and competitive pricing means it provides outstanding performance, and public reviews back that up.
Moreover, its flexible tiers ensure you get a plan that matches the needs of your company.
Click here to try the ActiveCampaign free trial if you’re interested, as the sooner you start, the sooner it can start producing results.