If you've been looking into email marketing platforms, you've almost certainly come across both Mailchimp and Klaviyo. They're the two names that come up most often, and the question of which to use is a genuinely common one. The good news is the answer isn't complicated once you're clear on what type of business you run.
Let me cut through the feature comparison articles and give you a practical recommendation. If you want help making this call and getting set up, my email marketing in North Wales service covers platform selection and onboarding as part of the initial setup.
The short answer
If you run an e-commerce business, particularly on Shopify, and you're generating meaningful revenue, Klaviyo is worth it. If you run any other type of small business, Mailchimp or Brevo is almost certainly the right choice, and Mailchimp's free tier is the obvious starting point.
Most of the noise around Klaviyo being superior applies specifically to e-commerce automation — things like abandoned cart emails, post-purchase sequences based on what someone bought, and revenue attribution that links directly to your Shopify data. Those are genuinely powerful features if your business model needs them. They're largely irrelevant if you're a service business, a local retailer, or a consultant.
What Mailchimp is good at
Mailchimp is the most widely used email platform in the world for a reason. It's approachable for non-technical users, has good documentation, integrates with essentially everything, and the free tier is sufficient for most small businesses getting started.
The free tier covers up to 500 contacts and 1,000 emails a month, which is enough to get started, build good habits, and see whether email marketing is worth developing further for your business.
The automation features on Mailchimp are solid for most small business use cases: welcome sequences, birthday emails, re-engagement campaigns, and basic behavioural triggers. You don't need Klaviyo's advanced automation unless you're doing e-commerce segmentation at scale.
The drag-and-drop template builder is straightforward. If you've never used an email platform before, you'll be sending your first campaign within a couple of hours. That ease of entry matters. The best platform is the one you'll actually use.
Mailchimp's pricing scales by contact count once you exceed the free tier. At 1,500 contacts, you're looking at around £12-15 per month on the Essentials plan. At 5,000 contacts, it's around £40-50 per month. These figures change, so check the current pricing, but the general shape holds.
What Klaviyo is good at
Klaviyo was built specifically for e-commerce, and it shows. The Shopify integration is the best in the industry. It pulls in real-time purchase data, browsing behaviour, order values, product preferences, and more — and lets you segment and automate based on all of it.
The pre-built automation flows for e-commerce are excellent: abandoned cart sequences (the most valuable single automation in e-commerce email), post-purchase review requests, win-back campaigns for lapsed customers, browse abandonment, and welcome series for new subscribers. These are set up in a structured way that makes it genuinely manageable.
Klaviyo also gives you revenue attribution — so you can see directly how much revenue each email sequence or campaign generated. For an e-commerce business trying to understand which marketing is earning its cost, this is very valuable.
The trade-off is cost. Klaviyo has no free tier for email beyond 250 contacts and 500 emails. Once you're sending to a meaningful list, the pricing is noticeably higher than Mailchimp. At 1,000 contacts, Klaviyo costs around £15-20 per month. At 5,000, you're looking at £85-100. That premium is worth it if the revenue attribution is showing you a strong return. It's hard to justify if you're not running an e-commerce store.
Other platforms worth knowing about
Brevo (previously Sendinblue) is worth mentioning if cost is a priority. Its free tier is more generous than Mailchimp's — you can store unlimited contacts and send up to 300 emails per day. Paid plans are priced by send volume rather than contact count, which makes Brevo cheaper than both Mailchimp and Klaviyo at higher contact numbers.
Brevo's interface is slightly less polished than Mailchimp's, but the core features are all there: automation, segmentation, A/B testing, landing pages. If you have a larger list on a tight budget, or if you're a business that sends infrequently to a big list, Brevo's pricing model can save you a meaningful amount.
ActiveCampaign is worth mentioning for businesses that rely heavily on automation. If you run a coaching business, a consultancy, or any service where automated follow-up sequences are central to how you sell, ActiveCampaign's CRM and automation capabilities go deeper than Mailchimp or Brevo. It's more expensive, but the automation logic is more sophisticated.
For most North Wales small businesses I work with, none of this complexity is needed. Start with Mailchimp.
I've set up both platforms for different clients and the consistent finding is that the platform matters far less than people think. A well-run Mailchimp account with a sensible sending strategy will outperform a poorly managed Klaviyo account every time. Don't let platform selection become a reason to delay getting started.
The Shopify question
If you're on Shopify, this choice is simpler. Klaviyo is the native integration and it's significantly better than the alternatives for e-commerce use. The deep data sync with Shopify means you can personalise based on what someone bought, how much they spent, how long ago they last purchased, and what they looked at but didn't buy.
If you're generating over £5,000 per month from your Shopify store, Klaviyo is likely worth its cost within the first few months of setting up the basic automations. The abandoned cart sequence alone typically generates a meaningful uplift.
If you're earlier stage or running a Shopify store with modest volume, start with Mailchimp's Shopify integration and move to Klaviyo when the revenue justifies it.
My recommendation by business type
Service businesses (trades, consultants, professionals, local services): Mailchimp on the free tier to start. Upgrade when you outgrow it. You don't need Klaviyo's e-commerce features.
Retailers and e-commerce on Shopify: Klaviyo if revenue is meaningful. Mailchimp if you're just getting started and budget is tight.
Businesses with a large list and infrequent sending: Brevo, where the per-send pricing model works in your favour.
Businesses where automation sequences are the primary sales tool: look at ActiveCampaign.
The platform you pick matters less than what you do with it. A simple Mailchimp setup used consistently will outperform an elaborate Klaviyo account that nobody maintains. Pick the one that matches your situation, set it up properly, and focus on sending things worth reading.
For help with what to actually send, read what should I send to my email list. And if you want to see how automation works in practice for small businesses, email automation for small businesses has practical examples across different business types.
If you'd like help choosing the right platform and setting it up correctly for your business, that's part of what I cover in my email marketing service.
