Why do experienced digital marketers switch email platforms?
After 20+ years in online business, here’s why I abandoned heavyweight tools like ActiveCampaign for something radically simpler – and what I’m building now.
Fast Answer:
I switched from ActiveCampaign to MailerLite because MailerLite is simpler, more affordable, and far better suited to solo women entrepreneurs building from scratch. ActiveCampaign felt bloated, overwhelming and catering towards a more corporate/big business customer. MailerLite makes me want to not only email again, but teach others how to do it, successfully - without the whole tech overwhelm.
My Email Journey: From Direct Mail to MailerLite
I started my first mailing list in 2001 - it was part email, part direct mail (yes, posted through the Royal Mail). I had 500+ subscribers in a Yahoo Group before newsletters were a thing.
Since then, I’ve used:
- Kit (ConvertKit)
- GetResponse
- Aweber
- ConstantContact
- Klaviyo
- Keap (Infusionsoft)
- ActiveCampaign
And while I ran digital marketing for clients for years, I never built a consistent email system for myself. Every pivot meant I’d burn it all down. Definitely an email marketing mistake that I'd never recommend to clients!
That changes now.
Why I Left ActiveCampaign (Even with All My Experience)
Let’s be honest: ActiveCampaign is powerful - but too powerful when you’re solo.
- Overkill for solo entrepreneurs just (re)starting
- Complex to navigate and scale
- Expensive for the features I don’t use
- Clunky interface that made email feel like a chore, even after the upgrade.
I was already signed up for ActiveCampaign’s affiliate programme when I began taking on email marketing clients - probably for 8 to 10 years total. I believed in the platform. I used it. I shared it with clients and my audience. And I built up a decent recurring affiliate income over time.
Then I decided to go all in with email marketing - not just as a service, but as a system. I opened an Agency account with ActiveCampaign so I could pre-build automations, manage client billing, and scale my client work faster. From that point on, I onboarded clients directly through the agency setup, not the affiliate programme.
That’s when the real sting came. ActiveCampaign changed their affiliate policy: if you didn’t sign a new affiliate client every six months, they would revoke all past commissions and you'd need to start from scratch again. I hadn’t stopped referring clients. I’d just changed how. But because they weren’t technically affiliate signups anymore, I lost it all. No exception. No conversation. Just erased.
That was the moment I knew I needed a platform that respected creators and solo service providers. MailerLite was the answer.
What I Look for in an Email Marketing Platform (Especially Starting From Scratch)
When you're just starting to build your list — or coming back to it after a long break — there are a few non-negotiables I always look for in a platform:
- Simple but powerful segmentation - I want to tag people based on what they click, buy, or sign up for, without needing to fight the system.
- Automations that are easy to map out - If it takes a PhD to build a welcome sequence, I’m out.
- Flexible opt-in options - Like double opt-in, custom fields, and user-friendly forms that easily integrate with my website builder (Thrive Theme Builder/Thrive Leads)
- Compatibility with Make.com - Because I’m slowly building a fully automated, streamlined business back-end using Make. MailerLite has hundreds of Make integrations that many other email marketing platforms don’t.
Why I’m All-In on MailerLite
MailerLite is:
- Clean – the UI is intuitive and elegant
- Affordable – free to get going, fair pricing to scale
- Flexible – landing pages, forms, automations, tagging, segmentation, sales platform
- Compatible – works seamlessly with my WordPress + Thrive + Make.com setup
Most importantly?
It caters for beginners and growing soloentrepreneurs.
It makes me want to recommend them AND learn everything I can about the platform to teach others that may not have a tech-aligned brain.
What I’m Building in MailerLite Right Now:
- Welcome sequences
- Product delivery automations
- Segmentation by archetype + product interest
- Funnels for my digital toolkit and Neville Goddard tripwire
- Plans for list-building quizzes and opt-ins per blog category and testing the new sales addition (no need for a separate shopping cart)
This isn’t a tech setup. It’s the engine of my digital business empire - built using my past experience and the growing tools within Mailerlite. To say I'm excited to show you what I've discovered would be an understatement!
Who should use MailerLite instead of ActiveCampaign?
If you are:
- A solo entrepreneur rebuilding momentum
- A woman juggling mindset and monetisation
- A coach, content creator, or course creator overwhelmed by “funnels”
- A product-based brand wanting ease over endless features
MailerLite is your girl.
Why My Opinion Might Actually Matter to You
I've worked with just about every email platform on the market - GetResponse, AWeber, Constant Contact, Klaviyo, Infusionsoft, ActiveCampaign - both for myself and dozens of clients over the last two decades. What you’ve read above isn’t a MailerLite tutorial or deep feature breakdown (that’s coming soon), but rather the honest truth about why this time, I chose differently.
Faq
I’d been using ActiveCampaign for years - first as a user, then as an affiliate, finally with an Agency account for my email marketing clients. But when they changed their policy to revoke affiliate commissions unless you referred someone new every six months, I lost all the recurring income I’d built up over nearly a decade. That was a line-crossing moment for me. MailerLite gives me clean tech, a fair system, and a fresh start.
Yes. MailerLite is ideal for solo entrepreneurs and small creators just starting out or restarting. The platform is intuitive, clear, and makes essential features accessible without needing a tech background. It also offers a free tier so that you can get setup, work on building your list without worrying about the cost.
Absolutely. You can build email sequences, tag your subscribers (Mailerlite uses groups instead of tags), segment by interest or behaviour, and even deliver digital products automatically. It’s powerful but simple.
Final Thought
You don’t need the fanciest tech.
You need a system that gets out of your way.
That’s what MailerLite gave me.
And honestly? I wish I’d switched years ago.