Graphicmail router test - Price, interface, list creation, form creation

This is the first article in a series of Graphicmail router tests : https://www.graphicmail.fr

Who is Graphicmail?

To start, a brief overview! Graphicmail is an email routing platform published by Quattro Internet Solutions and is based in Switzerland.

The email solution is available in 8 languages and is available in 16 different countries. Their portfolio includes clients such as Europcar, Siemens, Shell, Oxfam and Somfy.

What price level?

The price practiced by Graphicmail seem to be really competitive even on the French market, which tends to pull prices down.

There are two payment methodsa subscription ideal if you send about the same number of emails each month and a credits. But nothing new under the sun, it is a model that we see a little everywhere.

For subscription prices, you can use the price simulator which is offered on the site by clicking here.

And here are the prices of the credits below:

Graphicmail also offers a free trial and without commitment of its platform during 60 days. This is what we will test!

The Graphicmail interface

Here is theGraphicmail interface after filling out the free trial registration form :

We distinguish three different modes :

• The Express Mode which offers a easy access to the router's features
• The Advanced Mode which allows access to thefull functionality of Graphicmail
• The Mobile Mode which gives access to asending SMS and the creation of mobile landing pages

The home page of the Express and Advanced modes is a set of widgets allowing a quick access to the different functions of the router.

To get you started, Graphicmail also offers a checklist actions to be taken before sending your first email campaign :

We won't go through the whole interface right away (this will be done as we test the different features), but it is clear and uncomplicated. Even if we are not not at the level of what can be done, for example MailChimp or CampaignMonitorAll the elements seem to be in the right place and are easy to find.

Creating a list

Let's get to the heart of the matter with the creation of a list. As a demo, we will simulate the creation of a newsletter for Badsender.com.

To begin with, we will use the Express mode in order to discover the features as easily as possible.

We see it directly, theinferface is very simple.

By default, contact records already contain a large (and probably sufficient) number of fields.

However, if you wish to change the default fields, it gets complicated. Without going into details, you have to change the general settings to use "Mailing list and Address book menus" and not "the new Lists & Contacts menu". As a result, even in Express mode, it becomes much less easy to use, the new "Lists & Contacts" menu is much more pleasant, even if it lacks this functionality.

Creating a form

Now that a Badsender Newsletter list has been created, let's see the form creation module. What would an email marketing program be without a good way to collect subscriptions.

We obviously start in Express mode, but this error message will quickly make us switch to advanced mode:

In Advanced mode you can customize the format of your Address Book (add or remove fields, change the name of the data, etc.)

Without it impossible to customize the fields and for the Badsender Newsletter, I would like at least the gender (title) and company name of my subscribers in addition to the first and last name and email address.

It is possible to configure a double optin request, but we will skip that step for this time.

However, we will configure a confirmation email at the registration (minimalist at first). I'll skip the details, because we'll see that in the next article.

We cannot not to say that the form creation system is of a very great flexibility even in advanced mode, but it has the advantage of being understandable and quickly implemented.

The result

Do not hesitate to test this form (and then you will be subscribed to the newsletter of Badsender, newsletter that does not exist yet ...) :

I must admit that copying and pasting the code generated for the form was not easy in WordPress ... can do better!

It is quite disturbing to note that by default it is possible to modify a profile via this registration form by indicating a existing email address ...maybe I missed an option somewhere.

Next episode

Conclusion, for the moment it is very interesting. There are some points to improve, but nobody is perfect. A complete conclusion will be written in the third part of this test.

The next episode isn't written yet, so if you have any specific questions, now is the time to ask them! We'll look at the process of creating and testing a newsletter, and we'll also see what can be done in terms of automation.