Four tools, same category, very different products. HubSpot is a CRM that does email marketing. Mailchimp is an email tool for people who want to get started without a lot of setup. ActiveCampaign is a behavioral automation engine that happens to send email. Constant Contact is the reliable, no-frills option that works better than most people give it credit for. This comparison covers all four honestly — pricing, landing pages, automation depth, and which one makes sense depending on where your business actually is.
Quick comparison
| Feature | HubSpot | Mailchimp | ActiveCampaign | Constant Contact |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free CRM; email from $15/mo | Free up to 500 contacts | $15/mo (1,000 contacts) | $12/mo |
| Free plan | Yes (CRM only, limited email) | Yes — 500 contacts, 1,000 sends/mo | No | No (60-day trial) |
| Landing pages | Yes, CRM-connected | Yes, included | Yes, included | Yes, included |
| Automation | Strong, CRM-integrated | Basic (Customer Journeys) | Best-in-class behavioral | Simple welcome/follow-up |
| Built-in CRM | Yes — full CRM | No | Deals pipeline (Plus+) | No |
| Learning curve | Moderate to high | Very low | Moderate | Very low |
| Best for | Businesses wanting email + CRM in one place | Newsletters, list building | Behavioral automation, lead nurturing | Simple sends, local biz, nonprofits |
HubSpot
HubSpot's free CRM is a legitimate product — not a stripped-down trial. But email marketing lives in HubSpot Marketing Hub, which starts at $15/month per seat. At that tier you get email sends, landing pages, forms, and basic automation. As you move up to Professional ($800/month) and Enterprise ($3,600/month), the automation capabilities expand substantially — but most small businesses won't need those tiers.
The main advantage HubSpot has over the other three is native CRM integration. When a contact fills out a landing page form, they land directly in your CRM. When they open an email or visit your pricing page, that activity is logged against their contact record. For marketing agencies, consultants, or any business with a defined sales pipeline, having email behavior and deal stage in the same system saves real time and gives a cleaner view of the pipeline.
HubSpot's landing page builder is solid. Pages connect directly to forms, which feed contacts into lists or workflows. You can A/B test landing pages on higher tiers. For businesses running ad campaigns and wanting to track the full journey from ad click to closed deal, HubSpot's landing pages paired with its CRM make attribution genuinely easier to see.
Limitations to know:
- The free plan's email features are limited — HubSpot branding on emails, capped sends
- Cost scales fast. The jump from Starter to Professional is steep and often more than small businesses need
- Compared to ActiveCampaign, HubSpot's behavioral automation is less flexible at lower price points
- If you don't need a CRM, you're paying for features you won't use
Mailchimp
Mailchimp's free plan — 500 contacts, 1,000 sends per month — is still one of the most useful entry points in email marketing. No credit card, no trial expiry, no pressure. For a local business building its first list or a service provider testing email as a channel, Mailchimp removes every barrier to getting started.
The drag-and-drop editor is the most beginner-friendly of the four platforms. Templates are well-designed. Setup for a basic welcome sequence takes an hour, not a day. Landing pages are included on the free plan, though with Mailchimp branding. Integrations with Shopify, WooCommerce, and most major website builders are mature and well-documented.
Where Mailchimp falls short is automation depth. Customer Journeys — Mailchimp's visual automation builder — handles linear sequences well but is constrained when you need complex conditional logic. If a contact clicked link A but not B, wait three days, then branch into two different paths based on their contact tag — that kind of logic is harder to build cleanly in Mailchimp than in ActiveCampaign.
Limitations to know:
- Free plan's 1,000 send limit means a 500-contact list can only receive 2 emails per month before hitting the cap
- Contact-based pricing gets expensive faster than most people expect past 10,000 contacts
- Automation logic is simpler — behavioral branching is limited compared to ActiveCampaign
- No built-in CRM — audience management is basic tagging and segments
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign starts at $15/month for 1,000 contacts with no free plan. That $15 buys significantly more automation capability than any other option at a comparable price. The automation builder supports conditional logic, contact tagging based on behavior, lead scoring, site tracking, and split testing of automation paths. Your email sequences can respond to what contacts actually do — not just what step they're on in a linear queue.
Site tracking is one feature worth calling out specifically. Install a lightweight script on your website and ActiveCampaign can trigger automations based on which pages a contact visits. A contact who lands on your pricing page three times in a week can automatically receive a follow-up email tailored to purchase intent. Mailchimp and Constant Contact don't offer this natively.
The Plus plan ($49/month) adds a built-in CRM with a deals pipeline that connects directly to automations. You can move a deal to the next stage automatically when a contact opens a proposal, books a call, or hits a lead score threshold. For businesses with a sales process rather than just a newsletter, this CRM-automation connection pays off.
Limitations to know:
- No free plan — you're committing budget from day one
- The automation builder rewards time investment to use well; buying it and under-using it is common
- For basic newsletter sends to a small list, the added complexity isn't worth it
Constant Contact
Constant Contact doesn't get enough credit. It starts at $12/month, offers a 60-day trial, has strong email deliverability, and comes with phone support — something neither HubSpot nor Mailchimp nor ActiveCampaign offers at entry-level pricing. For small businesses that want email that just works without a steep learning curve, Constant Contact is a reasonable choice.
Landing pages are included. The builder is simple but functional for capturing leads, promoting events, or running basic campaigns. Automation is limited to welcome series, anniversary sequences, and simple follow-ups — nothing like ActiveCampaign's behavioral logic, but sufficient for businesses not yet building complex funnels.
Constant Contact's strongest use cases are nonprofits, event-heavy local businesses (gyms, studios, event planners), and service businesses that primarily communicate via a monthly newsletter. If your email strategy is "send updates to our list twice a month," Constant Contact handles that well and costs less than most of the alternatives.
Limitations to know:
- No free plan after the 60-day trial
- Automation is basic compared to ActiveCampaign or even Mailchimp's Customer Journeys
- Less native integrations than HubSpot or Mailchimp
- Not the right tool once you want behavioral automation or a connected CRM
Landing pages: how they actually compare
All four platforms include landing page builders. Here's how they differ in practice:
Pages connect directly to the CRM. Form submissions create contact records. A/B testing available on Professional+. Best option if you care about end-to-end attribution from page visit to deal closed.
Included on free and paid plans. Mailchimp branding on free tier. Integrates with Mailchimp lists and Customer Journeys. Simple to set up. Good for list building and basic lead capture.
Landing pages connect to automation sequences. A contact who fills out a form can immediately enter a behavioral sequence. More powerful for lead nurturing; less polished visually than HubSpot's builder.
Functional for event RSVPs, simple lead capture, and campaign promotions. Not designed for complex conversion flows or A/B testing. Works for what most local businesses actually need.
Which one to pick
You're just getting started and want a free plan. Mailchimp. The free plan is real, the setup is fast, and you can upgrade later when you need more automation depth.
You need email and CRM in one place. HubSpot. The free CRM plus Marketing Hub Starter gives you contact management, email, and landing pages without having to connect separate tools. Just know cost scales quickly as you grow.
You have a real sales funnel and want behavioral automation. ActiveCampaign. Nothing at this price point matches its automation depth. Invest the time to build your sequences properly and it pays off.
You want something simple, reliable, and supported by phone. Constant Contact. For businesses that don't need complex automation and just want email that works with decent deliverability and actual human support when things go wrong.
You're already on one platform and it's not working. Usually the problem isn't the tool — it's that the email sequences aren't connected to the right triggers. Before switching platforms, audit what automations are actually running and what's missing in your workflow connections.
The right email platform is almost never the bottleneck. Usually the problem is that nothing is connecting your email tool to the rest of your business stack.
The gap none of them solve on their own
All four platforms handle email sends. None of them natively know when a client paid an invoice in QuickBooks, when a new job was created in Jobber, or when a prospect booked an appointment in your scheduling tool. Getting a trigger from one of those systems into an email automation sequence requires a connecting layer that HubSpot, Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, and Constant Contact don't build for you.
The most common gap we see: a service business has Mailchimp or ActiveCampaign set up, their list is growing, but the sequences aren't firing because the triggers live in a different tool. The form submission lands in Jobber but never reaches the email platform. The invoice gets paid in QuickBooks but the review request never fires. The email tool is fine — the automation architecture connecting it to the rest of the business doesn't exist yet.
Not sure which platform is right for your stack — or why your current sequences aren't running? We audit your email and automation setup and identify exactly what's missing.
Get a Free Automation Audit →Your email platform is only as useful as the triggers feeding it.
HubSpot, Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, and Constant Contact all send email well. The hard part is connecting them to the rest of your business — your CRM, your jobs software, your booking system. We build that layer.
Frequently asked questions
It depends on your stage. Mailchimp wins if you're just starting out and want a free plan with minimal setup. Constant Contact wins if you want something reliable and simple with good support. ActiveCampaign wins if you need real behavioral automation. HubSpot wins if you want email and CRM in one platform and are willing to pay for it.
Yes. HubSpot, Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, and Constant Contact all include landing page builders. HubSpot's connect directly to its CRM. Mailchimp's are easiest to set up. ActiveCampaign's connect to automation sequences. Constant Contact's are functional for event signups and simple lead capture.
HubSpot's free CRM is genuinely free, but email marketing (Marketing Hub) starts at $15/month per seat. Mailchimp's free plan covers 500 contacts and 1,000 sends/month; paid plans start at $13/month. ActiveCampaign starts at $15/month for 1,000 contacts with no free plan. Constant Contact starts at $12/month. Verify current pricing directly with each provider.
Constant Contact has no free plan after the 60-day trial, while Mailchimp does. For businesses just getting started, Mailchimp is the obvious first step. Constant Contact's strengths are phone support, strong deliverability, and simplicity. It's a common choice for nonprofits, event-based businesses, and local service providers who want email that works without a learning curve.
ActiveCampaign has the deepest behavioral automation — conditional logic, contact tagging, lead scoring, site tracking, and split paths. HubSpot's automation is strong but tied to its CRM and gets more expensive at scale. Mailchimp's Customer Journeys handles simple sequences. Constant Contact's automation is basic and best suited for welcome emails and simple follow-ups.