List Size:
5K to 25K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
2 hr

Cust Serv: 4

Qual: 5

Ease: 4

Country:

Strengths: They do it all.

Weaknesses: creating HTML emails

Missing? Cut and paste functionality. From html editor to web

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
2 hr

Cust Serv: 5

Qual: 5

Ease: 3

Country:
US

Strengths: Powerful Okay interface very automatic easily configurable and easy modifications

Weaknesses: With power and control comes confusion so the learngin curve is steep...

Missing?

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
10 hr

Cust Serv: 1

Qual: 1

Ease: 3

Country:
US

Strengths: It is cheap

Weaknesses: I am unable to send my newsletter whenever I want. It takes me up to TWO days of frustration and time wasting effort.

Missing?

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
3 hr

Cust Serv: 2

Qual: 3

Ease: 2

Country:
US

Strengths: Ease of use.

Weaknesses: Interface is clunky. Difficult to compose and edit.

Missing? Offline editing.

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
7 to 25

Training:
1 hr

Cust Serv: 3

Qual: 3

Ease: 4

Country:
US

Strengths: I like the fact that it sends out both a text version and an HTML version of my newsletters. I also appreciate receiving a test email so I can check for mistakes. It is also fairly easy to use.

Weaknesses: The worst weakness is not being able to go to the database and sort it. I would like to be able to see the last several people who joined for example - Members are listed 20 to a page the most recently joined being on the last page. One of my lists has 2 000 - you can imagine how long it takes me to reach the people who have just signed up. On ListBot (the service that rolled over into ListBuilder) I could do this easily. I often went into the database to see who had just joined up. ListBuilder lets you sort the 20 on a specific page - what purpose does that serve? Also I would like to have more flexibility in sorting the database for people who receive the newsletters - for example everyone in Colorado everyone in the US everyone outside the US etc. Also there is virtually NO SUPPORt. They give you an email to write for support issues. I have written several messages to them in the last couple weeks asking questions and so far no one has responded.

Missing? Better sortable database which also allows you to view the most recently joined members. A support team that actually . . . supports their customers.

List Size:
100 to 1K

Empl:
one

Training:
10 hr

Cust Serv: NA

Qual: 4

Ease: 3

Country:
US

Strengths: Easy to place subscription link on Web site. Takes care of unsubscribes. Has a link on each email that lets people unsubscribe. Allows both text and html newsletters. Has a preview-before-send option. Allows collection of demographic information. Allows multiple lists to be named and kept.

Weaknesses: The user interface can be a bit fuzzy. You have to be willing to explore to get it to work (e.g. to get an archive of emails that have been sent out you have to look under email campaigns.

Missing? Listing a date for each subscriber's date of subscription. Allowing sorting of email lists by first letter of email address and by domain name.

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
one

Training:
1 hr

Cust Serv: 4

Qual: 4

Ease: 4

Country:
Canada

Strengths: ease of customization use and competitive rates

Weaknesses: none

Missing? some customizations to program but no big issues

List Size:
25K to 100K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
2 hr

Cust Serv: 1

Qual: 1

Ease: 4

Country:
US

Strengths: great for very small lists-- very low learning curve

Weaknesses: we were totally unable to integrate our own list beyond the 5000 names/month limit. After failing to allow the upload of our list after charging me for the allocation they promised to refund shut down the account and have never responded to any further emailed requests for reconciliation.

Missing? customer service with a phone number and tech's ability to actually increase the limits.

List Size:
100 to 1K

Empl:
500 to 1K

Training:
3 hr

Cust Serv: 4

Qual: 5

Ease: 3

Country:
Canada

Strengths: The most important reason that I choose to go with Microsoft BCentral is because it was a large company that I could trust with my list. (funny thing to say I know) But it was important as a webmaster myself to rely on a program that would only send my email out once. I have had a problem in the past with other email programs that sent the original email three times automatically. This was quite detrimental to my companies reputation of being a high-tech organization. We had a very negative response from our customers.

Weaknesses: I am always seeking a back-up copy of this list for myself. It is not easy to obtain.

Missing? A better navigational structure. Something that is even more user-friendly. I don't usually have the time to go through a lenghthy process to send out an email.

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
26 to 100

Training:
2 hr

Cust Serv: 1

Qual: 2

Ease: 4

Country:
US

Strengths: Easy way to handle subscribers. Upload for excel spreadsheet.

Weaknesses: A lot of error message. Often the program is not even available. Customer service is not so good!

Missing? Constant online service. Not so many error message!

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
100 to 500

Training:
5 hr

Cust Serv: 3

Qual: 4

Ease: 3

Country:
US

Strengths: 1. The double opt-in feature helps to maintain the integrity of the list. I only send newsletters to people who have asked for them. 2. The ability to send our newsletters in html and text at the same time so that people receive the newsletters in the format that thier email program supports. 3. This program seems to provide the most value for the money. We pay a very reasonable fee per year and can send up to 10 000 emails per month. We still have room to grow with this option.

Weaknesses: Error messages when trying to save a newsletter or send a newsletter are too frequent. Each time we try to send a newsletter we encounter at least one error message and have to keep trying until we can get past the error which tells us to contact the administrator. When we try to contact the administrator we get form email responses and up to a week later we will get an answer that tells us to try the program again or something equally unhelpful.

Missing? The program is not intuitive I would like to see them improve the directories and change the position of the buttons on the site so that items that are needed could be found more quickly and easily.

List Size:
100 to 1K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
1 hr

Cust Serv: 5

Qual: 4

Ease: 4

Country:
US

Strengths: Incredibly easy to use. All I do is create the newsletter campaign. Listbuilder handles all new subscriptions and unsubscribes automatically. I don't have to waste time adding new entries or deleting entries which are unsubscribed. I get weekly reports on all activity.

Weaknesses: None

Missing? Would like to have a seperate area for unsubscribes. Currently unsubscribes are kept in the same area as current members. I would rather have the two seperated at least for viewing purposes.

List Size:
100 to 1K

Empl:
one

Training:
5 hr

Cust Serv: NA

Qual: 4

Ease: 5

Country:
US

Strengths: reasonable price; I also like the fact that because it is a Microsoft product it is likely to be here today here tomorrow and not leave me scrambling to find a replacement because it suddenly goes under.

Weaknesses: A couple times potential subscribers have been unable to receive messages from the list because they are blocked in at least one case by a filtering system called SPEWS (I think)

Missing?

List Size:
100 to 1K

Empl:
one

Training:
3 hr

Cust Serv: 1

Qual: 1

Ease: 2

Country:
AU

Strengths: i'm afraid i don't like much about this service which is inferior to the formerly free Listbot. I plan to change to Topica's fee-based service this year. Just a few problems I've found with Listbuilder - * anchor links at the top of HTML version open new browser window instead of jumping down page - due to listbuilder altering the HTML code (but uploading an HTML page doesn't work either) * some non-US servers cannot handle US data and reject the messages (problem with international character sets apparently) * strange symbols in the plain text version (again listbuilder doesn't clean the text first - some problem with MIME and extended characters) * readers can't subscribe via email * live support doesn't work * subscriber stats are limited and inaccurate * readers can't choose whether they prefer to receive HTML or plain text (automatically sends whatever their email program can read) * can't search newsletter archives * can't view list of subscribers by date subscribed * can't view unsubscribers by date unsubscribed save yourself aggravation and avoid ListBuilder.

Weaknesses: see question 8. customer service email responses are nonsensical - obviously respond-bots used initially. incredibly insulting and annoying.

Missing? see question 8.

List Size:
1K to 5K

Empl:
2 to 6

Training:
3 hr

Cust Serv: 2

Qual: 4

Ease: 4

Country:
US

Strengths: I used this software for a statewide non-profit organization with multiple interest groups. It is easy to setup and manage and members could subscribe to multiple mailing lists.

Weaknesses: I do not recommend Listbuilder because of a potential privacy violation. Each email contains a link at the bottom that allows the user to update their preferences; however Listbuilder has *no* authentication process in place. What this means is that if your user forwards an email anyone who receives that email can click in directly and view any personal information that the list manager has requested such as your name email address mailing address demographics interests etc. Listbuilder representatives have told me that their programmers are not planning to provide a solution to this privacy leak.

Missing? Adding an authentication layer to accounts.