The Honest Truth About Emma
Emma by Marigold is a mid-market email platform that's been around since 2005. It was acquired by Marigold (formerly CM Group), which also owns Campaign Monitor, Sailthru, and other email tools. Emma is positioned for mid-size companies with distributed teams, franchises, and organizations that need brand governance.
The reality: Emma is expensive for what it offers, and many users have migrated to more modern, affordable alternatives. Its main strengths are team collaboration and brand management—features that matter for enterprises but are overkill for most SaaS founders.
When should you choose Sequenzy?
1. You're a SaaS Founder or Small Team
Emma is built for mid-market companies with distributed teams. Sequenzy is built for SaaS founders. If you don't need brand governance across locations or complex approval workflows, Emma's enterprise features are just bloat you're paying for.
2. You Want Affordable Pricing
At 10,000 subscribers, Emma costs $89-159/month depending on the plan. Sequenzy costs $49/month. At 25,000 subscribers, Emma's Plus plan jumps to $369/month. Emma is one of the more expensive options in the market.
3. You Need a Free Tier
Emma has no free tier—only a 14-day trial. Sequenzy offers 100 subscribers free forever. If you're bootstrapping or want to test before committing, Emma forces you to pay from day one.
4. You Need Stripe Integration
Sequenzy connects directly to Stripe and syncs subscription data, MRR, and churn signals. Emma doesn't have native SaaS billing integration—it's focused on general marketing, not subscription businesses.
5. You Want SaaS-Specific Automations
Trial expiry sequences, churn prevention, usage-based alerts—these are built into Sequenzy. Emma's automation is more generic and requires manual configuration for SaaS use cases.
When should you stick with Emma?
1. You're a Multi-Location Business
Emma excels at managing email for franchises, retail chains, and organizations with distributed teams. You can control brand assets centrally while giving local teams autonomy. We don't have multi-location features.
2. You Need Advanced Team Collaboration
Emma has sophisticated roles, permissions, and approval workflows. If you have marketing teams that need content approval before sending, Emma handles this well. Our team features are more basic.
3. You Require Enterprise Compliance
Emma offers SOC 2 compliance and enterprise-grade security features. If your organization has strict compliance requirements, Emma may be necessary. We're GDPR compliant but don't have SOC 2.
4. You Want Dedicated Support
Emma's higher tiers include dedicated account managers and phone support. We offer chat with the founder—more personal, but not the same as enterprise support infrastructure.
5. You Need SMS Marketing
Emma offers SMS campaigns alongside email. We're email-only. If SMS is important to your marketing, Emma has it.
Honest Limitations of Sequenzy
- Basic team features: Emma has more sophisticated roles, permissions, and approval workflows.
- No brand management: Can't control assets across locations like Emma can.
- No SOC 2: Emma has enterprise compliance certifications we don't.
- No dedicated CSM: We offer founder access, not enterprise support teams.
- No SMS: Emma has SMS campaigns. We're email-only.
- A/B testing coming soon: Emma has it now.
- No landing pages: Emma has a landing page builder.
Honest Limitations of Emma
- Expensive: One of the pricier options. $89-159/mo at 10k, $369/mo at 25k.
- No free tier: Only a 14-day trial. You pay from day one.
- Not built for SaaS: No native Stripe integration or subscription-focused automations.
- Enterprise bloat: Many features you won't use if you're not a multi-location business.
- Aging platform: Founded in 2005, some users report the UI feels dated compared to newer tools.
- Part of conglomerate: Owned by Marigold, which manages multiple email brands—support and focus may be diluted.
- Limited transactional: Primarily a marketing platform, not great for transactional emails.