6 Reasons Top Brands Leave Traditional Marketing Solutions for Klaviyo

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The Maze Group’s team is noticing a momentum shift: More and more mid-market and enterprise ecommerce brands are switching from traditional marketing solutions to Klaviyo.

Years ago, Klaviyo was so unprecedentedly easy to use, it was almost a hindrance in the enterprise space, says Jeremy Levine, head of client strategy at The Maze Group

The prevailing concern: It can’t be this easy. Klaviyo can’t be more cost-efficient and equally capable of executing complex enterprise strategies.

But it is—and leaders are realizing it.

A lot of retailers doing ecommerce in a big way have built on an old foundation. And many of those executives are looking to rebuild on a foundation that’s going to last the next 10 years.

“A lot of retailers doing ecommerce in a big way have built on an old foundation,” says The Maze Group’s CMO, Chip Moloney. “And many of those executives are looking to rebuild on a foundation that’s going to last the next 10 years.”

Here are the top reasons brands switch from traditional marketing solutions, according to leaders at two major digital agencies working with mid-market and enterprise brands: The Maze Group and Red Van Workshop.

1. To slash the total cost of ownership of their email platform—sometimes by millions

The list prices for Klaviyo and a traditional solution may look comparable, but “if you look at total cost of ownership, you will find savings,” says Aldo Secaida, VP of solutions at Red Van Workshop. “It takes far fewer people to run Klaviyo.”

So when brands switch to Klaviyo, the total cost of ownership (TCO) often drops 25-50%, Moloney says.

Klaviyo is allowing brands to reallocate resources from keeping the lights on and putting out fires to actually growing the business.

For large organizations, the savings can add up to millions. The Maze Group worked on a migration for a multinational group of 15+ brands—many of them with DTC and wholesale elements—and their TCO dropped millions when they switched to Klaviyo.

And brands get to reinvest those saved dollars into higher ROI activity.

“Klaviyo is allowing brands to reallocate resources from keeping the lights on and putting out fires to actually growing the business,” Levine says.

2. To boost operational efficiency

Switching to Klaviyo helps marketing teams move faster.

In a traditional platform, marketers need to coordinate with developers and administrators to execute basic tasks — like creating a segment or setting up an automation. “It’s too complex for a business user,” says Secaida.

That slows down marketing workflows. In a traditional platform, it could take weeks (and require engineering resources) to send an email, says Levine.

Ease of use is a big factor. With Klaviyo, you’re much more agile.

In Klaviyo, that same work takes minutes. Marketing teams can create, QA, and send emails themselves.

“Ease of use is a big factor,” Secaida says. “With Klaviyo, you’re much more agile.”

And that starts on Day 1 in the platform, because Klaviyo is intuitive to learn.

“Somebody could jump in Klaviyo, watch a couple of training videos, and figure it out,” says Levine. “Right out of the gate, you can do what needs to get done. You can support business as usual.”

3. To track performance in real time

In traditional platforms, real-time reporting can be a pipe dream. It can take weeks of work to pull performance data, Levine says.

In that environment, “brands don’t know if things are working or not working,” Levine says. “How do you grow and evolve your business if you don’t have visibility?”

To grow, brands need to be able to A/B test, and iterate rapidly based on performance. Especially for bigger brands, this is huge.

“A few basis points increase in performance is millions of dollars for these brands,” says Moloney. “So getting to table stakes testing is a massive revenue uplift.”

4. To consolidate their tech stacks

Many of the bells and whistles brands bolt onto traditional marketing platforms become obsolete when organizations switch to Klaviyo.

They can drop their SMS marketing platforms, for example, and consolidate email and SMS in Klaviyo.

Klaviyo SMS is a very common recommendation for us, because we strongly believe that you should have your messaging all coming from the same platform. That’s how you maximize the channels and test them against each other.

“Klaviyo SMS is a very common recommendation for us, because we strongly believe that you should have your messaging all coming from the same platform,” says Mat Feuer, retention practice lead at The Maze Group. “That’s how you maximize the channels and test them against each other.”

Other apps that frequently get dropped when brands switch to Klaviyo: personalization solutions, automation solutions, and product recommendation tools, Feuer says.

In a modern platform like Klaviyo, that’s all included.

5. To access 300+ low-code integrations

Nothing is low-code in a traditional platform.

“As soon as you need to start connecting your bespoke loyalty program, your customer service, etc.—it becomes incredibly challenging,” says Feuer.

Not so with Klaviyo, which has a powerful ecosystem of 300+ integrations, including:

• Integration with ecommerce platforms like Shopify, Salesforce Commerce Cloud
• Integrations with advertising and social channels like Google Ads and Facebook
• Integrations with customer service platforms like Zendesk and Gorgias

Brands that need to build custom integrations with proprietary tech find Klaviyo easy to work with, too.

“From a developer perspective, it’s really easy to integrate with,” says Secaida. “The APIs are flexible and documented well.”

Your mind opens up to all these new opportunities.

For new Klaviyo customers coming from old-school platforms, the ecosystem changes everything.

“Your mind opens up to all these opportunities,” Levine has noticed. “You say ‘It would be amazing if we could do this thing,’ and you’re not laughed out of the room. It’s like, ‘Oh yeah, let’s integrate with this thing. Let’s click a few buttons and off we go.’”

6. To modernize their data infrastructure

It’s just easier to import data into Klaviyo.

In a traditional platform, data needs to fit a specific format, and teams spend hours manually cleaning and restructuring their data so the platform can ingest it. One error can lead to data loss, system errors, and worse.

That’s no issue with Klaviyo.

One of things our team enjoys about Klaviyo is how it doesn’t require predefined data structures. The data acceptance from the Klaviyo side is awesome.

“One of things our team enjoys about Klaviyo is how it doesn’t require predefined data structures,” says Secaida. “The data acceptance from the Klaviyo side is awesome.”

This empowers brands to effectively analyze their customer data from any number of sources, and leverage it in segmentation, targeting, and personalization.

Choose a marketing solution built for your future

Klaviyo can provide enterprises the flexibility, scalability, and ease of use they need for growth.

“With traditional solutions, a business owning their future was sometimes nearly impossible,” said Levine. “What we heard time and time again from customers was ‘We need transparency. We need visibility. We need control.’”

Klaviyo meets those needs—and more.

With traditional solutions, a business owning its future was sometimes nearly impossible.