Ecommerce email software does not cost one thing. It costs whatever your pricing model charges for: list size, emails sent, a flat tier with limits, or your store platform's app. The same store can pay very different amounts depending on the model.
I work on Pidgely, an email API, so I will say that up front. This is a short version of our longer guide, with the math you can reuse with any vendor's current pricing page.
Start with your real monthly volume
Take a store with 20,000 contacts, four campaigns a month and 3,000 orders a month:
| Item | Math | Emails/month |
|---|---|---|
| Campaigns | 4 x 20,000 | 80,000 |
| Order emails | 3,000 orders x 4 emails | 12,000 |
| Abandoned cart | 2,000 carts x 2 emails | 4,000 |
| Welcome | 1,000 sign-ups x 3 emails | 3,000 |
| Total | 99,000 |
The example is hypothetical. Use your own numbers.
How each model behaves
- Per contact (bands): one contact over the limit moves the whole bill to the next band. Some tools count unsubscribed or bounced contacts until you delete them. Your bill grows with the list even if you send nothing more.
- Per email sent: you pay for what you use, so a big list that gets few emails is cheap. Daily sends to everyone show up directly on the invoice. Check the per-thousand rate above your plan.
- Flat tier with limits: predictable, but ask what happens at the limit: sending stops, automatic overage or a forced upgrade.
- Store platform app: easy integration, but pricing follows the app's policy, and moving platforms may not take your list along.
Annual vs monthly
Annual billing usually lowers the monthly equivalent but freezes your band for 12 months. If the list grows past it you pay the upgrade on top, and if you clean inactive contacts the prepaid money does not come back. To compare, add 12 months of each option with your expected growth.
Where Pidgely fits in the example
Pidgely bills by emails sent, monthly. At 99,000 emails a month the example store pays R$ 149 a month on the Growth plan (up to 250,000 emails). List growth alone does not change that bill.
The full guide has the hidden costs and ways to lower the bill without losing sales:
How Much Does Ecommerce Email Marketing Software Cost?
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