Buttondown vs. Elemailer

If you're looking to expand your Wordpress publication to include emails, you might have heard of Elemailer, a drag-and-drop email builder that integrates quite nicely with Elementor.

Elemailer's two biggest advantages are:

1. It is a true first-party WordPress plugin — you'll be able to manage your entire subscriber base and email strategy from your WordPress admin. Buttondown cannot say the same; everything you do in Buttondown will be on Buttondown's interface, which is admittedly a bit of a pain!
2. Elemailer is extremely aggressively priced — you can send an unlimited amount of emails to as many subscribers are you want for a mere $67/yr (or a $329 one-time purchase.)

To quote Elemailer directly on that last bit:

With that being said, even with current LTD we can sustain and maintain the product because we don’t have to spend money on maintaining servers (Email) like other marketing plugins/systems and that is our biggest advantage

This is actually key, and something you absolutely should be aware of before going all in — Elemailer relies on your existing email-sending functionality, which means they cannot guarantee or monitor email performance!

It doesn't matter if your emails are easily designed and cheaply priced if they aren't actually landing in your subscribers' inboxes; Buttondown invests heavily in machine learning and automated systems to make sure that your emails go out quickly, accurately, and in a way that guarantees maximum engagement from your user base.

If you're looking for a "ship this quick" solution, Elemailer might be a nice choice; but if you're serious about your newsletter, Buttondown is the way to go.