Feature Set:  

To ensure your emails are properly delivered, you can run a SPAM check and send a test email to yourself before you send it out to your customers. This program will also automatically add an unsubscribe link to the bottom of the email.

Missing features include: the ability to make demographic filters, autoresponses and email aliases.

However, we really like that Vertical Response can integrate with Google Analytics.

Ease of Use:  

Vertical Response has a user-friendly main control center where you can see all the options that are available to create your email campaign. There is a tab to manage your emails, reports, postcards and mailing lists. In addition, this program has a tour that will show you exactly how to use the program before you even start.

Email Campaign Creation:  

Through Vertical Response you can create a plain text email message, use a pre-existing template or a freeform where you can upload your HTML page. However, if you choose to upload an HTML into the program for your email, your source code cannot exceed 31KB (31950 characters), including the white spaces.

When you start creating your email campaign, the service directs you to a page where the creation process is broken up into different steps. These steps make it easier to create your message and navigate the entire process. However, the steps make a slightly more difficult if you are trying to make your campaign from scratch.

Vertical Response does not have any type of editor so there's no way to add images, links or lines without hard coding it into the HTML before you import.

Campaign Reporting:  

The reporting section is located on the homepage dashboard. The page includes all the campaigns you've sent. It will show you summary of how many emails were sent, opened, bounced, unsubscribed and display the number of times each link was clicked.

There is also a report based on the email domain. This shows how many of the emails have been sent, opened, clicked, bounced and unsubscribed by a specific domain name like Yahoo.com, MSN.com and others.

You can download and compare reports to strategize your marketing further. You can also use all this in conjunction with Google Analytics.

Help/Support:  

Vertical Response includes a searchable knowledgebase that frequently answered our questions. They also include email, phone and live chat support. The community and blog were interesting and good for some minor tips and tricks. However, we found Vertical Response didn’t include as many tutorials or “how-tos” about their service.

Overall, Vertical Response will help you to create good bulk emails. However, if you are looking for an easier to use email creator or faster uploading times we suggest our Gold or Silver award winners.