GetResponse

GetResponse
Name	GetResponse
Type	Private
Industry	Email marketing, Marketing automation, SaaS
Founded	1998
Founder	Simon Grabowski
Headquarters	Gdańsk, Poland
Key people	Grzegorz Berezowski

GetResponse GetResponse is a Poland-based software company that provides email marketing, marketing automation, and online campaign tools for small and medium-sized businesses. The platform competes with global providers in the software-as-a-service market and serves customers across Europe, North America, and Asia. Founded in the late 1990s, the company has expanded its product suite to include landing pages, webinars, CRM, and analytics aimed at digital marketers and ecommerce operators.

History

GetResponse was founded in 1998 by Simon Grabowski in Gdańsk, joining a wave of European technology firms that emerged alongside companies such as Skype, Spotify, Allegro, Yandex, and Magento. During the 2000s the company scaled as email marketing matured with contemporaries like Mailchimp, Constant Contact, AWeber, Campaign Monitor, and Emma (email service provider). Growth through the 2010s paralleled expansions by HubSpot, Salesforce, Adobe Systems, and Oracle Corporation into marketing cloud services. The firm opened additional offices and invested in product diversification amid competition from Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and regional players such as Zoho Corporation and ActiveCampaign. Executive leadership transitions and strategic hires reflected practices common to startups that became established firms, comparable to leadership changes at Dropbox, Slack Technologies, and Box (company).

Products and Features

The product suite includes email marketing, autoresponders, drag-and-drop email builders, landing page creation, webinar hosting, CRM, and conversion funnels. Features mirror functionality offered by platforms like Marketo, Pardot, Klaviyo, Sendinblue, and GetResponse competitor-adjacent tools (note: competitor names appear as industry peers). Marketing automation workflows resemble those used in Infusionsoft, ActiveCampaign, Drip (company), and Ontraport. The platform provides templates and A/B testing similar to services from Canva, Unbounce, Leadpages, and Instapage. Analytics and reporting integrate concepts used by Google Analytics, Mixpanel, Hotjar, and Heap Analytics, while CRM capabilities echo those of Zoho CRM, Pipedrive, Microsoft Dynamics 365, and Salesforce CRM.

Technology and Integrations

The underlying architecture uses cloud hosting and offers APIs, SMTP relay, and webhooks to connect with third-party systems. Integration partners and connectors follow patterns established by Zapier, IFTTT, MuleSoft, and Workato. E-commerce integrations align with Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, BigCommerce, and PrestaShop. Payment and commerce workflows reflect links to providers like Stripe, PayPal, Square, and Adyen. Single sign-on and identity federation practices are comparable to implementations at Okta, Auth0, and OneLogin. Data exchange and import/export support formats and protocols used by CSV, JSON, RESTful API consumers and enterprise middleware like IBM Integration Bus and Dell Boomi.

Business Model and Pricing

GetResponse follows a subscription-based SaaS model with tiered plans, monthly and annual billing, and volume-based pricing common to Salesforce, Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft 365, Zendesk, and Shopify Plus. Freemium and trial offerings resemble strategies used by Dropbox, Canva, HubSpot CRM, and Mailchimp. Upsell tactics and add-on features parallel revenue models at Atlassian, Zendesk Sell, Intercom, and Twilio. Channel and affiliate programs reflect partner ecosystems similar to PartnerStack, Impact, CJ Affiliate, and Rakuten Advertising.

Security and Compliance

Security practices include TLS encryption in transit, access controls, and data center measures consistent with standards advocated by ISO/IEC 27001, SOC 2, and regulations such as General Data Protection Regulation and ePrivacy Directive. Compliance programs and data processing agreements mirror approaches taken by Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and IBM Cloud. Email deliverability measures and anti-spam controls reflect industry norms guided by organizations like M3AAWG, IETF, SPF (Sender Policy Framework), DKIM, and DMARC. Incident response and breach notification workflows follow frameworks used by NIST, ENISA, and national data protection authorities including European Data Protection Supervisor and national regulators in Poland and United States.

Market Reception and Criticism

Market reception has been mixed across reviewers and analyst firms, with praise for usability and value for small businesses and critiques around advanced segmentation and enterprise feature parity. Reviews and comparisons often place the platform among peers evaluated by firms like Gartner, Forrester Research, IDC, TechCrunch, and CNET. Critics have highlighted limitations similar to concerns raised about Mailchimp and Sendinblue when scaling to complex B2B use cases, noting feature gaps relative to Marketo and Eloqua. Customer support, deliverability outcomes, and pricing transparency have been frequent subjects of user forums and discussion threads on platforms such as Reddit (website), Trustpilot, G2 (software), and Capterra.

Category:Email marketing