Pricing (weighted 12%)
Bloom
$69/year option with NO access to Bloom
Don't get fooled by this one. The website is not very clear about what you're buying. Bloom is just one of many features that is not included with their intro package. Elegant Themes is primarily a website theme provider, and this price point only includes themes.
$89/year for access to Bloom and other plugins
If all you need is a popup application then Bloom will be more of a headache than it is worth. This is pretty cheap, however.
$249 One-time payment
This gives you lifetime access to everything Elegant Themes has to offer, including Bloom.
Bloom is a lot less expensive since it is billed yearly rather than monthly.
OptiMonk
$29/month for 1 domain with a maximum of 4,000 views
They start you off with all of their app's features, but you are limited in pages views and the number of domains you can put popups on. If you run more than one website this one is not for you.
$79/month for 4 domains and 40,000 visits a month
This is a steep increase in price, but it is also a steep increase in the number of people who will see your ad.
$159/month for 10 domains and 200,000 visits per month
Once again a lot more money for a lot more ad views. This bumps it up considerably.
Enterprise
This plan is for anyone who has hit the internet big time. You have to talk to a customer service representative for a quote. The representative I talked to said that the Enterprise plan costs an additional $5 for every 10,000 unique visitors.
They also offer yearly pricing at a slightly discounted rate.
Design (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Almost everything in Bloom is editable. They also have 115 design templates to get you started.
The templates look good on their own, but they really are just to get you started. You can customize enough to make them unrecognizable.
The bars and fly-ins are nicely designed as well.
OptiMonk
OptiMonk has a number of templates to choose from with little deep customization. Their design templates are pretty boring and they feel a bit dated. Bloom has more robust design options.
Frontend Features (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has a lot of triggers for popups, but they are missing exit-intent. They are also missing a great feature in OptiMonk: the ability to create targeted popups based on a customer's shopping cart.
Bloom does have a number of different kind of opt-ins and triggers that will keep most users happy, but if you want to target users of your online store then OptiMonk is for you.
Types of Opt-ins in Bloom
After Commenting Popups
After Content Popups
After Inactivity Popups
After Purchasing Popups
After Scrolling Popups
Below Content
Fly-In
Inline
Opt-In Widget
Opt-In to Unlock
Timed Delay Popups
OptiMonk
OptiMonk's popups are clean looking, but can be a little boring. They have a good flow to them, so customers shouldn't get frustrated trying to sign up for your newsletter. The popups work very well partly because of the lack of customization.
The exit-intent sometimes fails. I manged to fool it a few times, but at least OptiMonk has exit intent.
OptiMonk has the ability to create targeted popups based on customers shopping cart contents. This is a highly personalized way to draw a potential customer back in.
Types of Opt-ins in OptiMonk
Exit-Intent Popups
Floating Bar
Traditional Popups
Shopping Cart Targeted Popups
Backend Features (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom is exclusively a WordPress plugin, so the backend is entirely though the WordPress dashboard.
It is well designed and easy to use except for the editor. The editor only allows you to preview the popup with the preview button that displays on the screen. Having to check the popup after every edit is pretty annoying after a while.
OptiMonk
OptiMonk's lack of customization makes for a clean and easy to navigate backend.
They also have a WordPress plugin to make life simpler, but unlike Bloom OptiMonk's popups are not limited to WordPress websites.
OptiMonk allows you to put a popup on and website by copying and pasting HTML where they tell you to. It is really quite easy. The instructions are detailed and complete.
Reports & Statistics (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has a good A/B testing system. It works much like OptiMonk's.
All of Bloom's analytics are directly on their website. There is no going through third party sites. Everything is well laid out and easily digestible. They have a number of helpful graphs and figures so you can make decisions faster and more easily.
OptiMonk
OptiMonk support A/B testing internally, but everything else is through Google Analytics.
OptiMonk makes you use Google Analytics for all other data. This is a bit more cumbersome than displaying all the analytics directly on the website. Forcing analytics through a third party is very tedious.
That said, GA does a good job of tracking popup data.
Flexibility (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has lots of different ways to engage with customers. If you're trying to build an email list they are going to provide you with multiple ways to engage with customers.
The number of different types of opt-ins they provide makes it so you can snag all different types of customers.
OptiMonk
OptiMonk has templates for all the basic popup applications, but I doubt it could handle more sophisticated uses. It has a frustratingly poor level of customization, but the end result works for what it is.
Extensibility (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Apps that work with Bloom
AWeber
ActiveCampaign
CampaignMonitor
ConstantContact
GetResponce
HubSpot
InfusionSoft
MadMimi
MailChimp
OntraPort
SalesForce
emma
feedblitz
iContact
mailpoet
sendinblue
WordPress plugin
Bloom mainly has integrations for email marketing apps.
OptiMonk
Apps that work with OptiMonk
AWebber
BigCommerse
CampaignMonitor
Dotmailer
Drupal
GetResponse
HubSpot
InfusionSoft
Joomla
Magento
MailChimp
PrestaShop
Shopify
VerticalResponse
Volusion
Webhook
WordPress plugin
iContact
OptiMonk is great if you want to integrate with your E-commerce platform, and it works with a good amount of other stuff as well. The major email marketing tools are included.
Support (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Elegant Themes only provides customer support forums. Bloom is only one of those customer support forums.
The moderators are quick with their responses, but it is still a forum. OptiMonk blows Bloom out of the water on support.
OptiMonk
OptiMonk has much better support than Bloom. They offer email and phone support, and their self-help section is very extensive.
If you pay a larger monthly rate, you will also get your own personalized tech support.