Pricing (weighted 12%)
Bloom
$69/year option with NO access to Bloom
Be careful when trying to buy Bloom. 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.
It's also worth pointing out that this has no monthly visitor cap. You can have unlimited popups.
Picreel
$19/month for up to 3,000 monthly viewers
This one is a pretty good intro package. It includes exit-intent and all of the integration with other apps. It's an extremely good value at this price. There are some features that you miss out on, like personalized tech support, which are only available on the higher priced plans.
$69/month for 10,000 monthly visitors
This package bumps up your monthly visitor count by quite a bit. If your site is starting to get some traction this is the plan for you.
$149/month for 50,000 monthly visitors
This one is getting on the pricey side, though it does quintuple the amount of monthly visitors you can have.
$399/month for 300,000 monthly visitors
There is no reason to spend this much money on opt-in forms.
Picreel also offers 25 percent off for yearly billing.
Design (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has some pretty good design options. Almost everything about the popup is editable, and Bloom also has 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. There are much deeper design features in Bloom than in Picreel.
The bars and fly-ins are nicely designed as well.
Picreel
Picreel doesn't have nearly as many design options as Bloom. They rely on basic design templates, which don't offer much in the way of customization.
You can upload your own code to create custom popups, but that requires that you know how to code. Most users will be stuck with the basic templates.
That said, the basic templates are pretty well designed. They don’t feel dated and they get the job done well.
Frontend Features (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has lots of different kinds of opt-ins with many different triggers. You can trigger a popup when someone gets to the end of a post, after they comment, or even after a period of inactivity.
They don't have exit-intent. This is a big disappointment. Otherwise, Bloom is a feature rich system, and the developers need to implement exit intent.
Bloom is loaded with features, but if you want exit-intent software this is not it.
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
Picreel
Picreel has all of the standard features that you would expect from a popup application. The popups have a good flow because of the limited templates.
The exit-intent is good. It works very well, especially when compared to Bloom which doesn't have exit-intent at all.
Picreel also offers targeted and specific popups based on where a customer is on your website. This is great for web stores. You can offer targeted discounts to get a sale that would otherwise be lost.
Types of Opt-ins in Picreel
Exit-Intent Popups
Mobile Popups
Targeted Popups
Traditional Popups
Backend Features (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has a strange design. The editor only allows you to preview the popup when you press a preview button. It is nice to see exactly what the customer will see, but it is also really annoying to have to keep clicking on the preview button when you want to look at changes.
Bloom is exclusively a WordPress plugin.
Picreel
Picreel's design is very user friendly. Their dashboard is well designed and looks very clean. It does have an annoying habit of navigating to the wrong page sometimes. That makes me nervous about any other bugs that might exist in their system.
Picreel has a WordPress plugin for all you WordPressers.
Reports & Statistics (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom has a clear and well-designed analytics page that lets you make data driven decisions.
They also have a good A/B testing system. Bloom and Picreel are strikingly similar in how they handle A/B testing and statistics. They both have the same clean and clear cut graphics and functionality.
Picreel
Picreel has good A/B testing and analytics that are accessible right from the dashboard. The graphs are eye catching and easy to read.
There is no need to go to the analytics page to check you A/B tests.The A/B testing gives you number of conversions and percentages right in the opt-in creation window.
Flexibility (weighted 12%)
Bloom
Bloom offers a lot of different kinds of opt-ins that allow you to convert as many visitors to subscribers as possible. The fly-in box that scrolls with you is particularly nice and adds a polite way to engage with customers.
The customization options allow for deep flexibility. Anything you might want to do with an opt-in is in Bloom.
Picreel
Picreel is a great tool for email marketing. Its flexibility is not great, but it does what it sets out to do rather well.
It has some flexibility in the kinds of opt-ins you can use, but it is mostly about popups.
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. If you want to integrate with CRMs, Picreel will work much better.
Picreel
Apps that work with Picreel
ActiveCampaign
Any CRM
Aweber
Campaign Monitor
ConstantContact
GetResponse
Highrise
HubSpot
Infusionsoft
MailChimp
Ontraport
Vertical Response
WordPress plugin
iContact
It has integration with all email marketing tools. Also, you can get all of your collected emails in a CSV file, which can be imported into programs. It also works with CRM platforms such as Webhooks, Highrise, Zapier, and Hubspot. So if you use a CRM this is your lucky day!
Support (weighted 12%)
Bloom
There are customer service forums on the Elegant Themes website, but that's it. There is no email or phone support. If you want help you have to post a new topic in one of their forums.
This seems pretty ridiculous, especially considering that this is the only means of support for their entire range of products. You also have to scroll all the way to the bottom to get to their Bloom support forums.
The moderators respond to questions quickly, but this is still a web forum and not really an effective means of support. Picreel has many many more support options. This is unsurprising considering how much Picreel costs.
Picreel
Picreel has good documentation and they have responsive customer support by both phone and email. Their knowledge base is also pretty helpful. You shouldn't have trouble getting your opt-in up and running.