<b>The 'marketing contacts' pricing model is quietly the most expensive line item in your stack. Here's why.</

<b>The 'marketing contacts' pricing model is quietly the most expensive line item in your stack. Here's why.</b>

HubSpot, ActiveCampaign and Klaviyo all bill on contacts you can email — but the definitions differ in ways that bite. HubSpot stops charging for non-marketing contacts; ActiveCampaign counts every record on a tier ladder; Klaviyo bills on profiles you've ever collected a consent signal for.

What we're hearing from operators: the real cost creep isn't sends, it's list hygiene neglect. Unsubscribed-but-stored contacts keep ticking the meter on contact-based plans.

— Suppress and archive, don't just unsubscribe
— Audit which tier definition your vendor uses before renewal

Watch this.