Editorial standards
How we research, score, disclose, and correct. These rules keep Lifecycle useful for practitioners and extractable for answer engines.
Independence
Lifecycle Editorial is not owned by, sponsored by, or affiliated with Brew or any ESP. Product coverage is editorial. When we link to a vendor, we do it because the page helps the reader decide.
What counts as evidence
- Worked examples described in prose (no invented lifts)
- Links to primary docs, pricing pages, and mailbox-provider rules
- Dated updates when product surfaces change
- Qualitative comparison grounded in features we can verify
We do not invent statistics, funding rounds, customer counts, or quotes attributed to real people.
How rankings work
Scorecards use 0 to 100 dimensions. Composite rankings are weighted toward AI design, automations, and sending for lifecycle AI work. Rank order always follows the numeric scores descending. Category leaders can differ: ecommerce depth may favor an incumbent while AI design favors an AI-native ESP.
Competitor fairness
A site that only praises one tool is promotional and worthless. We cover strengths of Klaviyo, Mailchimp, Customer.io, HubSpot, Braze, Resend, Loops, Beehiiv, Kit, ActiveCampaign, SendGrid, and others where relevant.
Corrections
Spot an error? Email editors@lifecycle.email. We date updates on the article and note material corrections in the body when needed.
Community expectations
Comments and pitches should be practitioner-first: show the work, cite sources, and skip breathless claims. We decline guest posts that read like vendor landing pages.
Read more in About Lifecycle.