As an agency owner for over a decade, I count on software application and automation to improve operations and supply results. So when GoHighLevel arised on the scene few years back, it certainly caught my focus GoHighLevel For Wholesale Real Estate.
The idea was enticing– an all-in-one customer administration system with marketing, sales, and solution devices integrated with each other. As an entrepreneur constantly aiming to simplify and scale my business, it appeared like a desire come true theoretically. That would not want a solitary remedy that does it all?
However in this extensive GoHighLevel review, I’ll take you inside my disastrous journey of trying (and failing) to switch over to this preferred brand-new software program. You’ll discover:
If you’re taking into consideration whether GoHighLevel is right for your own company demands, hopefully you can gain from my painful errors and blew up expectations.
Looter: I do NOT suggest GoHighLevel. If you require a CRM, begin with this listing of best CRMs instead. I use Keap.
Some GoHighLevel Alternatives
If you’re searching for a sales, marketing, and project administration alternative to GoHighLevel, then right here are a few we advise.
Backstory: Why I Thought About Switching Over from Keap
To understand what attracted me to GoHighLevel to begin with, you require context concerning my previous arrangement. For over 5 years I had been happily relying upon Keap (formerly Infusionsoft) to fulfill all my customer management and automation needs.
I found Keap user-friendly to utilize and it took care of whatever I needed– CRM, email marketing, sales funnels, subscription sites, and customer assistance.
Keap’s CRM and sales and marketing automation are made to help small businesses maintain their clients while including new ones easily. Automate follow-ups with emails and texts, guaranteeing leads and customers obtain the best messages at the correct time. Use web site and social networks forms to improve lead follow-up, and manage your growth with very easy visit organizing and lead tracking. Boost sales with automated quoting, invoicing, and payment processing, maximizing your time. With Keap, local business can conserve 10 hours each week and increase profits by 39%. Beginning with a 14-day free trial, no charge card required.
Why we like Keap
Keap offers a detailed client connection monitoring (CRM) and marketing automation service customized for small companies and entrepreneurs. We value Keap’s concentrate on improving sales procedures and supporting client relationships through powerful automation tools. The platform’s all-in-one approach combines CRM, email marketing, invoicing, and task administration, making it specifically appealing for companies aiming to settle their technology pile.
Essentially, it just worked accurately with very little fuss or upkeep required. My open and click-through prices were terrific (like 35% wonderful). Automations ran efficiently without any problems.
So why in the world was I attracted to uproot my entire functional foundation from a system that functioned to attempt something unproven and untried?
In hindsight I can admit I obtained seduced by the siren phone call of “shiny item disorder”. You understand the sensation: when everybody’s discussing a new tool that will certainly change your company … The grass frequently looks greener on the other side, and I questioned whether GoHighLevel may reduce rubbing points that I would certainly discovered to endure for many years with Keap.
I withstood in the beginning, but a few even more disappointments led me to think maybe it was time for a modification.
The Financial investment: Migrating My Company to GoHighLevel
Previously this year I decided to take the plunge. I signed up for HighLevel’s Company plan at $297/month, investing considerably greater than the $97/month starter cost.
This had not been a choice I took lightly. I knew switching platforms was going to call for moving all my Keap information and essentially restoring my entire tech framework from square one using all of the GoHighLevel integrations readily available.
Right here’s an overview of simply some of the effort required:
- Manually exporting 20,000+ e-mail customer documents
- Recreating lots of automations and workflows
- Moving customer accounts, notes, and project information to the new CRM
- Reconfiguring my Stripe billing integration
- Establishing landing pages, promotions, and sales funnels around again
- Learning an entirely international UX and user interface style
All in, I spent around 30-40 laborious hours of arrangement job transitioning whatever over– and also managing lost productivity throughout the switch.
However ultimately, it was a calculated financial investment I was willing to make. I figured some temporary pain would certainly settle with GoHighLevel providing a much better long-term service for my business, Dripify. Oh how wrong I was …
It just took me about a month of hands-on usage to realize I had actually made a huge mistake. The issues began accumulating quickly, till it got to a factor I had to reduce my losses and switch back to Keap completely.
Allow’s walk through the nightmarish troubles I came across.
Safety And Security Issues & Numerous Vermin
Provided GoHighLevel placed itself as an all-in-one automation system, I made sure to thoroughly recreate every workflow from my old Keap account.
These included series for onboarding new e-mail clients, onboarding new clients, automating follow-ups for webinar registrations, sending event suggestions, handling membership expirations and far more.
Every little thing appeared to be operating fine … until instantly it had not been. One morning, I awoke to discover 171 entirely irrelevant e-mails had been sent to customers that should NOT have gotten them. This took place three days straight, with a various batch of 160 individuals daily.
I hysterically tried repairing and rebuilding the automation from square one. Yet the trouble continued.
When I seriously reached out to their assistance group, they slightly declared “web server problems” were to blame. But this explanation really did not make any kind of sense, given that the errors proceeded happening each morning like clockwork unassociated to any downtime.
In my mind, this large failing was entirely inappropriate and just didn’t benefit my company. I have hundreds of calls relying upon my automated campaigns running smoothly.
So if GoHighLevel was going to be entirely unstable, exactly how could I turn over mission-critical workflows and delicate customer information to their technology?
The unintuitive interface only worsened these concerns …
Irritating UX
Originating from Keap where whatever was smooth and instinctive, GoHighLevel’s learning contour felt high and complex.
Straightforward tasks like editing workflows included excavating with food selection systems that were all over the place. Trick settings were unexplainably spread in absolutely different areas. Relocating in between functions felt disjointed or complex.
I’ll inform you what I indicate by talking about their funnel builder as an example. There were 3 different setups panels to manage general, specific, and product setups. Yet for some insane factor, the web links to gain access to each of these core setups were spread out on opposite sides of the display. What!?
As somebody that values tidy, thoughtful layout, this seriously irritated me.
It enhanced that GoHighLevel still felt like a work-in-progress instead of a refined item all set for prime-time use. Their concerns seemed focused on cramming in every feature under the sun, with poor usability as a second thought.
And talking features, I quickly realized the low price tag included expensive concessions …
Misleading Pricing GoHighLevel For Wholesale Real Estate
One of GoHighLevel’s most significant selling points is the affordable rate for access to numerous features. But I promptly discovered this affordable base price was misleading.
They nickle-and-dimed individuals with sporadic costs for core performance. All of a sudden my bank card statements had vague $10 charges from GoHighLevel here and there.
As it ended up, you get charged whenever you send an e-mail with their web servers. So for high quantity users, this amounted to hundreds of dollars in unexpected expenses.
In between these per-email costs and paying additional for deliverability add-ons like Mailgun, my “cost effective” GoHighLevel subscription ended up setting you back significantly MORE than my Keap plan.
The reduced price tag was appealing, but simply not reasonable in practice. This bait-and-switch left a negative taste in my mouth.
Email Rates Suffered
The last dealbreaker was seeing my very carefully supported email open prices plunge nearly overnight after changing to GoHighLevel.
Formerly, my target market engagement continually struck 35-40% open rates in Keap month after month. But once I moved their documents over to GoHighLevel, performance tanked promptly to a pitiful 9% open rate.
Despite how much I maximized my sending out practices or attempted every repairing technique, I might barely nudge open rates back into the teens– still a 50%+ decline from my previous benchmarks GoHighLevel For Wholesale Real Estate.
Let me repeat: my exact same target market and emails suddenly had awful involvement. The only point I can assume that would certainly be creating this was whatever was occurring behind the scenes at GoHighLevel. For a company so depending on email marketing, this was a big deal.
Between the crippling deliverability concerns, hidden charges, damaged features, and terrible interface, I had lastly reached my limit …
Why I Quit GoHighLevel after 37 Days
Simply 45 days after moving my agency to GoHighLevel, I understood I had made a big mistake. The disadvantages drastically surpassed any benefits.
No software is excellent, yet the large volume of problems was past appropriate.
At the end of the day, software boils down to count on. If I can not trust it to handle critical functions properly or believe a supplier has my benefits in mind, then it’s time to walk away– also after spending substantial time, money, and effort migrating.
So I made the hard call to turn around course and return back to Keap entirely just weeks after going done in on GoHighLevel. Allow’s explore what I gained from this ordeal.
Key Takeaways: What I Gained from My GoHighLevel Mistake
My time with HighLevel can be summarized as a pricey accident. But in knowledge, it educated me a couple of key lessons:
- Stick to what works. Don’t distress what’s working unless something is definitively much better across the board. Adjustment brings risk.
- Veterinarian declares thoroughly. Marketing buzz around new software program frequently obscures bigger underlying defects. Deep due diligence is essential.
- Choose simpleness over features. Properly designed devices must make your job life easier, not much more difficult and unpleasant.
- Openness builds trust fund. Nontransparent pricing, unethical reseller terms, and finger-pointing to escape problems destroys depend on.
- Look for impartial reviews. Satisfied support reviews indicate much less if extreme concerns indicate poor total usability.
- Excellence is difficult. No solitary service can completely meet every unique business demand. Find the least-bad fit.
- Development over change. Incremental improvements typically outweigh risky wholesale reinvention of what already functions fine.
In other words, I learned to be much more doubtful of “as well great to be real” marketing cases and much less attracted by the appeal of glossy new objects. The devices you make use of daily need to gain trust with transparency and efficiency, not glossy advertising.