As a firm proprietor for over a decade, I rely upon software application and automation to simplify operations and deliver results. So when GoHighLevel emerged on the scene couple of years back, it most definitely captured my attention Branded Client Portal in GoHighLevel.
The concept was enticing– an all-in-one client administration system with marketing, sales, and solution tools incorporated with each other. As a business owner constantly wanting to streamline and scale my company, it appeared like a desire become a reality on paper. That would not desire a solitary service that does it all?
However in this extensive GoHighLevel testimonial, I’ll take you inside my devastating trip of trying (and stopping working) to change to this preferred brand-new software. You’ll find out:
If you’re considering whether GoHighLevel is right for your own company requirements, hopefully you can learn from my painful blunders and pumped up expectations.
Looter: I do NOT advise GoHighLevel. If you need a CRM, begin with this checklist of best CRMs rather. I utilize Keap.
Some GoHighLevel Alternatives
If you’re seeking a sales, marketing, and project monitoring alternative to GoHighLevel, after that below are a few we suggest.
Backstory: Why I Considered Changing from Keap
To recognize what attracted me to GoHighLevel in the first place, you need context concerning my previous configuration. For over 5 years I had actually been gladly relying on Keap (previously Infusionsoft) to fulfill all my client management and automation requirements.
I discovered Keap instinctive to use and it took care of whatever I required– CRM, e-mail marketing, sales funnels, subscription sites, and client assistance.
Keap’s CRM and sales and marketing automation are designed to assist small businesses maintain their clients while adding brand-new ones effortlessly. Automate follow-ups with e-mails and messages, guaranteeing leads and customers get the ideal messages at the right time. Use website and social networks types to simplify lead follow-up, and manage your growth with easy visit scheduling and lead tracking. Boost sales with automated pricing quote, invoicing, and settlement processing, freeing up your time. With Keap, small businesses can save 10 hours each week and rise income by 39%. Start with a 14-day free trial, no bank card required.
Why we like Keap
Keap offers a detailed consumer partnership administration (CRM) and marketing automation remedy customized for small companies and business owners. We appreciate Keap’s focus on improving sales procedures and supporting consumer relationships through effective automation devices. The platform’s all-in-one approach combines CRM, e-mail marketing, invoicing, and task administration, making it particularly appealing for services looking to settle their technology pile.
For the most part, it simply worked dependably with very little difficulty or maintenance needed. My open and click-through prices were terrific (like 35% excellent). Automations ran efficiently without any concerns.
So why in the world was I tempted to uproot my entire functional structure from a system that functioned to try something unproven and untested?
In knowledge I can confess I got seduced by the siren telephone call of “glossy things syndrome”. You know the feeling: when everyone’s talking about a new device that will certainly transform your organization … The grass typically looks greener beyond, and I wondered whether GoHighLevel might minimize friction factors that I would certainly discovered to tolerate throughout the years with Keap.
I stood up to in the beginning, yet a few more irritations led me to believe maybe it was time for a change.
The Investment: Moving My Firm to GoHighLevel
Previously this year I decided to take the plunge. I signed up for HighLevel’s Firm plan at $297/month, investing dramatically greater than the $97/month starter cost.
This had not been a choice I ignored. I understood changing systems was mosting likely to need migrating all my Keap information and basically restoring my entire technology infrastructure from square one using every one of the GoHighLevel integrations offered.
Right here’s an introduction of just some of the effort called for:
- By hand exporting 20,000+ email subscriber records
- Recreating loads of automations and workflows
- Moving customer profiles, notes, and job information to the new CRM
- Reconfiguring my Stripe payment integration
- Establishing landing pages, discounts, and sales funnels throughout once more
- Learning a completely international UX and interface design
Done in, I invested around 30-40 laborious hours of arrangement work transitioning everything over– not to mention handling lost performance during the button.
But ultimately, it was a computed financial investment I was willing to make. I figured some short-term discomfort would repay with GoHighLevel offering a far better lasting remedy for my service, Dripify. Oh how incorrect I was …
It only took me concerning a month of hands-on usage to understand I had actually made a big mistake. The issues started accumulating quickly, until it reached a point I had to cut my losses and switch back to Keap completely.
Allow’s walk through the horrible troubles I experienced.
Protection Issues & Several Bugs
Given GoHighLevel placed itself as an all-in-one automation platform, I made sure to diligently recreate every workflow from my old Keap account.
These consisted of sequences for onboarding brand-new email clients, onboarding brand-new customers, automating follow-ups for webinar enrollments, sending event tips, taking care of subscription expiries and far more.
Every little thing appeared to be functioning penalty … until unexpectedly it wasn’t. One early morning, I awoke to discover 171 totally unimportant e-mails had actually been sent out to customers who must NOT have actually obtained them. This occurred 3 days straight, with a different batch of 160 people each day.
I frantically attempted repairing and restoring the automation from scratch. Yet the issue persisted.
When I desperately connected to their assistance team, they vaguely claimed “server problems” were at fault. But this explanation really did not make any feeling, because the errors proceeded happening each early morning like clockwork unrelated to any downtime.
In my mind, this substantial failure was completely unacceptable and just really did not help my service. I have hundreds of calls relying on my automated campaigns running smoothly.
So if GoHighLevel was going to be completely undependable, exactly how could I leave mission-critical workflows and delicate customer information to their technology?
The unintuitive interface just intensified these issues …
Frustrating UX
Coming from Keap where whatever was seamless and instinctive, GoHighLevel’s learning contour felt steep and challenging.
Basic jobs like editing and enhancing workflows entailed excavating via menu systems that were all over the place. Secret settings were unexplainably scattered in completely various sections. Moving in between features really felt disjointed or complex.
I’ll tell you what I indicate by speaking about their funnel builder as an instance. There were 3 different settings panels to handle total, individual, and item arrangements. Yet for some insane factor, the web links to accessibility each of these core settings were expanded on opposite sides of the display. What!?
As someone that values clean, thoughtful design, this seriously irritated me.
It enhanced that GoHighLevel still seemed like a work-in-progress instead of a refined product all set for prime-time usage. Their top priorities seemed concentrated on packing in every feature under the sun, with poor functionality as a second thought.
And talking features, I soon realized the small cost tag featured expensive concessions …
Deceptive Pricing Branded Client Portal in GoHighLevel
Among GoHighLevel’s biggest selling factors is the budget friendly cost for access to many features. But I quickly discovered this inexpensive base expense was deceitful.
They nickle-and-dimed individuals with sporadic costs for core functionality. Instantly my bank card statements had vague $10 fees from GoHighLevel here and there.
As it ended up, you obtain billed each time you send an e-mail via their servers. So for high quantity customers, this added up to thousands of bucks in unanticipated prices.
Between these per-email costs and paying added for deliverability add-ons like Mailgun, my “budget-friendly” GoHighLevel membership wound up costing substantially MORE than my Keap plan.
The low sticker price was appealing, however simply not practical in practice. This bait-and-switch left a negative taste in my mouth.
Email Fees Suffered
The last dealbreaker was seeing my thoroughly nurtured e-mail open rates drop nearly overnight after changing to GoHighLevel.
Formerly, my target market interaction constantly struck 35-40% open prices in Keap month after month. Once I moved their records over to GoHighLevel, performance tanked promptly to a worthless 9% open rate.
No matter just how much I enhanced my sending out techniques or tried every repairing technique, I could barely push open rates back into the teens– still a 50%+ decrease from my previous standards Branded Client Portal in GoHighLevel.
Let me repeat: my exact same audience and e-mails unexpectedly had dreadful interaction. The only thing I could believe that would be creating this was whatever was taking place behind the scenes at GoHighLevel. For a company so dependent on e-mail marketing, this was a big deal.
Between the debilitating deliverability problems, hidden costs, broken features, and terrible user interface, I had lastly reached my limitation …
Why I Give up GoHighLevel after 37 Days
Just 45 days after migrating my agency to GoHighLevel, I recognized I had made a massive mistake. The cons significantly exceeded any kind of advantages.
No software program is perfect, however the sheer 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 vital features competently or think a supplier has my benefits in mind, then it’s time to leave– also after investing significant time, cash, and initiative migrating.
So I made the tough call to turn around training course and return back to Keap totally simply weeks after going done in on GoHighLevel. Let’s explore what I picked up from this fiasco.
Secret Takeaways: What I Gained from My GoHighLevel Blunder
My time with HighLevel can be summarized as a costly misadventure. But in knowledge, it instructed me a few key lessons:
- Stay with what jobs. Do not upset what’s functioning unless something is definitively better across the board. Change brings threat.
- Veterinarian declares thoroughly. Marketing hype around new software program commonly obscures larger underlying flaws. Deep due persistance is vital.
- Pick simplicity over features. Well-designed tools need to make your work life less complicated, not more difficult and messy.
- Openness builds depend on. Opaque pricing, dubious reseller terms, and finger-pointing to escape problems ruins trust fund.
- Seek objective evaluations. Happy support assesses suggest much less if extreme concerns suggest inadequate general use.
- Perfection is impossible. No solitary option can perfectly meet every unique business demand. Discover the least-bad fit.
- Advancement over transformation. Incremental improvements commonly surpass dangerous wholesale reinvention of what currently works fine.
In other words, I discovered to be extra hesitant of “also good to be true” marketing insurance claims and less attracted by the attraction of shiny brand-new items. The devices you make use of daily need to gain depend on via openness and efficiency, not slick advertising.