As an agency owner for over a years, I rely on software application and automation to simplify procedures and deliver outcomes. So when GoHighLevel emerged on the scene few years back, it definitely captured my interest GoHighLevel Sell Snapshots.
The concept was enticing– an all-in-one customer administration system with marketing, sales, and solution devices integrated with each other. As a business owner always seeking to streamline and scale my company, it appeared like a desire happened theoretically. That would not want a single remedy that does it all?
But in this extensive GoHighLevel testimonial, I’ll take you inside my dreadful journey of attempting (and stopping working) to switch over to this preferred new software program. You’ll discover:
If you’re considering whether GoHighLevel is right for your own company requirements, ideally you can gain from my excruciating errors and pumped up expectations.
Looter: I do NOT advise GoHighLevel. If you need a CRM, start with this list of finest CRMs rather. I make use of Keap.
Some GoHighLevel Alternatives
If you’re seeking a sales, marketing, and job monitoring alternative to GoHighLevel, after that here are a few we advise.
Backstory: Why I Thought About Changing from Keap
To understand what attracted me to GoHighLevel to begin with, you require context regarding my previous configuration. For over 5 years I had actually been gladly relying upon Keap (previously Infusionsoft) to satisfy all my client administration and automation demands.
I discovered Keap intuitive to use and it dealt with whatever I required– CRM, email marketing, sales funnels, subscription sites, and customer assistance.
Keap’s CRM and sales and marketing automation are made to help small businesses keep their clients while adding brand-new ones easily. Automate follow-ups with e-mails and texts, ensuring leads and customers obtain the right messages at the correct time. Usage website and social media sites kinds to simplify lead follow-up, and handle your growth with easy visit scheduling and lead tracking. Boost sales with automated quoting, invoicing, and payment handling, freeing up your time. With Keap, small companies can save 10 hours per week and increase income by 39%. Start with a 14-day free trial, no credit card required.
Why we like Keap
Keap supplies a comprehensive customer partnership monitoring (CRM) and marketing automation remedy customized for small companies and business owners. We appreciate Keap’s focus on simplifying sales processes and supporting customer connections via powerful automation devices. The system’s all-in-one technique combines CRM, email marketing, invoicing, and task management, making it particularly attractive for businesses wanting to consolidate their technology pile.
Generally, it just worked reliably with minimal fuss or maintenance needed. My open and click-through prices were excellent (like 35% wonderful). Automations ran efficiently without concerns.
So why in the world was I attracted to uproot my entire operational foundation from a system that worked to attempt something unproven and untried?
In knowledge I can admit I obtained seduced by the alarm call of “glossy things disorder”. You understand the sensation: when every person’s discussing a brand-new tool that will transform your company … The grass often looks greener beyond, and I questioned whether GoHighLevel could lower friction factors that I would certainly found out to endure for many years with Keap.
I resisted at first, however a couple of more irritations led me to assume perhaps it was time for an adjustment.
The Financial investment: Migrating My Company to GoHighLevel
Previously this year I determined to take the plunge. I enrolled in HighLevel’s Agency plan at $297/month, spending considerably greater than the $97/month starter cost.
This had not been a decision I took lightly. I knew switching over platforms was going to call for migrating all my Keap information and basically restoring my entire technology facilities from scratch making use of all of the GoHighLevel integrations readily available.
Below’s a summary of simply some of the initiative required:
- Manually exporting 20,000+ e-mail client documents
- Recreating loads of automations and workflows
- Moving customer accounts, notes, and task data to the new CRM
- Reconfiguring my Stripe payment integration
- Setting up landing pages, discounts, and sales funnels around once again
- Learning a completely international UX and user interface layout
All in, I spent around 30-40 tedious hours of setup job transitioning whatever over– as well as taking care of shed efficiency during the switch.
But inevitably, it was a calculated investment I was willing to make. I figured some temporary discomfort would certainly pay off with GoHighLevel offering a much better long-lasting service for my business, Dripify. Oh just how wrong I was …
It just took me regarding a month of hands-on use to realize I had made a large error. The concerns started accumulating promptly, until it got to a factor I had to cut my losses and switch back to Keap totally.
Allow’s go through the horrible troubles I ran into.
Safety Issues & Lots of Vermin
Offered GoHighLevel positioned itself as an all-in-one automation platform, I took care to thoroughly recreate every single workflow from my old Keap account.
These included sequences for onboarding brand-new e-mail clients, onboarding brand-new clients, automating follow-ups for webinar enrollments, sending out occasion reminders, taking care of membership expirations and far more.
Whatever appeared to be operating fine … till unexpectedly it had not been. One morning, I awoke to find 171 totally unnecessary e-mails had been sent to customers that ought to NOT have actually received them. This happened 3 days in a row, with a different set of 160 individuals each day.
I desperately attempted fixing and reconstructing the automation from scratch. Yet the problem continued.
When I desperately reached out to their assistance group, they slightly declared “server problems” were at fault. But this explanation really did not make any feeling, because the errors proceeded taking place each early morning like clockwork unassociated to any kind of downtime.
In my mind, this massive failure was entirely undesirable and simply really did not work for my company. I have countless contacts relying upon my automated campaigns running efficiently.
So if GoHighLevel was going to be absolutely undependable, exactly how could I turn over mission-critical workflows and sensitive customer data to their technology?
The unintuitive interface just worsened these concerns …
Frustrating UX
Originating from Keap where everything was seamless and intuitive, GoHighLevel’s learning contour really felt high and challenging.
Simple jobs like editing workflows included excavating through food selection systems that were all over the place. Secret setups were unexplainably spread in completely various sections. Moving between functions really felt disjointed or complicated.
I’ll tell you what I indicate by talking about their funnel builder as an example. There were 3 different setups panels to handle general, specific, and item configurations. Yet for some crazy reason, the web links to accessibility each of these core settings were spread out on opposite sides of the display. What!?
As someone that values tidy, thoughtful style, this seriously annoyed me.
It reinforced that GoHighLevel still felt like a work-in-progress rather than a refined product all set for prime-time usage. Their priorities appeared focused on packing in every feature imaginable, with poor usability as an afterthought.
And talking features, I soon understood the small cost tag came with pricey compromises …
Deceptive Pricing GoHighLevel Sell Snapshots
One of GoHighLevel’s largest marketing factors is the affordable cost for access to many features. But I promptly discovered this low-cost base expense was deceitful.
They nickle-and-dimed individuals with occasional costs for core performance. Suddenly my bank card statements had vague $10 fees from GoHighLevel occasionally.
As it ended up, you obtain billed every single time you send out an email with their web servers. So for high quantity users, this amounted to numerous bucks in unforeseen expenses.
Between these per-email charges and paying extra for deliverability add-ons like Mailgun, my “budget friendly” GoHighLevel registration wound up costing substantially greater than my Keap plan.
The reduced sticker price was appealing, yet simply not practical in practice. This bait-and-switch left a poor preference in my mouth.
Email Rates Suffered
The final dealbreaker was seeing my very carefully nurtured e-mail open prices plummet almost overnight after switching over to GoHighLevel.
Formerly, my target market engagement constantly hit 35-40% open rates in Keap month after month. Once I moved their records over to GoHighLevel, performance tanked instantly to a pitiful 9% open price.
No matter how much I optimized my sending techniques or attempted every troubleshooting trick, I might hardly push open prices back right into the teenagers– still a 50%+ decline from my previous benchmarks GoHighLevel Sell Snapshots.
Let me repeat: my exact same audience and e-mails instantly had dreadful interaction. The only point I can assume that would be causing this was whatever was happening behind the scenes at GoHighLevel. For an agency so based on email marketing, this was a big deal.
In between the crippling deliverability problems, concealed costs, broken features, and dreadful interface, I had actually lastly reached my restriction …
Why I Stop GoHighLevel after 37 Days
Simply 45 days after moving my agency to GoHighLevel, I knew I had made a massive error. The cons drastically exceeded any benefits.
No software program is perfect, however the large volume of problems was past appropriate.
At the end of the day, software application boils down to trust. If I can not trust it to manage vital functions capably or believe a supplier has my benefits in mind, after that it’s time to walk away– also after investing significant time, money, and effort migrating.
So I made the challenging call to turn around course and return back to Keap totally just weeks after going done in on GoHighLevel. Allow’s discover what I gained from this ordeal.
Key Takeaways: What I Picked up from My GoHighLevel Blunder
My time with HighLevel can be summed up as a costly accident. However in hindsight, it taught me a few vital lessons:
- Adhere to what works. Don’t upset what’s working unless something is definitively better across the board. Adjustment brings risk.
- Vet declares extensively. Marketing buzz around brand-new software commonly covers bigger underlying flaws. Deep due persistance is essential.
- Select simplicity over features. Properly designed devices ought to make your work life much easier, not more difficult and untidy.
- Transparency constructs depend on. Nontransparent pricing, questionable reseller terms, and finger-pointing to avert issues destroys trust.
- Seek honest testimonials. Happy assistance examines suggest much less if excessive problems indicate poor total usability.
- Excellence is impossible. No single option can completely fulfill every unique business demand. Locate the least-bad fit.
- Development over transformation. Incremental enhancements commonly outweigh dangerous wholesale reinvention of what currently works fine.
In other words, I learned to be extra skeptical of “also great to be real” marketing cases and less lured by the allure of glossy brand-new items. The devices you utilize daily should gain count on via openness and efficiency, not glossy advertising.