As an agency owner for over a decade, I depend on software application and automation to improve procedures and deliver outcomes. So when GoHighLevel arised on the scene few years back, it definitely captured my attention GoHighLevel Upsell.
The concept was attractive– an all-in-one client administration system with marketing, sales, and service devices incorporated with each other. As a business owner constantly wanting to streamline and scale my business, it appeared like a desire come true theoretically. Who wouldn’t want a solitary service that does it all?
But in this extensive GoHighLevel evaluation, I’ll take you inside my dreadful trip of trying (and failing) to change to this preferred brand-new software application. You’ll learn:
If you’re taking into consideration whether GoHighLevel is right for your very own business requirements, with any luck you can pick up from my uncomfortable blunders and inflated expectations.
Spoiler: I do NOT advise GoHighLevel. If you require a CRM, start with this checklist of best CRMs instead. I make use of Keap.
Some GoHighLevel Alternatives
If you’re trying to find a sales, marketing, and project monitoring alternative to GoHighLevel, after that here are a few we recommend.
Backstory: Why I Considered Switching Over from Keap
To comprehend what attracted me to GoHighLevel in the first place, you require context concerning my previous arrangement. For over 5 years I had been gladly counting on Keap (formerly Infusionsoft) to satisfy all my client monitoring and automation demands.
I discovered Keap user-friendly to make use of and it handled everything I required– CRM, e-mail marketing, sales funnels, membership sites, and client support.
Keap’s CRM and sales and marketing automation are developed to help small companies keep their clients while including brand-new ones easily. Automate follow-ups with emails and messages, making sure leads and customers obtain the ideal messages at the correct time. Usage website and social networks forms to streamline lead follow-up, and manage your growth with very easy visit scheduling and lead monitoring. Boost sales with automated pricing quote, invoicing, and repayment processing, freeing up your time. With Keap, small businesses can save 10 hours each week and rise revenue by 39%. Start with a 14-day free trial, no credit card called for.
Why we like Keap
Keap provides a thorough consumer partnership administration (CRM) and marketing automation service customized for small businesses and entrepreneurs. We appreciate Keap’s focus on simplifying sales processes and supporting customer partnerships with powerful automation tools. The platform’s all-in-one strategy combines CRM, email marketing, invoicing, and job management, making it especially attractive for businesses looking to consolidate their tech stack.
For the most part, it just functioned dependably with minimal difficulty or upkeep called for. My open and click-through rates were fantastic (like 35% excellent). Automations ran efficiently without concerns.
So why in the world was I tempted to uproot my whole operational foundation from a system that functioned to attempt something unproven and untested?
In hindsight I can confess I got attracted by the alarm call of “shiny item syndrome”. You recognize the feeling: when everyone’s talking about a brand-new tool that will certainly reinvent your business … The grass commonly looks greener on the other side, and I questioned whether GoHighLevel might reduce rubbing points that I ‘d found out to endure for many years with Keap.
I stood up to in the beginning, but a couple of more aggravations led me to believe perhaps it was time for an adjustment.
The Financial investment: Migrating My Agency to GoHighLevel
Previously this year I determined to start. I registered for HighLevel’s Firm plan at $297/month, spending significantly more than the $97/month starter expense.
This had not been a decision I took lightly. I understood changing systems was mosting likely to require moving all my Keap data and basically reconstructing my entire tech framework from scratch using all of the GoHighLevel integrations available.
Here’s a summary of just several of the initiative needed:
- By hand exporting 20,000+ email client records
- Recreating loads of automations and workflows
- Moving customer accounts, notes, and job data to the new CRM
- Reconfiguring my Stripe invoicing integration
- Establishing landing pages, promos, and sales funnels around again
- Learning a completely international UX and interface design
Done in, I invested around 30-40 tiresome hours of configuration job transitioning every little thing over– as well as managing lost productivity throughout the button.
However eventually, it was a computed financial investment I agreed to make. I figured some temporary pain would settle with GoHighLevel providing a much better long-lasting remedy for my organization, Dripify. Oh how incorrect I was …
It just took me regarding a month of hands-on usage to recognize I had actually made a big error. The concerns started accumulating swiftly, till it reached a point I needed to reduce my losses and change back to Keap totally.
Allow’s go through the nightmarish issues I encountered.
Protection Issues & Lots of Bugs
Provided GoHighLevel positioned itself as an all-in-one automation platform, I made sure to thoroughly recreate every workflow from my old Keap account.
These included sequences for onboarding new e-mail subscribers, onboarding new clients, automating follow-ups for webinar enrollments, sending occasion reminders, handling membership expirations and far more.
Every little thing appeared to be operating penalty … up until unexpectedly it wasn’t. One morning, I woke up to locate 171 entirely irrelevant e-mails had actually been sent out to individuals who ought to NOT have actually obtained them. This took place 3 days straight, with a different set of 160 people every day.
I desperately tried repairing and restoring the automation from square one. However the problem continued.
When I desperately connected to their support group, they vaguely asserted “web server issues” were to blame. Yet this description really did not make any type of feeling, given that the errors proceeded taking place each morning like clockwork unconnected to any kind of downtime.
In my mind, this large failure was totally unacceptable and just really did not benefit my organization. I have countless get in touches with relying upon my automated campaigns running smoothly.
So if GoHighLevel was mosting likely to be totally unstable, how could I turn over mission-critical workflows and sensitive client information to their modern technology?
The unintuitive interface only worsened these concerns …
Irritating UX
Originating from Keap where whatever was seamless and intuitive, GoHighLevel’s learning curve really felt high and complex.
Basic jobs like editing workflows included excavating with menu systems that were all over the place. Key settings were unexplainably scattered in absolutely various sections. Relocating in between features felt disjointed or complicated.
I’ll inform you what I suggest by discussing their funnel builder as an example. There were 3 separate setups panels to handle overall, private, and item setups. Yet for some crazy reason, the links to gain access to each of these core settings were spread out on contrary sides of the screen. What!?
As somebody that values tidy, thoughtful design, this seriously irritated me.
It strengthened that GoHighLevel still seemed like a work-in-progress rather than a sleek product prepared for prime-time use. Their priorities appeared concentrated on packing in every feature imaginable, with poor functionality as an afterthought.
And speaking of features, I quickly recognized the low price tag included expensive concessions …
Deceptive Pricing GoHighLevel Upsell
Among GoHighLevel’s biggest marketing points is the budget-friendly cost for access to many features. However I rapidly learned this inexpensive base cost was deceptive.
They nickle-and-dimed customers with erratic charges for core functionality. Instantly my credit card statements had unclear $10 fees from GoHighLevel occasionally.
As it ended up, you get charged whenever you send an email via their servers. So for high quantity users, this added up to hundreds of bucks in unexpected prices.
Between these per-email costs and paying additional for deliverability add-ons like Mailgun, my “cost effective” GoHighLevel subscription ended up costing dramatically MORE than my Keap plan.
The reduced sticker price was alluring, yet just not sensible in practice. This bait-and-switch left a poor preference in my mouth.
Email Fees Suffered
The last dealbreaker was seeing my thoroughly supported email open prices plummet virtually over night after switching to GoHighLevel.
Formerly, my target market involvement consistently struck 35-40% open rates in Keap month after month. But once I migrated their records over to GoHighLevel, performance tanked instantly to a pitiful 9% open rate.
No matter how much I enhanced my sending out practices or tried every fixing technique, I might barely push open rates back right into the teens– still a 50%+ decline from my previous criteria GoHighLevel Upsell.
Let me repeat: my exact same target market and emails suddenly had awful engagement. The only thing I could think that would certainly be triggering this was whatever was happening behind the scenes at GoHighLevel. For a company so dependent on e-mail marketing, this was a big deal.
In between the crippling deliverability problems, concealed fees, busted features, and horrible interface, I had ultimately reached my limitation …
Why I Quit GoHighLevel after 37 Days
Simply 45 days after migrating my company to GoHighLevel, I understood I had actually made a big blunder. The cons drastically surpassed any benefits.
No software is perfect, however the sheer quantity of problems was past acceptable.
At the end of the day, software comes down to trust. If I can not trust it to manage vital functions effectively or believe a vendor has my benefits in mind, then it’s time to walk away– even after spending substantial time, money, and initiative migrating.
So I made the difficult call to turn around course and return back to Keap completely simply weeks after going done in on GoHighLevel. Let’s explore what I learned from this ordeal.
Key Takeaways: What I Gained from My GoHighLevel Error
My time with HighLevel can be summed up as an expensive misadventure. However in knowledge, it taught me a few crucial lessons:
- Stick to what jobs. Don’t upset what’s functioning unless something is definitively far better across the board. Adjustment brings threat.
- Veterinarian asserts completely. Marketing hype around brand-new software program commonly obscures larger underlying defects. Deep due persistance is important.
- Pick simplicity over features. Properly designed devices should make your job life simpler, not extra challenging and messy.
- Openness constructs trust fund. Opaque pricing, questionable reseller terms, and finger-pointing to avert issues damages depend on.
- Seek objective testimonials. Satisfied assistance assesses suggest less if extreme concerns suggest bad overall functionality.
- Excellence is impossible. No single service can completely meet every special organization requirement. Find the least-bad fit.
- Evolution over change. Step-by-step renovations generally exceed risky wholesale reinvention of what already functions fine.
Basically, I discovered to be a lot more cynical of “as well excellent to be true” marketing insurance claims and less tempted by the appeal of glossy new items. The devices you use daily should gain depend on through transparency and efficiency, not slick advertising.