Are you trying to sell stuff online?
I’m sure you will agree that converting your visitors into revenue is hard.
And getting yourself profitable? That’s even tougher.
But there’s a simple secret to increasing the value of each customer you sell to:
Sales funnels. Click Funnels Cost Per Month
By producing a well-designed sales funnel, it is possible to dramatically increase your earnings and provide more value to your clients.
In this article, I will present you to ClickFunnels, the software I am using to build sales funnels for my business.
You do not need any technical know-how to use this, and it will truly change the way you run your business.
Plus:
If you are prepared to throw yourself into the ClickFunnels world, it’s one of the best affiliate programs out there. I will be speaking about that too later on.
What is ClickFunnels?
ClickFunnels was made back in 2014 by Russell Brunson and his group. Since that time, Russell has turned ClickFunnels to a $100 million a year company and they just crossed over 65,000 active members as of August 2018.
In its core, ClickFunnels is an application for constructing sales funnels. With a bunch of additional bells and whistles.
You can use it to build:
– Landing pages
– Squeeze pages
– Webinars
– Membership websites
– Every type of sales funnel you can think of, complete with order bumps, upsells and downsells
Plus, with the highest end Etison Suite package you will even have the ability to start your own affiliate program (Backpack) and replace your email service with (Actionetics MD).
Basically, you’re getting everything you need to advertise and sell your products online, without having to employ expensive developers.
And people are utilizing ClickFunnels with great success.
If you check out their 2 Comma Club site, you can see that almost 300 entrepreneurs have already created 1 million dollar funnels utilizing ClickFunnels.
That is remarkable.Click Funnels Cost Per Month
What are the best parts of ClickFunnels?
Best Feature #1: Funnel template blueprints
In case you’ve never created a sales funnel before then ClickFunnels has you covered.
Russell has identified 22 distinct types of funnels that he has used successfully in his own business.
The funnel types fall into 3 main classes: Lead Capture Funnels, Sales Page Funnels, and Event Funnels. But there are a few additional special funnels like Membership funnels you can create as well.
They include simple funnels like the Squeeze Page Funnel which gathers a visitor’s email address and then sends them to a Thank you page when registering.
Or to more sophisticated sales funnels like the 2-Step TripWire Funnel which sells a very low ticket front-end product (your tripwire) and then upsells them to a more expensive products with Order Form bumps, and One Click upsells or Downsells.
In addition, every funnel type has its own set of free templates and paid templates. So even if you don’t have any design skills, your funnel pages will all have a consistent, professional design.
Here’s a high-level overview of how to create your first sales funnel:
- Choose a funnel type.
- Select a template.
- Customize each page to fit your business.
- Add your products and ensure all your email and payment integrations are set up.
- Set a domain name for your new funnel.
- Save your funnel.
Your sales funnel is now live and you can start sending traffic to it. Click Funnels Cost Per Month
Best Feature #2: Good Visual Drag and Drop Editor
While ClickFunnels gives you a great starting point with its funnel and webpage templates, the ClickFunnels editor is where you can truly make each page in your funnel your own.
Pages in ClickFunnels are laid out with sections that can have any number of rows and columns. After that you can use your mouse to drag elements around and place them where you want them.
While not as flexible as Instapage’s landing page editor, it is still quite good and it can be used to achieve pretty much any design you desire.
What I like is that the editor is quite intuitive to use.
Selecting elements on the page and transferring them where you want is very seamless.
Text elements can be edited inline, and changing any element’s properties can be done via the fly-out sidebar.
And contrary to other editors out there, everything is organized in a logical way. You are not spending a lot of time searching for what you want to do.
The important thing is that no coding is required. So you do not have to spend time studying HTML or CSS or some other technical things like that.
Best Feature #3: Nice Selection of Page Elements
Elements (or widgets) are all essential for providing you the flexibility to design the exact pages you want and ClickFunnels gives you a wide variety of them to use.
Fundamental elements comprise of Headline, Photo, Text, Button, Input types and Video widgets. These are the fundamental building blocks for any landing page you construct in the software.
ClickFunnels also includes a number of advanced elements such as:
– SMS Signup
– Surveys
– Pricing Tables
– Progress Bars
– Facebook Comments
– FAQ Blocks
– Countdown Timers
– Custom HTML
Plus, there are specialized elements like Membership elements for your membership pages and order and shipping form elements for your order pages.
Each element can be easily customized in the editor sidebar. With majority of elements, you can change common properties such as background colors, margins, fonts, and alignment.
Then there are element specific attributes like the image URL for the Image element or the Button text of your button.
Best Feature #4: The ClickFunnels Affiliate program is awesome
There’s no doubt in my mind that ClickFunnels has the best, legitimate affiliate marketing program that you can be a part of.
First the Fundamentals:
The ClickFunnels affiliate program pays 40% recurring commissions for every referral you make and you can win cool prizes like $500 towards your own dream car as soon as you reach 100 active referrals.
On top of that, they offer 5%, 2-tier commissions for referring people to the ClickFunnels affiliate program itself.
In addition you earn 40% commissions by promoting any product in the ClickFunnel’s ecosystem such as DotCom Secrets, Expert Secrets or even the Software Secrets books.
And thanks to the ClickFunnel’s sticky cookie, you’ll also earn commissions on any upsells that your referrals purchase as they go through their specific funnels too.
That’s not all:
ClickFunnels also has another great feature for affiliates known as share funnels.
Inside the Settings tab of any of your funnels, you can grab your Share Funnel URL.
When someone visits this URL, they’ll be able to bring this funnel directly into their account if they are an existing ClickFunnels member. If they are not a member yet, they can register for the ClickFunnels 14-day free trial then get your funnel added to their account.
What’s really awesome is that this share URL also functions as your affiliate link, and you’ll get a recurring commission if this new user ends up staying.
What I do not like about ClickFunnels?
Bad Part #1: Why is adding a funnel so slow?
After choosing your funnel type and template, it needs to get added to your account.
For some reason, this procedure seems to take approximately 8-10 seconds every time.
While I really don’t understand what is going on behind the scenes, it does not make sense to me why this would take a long time. It is a bit annoying, although just a minor annoyance.
Bad Part #2: Limits on funnels you can create and visitors
ClickFunnels limits you to 20 funnels, 100 pages, and 20,000 visitors in their cheapest plan. I am not a fan of software products that restrict you in this way.
If you are just building sales funnels for yourself, these limits are probably okay.
However you can get more annoyed at these limitations if you are doing client work, creating funnels for multiple customers or promoting ClickFunnels as an affiliate using share funnels.
You’ll want to upgrade to the Etison Suite plan if you would like to build unlimited funnels.
Bad Part #3: Fairly High learning curve
The range of what ClickFunnels could do is fairely huge, and it can certainly be intimidating to some.
That’s why ClickFunnels put a lot of work into the onboarding process to help ease you into the program. The ClickFunnels interface is fairely well made for the most part and once you’ve built a couple funnels yourself, the entire procedure does get easier over time.
ClickFunnels Pricing
Over time, ClickFunnels has evolved their pricing plans. In the beginning, they had 3 different pricing tiers, however they have now been consolidated into 2 separate plans.
So how much is ClickFunnels now?
At the moment, the cheapest ClickFunnels plan is $97 a month. On this plan, you get access to all of the funnel creation tools, but you are limited to generating 20 funnels, 100 pages, and 20,000 visitors. You also don’t get access to Actionetics, their built-in email service provider and Backpack, which allows you to create your own affiliate program.
To gain access to that, you’ll need to go for the Etison Suite plan. It includes everything, plus you get unlimited funnels, pages, and visitors. However, this will run you $297 a month.
As far as I can tell, there are no ClickFunnels coupon codes out there. However, you can purchase Funnel Hacks for $997 which provides you 6 months of Etison Suite for free plus some extra bonuses. This brings the cost down to $166.16 per month.
ClickFunnels does make it easy for you to demo their service with their free, 14-day free trial. It’s not constrained whatsoever which lets you give the software a complete evaluation before you fully commit.
If $97 or $297 a month sounds like too large a commitment for your current budget, there is also a semi-secret, unadvertised Share Funnel plan which you can also have access to for just $19 a month. You can only produce 3 funnels and 10 pages with this plan, but it’s a great way to test out ClickFunnels on a budget.
Everything else you need to know about ClickFunnels
How is their support?
ClickFunnels support is quite good in my experience, although they can be somewhat slow in responding. They use Intercom, so you can immediately ask questions in the live chat box. Support requests are usually answered within a few hours and I found the team to fairly helpful to all my queries.
Do I need my own domain? Click Funnels Cost Per Month
You do not necessarily need your own domain name to launch a funnel, although I would advise it. If you don’t have one then your funnel URL will look something like http://username.clickfunnels.com.
One nice bonus I did not know about is that ClickFunnels will get you your first domain name for free and even install SSL on it for you. You can discover how to do this from the first game in the onboarding training.
Do they have an active community?
ClickFunnels has an massive community. There is the official group on FB with over 100k members and the ClickFunnels Avengers FB group (for affiliates) that has over 30k members.
Both groups are extremely active and it is a great place to get opinions on your sales funnels and answer any questions you might have.
There are also other FB groups run by ClickFunnels affiliates that are also quite active. The main one I recommend joining is Automation Nation. It is run by Spencer Mecham who is ClickFunnel’s top affiliate.
What integrations do they offer?
Even though ClickFunnels has its own email service provider via Actionetics, it also integrates directly with all the best email marketing software on the market.
For payment gateways, ClickFunnels integrates with Stripe, Paypal, Clickbank, Infusionsoft, Authorize.net, and a couple of others. The one constraint with using Paypal though is that it does not support One Click Upsells or One Time Offers. That’s the reason why I would highly recommend going with Stripe if you’re able to.
What is the Funnel Hacks system?
If you’re looking to get the $297/mo. Etison Suite plan, then it’s definitely worth it to sign up with Funnel Hacks instead to save some additional money. For $997, you are going to get six months of the Etison Suite plan which is $1,782 in value.
You’ll also get a bunch of additional bonuses and training that include:
– 6 Week Funnel Hacks Master Class ($2,997 value)
– Instant Traffic Hacks ($1,997 value)
– Inception Secrets ($1,997 value)
– SOAP & Seinfeld Email Sequences ($997 value)
Is ClickFunnels a scam?
I believe ClickFunnels has some negative buzz around it because of all of the affiliates who are trying to market it.
But no, ClickFunnels isn’t a scam. It’s definitely the real deal.
It’s a great software with an amazing affiliate opportunity. So many people are using ClickFunnels to build 6 and 7 figure businesses.
It’s a software with an amazing affiliate opportunity. So many men and women are using ClickFunnels to build 6 and 7 figure companies.
When folks ask, “How can I create a sales funnel”, ClickFunnels is the #1 answer hands down. There’s no other application that can do everything that ClickFunnels does at the moment.
What else is ClickFunnels used for?
Besides building standard sales funnels, there are plenty of ways marketers are using ClickFunnels at the moment in their business.
It is great for creating opt-in funnels to help you generate more leads and build your email list.
You are able to produce webinar funnels that will help you grow your brand and sell your products and services.
And you can use it to create membership sites where you’re able to gate your premium content so that it is accessible only to subscribers.
How can you make ClickFunnels work for you? Click Funnels Cost Per Month
First of all, you need to have a product or service to market. If you do not have something to market, then do not even bother looking into ClickFunnels until you do. Unless you just want to market it as an affiliate.
Next, you have to be willing to invest time and money into creating your value ladder and constructing your entire sales funnel.
That means creating a lead magnet or low-cost tripwire product to get customers or clients into your funnel. And coming up with appropriate upsells, order bumps and other OTOs that match or improve your main product offering.
If you’re unclear how to being, I would take a look at Russell’s own multi-million dollar sales funnels to give you inspiration. Read his book DotComSecrets where he explains precisely the why and how of building sales funnels and how to tell stories to sell your products and services.
And as you go through his own sales funnels you can see the way he goes from low-cost tripwire (DotComSecrets) to promoting his flagship product (ClickFunnels).
By creating his own community of raving fans he could then upsell his various different products and events like Funnel Scripts, Funnel Hackers Live, and more.
As soon as you’ve gone through his funnels, then you can take the components that apply to your own business and create a strategy for your own sales funnel. Once you have that in place, you’ll be prepared to start making money with ClickFunnels.
ClickFunnels versus the competition
There are a few ClickFunnels alternatives out there that share a number of the same capabilities as ClickFunnels. Two that I use myself are LeadPages and SamCart.
ClickFunnels vs LeadPages
Today, LeadPages is one of the market leaders in the landing page builder space and it is a really popular tool in its own right.
It also recently introduced the capability to sell products directly on their pages using its new Checkout widget
Each product comes with a huge selection of nice looking templates. Both have drag and drop editors which make it effortless for you to build the designs you desire. And both integrate with the popular email service providers.
But, Leadpages is significantly more limited in scope than ClickFunnels. You use it to create landing pages that will help you collect leads. This is not a terrible thing since LeadPages really shines for building landing pages quickly.
At this time, among the most effective strategies for developing your email list is by using content upgrades. By producing targeted lead magnets into your most well-known articles you can acquire opt-in conversion rates that far exceed your typical pop-up.
LeadPages is the best service for implementing this strategy with its LeadBoxes, 2 step opt-ins, and automated lead magnet delivery which is why they are the most popular popup you will see now.
So if you’re primarily focused on lead generation, I’d definitely suggest trying out LeadPages.
However, if you are selling a product or service, then ClickFunnels is the better choice. While it comes with a higher learning curve than Leadpages, once you master the tool, you can really explode your sales once you start creating sales funnels for each of your products.
But, if you’re selling a product or service, then ClickFunnels is the better alternative . While it comes with a higher learning curve than Leadpages, as soon as you master the tool, it’s possible to definitely explode your sales as soon as you begin creating sales funnels for all your products.
ClickFunnels vs SamCart
SamCart is a product which lets users create amazing, high converting checkout pages. Which gives it a whole lot in common with ClickFunnels.
SamCart is geared towards getting setup and selling quickly. It supports both Stripe and Paypal and it comes with 17 different checkout page templates which you can customize.
In terms of flexibility, there is not any comparison between ClickFunnel’s drag and drop editor and SamCart’s.
ClickFunnels is infinitely more powerful in that you’ll be able to design any checkout page you can dream about. SamCart only allows for some basic customizations to its pre-made templates.
SamCart does permit you to add order bumps, upsells and downsells such as ClickFunnels does. You can also quickly create coupons for your products which is another terrific way to raise conversions.
But where Samcart is missing, is the capability to capture leads and build complete sales funnels. Both products come in at the exact same $97 per month price point, and I find ClickFunnels to be quite a bit more flexible and more powerful than Samcart.
ClickFunnels Pros
– Best software for creating marketing and sales funnels
– Editor balances ease of use with flexibility
– Integrates with all major email and payment providers
– Beautiful looking templates for each type of funnel
– Great on-boarding process for learning the software
– Software continues to get better after every update
– Readily share any funnels you build and automatically earn affiliate commissions
– 2-tier affiliate program
– Free domain name with SSL installed
– 14-day free trial
ClickFunnels Cons
– Limitations on the number of funnels, pages, and visitors with the standard plan
– Lots of things to understand, a steep learning curve
– Split testing is pretty basic
Final Thoughts Click Funnels Cost Per Month
Which software you go with depends on your requirements and the quantity of work you are willing to invest in your business.
Although many of you are selling standalone products, are you willing to put in the effort necessary to create a high converting sales funnel?
If not, ClickFunnels could be overkill for you. It’s possible to collect leads or sell your front end product more cheaply using alternative services.
However, if increasing the average lifetime value of your clients is important to you, then I really suggest giving ClickFunnels a try.
Not just to access the software but also since the coaching you get will probably be both inspirational and enlightening.
Take advantage of the ClickFunnels 14-day free trial, and see if you can use it to increase your business now.
