Are you currently trying to sell stuff online?
Then I’m confident you will agree that converting your visitors into sales is hard.
And getting yourself profitable? That’s even harder.
But there is a simple secret to increasing the value of every customer you sell to:
Sales funnels. Funnel Scripts Software
By producing a well-designed sales funnel, it is possible to dramatically increase your sales and provide more value to your customers.
In this article, I will present you to ClickFunnels, the software I’m using to create sales funnels for my business.
You don’t need any technical know-how to utilize it, and it is going to truly change the way you run your business.
Plus:
If you are ready to throw yourself into the ClickFunnels world, it has one of the best affiliate programs on the market. I will be talking about that too later on.
What’s ClickFunnels?
ClickFunnels was created back in 2014 by Russell Brunson and his team. Since that time, Russell has turned ClickFunnels into a $100 million per year company and they just crossed over 65,000 active members as of August 2018.
At its core, ClickFunnels is an application for building sales funnels. With a bunch of added bells and whistles.
You can use it to build:
– Landing pages
– Squeeze pages
– Webinars
– Membership sites
– Every kind of sales funnel you can think of, complete with order bumps, upsells and downsells
Additionally, with the highest end Etison Suite package you’ll even be able to start your own affiliate program (Backpack) and replace your email service with (Actionetics MD).
Essentially, you’re getting everything you need to advertise and sell your products online, without having to hire expensive programmers.
And people are utilizing ClickFunnels with great success.
If you check out their 2 Comma Club site, you can see that nearly 300 entrepreneurs have already created 1 million dollar funnels using ClickFunnels.
That is amazing.Funnel Scripts Software
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 different forms of funnels that he has employed successfully in his own business.
The funnel forms fall into 3 main categories: Lead Capture Funnels, Sales Page Funnels, and Event Funnels. But there are a few additional special funnels like Membership funnels you can create too.
They include simple funnels like the Squeeze Page Funnel which gathers a visitor’s email address and then sends them into a Thank you page when signing up.
Or to more sophisticated sales funnels like the 2-Step TripWire Funnel which sells a low ticket front-end product (your tripwire) and then upsells them to your more expensive products using Order Form bumps, and One Click upsells or Downsells.
Moreover, each 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. Funnel Scripts Software
Best Feature #2: Good Visual Drag and Drop Editor
While ClickFunnels gives you a wonderful starting point with its funnel and page templates, the ClickFunnels editor is the place you can actually make each page in your funnel your own.
Pages in ClickFunnels are laid out using sections that can have any number of rows and columns. You can then use your mouse to drag elements around and put them where you want them.
While not as adaptable as Instapage’s landing page editor, it is still quite good and it may be utilized 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 moving them where you want is very seamless.
Text elements can be edited inline, and modifying any element’s properties can be done through the fly-out sidebar.
And contrary to other editors on the market, everything is organized in a logical manner. You’re not spending a great deal of time hunting for what you would like to do.
The main thing is that no programming is required. So you don’t need 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 essential for providing you the flexibility to design the exact pages you woud like and ClickFunnels gives you a large array of them to use.
Fundamental elements comprise of Headline, Image, Text, Button, Input forms and Video widgets. These are the fundamental building blocks for any landing page that you build in the software.
ClickFunnels also includes a number of advanced components such as:
– SMS Signup
– Surveys
– Pricing Tables
– Progress Bars
– Facebook Comments
– FAQ Blocks
– Countdown Timers
– Custom HTML
Additionally, 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 from 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 very best, legitimate affiliate marketing program which you can be a part of.
First the basics:
The ClickFunnels affiliate program pays out 40% recurring commissions for every referral you make and you can win cool prizes like $500 towards your very own dream car once you hit 100 active referrals.
In addition to that, they offer 5%, 2-tier commissions for referring people to the ClickFunnels affiliate program itself.
You also get 40% commissions by promoting any product in the ClickFunnel’s ecosystem including DotCom Secrets, Expert Secrets or even the Software Secrets books.
And thanks to the ClickFunnel’s sticky cookie, you will also earn commissions on any upsells that your referrals purchase as they go through their specific funnels as well.
That is not all:
ClickFunnels also has another excellent feature for affiliates called share funnels.
Within the Settings tab of any of your funnels, you can grab your Share Funnel URL.
Whenever someone visits this URL, they will have the ability to bring this funnel directly into their account if they are an existing ClickFunnels member. If they aren’t a member yet, they can sign up for the ClickFunnels 14-day free trial and then get your funnel added to their accounts.
What’s really awesome is that this share URL also acts as your affiliate link, and you will get a recurring commission when this new user ends up staying.
What I don’t 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 process seems to take around 8-10 seconds every time.
While I don’t understand what is really going on behind the scenes, it does not make sense to me why this would take a long time. It’s a bit annoying, although only a minor inconvenience.
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 lowest plan. I’m not a fan of software products which limit you in this way.
If you are just building sales funnels for yourself, these limitations are probably okay.
But you may get more annoyed at these constraints if you are doing client work, creating funnels for multiple customers or promoting ClickFunnels as an affiliate with share funnels.
You’ll want to upgrade to the Etison Suite plan if you want to develop unlimited funnels.
Bad Part #3: Fairly High learning curve
The scope of what ClickFunnels could do is fairely huge, and it can definitely be intimidating to some.
That’s why ClickFunnels put so much work into the onboarding process to help ease you into the program. The ClickFunnels interface is pretty well made for the most part and when you’ve assembled a few funnels yourself, the whole procedure does get easier over time.
ClickFunnels Pricing
Over time, ClickFunnels has evolved their pricing plans. Initially, they had 3 different pricing tiers, but they have now been merged 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 production tools, but you are limited to creating 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 lets you create your own affiliate program.
To gain access to that, you’ll need to go for the Etison Suite plan. It features everything, and you receive 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 available. But, you can purchase Funnel Hacks for $997 which provides you 6 months of Etison Suite for free and 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 limited whatsoever which lets you give the software a complete test before you fully commit.
If $97 or $297 a month seems like too big a commitment for your present budget, there’s also a semi-secret, unadvertised Share Funnel plan that you can also get access to for only $19 a month. You can only produce 3 funnels and 10 pages with this plan, but it’s a great way to try 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 may directly ask questions in the live chat box. Support requests are usually answered in a few hours and I found the team to fairly helpful to all my queries.
Do I need my own domain? Funnel Scripts Software
You don’t necessarily need your own domain name to launch a funnel, although I would recommend it. If you do not have one then your funnel URL will look something similar to http://username.clickfunnels.com.
One nice bonus I didn’t know about is that ClickFunnels will buy you your first domain name for free and even install SSL on it for you. You can learn how to do this from the first game in the onboarding training.
Do they have an active community?
ClickFunnels has an enormous community. There’s the official group on FB with over 100k members as well as the ClickFunnels Avengers FB group (for affiliates) that has over 30k members.
Both groups are very active and it is a great place to get feedback on your own sales funnels and answer any questions that you may have.
There are also other FB groups run by ClickFunnels affiliates that are also quite active. The main one I suggest joining is Automation Nation. It’s 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 the best email marketing software out there.
For payment gateways, ClickFunnels integrates with Stripe, Paypal, Clickbank, Infusionsoft, Authorize.net, and a few others. The one limitation with using Paypal though is that it does not support One Click Upsells or One Time Offers. That is why I would highly recommend going with Stripe if you’re able to.
What’s the Funnel Hacks system?
If you’re looking to acquire the $297/mo. Etison Suite plan, then it is definitely worth it to sign up with Funnel Hacks instead to save some additional money. For $997, you’ll receive six months of the Etison Suite plan which is $1,782 in value.
You will also get a bunch of additional training and bonuses 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 gets some negative buzz around it due to all the affiliates that are making an effort to market it.
However, no, ClickFunnels isn’t a scam. It is 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 is a fantastic software with an amazing affiliate opportunity. So many men and women are utilizing ClickFunnels to construct 6 and 7 figure businesses.
When people ask, “How do I create a sales funnel”, ClickFunnels is the #1 response hands down. There’s no other application that can do every thing that ClickFunnels does at the moment.
What else is ClickFunnels used for?
Besides creating standard sales funnels, there are plenty of ways marketers are using ClickFunnels right now in their business.
It’s terrific for creating opt-in funnels to help you generate more leads and build your email list.
You can produce webinar funnels that will help you develop your brand and promote your services and products.
And you can use it to build membership sites where you’re able to gate your premium content so that it’s accessible only to subscribers.
How can you make ClickFunnels work for you? Funnel Scripts Software
First of all, you need to have a product or service to sell. If you do not have something to sell, then don’t even bother looking into ClickFunnels until you do. Unless you just want to promote it as an affiliate.
Next, you need to be willing to invest money and time into creating your value ladder and building out your entire sales funnel.
That means at least creating a lead magnet or low-cost tripwire product to get clients or customers into your funnel. And coming up with proper upsells, order bumps and other OTOs that match or enhance your principal product offering.
If you’re unclear how to start, I would take a look at Russell’s very own multi-million dollar sales funnels to give you inspiration. Read his book DotComSecrets where he describes precisely the why and how of creating sales funnels and how to tell stories to sell your services and products.
And as you go through his own sales funnels yourself you can observe the way he goes from low-cost tripwire (DotComSecrets) into promoting his flagship product (ClickFunnels).
By creating his own community of raving fans he could then upsell his various other products and events like Funnel Scripts, Funnel Hackers Live, and more.
Once you’ve gone through his funnels, then you can take the parts that apply to your own business and create a strategy for your own sales funnel. As soon as you have that in place, you will be prepared to begin making money with ClickFunnels.
ClickFunnels versus the competition
There are a couple of ClickFunnels alternatives out there that share some of the same capabilities as ClickFunnels. Two that I use myself are LeadPages and SamCart.
ClickFunnels vs LeadPages
Today, LeadPages is among the market leaders in the landing page builder space and it’s a really popular tool in its own right.
It also recently introduced the ability to sell products directly on their pages using its new Checkout widget
Each product comes with a huge selection of fine looking templates. Both have drag and drop editors which make it easy 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 compared to ClickFunnels. You use it to create landing pages that can help you collect leads. This is not a bad thing since LeadPages really shines for creating landing pages fast.
Right now, one of the most effective strategies for developing your email list is by using content upgrades. By producing targeted lead magnets into your most well-known posts you can acquire opt-in conversion rates that far exceed your standard pop-up.
LeadPages is the best service for implementing this strategy with its LeadBoxes, 2 step opt-ins, and automatic lead magnet delivery which is why they are the most popular popup you’ll see now.
So if you are primarily focused on lead generation, I would 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, once you master the tool, it’s possible to really explode your earnings once you start creating sales funnels for each of your products.
ClickFunnels vs SamCart
SamCart is a product that lets users build amazing, high converting checkout pages. Which gives it a whole lot in common with ClickFunnels.
SamCart is targeted towards getting set up and selling fast. It supports both Stripe and Paypal and it includes 17 different checkout page templates which you may customize.
Concerning flexibility, there’s absolutely 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 of. SamCart only allows for some basic customizations to its own pre-made templates.
SamCart does allow you to add order bumps, upsells and downsells like ClickFunnels does. You can also quickly create coupons for your products which is just another great way to increase conversions.
However, where Samcart is missing, is the capability to capture leads and create 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
– Amazing looking templates for each type of funnel
– Great on-boarding procedure for learning the program
– Software continues to get better after each update
– Readily share any funnels you create and automatically earn affiliate commissions
– 2-tier affiliate program
– Free domain name with SSL installed
– 14-day free trial
ClickFunnels Cons
– Limits on the number of funnels, pages, and visitors with the standard plan
– Plently of things to learn, a steep learning curve
– Split testing is pretty basic
Final Thoughts Funnel Scripts Software
Which application you go with depends on your needs and the quantity of work you’re willing to invest in your enterprise.
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 might be overkill for you. You can collect leads or market your front end product more cheaply using alternative services.
But if increasing the average lifetime value of your customers is important to you, then I truly suggest giving ClickFunnels a try.
Not only to access the software but also since the training you get will be both inspirational and enlightening.
Take advantage of the ClickFunnels 14-day free trial, and see if you can use it to grow your business today.
