When we start out on our entrepreneurial journey, we tend to piecemeal a lot of the things we add to our business toolkit in order to get the job done. We feel a little like MacGyver as we experiment with different tools on recommendations. We buy what we like best or what we can afford, and do our best to make everything fit together. I don’t feel my business is very tool heavy. I research a lot before I commit to something and recommend it to my audience.
What's Currently in my Business Toolkit
ClickFunnels for Sales Funnels
Currently, I am using ClickFunnels for my Pinterest course. I created it with a beautiful funnel template purchase from the amazing ladies at Funnel Gorgeous so it was easy to set up and has an attractive user interface. ClickFunnels is the software created by Russell Brunson. If you are familiar with his work, you know he’s a great marketer and one to learn from. I went through his One Funnel Away Challenge and owe a lot of what I know about online marketing to him.
Limitations
Over time I have come to realize some of the limitations with ClickFunnels. It’s difficult to integrate with PayPal without having custom tools or a lot of technical knowledge to do the set-up. In a day and age when so many clients and customers are using PayPal, it’s just a no-brainer to have this as part of your platform.
I also learned it’s challenging to offer any kind of promotion through ClickFunnels. So if I wanted to put my course on a limited-time sale, it requires some workarounds to make that happen. It’s not easy.
Thirdly, ClickFunnels has a monthly fee of $97 which pays only for the funnel software and membership area. And I eventually want to offer my course through affiliates which is only available at the $297 per month level.
Podia for Teaching Platform
I additionally use Podia which I chose over competitors like Teachable and Thinkific. Podia has a great price point option of either $39 or $69 a month. It offers a wide array of features, IT’S PRETTY, and there is an option to add affiliates to your course to help you promote your offers at the $69 monthly fee. Other pros for Podia are the intuitive set-up, the amazing customer service team, and easy-to-design sales pages for small opt-ins and tripwires.
One of my favorite features of Podia is its storefront. I love this because you are able to send people to your store, and they can literally shop and see all the different things you have to offer. And while this feature is amazing, it’s limited in that it isn’t as customizable as I would like.
Limitations
One of the drawbacks of Podia is that there are some design limitations within Podia. There was more space padding between sections, limited font selections, limited elements, and so for a long-form sales page, it’s not really a good option. As a Pinterest Strategist, design is an important element to me.
Podia also has limitations in the ability to add upsells. Yes, they do offer simple one-click upsells, but they don’t offer the ability to add additional explanation or design. In other words, Podia simply presents the upsell to the buyer with the option to add it to the cart. If the buyer cannot make the connection or see the association as to why they should add it to their purchase, they may not choose to purchase. So I do believe the ability to have an additional explanation or image mock-up would be valuable here.
Podia also excludes the ability to add SEO to my pages. I will add ClickFunnels does not allow for SEO enhancements either. Since I am a Pinterest Strategist, ideally I want my Pinterest tag on the sales page and the checkout page. Podia has been trying but it doesn’t work yet. This creates challenges in being able to retarget your audience.
Thrivecart for Sales
ThriveCart is one of those programs that was probably mentioned often in my circle, but I had never really paid attention. I learned I was able to build (move) my funnel to my current website and ThriveCart takes care of the shopping cart similar to Clickfunnels, adding the ability to have one-click upsells and one-time offers.
Limitations
ThriveCart has the option to add affiliates, which is an important factor for me. They currently have a lifetime deal that is $690 to have the affiliate option. Sigh.
ThriveCart was able to do the order bumps similar to ClickFunnels. It lacked the membership component, so I would still have to retain Podia for that. And I still had my website for everything else. So I needed the tech for all of the different programs to coordinate and work together since I am using, and paying for, three different pieces of software.
Zapier
In comes Zapier, our integrator piece. So I guess you can say I am using four pieces of software to try to get my business toolkit to work right now (probably more, but four for this purpose). As far as integrating things, I love native integrations. I avoid Zapier like the plague because it can be glitchy and will eventually add an additional cost depending on how many zaps per month you use and the time delay you want.
Luckily, a friend introduced me to GrooveFunnels at the perfect moment.
Why I Streamlined My Business Toolkit with GrooveFunnels
I immediately signed up for the FREE ACCOUNT because I wanted to get in and see what GrooveFunnels offered. Right away I was impressed. I signed up on a Thursday and then spent the entire weekend exploring the different features and researching the possibilities. Is this going to do what I’m going to do? Is it going to solve all my problems?
IT DOES!
There are so many tools that GrooveFunnels can replace in your entrepreneurial toolbox. I am going to start with five of my most favorite features although there are many more and will require other blog posts. There are that many tools!!
The Brains Behind GrooveDigital
A little background first. The company is still in beta when this is written (Oct. 2020). The company is founded by CEO Mike Filsaime and three additional partners. Mike has experience co-creating WebinarJam, Everwebinar, and later Karta. After leaving Karta, which is another popular all-in-one platform, and ending his non-compete clause, he re-entered the market with GrooveFunnels. John Cornetta and Matt Serralta are the additional founders and each has his own specialties they bring to GrooveDigital.
There is so much more diversity in their offerings. Another thing I have found interesting was their work in the field of what they call “butterfly marketing.” Essentially, if you are familiar with the concept of the butterfly effect where the flap of a butterfly’s wings can affect things in the ecosystem thousands of years from now. Butterfly marketing is how one small change in your business can have a ripple effect far into the future. If you want to read more about it and Mike Filsaime, I have included a link here.
The takeaway is that they understand how all pieces of your business integrate with one another, and how a simple tag in one area can affect your ability to market or upsell at a later date, so they ensure everything is woven together within their platform.
But onto the business toolkit:
GroovePage (Website Builder / Funnel Builder)
There are different tiers available at this time. GroovePages Free Account allows for GroovePages Lite. This doesn’t limit features or capabilities, but it does limit the number of funnels you can create to three. There is also a Pro version which allows you to have an unlimited number of funnels.
So what is considered a funnel? Well, you could literally use GroovePages to build a 5-page website and have that count as one funnel. Or you can build an opt-in. In this way, I would compare GroovePages to LeadPages in that it allows you to make sales pages or website pages. GroovePages Lite Free Account even allows you to choose a custom domain. You heard right. A custom domain. You know that isn’t normally given on a free account of any kind; it’s almost always an upgrade.
I will note I am saying a 5-page website because I think it’s a common page number (home, about, services, blog, contact). Your site may have additional pages, but some may be hidden. GroovePages allows you to have unlimited pages with some hidden and 5-facing pages to count as one funnel.
What I Love
I absolutely love that it’s all drag-and-drop. There is no coding or advanced design skills necessary. It’s all very intuitive when putting your pages together. I will be the first to raise my hand and say I do not claim to build websites and did not build my own. I paid to have my current WordPress site done for me.
Because GroovePages is so easy (and did I mention it’s pretty?) when my current site expires, I have confidence I would be able to build my site easily. I would also be assured that everything would be cohesive. They allow you to create global settings so if you compare this to ClickFunnels for example, if you make a change to something on the front page, you’ll have to change it manually on multiple pages. I can easily see on each page where to add a Facebook and Pinterest pixel.
Also, Groove offers the H1, H2, ….headings which is why you can create a blog (or multiple) on GrooveFunnels. The ability to add SEO is key. You can build a website on Clickfunnels, but not a blog because it lacks that SEO component. This carries over to your sales pages too. Add the headings for SEO and you get the SEO juice for your sales pages too. This was another reason I was going to move my funnel to my website.
GrooveMail for E-Mail Marketing
If you built your sales page or your opt-in page, there is always that extra step of integrating it with your email system. There are times when you have software that may not integrate with your current email so then you have to bring in a Zap. GrooveMail now allows you to drag the mail icon over to wherever you want the signup box to be on the page and then assign it to the list you would want to drop email subscribers to. Easy peasy.
GrooveMail is allowing you 5,000 leads with their Lifetime upgrade option. I will mention the option to upgrade to the Lifetime offer is available in the short term future, but they will be reducing the benefits as time goes on.
What I Love
If you compare some of the features from ConvertKit (what I currently use), ActiveCampaign, KartraMail, or InfusionSoft, GrooveMail is set to be a powerful contender. There are visual automations, it is very easy to set up, workflows are simple to create, and there are amazing retargeting capabilities.
This brings me to the idea of behavior marketing, which is not something ConvertKit has allowed me to do. As an example, say you shared a video that was seven minutes long. Your subscriber stopped watching about halfway through and didn’t see your pitch. You could retarget them because they missed the pitch in the video. Alternatively, if they had seen the whole pitch, but didn’t make the purchase, you could again retarget them but with a slightly different message. Not to mention, to make this all happen, you would have to again piecemeal this all together with zaps and such. Not so when your video and email are integrated together in a comprehensive business toolkit.
How amazing is that? I mean, amazing in a kind of eerie sense. Like when you think of something and suddenly see it on your Facebook newsfeed. Am I right? But from a sales point of view, it’s amazing!
GrooveVideo for Video Hosting
So going along with that line of thought is GrooveVideo. Compare this to a monthly cost of video hosting programs like Wistia ($1200 a year) or Vimeo ($240 a year) or a site like YouTube which recommends videos from other businesses once yours finishes playing even if it’s “unlisted.”
What I Love
Everything is integrated. So GrooveVideo and GrooveMail are already talking to one another.
As I explained above, I am currently using Podia which allows me to drag and drop videos to their platform for hosting. Since I am still in my boot-strapping stage, I am choosing not to pay the $240 annual fee for Vimeo. My videos are unlisted on YouTube which allows your audience to share them and give them away to somebody else. Once that video finishes playing, it can lead your audience to a random video from one of your competitors which is less than ideal.
Integration between GrooveFunnels and GrooveVideo allows me to streamline my business toolkit and my finances because I am eliminating the third party video hosting like Wistia or Vimeo with ClickFunnels. The more tools you have add to the cost of selling your course.
GrooveSell, GrooveKart, and GroovePay
GrooveKart is for selling physical products vs. GrooveSell is for selling digital products, courses, and memberships. The user can click to purchase, payment is integrated (my favorite word of the day). Groove sell works with both PayPal and Stripe. GroovePay is a feature that is on the horizon to be released.
What I Love
While all of the details about GroovePay have not been released, my understanding is that it is very competitive with Stripe. It will be accepted worldwide except for countries like Cuba, North Korea, and similar countries where Stripe is also currently restricted.
GrooveAffiliate allows you to create affiliates for your products eliminating the need for ThriveCart. This is included in your free account along with the GrooveSell and GroovePages Lite. I really encourage you to sign up for at least the free account, to take advantage of these options as part of your business toolkit, and there is always the opportunity to upgrade later.
GrooveMember for Memberships
This is a feature that just released in September. I am so ready to get this piece set up so I can leave ClickFunnels and Podia to move my course to Groove. What would you do with an extra $97 a month?
Do I Have to Re-Learn Everything in my new Business Toolkit?
I understand you may be thinking, “Karrie, this all sounds great. But I don’t have time to learn how to use all these cool new tools. I am busy running my business.” I completely agree but the smart guys over at Groove have made it easy for us.
GrooveAcademy
GrooveAcademy provides so much valuable education and resources about learning GrooveFunnels as part of your business toolkit in the form of weekly education and webinars on different topics. If you miss the live webinar, all of the replays are stored in the GrooveAcademy for reference along with tutorials.
One of my favorites is called State of the Groovion (think State of the Union). The video is about 2 ½ hours long and it’s given quarterly where they sneak peek features to be released, behind the scenes, and more.
Community Support
In addition, there is a Facebook support community for those on the social platform. David Lemon is with Groove, and he is very active in the Facebook group providing value, support, and doing live videos twice a week and they are all archived within the group for reference.
These videos are also shared on the Groove YouTube channel. They understand their success is dependent on our success and so they want us to be happy with using their product. Their resources and tutorials are well-organized and you can choose to do a quick overview or a deep-dive on any topic.
Moving Your Content
I think everyone dreads the thought of moving platforms. It is so much work, I agree and has been the most asked question in the Facebook group. Will we have to rebuild everything? The answer is NO. A feature released in September gives you the ability to “copy and move” your existing funnel or sales pages wherever they are on the internet into your GrooveFunnels account.
Pricing Options
Free Account
There is currently the free account that I have mentioned. This allows you to access GroovePages Lite or three funnels and GrooveKart which is for selling physical products in one storefront.
You are able to point to three URLs or three different domains. You could have your main website hosted on one, or a course under another domain, and so on. I know many of my entrepreneur friends are kids in a candy store when it comes to buying URL’s so they may benefit from Lifetime Access which allows them to host unlimited URLs. 😉
Again, you get everything you need in your business toolkit and more and save thousands in the process.
You don’t need to learn to code or hire a team.
You just have to see it to believe it.
Take a closer look at it yourself, and pick up your FREE ACCOUNT while you’re there.
Seriously, what do you have to lose?
I haven’t even got to the ins and outs of their affiliate program (another topic for another video/ blog post since affiliate marketing is my jam besides Pinterest marketing) but with the free account, you can earn a 20% commission if you refer GrooveFunnels to another one of your entrepreneur friends who upgrades to the lifetime offer. If you upgrade and take advantage of the Platinum Lifetime option, that goes up to a 40% commission which is a good chunk of change!
Lifetime Access
While not all the features are available yet, Platinum Lifetime Access allows you to lock in pricing and access to the features as they are available. As of this writing (October 2020), Lifetime Access is a low as $1397 (depending on how you want to pay, payment plans are available in 3, 6, or 12 months) and would include over 12 apps: GrooveFunnels, GroovePages, GrooveSell, GrooveAffiliate, GrooveMail, GrooveMember, GrooveVideo, GrooveBlog, GrooveWebinars, GrooveDesk, GrooveCalendar, GrooveSurvey, and any new features released.
Not all of these features are available immediately. Groove Video, Groove Member, and Groove Mail are available now. Training on each of these tools are being offered, and then another app is launched, and so on. In this way, members aren’t overwhelmed with everything released at once. You have a chance to integrate an app into your business toolkit one at a time. This way you are able to use everything to your best ability.
As of now, the Platinum Lifetime Access continues to be available, but the terms can change at any time. The investment has been steadily increasing and the email subscriber leads were reduced from 25,000 allotments to 10,000 leads. For those reasons, I’d recommend taking advantage of this sooner rather than later.
Once Lifetime Access ceases, GrooveFunnels will be offering traditional tiered monthly plans such as $99, $199, and $299 per month with each having access to different features. And while I still believe the value they are providing exceeds what you would be paying for various apps on a piecemeal basis (ClickFunnels is currently $97 a month, Podia is $39 a month, ConvertKit is $29 a month, Wistia $99 a month, and so on), the Platinum Lifetime Access deal still blows them all away.
Stop trying to do and be all the things in your business. Streamline your business toolkit and your finances. Everything in GrooveFunnels is integrated making it an all in one solution. In other words, no more third-party integration tool needed (buh-bye Zapier!), no tech VA to set up all the complicated workarounds, and no more pricey apps to do less than what you need. I feel like I have found the answer to making everything so much simpler in my business, which will allow me to grow and expand in creating more courses and products so I can show up and serve in a bigger way. You can learn more about GrooveFunnels Free Account here or their Platinum Lifetime Access Account here.
OFFICIAL GROOVEFUNNELS SOFTWARE UPDATE!
GROOVEPAGES
- Share pages, sites, and Funnels
- Funnels Management
- WebSite, Block, Funnel, Popup Templates
- ON CANVAS row/column drag handles for easy layout and editing.
- Easier centering of images and buttons
- Lazy Loading and Image Optimization for Better SEO as per google requirements
- Analytics and a new dashboard
- Split testing
- User Roles
- Agency Model
GROOVESELL - added summer 2020
- Affiliate marketplace
- GrooveSellPayments
- SocialProof Widget
- Custom Domains for checkout pages, tracking, and affiliate links.
- NMI (Already added)
- PayPal Commerce (this week)
- Coupons
- Partner Contracts
- View Sub Affiliates
- View Manage, mail – Customers cart abandons,
- IF/Then Automations
- Sales Tax
- Multiple Currencies
- GrooveSellPaymets
- Wallet System
- Guaranteed Commission from vendors
- Affiliate Approval and management/ban etc
- Custom Terms for affiliates
- Option Questionaire for affiliate approval
- Order Bumps August
Integrations:
- Zapier
- Active Campaign
- MailChimp
- Aweber
- Campaign Monitor
- Webform
- Get Response
- GotoWebinar
- Mautic
- Perkzill
- ProductDyno
- WebinarJam
- Everwebinar
- Pipedrive
- FunnelYtics
- YouZign
- Kunacki
- Lulu
- ConvertKit
- SendLane
- GoHighLevel
- Mailerlite
- Drip
- iContact
- Kajabi
- Wishlist member
- LearnDash
- Everlesson
- ValueAddon
- Memburium
- Member Mouse
- Thinkific
- Teachable
The Future Products:
- GrooveBlog
- GrooveDesk
- GrooveSurvey
- GrooveCalendar
- GrooveWebinar Live
- GrooveWebinars Automated
- GrooveWebinar Livestream
- GrooveKart Updates
- Mobile App
Updated October 4th:
New to the Business Toolkit: Groove Video, Groove Member, and Groove Mail are now available!
