The Question I had to answer for my clients.
I recently asked myself, if I had to start over, would I start with the Click Funnels strategy?
After all, aren’t we just “One Funnel Away?”
My online transition from the 9 am – 5 pm to would have been easier for sure, rather than starting with multiple niche specific websites.
The Click Funnels strategy is easier when you are intimidated by the techy side of set-up. But with effort I was able, to learn, how to build and monetize websites. It’s not as difficult as many make it to be.
Along my online journey, I’ve become a website builder, an online freelancer, blogger, affiliate and email marketer. I have created e-books, webinars, e courses, membership sites and e-commerce shops. I’ve made mistakes, not known what to do next, spun my wheels for too long, learnt a lot, and built an online business.
My journey was a solo one, expensive and time consuming. It was blood, sweat and no tears because I love the freedom and flexibility of my online life.
Taking the slow website route forced me to learn different online strategies, when to use them, and how to set up, leverage and maintain them.
There are many online strategies and each suits different people, purposes, enterprises and expertise.
I help professionals, and community organisations to transition online. They extend their reach sharing their expertise, message and purpose. They grow their supporters, authority, voice, impact and income streams.
The Question
Should I be directing my clients to Click Funnels from the get go? Rather than to other online strategies?
Not everyone has the tenacity and determination to master many online strategies into one business model. Could I have used Click Funnels for an easier path to create diverse income streams?
Click Funnels V’s Website’s
A year ago, I came across Click Funnels and started with their 14 day Click Funnels Free Trial and then completed their 30 Day Challenge. Without any doubt, Click Funnels made many things easier and helped me to grow my business.
I questioned my years of trial and error, and asked what if I had found Click Funnels earlier, would I have done things differently? Would success have come sooner? Do I even need a website? Do my clients need a website?
A website is the most common choice when transitioning online. The domain name, https://www.yourname.com provides your online address where people can find you.
The owner of Click Funnels, Russell Branson, who has an interesting journey to success, and many users say you don’t need a website, and only need Click Funnels.
Like a website, with Click Funnels you can link different online strategies. You can launch a webinar, create a membership site, sell a product and much more. Almost any online strategy and integration that a website can do, so can Click Funnels.
With Click Funnels, it’s easier and time saving compared to website building.They say it’s cheaper because many of the website addons such as email integration are included.
Click Funnels and build a website have a learning curve, and costs to set up and manage. There are more free design options when building website. Click Funnels have templates with free and paid design options. You can customize the look and functionality but not as freely as you can with a website.
I have built and manage over twenty WordPress.com websites and my “go to” is Go Daddy for hosting and support. The reason is, I have always found the Go Daddy customer support responsive, helpful and it’s good to be talking to a real person 24/7 rather than a chat box.
The Go Daddy costs to buy a domain name for US $13 a year, and web hosting on a shared server is US $4.99 per month, that’s US $73 per year. There can be added costs but I’m keeping it simple, just the costs for a website to build your online presence.
To access Click Funnels at the basic entry level is US $97 per month. For this you can build 20 funnels. The next level cost $297 per month with a range of additional features. Before you jump in, read on.
The Argument For Click Funnels
Here is the argument for no longer needing a website with Click Funnels. Following are my thoughts about the benefits of a website.
A funnel is the sales process to lead your potential customers to learn about you and/or your product(s). It is a very direct way to shepherd potential customers to your offer. This is an attractive advantage over a website.
Imagine visiting a car yard and the sales person takes you by the hand to the car you desire. This is the funnel strategy as you focus the customer on one thing, your offer.
Imagine again you are visiting the same car yard. This time the sales persons shows you a brochure of all the cars and leaves you browse by yourself. There are so many choices, you can’t find what you want and leave.
The same can happen to website visitors. There is information overload and the visitor becomes overwhelmed and leaves. There are strategies you can use to reduce your “bounce rate” and keep your website visitor for longer. Improving your content, design, and making it clear to the visitor what you want them to do next
If you have a product and want a sale, use a funnel.
If you want to reach out, creating a funnel is easier to find leads than setting up a website to do the same task. Creating optins, landing pages, and linking to your email or calendar is easier with “Drag and Drop” functionality of Click Funnels compared with website integration’s.
The Argument for a Website.
For your own online growth, a business or community organisation build a website .
For professionals and others, it’s not always about making immediate sales, it’s about purpose, reach and social impact.
A website with a blog is easy to set up and contrary to many, does not cost thousands. You can learn to do it yourself. With a website, there are many low cost and free design options to get your own look of your unique online presence.
With a website strategy valuable content in published. You describe your purpose, the mission, provide useful information, talk about your team and your story. Your followers get to know you, what you stand for, and how you can help.
Use a website to create an authentic and deep online presence providing a solid foundation for relationship building and genuine engagement.
This leads to the next very important difference. If you have a business or creating one to go the distance it’s important that you have control over the platform and your content for the long term.
Click Funnels owns the platform where you locate your content. If you stop paying the membership fee, you don’t have access anymore. That’s reasonable of course.
If your website becomes inactive the host ie Go Daddy will keep your content for a lower fee of US$5 per month compared to US$97 monthly fee for Click Funnels.
You need both, Click Funnels and a Website for different reasons.
My advice is use both website and Click Funnels. Each strategy has a place especially for professionals, expert based businesses, not for profit and community organisations.
A website is your opportunity to create unique online design and content. An ideal place to showcase you, your expert value and capacity to transform lives, and maybe save them.
When you want to Fast Track lead generation with your products or services, Click Funnels is the “go to” choice. For experts this is likely to include information products, services, newsletters, membership sites and e-courses. Click Funnels is also perfect to promote your message with webinars, and lead generation.
Want to learn more about WordPress.com? Click Here. There are excellent free training programs, video’s, MeetUp groups and Facebook Communities.
WordPress.com isn’t the only platform to build your website. For a comparison of other options for a website platform, there is a detailed article here.
For Click Funnels, there are many choices.
If you really want to learn more about Clickfunnels, I recommend you read Russell Bransons books, take the 14 day free trial and if you think it is for you, the 30-Day Challenge to build your first funnel.
For a limited time, the new Expert Secrets is Free.
I hope you have found this article useful. It’s been good for me to sit down and think about the two strategies, and the reasons experts, professionals and purpose driven organisations choose to have a website and Click Funnels.
If you would like to schedule a free 60 minute Strategy Session I’d love to meet you and hear your story to help with your online journey. Click Here to schedule an appointment.
