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Keap Review: What They Won't Tell You About Keap, But I will
Easy Navigation Links
- Kicking The Keap Tires
- The Mandatory Kickstart
- Keap Case Studies
- A Blog Debate
- Confusionsoft
- Venture Capital
- Features I don't use
- Keap Is NOT Right For You If...
- Conclusion
- Keap Resources
- Order Keap
- Contact Us
Kicking The Keap Tires
I started using Zoho because I was familiar with CRMs but couldn't afford Salesforce.
So I had my contacts in Zoho, I didn't have a merchant account, so clients would have to mail me checks, I was using an email tool created by a local company that wanted me to be a reseller for them, so they gave me a free account.
A friend created a static HTML website in Dreamweaver that I couldn't update.
I was using Apple Mail to correspond to people that I cold-called or met out in the community, and I was tired, but I was in business.
- So Zoho alone was not confusing.
- The email tool alone was not confusing.
- Taking checks alone from clients and driving them to the bank to deposit them was not confusing.
- Sending one-off emails was not confusing.
- Making cold calls was not confusing.
- Trying to explain my non-existent business model was quite confusing.
- Trying to predict sales and revenue was confusing.
- Tracking and measuring prospect engagement and nurturing them was NOT confusing because it was IMPOSSIBLE.
So when a salesperson or business owner is asked to map out their chaos as described above and then tie it all together with five windows per step, their lack of process combined with a non-intuitive, non-GUI-based marketing automation tool is going to lead to the term Confusionsoft.
Now, we can't the fact that entrepreneurs still don't have a process, but we can help you map it out and launch it with more intuitive software, better training, higher caliber Keap Consultants, drag-and-drop email and sequence and campaign builders, free training, free support, etc.
So anyone calling Keap "Confusionsoft" now either doesn't understand the major advances since 2012, has a bone to pick with Infusionsoft for some reason (It happens. Nobody's perfect.), or they still don't have their own processes mapped out, and they're taking it out on Infusionsoft. (It's called "transference neurosis," and Freud introduced the term in 1914. Please seek professional help for anyone suffering from this Confusionsoft Transference.)
Sure, there will always be people that refer to Keap as "Confusionsoft."
Sometimes systems and platforms are just laid out and structured in a way that doesn't make sense based on how you learn or prefer to work online.
I think the number of those types of people is slowly going down as Keap and Keap Consultants like my team and I provide more complete marketing Campaigns and Done-For-You services that help you quickly launch and automate the key sales and marketing components of your business.
Because, at the end of the day, automation is key.
If it works and it works affordably and quickly, we really don't have to understand it, do we?
Salesforce.com understands this, which is why it purchased ExactTarget in June 2013 for $2.5 billion. And ExactTarget already purchased Pardot in the Fall of 2012.
Having email, CRM, workflow, sales pipeline, etc., all under one roof, seamless and automated, is the first name of the game.
Making these systems easy is the last name of the game.
Keap does have a learning curve, but it's worth the effort.
Recommendations
I've used Keap since 2008 to build my own sales training and marketing consulting business and began reselling it soon after I bought it because of its power, support, and the training Keap offers.
But if you don't have a documented system for sales and marketing, don't blame Keap.
The software makes more sense when you have a well-thought-out prospecting, marketing, and selling process.
Venture Capital: Goldman Sachs & Bain Capital Ventures
In January 2013, Goldman Sachs invested $54,000,000 in Keap.
In October 2014, Bain Capital Ventures gave them $55,000,000.
Some people were excited.
Others got concerned, thinking Keap would become "beholden" to the Wall Street behemoth and lose their unique entrepreneurial feel, and for a while, it was starting to look like that was happening.
We brought this up to Clate Mask, the CEO of Keap, and he responded like the great leader he is at the annual Keap Partner Conference in November 2014.
He admitted that they had gotten too focused on sales and had lost their focus on making a great product and that he had changed his outlook on how to grow the company.
They would become a product-centric company, and I started to see the shift in focus, and it was a good thing, but it feels like it might have been too little, too late.
Getting outside funding is both good and bad.
It looks like both Goldman Sachs and Bain Capital Ventures realized Collateralized Debt Obligations and Credit Default Swaps and all of the other derivative investments that led to the 2008 financial meltdown weren't in anyone's long-term best interests, and they are now investing in the backbone of America and letting those companies continue to do their thing.
Keap Features I Don't Use
- Share this record with a group of users: In the Legacy Action Sets, this is a function that I've just never had to use.
- Distribute this record to another Keap application: I only have one application, but this can be valuable for entrepreneurs that own multiple businesses with different partners, but I've never seen anyone use it.
Other than that, I use everything in Keap to one degree or another. (But realize I've used the platform since 2008.)
Do you need to use every piece of Keap to realize a positive ROI? Absolutely not.
Can you build an amazing business with minimal staff and maximum income by utilizing more of Infusionsoft? You betcha.
Keap Is Not Right For You (But Keap Might Be) If...
As I stated in my introductory video, Keap is not right for everyone, and I actually help more people decide AGAINST Keap for various other platforms, such as starter packages with AWeber and Constant Contact, or more robust platforms such as Salesforce.com with Act-On or HubSpot.
So here are some ways to know if Keap is not right for you:
You are brand spanking new in business.
If you are not really in business yet...
If you haven't really sold anything...
This is no longer the case since Keap now offers a truly free option so you can get started mapping out your ideas and creating the foundation of your systems before you spend a dime.
If you have a "great idea" but don't have a marketing plan in mind, a budget to launch, a team, and/or the patience and aptitude to buckle down and focus on growing your business with a good bit of lost sleep, trial and error, research, false starts, re-starts, and do-overs, Keap is a great place to start. (Refer to my Resources page for ideas on other tools to help you grow.)
You have thousands of SKUs you sell online
This is a "maybe" because we have done some nice integrations with Magento and Big Commerce whereby our clients have large e-commerce needs but needed the automation of Infusionsoft to deliver and fulfill and follow up with prospects and clients.
But this is a custom solution.
Keap has been designed for smaller businesses with a few products or even dozens of products, especially digital products and coaching programs, vs. those that are trying to emulate Amazon.
You need to provide detailed quotes with multiple components
This is partially related to the previous item, but if you run an IT consulting firm and you need to create a quote with dozens or even hundreds of line items that are not native to Keap. It's not a quoting tool.
However, since the mid-2016 release—and now with Keap—you do have a quoting capability that enables you to send the quote over digitally with a big green APPROVE or red DECLINE button that makes it fast and easy to get an order from a client that requests a quote.
It also gives you the ability to include a payment link with the quote, which helps eliminate your tracking down payments from clients.
Again, like the previous point, with Keap's API, you can create some custom code to integrate with a quoting tool, but that is not native to Keap.
You can't spend 5-10 hours a week marketing your business
Let's get real for a minute.
If there was a program out there that could be purchased and loaded in 5-10 minutes and never touched again, and it produced even a 10% ROI, it would cost $1,000,000.
Keap is a sales and marketing automation tool, just like WordPress is a blogging tool and Twitter is a micro-blogging tool, and a Craftsman® socket is a tool.
All tools take time to master.
When you buy a $1 trial at AWeber and grow very little and stay under their 500 subscribers limit, you'll only pay $19.95 per month, and you'll forget about it because $19.95 per month is not a big deal.
But I've had people quit AWeber because it was too hard to learn.
Growth comes through effort, trial and error, testing and measuring, and tweaking and modifying.
Marketing efforts that worked last year may not work this year.
That's why Army has changed its slogan from "Be All That You Can Be" to "An Army Of One" to "Army Strong," etc. Ditto for McDonald's, Coca-Cola, and every other big brand you see out there.
They are always trying to improve their marketing.
You and I, as business owners, must do the same thing.
This will require your time.
Getting help from a Keap Consultant team (like mine) and the free, unlimited support from Keap, including their weekly Mastermind calls, free supplemental training, etc., helps you realize you are not alone (check out my post on "One Is The Loneliest Number In Business and Life") and that extra support and encouragement and instruction are what will help you reach your goals.
Keap Review Conclusion
Thanks for reading this far.
If you've read this entire page, you know what I think about Keap, both good and bad.
I've used databases to track personnel since I was a young Lieutenant at March Air Force Base in 1994 and CRMs since I became a stockbroker in Mobile, AL, in 1997.
In 2004 I started using Salesforce.com at a technology startup in Austin, and in 2007 I was retained by Dell to bring in a team to assist with their Salesforce.com implementation and new hire training over a 10-month period and was rated the #1 instructor out of 25 during that time. So I know a thing or three about these platforms.
While I beat up on Salesforce around my site, I do so from the angle of small businesses. It's fantastic and needed for large enterprises, but not for you and me.
Keap was started by a small business to help other small businesses.
Are they perfect? (Are you?)
Are they passionate? You bet.
Are they greedy, smarmy, snarky software scum who only want to make money at any cost? Not by any stretch of the imagination.
Can you buy this software and still lose money and go bankrupt and close your doors and have your dad get punched in the stomach over a can of soup? Yes.
Will Keap or I take your money and run and you never hear from us again and are left alone, in the dark, clicking around online user guides in feeble attempts to get the software to work?
Don't take my word for it. See what my clients have to say.
Keap is right for you if you have the drive and determination to streamline and centralize and think through the creation of a sales and marketing automation program and are coachable and willing and able to listen to my team, me, and Keap to help you do it.
Are there other platforms that can help you achieve those goals? Sure.
But do those other platforms help you learn and focus and grow like Keap?
Since 2008 I've yet to find one that does it at this price point, with this much passion and this much commitment to the small business owner.
If you still have questions please contact me here and complete the form at the bottom of the page and I'll get back to you asap.
Keap Resources
Check back often as we add and retire Infusionsoft Resources to help you grow such as The Best Campaigns
- Keap Longterm Nurture
- Keap Sales Pipeline
- Keap CRM
Ask Wes Your Keap, CRM, Email Marketing, Marketing Automation Question
Market like you mean it.
Now go sell something.
