Infusionsoft vs ActiveCampaign. These platforms compete massively for the same market of small businesses, start-ups, and agencies. They are both focused on marketing automation via email and also take advantage of some direct sales features.
They differ in their range of functions, pricing, and user-friendliness.
Infusionsoft’s all-in-one marketing suite is designed to meet most of your marketing and sales needs. It has CRM, sales automation, and e-commerce functions. Essentially, Infusionsoft wants to handle every stage of the customer journey.
ActiveCampaign is less ambitious. It mainly focuses on email automation and focuses on user-friendliness. It has some sales features, but compared with Infusionsoft, these features are limited. It does not yet have any e-commerce functions.
Infusionsoft, now recognized with the new name Keap, offers a wide range of e-marketing and e-commerce tools. Infusionsoft by Keap is all-in-one sales and marketing software designed for entrepreneurs, startups, and large teams.
The platform concentrates on your customer information and your daily work in one place, so you have more time to focus on growing your company and providing quality services.
As we delve into the features of the tools, user experience, pricing, and support of Infusionsoft and ActiveCampaign, these differences will become more apparent.
Regarding pure email marketing needs, both Infusionsoft and ActiveCampaign can use simple functions, which are the focus of essentials.
On this matter, some people like that the email marketing tools they use are a bit more complex, which is what Infusionsoft uses more than Activecampaign.
It is strongly recommended that developed companies with more than 10 employees are better to use Infusionsoft. As an extremely versatile email marketing tool, it has the ability to use major upgrades in any marketing project.
You can personalize it to accurately have the type of results you want, and generally control a wider range of marketing activities.
Infusionsoft
You are probably asking yourself by now what does Infusionsoft do. Infusionsoft is more than a well-organized customer relationship management (CRM) system. It is also a marketing automation tool, including sales components and shopping carts.
As a highly intuitive marketing system, it can be almost tailored to a single customer level, or at least it can bring a very strong impression to your customers, which can really affect your profitability.
This software is specially designed for small businesses and medium businesses, so its automation function is very good. Infusionsoft’s Campaign Builder focuses on automating customer lifecycle marketing and shows considerable benefits in terms of your business.
In Infusionsoft, you can set up product and sales forms on your e-commerce store. Once added to your website, this sales form will enable you to collect payment information, at which point Infusionsoft will automatically establish contact with payment processors such as PayPal or other merchant accounts.
Although it brings some kind of “digital handshake” during the purchase process, Infusionsoft is still doing a good job of making it a truly automated process. Just set up your product and any necessary labels or tags and email sequence in Infusionsoft marketing automation software, and let the software do the rest and you will have so-called automation sales.
More than 25,000 small business owners use Infusionsoft to customize their CRM and segment their lists. Almost all of these activities can be automated in Infusionsoft, which can save you time. Handling all sales (including sales team management and shopping cart functions), marketing (including social media activities) and CRM within the same system which is also very beneficial. Infusionsoft was developed to solve the nightmare of multiple system chaos, the thing every small to medium business owners deals with at some stage. This software is an effective way to solve this problem.
Infusionsoft covers almost everything a business owner needs, including the creation of newsletters and the planning of campaign strategies. With Infusionsoft you can easily complete the capture, scoring and follow-up of potential customers and focus on tailoring it to your own business.
This can also be automated to save your time. Infusionsoft can also allow you to customize your campaigns to suit your business and the types of customers you want to attract, and do this easily.
Infusionsoft Benefits:
- Good email delivery rate
- Personalized campaign generator
- Excellent CRM system
- Good customer service
- Stable and fast platform
Infusionsoft Features
The training included with Infusionsoft is the fastest way to automate your sales and marketing and is one of the best features of the software. Your one-on-one consultant will guide you step by step to set up the backend, plan, execute, and track early campaigns.
The flexibility of the platform means that it is a good idea to get the right guidance to hold your hand when building the system and integrating it into the business process.
Infusionsoft provides a variety of functions for you to choose from. By customizing the system that best suits your business, you will get the most value. You can then adjust as your business grows. Infusionsoft aims to be scalable and grow with your business.
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign combines the functions of email marketing, marketing automation, and sales/CRM automation. You will be able to create powerful automated marketing and sales processes to accommodate the need to create happier and more loyal customers.
- Send press releases, beautifully designed email campaigns, easy drag and drop email builder features, and keep in touch with your contacts and customers.
- Use personal and behavioral data about contacts to automate marketing.
- Complete and close deals faster with a new approach to customer relationships.
With ActiveCampaign, the online sales process requires you to do various levels of manual work. ActiveCampaign itself does not provide any product or sales features, except to use third-party integration with various payment processing systems (such as PayPal, Stripe, WooCommerce, etc.).
However, the 3rd party integrations available to ActiveCampaign users are not created equally and don’t have the same specifications. Some of them are ActiveWoo, Bigcommerce, Gumroad, Magento, Shopify, Stripe, Square, CartBounty, Goody, LandingCube and many more.
For example, if the Shopify integration selects marketing updates when purchasing a product, it will only automatically add new customers to your list. Otherwise, if you want to apply a specific set of tags and add them to the sequence, you must manually add each client.
On the other hand, Bigcommerce integration promotes its automated process of adding new customers to ActiveCampaign marketing automation CRM.
ActiveCampaign Features
Contact management – This includes intuitive label management and a fully automated email sequence. It also provides a level of segmentation breakdown that many other systems in this field cannot. However, it is limited in a way that it will allow you to manage your data segmentation details only as a list-based.
Business Opportunity Management – You can customize sales funnels explicitly to your business type. It is simple to set up and has a drag-and-drop function for easy startup. This part of the software can also track tasks, emails, and notes about client interactions.
Email marketing– It is very easy to do in ActiveCampaign, especially for e-newsletters. You can as well customize the content of the e-newsletter so that one client can receive a different copy of another client based on the marking method in the list. This is an important function to personalize your marketing.
Automation – You can design the “flow” of automated activities and program them easily. You can also use SMS marketing in automated marketing campaigns and automatically update social media for Facebook and Twitter.
However, it is not easy to version from one campaign to another or to use the same email in a series of automated email sequences. Setting up an automated sequence triggered by a positive (active) response from a potential customer is not an easy task, and some users find it unnecessarily complicated.
Support – ActiveCampaign provides 1:1 training courses, as well as live chat, email support, and searchable help files.
ActiveCampaign benefits:
- User-friendly all-in-one platform
- Excellent messaging and email functions
- Powerful and user-friendly marketing email automation platform
- It allows the creation of automatic follow-up sequences
- Great customer support service
CRM and Automation
As we are comparing and evaluating Infusionsoft vs ActiveCampaign automation software, understanding the expectations of the CRM platform is crucial. Consider asking yourself a question-do you want your business to grow? Well, of course, you do!
The problem is that doing business means maintaining the ability to contact potential customers at the most suitable time and provide them with all the information they need to make a purchase decision. Today, it is almost impossible to accomplish without using CRM.
In short, a CRM platform is a centralized database used to store contact information of all customers and potential customers in an organized and strategic manner. Gone are the days when companies had to check emails to find the latest interactions with potential leads or customers.
Customer service representatives can easily access the entire history of each customer interaction. This helps reduce the chance of errors that could severely impact your business. Imagine a customer who has to explain the same problem to your employees multiple times, which makes your business appear cold and unprofessional.
More importantly, the CRM platform enables companies to automate their sales and marketing strategies. For example, you can run an automated email sequence to seamlessly direct potential customers to your sales channel without manual processing.
Therefore, the CRM platform may save you a lot of time and money, which is invaluable for your business development, and knowing a bit more about Infusionsoft vs Activecampaign CRM can be beneficial when deciding which platform could be best for small business or a large business needs.
Infusionsoft provides all the basic functions expected by the CRM platform. This includes automatic messaging, sales, email, marketing automation, and some other features not normally found in most CRMs.
A good example is an integrated feature that allows users to send quotes and invoices to customers directly from the application. They also have powerful planning features that enable customers to book and reschedule their bookings.
On the other hand, ActiveCampaign is a CRM platform with the same functions. Although it does not have as many features as Infusionsoft, most CRM users agree that they make up for this deficiency by covering all the basic elements and making it very easy to implement.
When comparing automation sales sequences with Activecampaign vs Infusionsoft, you can’t actually find a lot of differences between the two. That being said, they are much better than the other similar platforms out there.
Although Infusionsoft allows you to perform more complex sorting than ActiveCampaign, unless you are a large enterprise, this feature is usually not needed.
Tagging
Most business owners use tags in their emails, which helps to create better received and organized emails. Thankfully, both platforms have this feature, and it can be categorized in your CRM. They will work within any parameters you set, and you can do this with either software.
Having said that, both marketing automation tools do things differently. Marking will allow you to extract the email list and divide it so that some members will get exclusive content while others will not.
The next part depends on the size of your business and what your email list looks like. If you use less than 100 tags, Active Campaign is really easy to use. The label tag works well and is not difficult to set up. If you use more than 100 tags, Infusionsoft may be your better choice.
Another part depends on the size of your business and what your email list looks like. If you use less than 100 tags, Active Campaign is really easy to use. The label works well and is not difficult to set up. If you use more than 100 tags, Infusionsoft may be your better choice.
Infusionsoft is useful because they have a feature that allows you to take out the put tags and sort them which is helpful if you have a lot of different tags. Obviously, it depends on your marketing and sales goals, but there are usually no problems if you have more tags. Therefore, this classification of tags will only benefit Infusionsoft. However, if you don’t want to use multiple other tags, don’t worry, Active Campaign will work well.
Customer Service and Support
Both have some of the most knowledgeable, pretty responsive, and available customer support ninjas. However, in both cases, phone support is only available in high-priced packages.
If you need more help to make it work, Infusionsoft support will be especially useful, as there are relatively more knowledgeable people 24/7 compared to ActiveCampaign’s 24/5.
You can contact Infusionsoft via email, use the help center, and even ask for help from its community forums and Facebook group members. Alternatively, you can use the program’s searchable database to find certified partners.
The main advantage of Infusionsoft lies in its huge market of experts, such as developers, coaches, and integration consultants. But, again, third-party support means that Infusionsoft’s operation and maintenance costs will increase, and ActiveCampaign can help one save money and you may not need to seek specialist help to determine how ActiveCampaign works.
In addition, ActiveCampaign’s page has built-in contextual help, so when you set up your campaign on its largely visual campaign builder, you can get a summary of the help.
ActiveCampaign vs Infusionsoft Similarity
- Both systems send marketing emails.
- Both have drag-and-drop.
- Both have mobile-responsive email builders.
- Both Infusionsoft and ActiveCampaign come with starter templates, which you can use as needed. And, if all you plan to do is send an email anytime, then ActiveCampaign is your ideal choice because it is a much cheaper method for what you want to do. That is until the price is no longer cheap in ActiveCampaign as large lists and large numbers of emails can become expensive.
- Both systems are CRM so Infusionsoft vs ActiveCampaignis tie. Infusionsoft calls it a business opportunity, and ActiveCampaign calls it a deal. Infusionsoft’s “Business Opportunity” feature is very old, and it doesn’t say much (it is not actually what customers want, which is why many users now use tags to manage sales channels) and Campaign Builder (where most current customers build automation).
- Selling deals plays better in Automations (automation is built in ActiveCampaign), so I think ActiveCampaign is more useful for typical B2C small business owners using CRM. However, regarding Activecampaign, Infusionsoft is very stable and is packed full with everything businesses would need, there are some differences that may make ActiveCampaign transactions useless for your business where you cannot have duplicate contact records in the system.
- E-commerce – Infusionsoft is built-in, while ActiveCampaign is not. However, you can use Zapier to plug-in solutions such as SamCart, Stripe, PayPal, Shopify, etc., and the developers can build a stronger integration for you. This can be a downside when considering rating Infusionsoft vs Activecampaign.
- Both systems have automation tools, and both are good. Infusionsoft calls it Campaign Builder and ActiveCampaign named it Automations.
Ease of Use
In the eyes of most users, ActiveCampaign is definitely the best in this “ease of use” category. It is stylish and user-friendly, and it only takes a small amount of time for dedicated users to figure out how to get the job done.
On the other hand, Infusionsoft has a fairly steep learning curve before you can browse its interface with confidence. A large part of this is because it does provide more customization options.
If you have more complex needs (think coupons, limited trial versions, and hundreds of tags to manage), Infusionsoft may provide you with better performance than ActiveCampaign. Keep in mind that these more complex functions may require some technical proficiency o your part.
Fortunately, if you can’t (or don’t have the time) to do it yourself, there are many Infusionsoft certified partners (some of which are also trained and accredited AccessAlly certified partners) are ready and able to get your job done.
For entrepreneurs who do not need to perform super-complex funnels or super-fine-tuned conditional tags, Infusionsoft’s extra features in this area may be unnecessary and Infusionsoft vs ActiveCampaign gives points to ActiveCampaign.
Price:
Of course, the price of Activecampaign vs Infusionsoft is always a big factor but also when choosing any marketing tool. The CRM platform is no different.
ActiveCampaign automation software happens to be cheaper than Infusionsoft marketing automation software, and Infusionsoft justifies the higher asking price by providing more advanced features in advance.
ActiveCampaign marketing automation pricing is very affordable. It only costs $9 per month to use all basic functions and provide space for up to 500 contacts. This makes Activecampaign pricing an ideal starting point for new or small businesses that want to start using CRM at the lowest cost.
Naturally, as you add more contacts to your campaign and gain access to more advanced features, the price will increase. On the positive side, based on the ActiveCampaign pricing, it provides a migration service that can migrate customer data from other platforms to new users for free.
In contrast to ActiveCampaign, Infusionsoft’s entry price is much higher, including migration, $199 per month. In other words, many companies see it as a viable long-term investment to deal with future marketing activities.
On the one hand, Infusionsoft guarantees that they have all the features that marketers might want or need. To get started, new users can also access a large number of training materials to take full advantage of its CRM platform.
No matter which CRM marketing automation platform you choose between Activecampaign vs Infusionsoft, it represents some of the best choices in the market today. Both have a free demo period, allowing new users to get started and test them with zero risks. This free demo can actually help you decide if Infusionsoft or Activecampaign is a good fit for your business or different businesses you might have,
Conclusion
In summary, and as a conclusion to Infusionsoft vs Activecampaign comparison, this is a list of the advantages and disadvantages of each CRM platform.
ActiveCampaign advantages:
- Nice easy to use automation and tagging options based the people’s behavior
- Easy to build powerful automated workflows
- Perfect for smaller businesses who are just starting out
- ActiveCampaign has a reliable marketing automation system that can be integrated with third-party tools
- If you need e-commerce or affiliate programs, it can be integrated with Activecampaign
- You can use AccessAlly to design your member area on WordPress
- ActiveCampaign has a user-friendly interface, easy to learn
- Very simple and visual automation builder
- Plans start at a lower price
Activecampaign Disadvantages:
- This is not an all-in-one solution, so you must use third-party tools for e-commerce, affiliate, etc.
- Limited features
- The tagging system can be overwhelmed because it lacks a categorized organization
- A large number of email contacts can greatly increase the price of your subscription
- No landing page builder
- No support for payment processing in contrary to Infusionsoft
If you are a new, small business owner or have more limited email marketing needs, ActiveCampaign may be your best choice.
Infusionsoft Advantages:
- Packed with powerful and useful features
- Great email automation campaigns, sequences, up-sells, and tags can be automatically carried out according to the customer’s behavior
- Almost unlimited options for customization
- Great all-in-one system for handling email marketing, e-commerce, and affiliate orders
- 1-1 Customer relationship management in the sales process, and communication in different formats, such as print or phone
Infusionsoft Disadvantages:
- E-mail delivery capabilities are uneven and slow as you add complexity
- Steep learning curve
- Large pre-registration fees for training
Infusionsoft is easy to say a better software. Its all-in-one business meaning that customers/ users do not need to purchase any other marketing software as Infusionsoft will handle everything from acquiring potential customers to accepting payments from potential customers.
Although this may be the perfect choice for small businesses with growing sales teams or experienced information entrepreneurs, most young startups, bloggers, and small businesses will be at a loss. Using Infusionsoft requires a lot of upfront investment and annual contracts to no avail.
For users who are more into email marketing automation than sales or e-commerce functions, ActiveCampaign is a better choice. It is easy to use and does not require harsh up-front commitments. You can sign up by yourself (even if you don’t have a credit card), and you can try it out for only $9/month.
If you are a blogger, are an online store owner, or a small company who just wants to use easy-to-use introductory tools for marketing automation, you will love ActiveCampaign.