ONTRAPORT Software

Ontraport Makes Marketing and Selling Effective, Automated, & Easy

Pros

Ontraport makes marketing and selling in my business effective and easy. With great email deliverability I don't have to worry that my marketing messages aren't getting to my prospects and customers. The payment processing and affiliate systems allow me to accept payments for my services and products and have my partners share them with their communities so I can help more people get the solutions they need. But the best part is how automated everything can be with the sequences, tasks, and if/then rules. No matter what the event: a client signs up, a promotion runs, a prospect wants to talk to me about how I can help them, everything that needs to happen to deliver a quality experience them, happens and it's on autopilot. And on top of all of that the support team isn't knowledgable and fast when I have a question about how I could use the system better to accomplish my goals. I couldn't be happier about my experience with Ontraport and love sharing it as a resource with my clients.

Cons

I don't have one complaint about the Ontraport system or the company. The staff are friendly and really care about the success of their customers. They are careful to roll out updates after thorough testing and creating new features that the community of users wants.

Ontraport is so powerful and flexible - almost to the point of overwhelm

The biggest benefit is that it allows us to intelligently segment our customers and have a true CRM where we can see what happened when and troubleshoot errors.

Pros

You can just do so much with this software. It's amazing to have the ability to use such a powerful tool where we can design helpful systems for all aspects of our business without ever having to pay or consult a developer. The new updates they have made to the software have been amazing, and I love how there is always a helpful support person just one click away if you ever get stuck.

Cons

Because the software can do so much and is so flexible, it can be a bit overwhelming and at times confusing because you end up doing things in a non-standard way which can lead to a messy account.

Easy-to-use and powerful CRM tool

-Easy to manage and navigate CRM -Saves time during customer file management -Intuitive user interface

Pros

I use Ontraport as a team member to manage client files and support membership-related inquiries.

I love how easy it is to work with client files and support customers with their inquiries. In general, I've found this particular Ontraport feature relatively easy to learn, and in comparison, found it much easier and more user-intuitive than Infusionsoft.

I can't speak to the marketing automation aspects, other than my client has installed a powerful and complex automated marketing email system and it seems to work quite well.

Overall, this is a great software, especially if you're thinking of outsourcing CRM and support-related tasks.

Cons

I can't find any drawbacks for using this software. From what I understand support has also been wonderful whenever my client has needed to contact them.

Powerful, multifaceted, intuitive

It just simplifies so many processes. Being able to build a page, send emails, manage contacts, and set up campaigns all under one roof makes everything so straightforward. We're better able to roll out new ideas and events because multiple team members have learned the simple UI, and because we don't have to juggle amongst several different services for each step of the process.

Pros

I like how easy it is to create a sequence of events from start to finish--a page for customers to visit, a form to fill out, an email to send them upon form submission, a page to be routed to, a campaign of future emails to be added to... it's all so simple to set up with Ontraport's vastly powerful tools and visually intuitive interface.

Cons

Some quirks and bugs in the page editors can make building a page frustrating--for instance, in the sidebar where you upload a photo for a certain block of the page, your cursor naturally tracks over Ontraport's sample photos on the way to the Submit button--and hovering over one of those images causes it to be chosen, overwriting the image you just uploaded and inserted. I have to take a scenic route in a big C-shape with my cursor to avoid this happening. Little quirks like that stack up and become pretty frustrating.

Good in theory, buggy overall

Not having to juggle between a bunch of other software.

Pros

Ontraport does a lot of things. For the small businesses that are just starting and not sure what they want, Ontraport is great.

Cons

Ontraport made me terrified of all-in-one solution packages. It does a lot of things... but nothing well. Every solution that it solves also has a huge "Yes, BUT..." Rising prices, followed by my inability to do what I need for it to do perfectly, has made me leave Ontraport.

Like, being able to control permissions for wordpress pages is neat. But incredibly tedious to disable access when there's a lot of content. Subscriptions would be hard to manage if the customer had multiple products. Email campaigns were difficult to execute. Just a long laundry list of problems.

If you're a small business that DOES know what you want, and the software to handle it -- I recommend that solution instead.

Not bad, but in hindsight I would probably pick a different CRM for us

Pros

-The campaigns feature is really comprehensive and easy to use, once you understand it. There is a bit of a learning curve.
-The Email template builder is a pretty nice plus - this was something we really wanted in a CRM, although it could use some work.
-HTML editor for emails is available.
-Custom fields, link tracking and automatic tagging can be set up, which is great.

Cons

-Hardly any of their customer service reps seem to understand how the software works. After calling and emailing support multiple times to get help setting up our first campaign, I talked to only one person who was able to give us a comprehensive and complete solution that suited our needs. Other people would constantly refer us to someone else or straight up say they didn't know/didn't offer that kind of support.
-Nothing you do is saved automatically. If you're used to software with autosave (which I was), you're going to be in for a world of hurt if you forget to save regularly.
-The Email templates are too rigid for my liking. I wish you could do more with it. We also have issues sometimes when sending emails where two objects which are both centered will appear in different positions, and there isn't anything that can be done about it, and other little bugs like that.
-There's no mobile preview for email templates. You have to scale the window down to the size of a mobile phone to get the idea.

Used campaigns, rules, message sequences to structure our business.

I was able to automate tasks that would otherwise require someone to send out various emails to thousands of people.

Pros

I like the functionality of campaigns, tags, triggers, and sequences most. It's very helpful and means I can automate what I would otherwise have to pay someone else to do.

Cons

The inability to sanitize campaign data during testing (i.e. I test buy a product and lifetime customer value report will always say I earned $X - I cannot reset it after testing, unless I want to copy and paste the whole campaign to start again, which would require more time to test.

Also, it's a fairly slow/bandwidth intensive software to use.

Phenomenal software and customer support

This company and its software is incredible. I've worked with many softwares in the past and never run into customer service like this.

Pros

We are on our way to taking over the world using this software. It has opened up so many doors for us. Originally, we were looking for a software to create a "drip" email marketing campaign. After talking to ONTRAPORT customer service about all the features, we ended up completely migrating our CRM from another software. We even use it to create customized landing pages for our clients. We've done way more than we ever intended to do with ONTRAPORT. The customer service, training, and knowledge base are out of this world.

Cons

The only thing I find somewhat frustrating is the inability to do certain things. For example, when I'm creating a new email, I have certain limitations for what I can do to the text in an email or the formatting. There's usually a somewhat comparable workaround, and they add new features regularly, but it is a little annoying when you have a vision you can't completely bring to life immediately.

Best all in one automation platform

very powerful automation platform, way above many more on the market

Pros

very complex
powerful sales funnel platform
email automation at the highest level

Cons

landing page builder is very old school
not being able to add css into emails

We have been able to automate the entire back-end of our business through this system.

We were able to increase our time to do other things since the software automates our follow up process, billing, and even a quicker response task for potential clients.

Pros

We love that these systems help to streamline everything from client onboarding to actually billing our clients monthly.

Cons

It is a little pricey on a monthly basis, but the amount of time it saves us is almost invaluable. They do have their branding on the automation that we haven't figured out how to take off of the emails.

A growing tool for growing businesses

Pros

I love the support that Ontraport provides to their users. They are quite receptive to feedback and listen when you tell them there is a bug. I also like the automation of course. The membership site integration with PilotPress is great. I like that their support is also better than their competitors. I've spent many weekend days in the midst of an issue with their support. They are so helpful!

Cons

The growing pains. Sometimes bugs pop up ( seems to be in the past but still ) and it's frustrating mid launch to have things like this come into play.

Transfered my email services to Ontraport this year. Sales & Efficiency has improved!

Increased sales per send from previous platform.

Pros

I really like the hands on customer service, we have had multiple "how to" conference calls that were extremely helpful. I also like the easy, clean templates. The Email automation has improved our efficiency.

Cons

None off the top of my head really. I have only been using this for 6-12 months. Would be nice to be able to update or delete sales transactions from a customer profile.

A highly scalable system that can do a lot

Pros

The customer service support is outstanding. Ontraport is basically a very scalable system - if you know how to use it. Their staff are amazing at helping you with your questions and in teaching you how to use the system.

Cons

At present, the price. In USD it is making it quite unaffordable due to a falling AUD where I live. Also I feel the system needs to be tiered. I don't use it as much to warrant the fee per month but don't want to leave the system either.

Positive experience. Noticed an increase in email marketing return. Efficiency increased.

Pros

Customer automation. Customer support calls are highly beneficial. Potential customer information capture.

Cons

The unsubscribe feature lacks the ability to unsubscribe from just the one email. It relates to the whole campaign

Made all the difference with my business

Pros

I like the way my business runs on it.

I own a small business (3 employees) and was having troubling scaling. The more customers I got, the more time I had to spend juggling just to keep my business afloat. I was using a bunch of different technologies, couldn't get them to talk to each other, and was so frustrated with technology.

Then came ONTRAPORT. My business now runs on autopilot. I have free time and am making a lot more money (now that technology isn't a roadblock).

The customer support is fantastic. They've done a stand-up job supporting me and worked overtime once to help me with a launch.

Cons

I've been waiting on the release of their updated software. ONTRAPORT is great as it is, but I can't wait for the extra features.

Solid platform

Pros

There is so much available through one platform, it's impressive. That might be what I like most, especially for those who are growing their businesses and need some plug and play options and other fully customizable ones. Setting up a membership site, a sales page, etc. can be done fairly easily from one place.

Cons

I have sometimes wished that certain product/payment options were better. For instance, pay what you can has become increasingly popular in my field, and there aren't a lot of platforms that make it easy to set that up. You can certainly create multiple products at various price points, but it's not the best experience.

A full-cycle CRM and email marketing platform with one of the best editors for forms & landing pages

Pros

Ontraport is very comparable to Infusionsoft, and it's cheaper though the difference in pricing has limitations due to Ontraport's odd pricing tiers. It does however surpass Infusionsoft when it comes to the flexibility in customising things, and the creation of forms, landing pages and emails is superb. It has one of the best automation features and editors I've come across.

Cons

You can't get a free trial. So you either pay and use the 90 days money back guarantee, or find a friend who has it to see it in action and try it out. The pricing tiers are rather odd as there's no middle ground. The difference in price between having 2500 contacts and 25000 is double. The lack of scaling of the pricing can be an issue for smaller/medium sized businesses.

Ontraport user experience

Pros

easy to plan/view/execute your strategic marketing goals and stay in touch with your customers which is invaluable feature.

Cons

It would take some time get used to it and learn the functionalities since it is a very complex platform with endless opportunities.

Not recommended

Pros

The customer support is really good. Very responsive and goes the extra mile.

Cons

Very large learning curve. Many of the terms used are not the same as other similar programs. If you are a solo entrepreneur and want to do something as simple as send an email, you would have to learn the system. If you have a support team, they will have to become expert to use it effectively.

Good software but not without flaws

Pros

I love the automation functionality, it really is what puts Ontraport above other competitors in my mind.

Cons

Sometimes the system can get bogged down, especially after years of use and data.