HighLevel CRM Review – Powerful CRM for Agencies

HighLevel is an all-in-one sales and marketing platform that replaces many diverse types of business software. You’d usually use different stand-alone apps for all your different business tasks, like: 

• Email and SMS marketing 
• Sales funnel and website building 
• Call tracking 
• Surveys and forms 
• Bookings and appointments 
• CRM and pipeline management 
• Tracking and analytics 
• Courses and product sales 
• Reputation management

Instead, you can just use HighLevel – it’s the complete package.

As a full-suite business solution, HighLevel makes MailChimp, Leadpages, ClickFunnels, Teachable, Wix, Calendly, Pipedrive, WordPress, ActiveCampaign, and many other software tools relatively redundant. It saves you both time and money, and it helps you run your online business in a much more convenient fashion.

In this article, however, we’re looking at HighLevel primarily for its CRM features. Naturally, then, the first question we have to answer is, “What exactly is CRM?”

What Is CRM?

CRM is short for “customer relationship management.” CRM systems are based on data analysis. Their purpose is to enhance and advance the communication and business relationship between product or service providers and their audiences.

CRM software tracks users’ preferences and activities, for example how they interact with your e-commerce store. The gained insights allow business owners to provide customized and personalized service, which enhances the customers’ experience. 

Instead of assessing your customers as a whole, CRM software considers differences in demographic, culture, age, and other variables. Thanks to the workings of the CRM software, you’ll be in a good position to predict what kind of product a particular user likes. It also helps you better understand how effective your sales and marketing strategies are, enabling you to make adjustments that result in higher conversions.

CRM is all about centralized and automated management of a connection network between an agency, a business owner, a sales team, a marketing team, dealerships, and the users. 

An important thing to note here is that this whole process doesn’t end with a purchase – the follow-up that keeps a customer coming back is a key part of the puzzle. You can ensure that customers get additional notifications about products they may like or special offers. 

One of the goals of CRM is to create a steady and loyal customer base that brings a consistent inflow of revenue. The other is to keep consumers happy by meeting their needs and wants.

So, Why Do You Need CRM Software? 

In addition to what’s already been mentioned, the answer is very straightforward. CRM software makes it possible for you to learn more about your audience, organize business processes better, and optimize the customer experience. CRM tools are a very important facet of online business today, and rightfully so.

HighLevel CRM Overview

HighLevel is geared towards marketing agencies. Their slogan is “for agencies, by an agency,” so you’re in safe hands. Today, HighLevel is what it is thanks to the difficulties they themselves faced as a marketing agency. As a result of this experience, they were able to create software to eliminate particular issues.

HighLevel’s CRM software allows you to monitor and follow not just the communication between your business and your clients but also the clients' communication with their audiences.

All lead communication is in one place, which is super convenient. The lead messages show in the dashboard from where the audience can be directly contacted. The platform closely follows the leads’ answers and the way they interact. 

For instance, if there is a positive interaction – a customer buys something – HighLevel is a smart enough system to know that it should stop sending follow-up emails. They won’t receive the same type of messages over and over again, which can be annoying. 

However, this doesn’t mean that the lead won’t receive any messages after they’ve tried certain products or services. You or an appointed admin can then set up an email automation that asks for a review of the purchased product, offer another product at a discounted price, or offer a special deal. This is instrumental in keeping your customers interested and showing that you care about their opinion.

HighLevel CRM Features

HighLevel offers a very rich assortment of tools. Some of them are not strictly CRM tools, like the built-in scheduling software. But since they’re virtually all intertwined, even those that are not, technically speaking, CRM tools contribute to the same purpose. 

Now let’s have a look at what CRM-related features HighLevel offers: 

• Out-of-the-Box White Labeling

This means that the HighLevel branding is completely removed, so you, as an agency owner, can have your own logo, branding, and domain. If you’re going to spend a lot of time and money marketing your brand, you don’t want to have another logo or watermark that will confuse your image.

• Automated Follow-Up Campaigns

HighLevel offers plenty of options for building follow-up campaigns: you can use SMS messages, contact leads via Messenger, make phone calls, send emails, send voicemail messages, and more. Also, you can set the exact time when you want to send a message to the leads.

• Sales Funnels and Pipelines

Sales funnels allow you to influence and understand a customer's online shopping process and decision-making factors. Overall, sales funnels will help you to convert more customers if done right. HighLevel enables you to build sales funnels and pipelines and monitor what phase in the funnel the leads are at. They cover the whole process from start to finish.

• Drag-and-Drop Editor

The platform provides you with an opportunity to create forms, surveys, emails, and essentially any other type of page for lead capturing and conversion. It allows you to add sections, rows, columns, photos, videos, countdown timers, buttons, navigation menus, and more. 

In addition to this, you can modify the padding and text properties, use custom code, utilize the available pop-up model, preview your pages on mobile and desktop devices, etc. You can even build an entire website for your clients, with everything revolving around their businesses and capturing leads. 

• Duplicate an Account

This is a convenient tool for situations where you have multiple customers with almost identical or similar characteristics. To save time, you can duplicate the account and then change the client specifics, like name and contact details.

• Create Marketing Campaigns from Scratch

With all the research you do on your customers, you want to create a detailed marketing campaign that’s just right. HighLevel gives you the ability to custom-create an entire marketing campaign from scratch. Since this can be time-consuming, HighLevel also allows you to copy an entire existing campaign.

• SMS Communications: Broadcast Messaging, Two-Way Texting, and Trigger Links

The purpose of broadcast messaging is to keep a broad swathe of users updated, say, on the latest offers. They’re sent simultaneously to a host of users, which makes the whole process quick and convenient. Due to their broad nature, they don’t necessarily need to be personalized.

Trigger links also use SMS, except they are a marketing tool similar to a sale funnel where the link in the SMS sends the customer on a predetermined path toward a specific action. As the name suggests, the links trigger an action.

HighLevel allows two-way texting, so you can send and receive messages on a desktop or a mobile device. SMS communication is convenient for both customer and client communication.

• Import and Export Contact Lists

If you’re moving to HighLevel or maybe you have another website and you want to merge contact lists, you can. With HighLevel, you can add your clients’ contacts from another platform and vice versa.

• Integrations

HighLevel integrates with a lot of third-party apps available through Zapier, which can come in very handy in the CRM context. On top of that, you can add apps outside of Zapier. 

DropInBlog, a top-notch blogging software, is one clear example of how quick and convenient this process can be. Check out the article on how to create a blog on HighLevel for more details on this topic.

• Call History and Forced Calls

You can have insight into a detailed call history with marketing-relevant information about each lead. For example, on your landing page, you can add a number pool where the specific phone number on that page can be monitored. You’ll receive a report and use it to understand where exactly you’re attracting leads from.

In addition, forced calls can be set up to automatically redirect a customer to an available operator. It’s important customers’ calls are answered promptly to maintain a good relationship.

• Library of Templates

The templates are called snapshots, and they’re built around various industries. They contain pre-built forms, landing pages, and triggers. In short, they include everything you need to create your clients’ accounts.

• Real-Time Notifications

You’ll be notified about interactions with your or your clients’ sites as they happen. This allows you to respond quickly to issues and respond to customer inquiries in a timely manner.

• Appointments

Creating an appointment schedule is a crucial part of a manager-customer relationship, particularly for a growing business. With HighLevel, you can schedule appointments with leads and set them so your clients receive timely reminders well before the meetings.

• Advanced Analytics

HighLevel provides a dashboard with blow-by-blow reports on campaigns, lead activities, and lead conversion. This is what gives you the edge and enables you to convert more and more customers.

• Connect to a Client’s Website or Social Media

Social media is becoming increasingly dominant in online sales and marketing. People from almost every demographic use social media, so it has become a great place to not only advertise your products and services but also to communicate with your customers. 

HighLevel allows you to connect to a website chat and Messenger chat, so you won’t lose those potential customers.

• Automate Multi-Channel Marketing Campaigns

The larger your reach, the better. Multi-channel marketing campaigns allow you to promote products and services across various channels to improve your chances of gaining leads and connecting with them. 

By automating this, you’ll be able to cut down on time spent managing operations – another nice-to-have business feature.

• Built-In AI and Machine Learning System

This is not so much a separate feature as much as an overarching mechanism powering the entire HighLevel CRM system. AI and machine learning are rapidly taking over the internet, and HighLevel is not going to be left behind. They have already adopted machine learning into their features with the aim of continuous improvement.

While we’ve only scratched the surface of the features available with HighLevel so far, I think it’s sufficient to give you a good idea of what this platform offers in terms of CRM-related functionalities.

Ease of Use

HighLevel is a highly integrated platform that, as we just saw, offers a lot of features revolving around CRM. As a rule, the more features a platform offers, the more complex it is. HighLevel is no exception.

It takes time, skills, and dedication to get the most out of HighLevel. So, don’t worry if, at first, it looks a bit perplexing – that’s normal. Of course, if you have any questions, you can just contact the HighLevel customer service or explore the documentation available on their support page. You can also seek help from the many knowledgeable HighLevel users on the forums online.

One thing users find especially confusing at the beginning is that HighLevel is completely blank when you’re just starting out with it. It can be really intimidating and hard to know where to start from a clean slate like this. But that’s the way it’s supposed to be since there’s no data on any clients or activities yet. As you utilize the platform more and more, you’ll see more things appear on the dashboard.

Pricing

HighLevel offers two regular pricing plans, or “Accounts,” as it calls them, and a 14-day free trial that enables you to try out whichever plan you want.

The regular plans are as follows:

• Agency Starter Account: $97/month
• Agency Unlimited Account: $297/month

A few words on the included features with each of these accounts.

The Agency Starter plan includes both Twilio and Mailgun. Twilio is a cloud-based platform that enables various types of communication, like text messaging and phone calls, through its APIs. Mailgun, on the other hand, is a communication platform for sending and receiving emails. 

These are both considered essential services for a CRM. If you want more control and a broader range of options, the Agency Unlimited Account is the way to go. It basically gives you unlimited everything, which is a pretty nice idea. However, keep in mind that the price difference is significant.

None of the plans are obligatory or contract-based, so you can downgrade or cancel any time you want.

Customer Support

When it comes to resolving issues, the HighLevel support team is always on top of the situation. They are professional and extremely helpful, and overall, HighLevel holds very high customer approval ratings.

The platform provides around-the-clock support via different channels: 

• Support portal
• Ticket system
• Email
• Phone
• Live chat
• Facebook community
• Community forums

A live chat option is always an excellent means for resolving urgent problems or for getting answers to quick questions. Even if there wasn’t any other way of contacting HighLevel, this would be sufficient to meet the criteria for good customer support. But together with all the other options – HighLevel’s customer service is just about perfect.

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