Time Sensitive: Entrepreneurs, don’t miss the Ontraport deal (and a little email newsletter marketing review too about aWeber, Mailchimp, Constant Contact, and ConfusionSoft!)
I’ve been procrastinating.
Knowing darn well that cutting/pasting, duct taping, manually adding sequences to my mailing list, newsletter, offers was not only a time-consuming royal pain on my end, but an expensive spider-web of confusion from the techs I hired to streamline things (ha!) to listening to a million different tech support lines (annoying).
Life shouldn’t be this complicated.
I kept thinking that maybe I wasn’t “ready” for a more robust email marketing all-in-one system like Office Autopilot (now morphed into its stated of the art version and re-branded as Ontraport).
But all that “thinking” got buried in the time trying to figure out what the heck was going on and the sands of time kept ticking by as my web development bills skyrocketed with no end in sight.
All I wanted to do was get straight to the point.
Here’s the thing: I’m like the Newsletter System Queen…. I’ve tried more services than Heinz has variety.
These systems may do the job for some but I can’t say they made my life any easier, let alone “talk” to each other. I can only speak from first hand experience, and I have had a lot of that being online since 1999.
If I could add up my time getting systems to work together, plugins to cooperate, listening to web devs & V.A.’s “think” they reinvented the wheel with mangled code, or deal with phone or chat support, I could probably shave off a chunk of years spent with a receiver to my ear or a screen up my face… a total costly no fun zone.
Before I started to consider how to streamline my email with my business in as much of one roof as possible, like with Ontraport, I started way back when with Constant Contact. Truth be told, that’s why I never bothered sending an email newsletter for probably five years but let Google do its organic traffic blessing.
To make up for not having the hours to craft each CC newsletter, I had people subscribed through Google’s freebie Feedburner but you can’t do anything other than send straight from a feed and the images are missing, yet I still have hanger-ons in there 🙁
Then I switched to Mailchimp, which is probably the most aesthetically pleasing of the lot.
As FocusOnStyle has a massive amount of content, the RSS to Newsletter option in Mailchimp is very attractive. But as I teeter the tightrope between free blog content and premium offers, the monkey wasn’t serving me well in keeping the right peeps on the right list sequence.
I listened to many people in marketing groups and migrated to aWeber (my developer’s bill for switching over was handsome). Thing is that only after all the migration moulah, the awebs do have a RSS newsletter blog broadcast, but it publishes backwards! Hello, oldest item on top… what the???
The plus there is that you can have separate list sequences, to a point.
It’s a big point because with these email programs you then need to tack on an affiliate program, membership program, landing page program, shopping cart/paying program, and a program to deal with the nuisance of all the programs (I made that up as wishful thinking). OY.
So with a backwards aWeber blog broadcast, I needed someone in London to chronologically hand code what should be my automated weekly newsletter digest to send out correctly the in morning New York time (not as glamorous as it sounds & with regular hiccups), back to the monkey we go!
There’s no doubt that Mailchimp is the best for an easy weekly digest RSS to newsletter, but what about the rest of your mailings?
Each separate list is, well separate, and segmentation is a manual endeavor (that group thing is really not what it seems). Fine if you have a small list and a lot of time to manually move subscribers around, but…
The segmentation issue became an annoying BIG deal.
I have people who like my free weekly stylist advice newsletter + its French Chic bonus, peeps who want my V.I.P. One on One Style Mentoring, or one of my programs, and not the other. The backend of my Mailchimp looks like the Dewey Decimal Systems of offers, minus the system.
Also, now that could compare between aWeber and Mailchimp, I could see a drop in sign ups as people just don’t understand that you need to reconfirm with the way Mailchimp has the process set up. Bummer.
That’s when I started to really consider a more robust system.
On several occasions, I spoke to the other well-known company, sometimes called ConfusionSoft. In my opinion, the sales guy there was like a used car salesman playing Cups in a back alley. I couldn’t seem to get a straight answer on what the cost “really” would be and there was so much scarcity playing and shifting around of prices, add-on’s, and obligated training for an additional fee, that each call left me pissed off and feeling like I was hit with a slime ball. Yuck.
So I started playing closer attention to Office Autopilot/Ontraport used by big marketers like Brendon Burchard and Marie Forleo who were both keynotes at Ontrapolooza, the company’s mega event for business rockstars.
I like what I heard. I liked that (most) everything could be under one roof. I liked that my sales guy, Dan, was willing to take the time to go the extra mile to figure out some special configuration for me. I really like the Ontraport Support Team when I called with user questions.
But, I still didn’t buy on the spot.
Even though there is a three-month period to love it or leave it + cancel your account so it’s pretty risk-free for trying (at the time of this writing).
I started to test the OAP waters. Then, I heard about this Ontraport deal for the month of March, which is a very sweet deal.
The company that shoots straight up about its prices is offering a deal to spread the love on its new Ontraport release. If you sign up through registered affiliate or Ontraport user, like me, during the Month of March 2014, you get TWO FREE EXTRA USER SEATS FOR LIFE ($100/month value)! That means if you want to grow, add another account (my husband may run his business off this bonus), you can without ever having to pay for the privilege!
If you are like me, and need an extra push, now is the time to take the plunge, get the bonus deal (it’s not publicized on their site), and still have 90 days to love it or leave it.
Deal or no deal, here’s 19 reasons why I’m loving Ontraport as we set up and flesh out my new account:
- I don’t have the too many chefs spoil the broth or too many plugins kill the site nonsense.
- Email marketing lists can be easily segmented based on whatever you like, including if/then rules.
- I can add a zillion different email sequences if I like.
- No extra formmail plugins or order forms… it’s all built in.
- It integrates with Paypal, Leadpages, WordPress, and most of the tools I use.
- I can build landing pages right in there too.
- There’s bunch of really nice looking templates.
- There’s membership site options that go right into WordPress (talk to them about your existing membership sites)
- I can create premium content within my content site.
- I can manage affiliates right in there without yet another plugin.
- I don’t need a shopping cart plugin.
- I can link my calendar right in there.
- I don’t need a million conflicting plugins as almost everything is built in.
- I don’t have a million different developer opinions & learning curves as it’s an all in one, not one of many.
- It’s fairly easy to use.
- There’s a comprehensive video training library to learn at my own pace.
- The telephone support is awesome.
- If I need them to configure things, I can pay for Concierge support and not have to outsource.
- I can ask them for referrals on V.A.’s, custom API integrators, and generally fantastic peeps who are very familiar with working with Ontraport.
So that’s the deal for now. It’s automated. It’s integrated. And, I put on my big girl panties and made the decision to go forward as an entrepreneur with my business with Ontraport! Yes, as a proud affiliate, I get a commission for referring you, but it’s also the only way you can get the March deal (use another affiliate if that pleases you).
Besides, didn’t I really explain my email marketing travails?
I honestly don’t want anyone else to go through the hell of confusion that I have been through in something that should be so straightforward that you can concentrate on what you do best, the rest of your business!
Now, if I can’t convince you, let’s consider the Ontraport mission statement that sounds right on to me:
To support entrepreneurs in delivering their value to the world by removing the burden of technology and automating their business.
If you decide to purchase with my links so you can claim the two free extra user seats for life, click :
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Ontraport Home
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Schedule a Free Demo
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Sign Up (you get 90 days to change your mind)
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Or, call my fab account guy Dan DeAngelis (805.568.1424) and tell him FocusOnStyle referred you…
P.S.
What does the March 2014 deal of two free extra user seats for life mean?
Well, $100 a month saving so that you can run another business or two (like my husband), have team members, and any other person who needs access to your account have their own perimeters set up by you without you having to pay extra for it. Sweet!
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