Joel Solomon: Secrets From an Impact Investor Leading the Clean Money Revolution

Interview with Impact Investor & Author Joel Solomon, Renewal Funds

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This was an invigorating conversation.

Joel is full of wisdom after 30+ years of experience in the impact business space.

Why are things the way they are, where are they going, what can we do to all help, what do impact investors look for from entrepreneurs? Those are just a few of the questions we answer in this discussion.

As the founding partner of Renewal Funds, Joel manages over $98M in assets supporting companies that are shaping a better future.

Renewal Funds is Canada’s leading “mission venture capital” investment firm supporting early growth stage Organics and EnviroTech companies in Canada and the USA.

The Fund has over 150 individual, family, and foundation investors mostly split between Canada and the USA, with several in Europe and Asia. The goal is above market financial returns from a portfolio of companies offering positive societal advances. Renewal Funds dynamic team is led by Paul Richardson, President and CEO, and Joel Solomon, Chair, with crucial backing from Carol Newell.

Renewal Funds has been named a “Best for the World Funds” by B the Change Media, for setting the measurement and management bar for impact investing. It has also been name a B Corp for “Best for the World Company.”

What caught my attention was his book, The Clean Money Revolution. It’s inspiring and very much aligned with my values and led me to meeting Joel.

I would highly recommend checking it out!

Here More From Joel in this Video

Keeping Up With Google: The Most Powerful Way to Grow Your Business Online

change creator google

Smart brands have known for some time that investing in organic traffic is the best kind of traffic, but when Google keeps changing the rules, how do you keep up?

It shouldn’t matter how or when Google changes the rules.

If you have a solid business, a solid vision and can communicate that clearly to your customers online, you’ll always be ahead of those who focus on SEO strategies and tactics anyway.

Keeping up with Google…

I have to confess. I am a total SEO nerd.

It wasn’t always like this. I used to be part of the masses that hoped that just writing good content would be enough for Google.

This year (if you don’t know already) Google put out another major update to their algorithm. It was an exciting and scary time for many of my clients.

Most of my clients saw huge shifts in their organic traffic just from this one update. There were not too many sites that were completely immune.

Some saw huge shifts upwards, with a sudden spike up in traffic and a few of my clients saw a sudden drop in traffic too.

Either way, it shook things up.

Google’s mission is clear — they want to provide the highest quality, most authoritative search results for its users and remain the leading search engine provider for many decades.

While SEO nerds like me can really get into the nitty-gritty of tactics and strategies to improve SEO, everything from placement of keywords in titles, to the length of meta descriptions, and schema pro, there’s so much more to know about online organic growth than that.

If you can step away from the tactics and strategies for a moment, and look at Google’s bigger mission and even larger goal for their audiences, you can tap into the most powerful way to grow your own business online.
Google’s Major Shift Towards Authority: What You Need to Know

This year Google had a huge update this summer that was geared towards money, lifestyle, and health websites, but in turn, will soon have an effect on many other genres of websites too (so pay attention).

Why YMYL (Your Money Your Life) Sites First?

In Google’s major shift to giving its users the most authoritative, trustworthy content available online, they decided to start with two major areas of websites to target in this latest major update this summer. We make important consumer and health decisions all the time online and Google wants to provide the most relevant, trusted sites to our inquiries.

Any site that could potentially impact your health, finances or safety of users could be under the YMYL umbrella and would have been impacted by Google’s latest major update.

If you have an e-commerce store for example, that sells health supplements, you would have definitely seen a shift in your organic traffic (good or bad).

Many sites saw a big shift upwards in organic traffic with this update, but what made that happen?

In this discussion on a Google forum, nikant25 provides the best answer to what this update means for the YMYL sites. Let’s discuss these updated requirements of EAT and what Google now looks for on your website.

The new requirements of Google search: Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness (EAT)

Expertise: Gone are the times that anyone can publish a bunch of content and call themselves an ‘expert’, especially if they are asking their audience and viewers to buy something, make a health-related decision, or impact an important part of our lives. Expertise seems to be an earned right according to Google with this update, which means, you must have some ‘outsider’ expertise as well. If your only expertise resides within the confines of your website, good luck — you won’t rank as a true web expert and Google will no longer favor you with more traffic.

Authoritativeness: This is almost one step above expertise. Do people and readers view you as an authority on the subject matter of your site? If not, you are going to lose marks in this category.

Trustworthiness: Reputation is now a quality that every business and website owner must have. If your site isn’t giving users a valuable, authentic experience, Google is going to find a way to penalize you. How do you build trust online? If you are selling a product, you must be transparent and clear that you are selling a product, with honest reviews and write-ups. The main author or editor of the site must also have a trustworthy reputation online.

Here are some other things to consider for Google’s new EAT algorithm to work for your website:

Do you have an authoritative and clear ‘about us’ page that tells the reader who you are, why you are an authority in this space, and what your business mission is?

Do every page, blog post, and image serve a clear purpose?

Can you find out information about who you are, what your company does outside of your website?

Is your content high-quality?

Your titles should be descriptive and clearly define what each page, post, topic, or item is for the reader/buyer.

Can your users easily identify and get to know the owner of the website as well as the contributors?

Can you easily find products, product descriptions, and find information on each product in a clear, logical way?

We’re just scratching the surface here but you get the point — Google is working hard to give its users better, higher quality search results.

The Requirements of EAT — Time to Up Our Authenticity

Whether you have an e-commerce website selling ethical clothing, or an affiliate site selling baby products, Google is not going to give anyone traffic unless you are authentic.

The purpose of your website must be clear for the readers and buyers.

Gone are the days of shady SEO tactics, weak backlinks, or publishing reams of weak keyword-stuffed content. (Those days have been gone for a while.)

You don’t have to be an SEO nerd or expert like me to reap the benefits of Google’s new algorithm either. If your business has a clear purpose, is authentic, and its authors continue to build authority and trust, both on the site and outside the website, you are ahead of the game.

What is the Purpose of a Website?

Google has expanded on its definition of the purpose of a website:

“Most pages are created to be helpful for users, thus having a beneficial purpose.”

This purpose has shifted from the previous definition which included, “to entertain” as one of a website’s mandates. With this one shift in terminology, Google is signaling to anyone who has a website that authority online is key. Websites can no longer just ‘be’, they have to have a clear purpose for your audience.

Some of the strategic ways to improve and show Google that your website has a strong purpose is to guide writers through your site logically. Some websites have a ‘start here’ page, but having clear categories, pages, and user flow is key to showing your audience (and Google) your site has a purpose.

The key here is the purpose. How can your website have a clear purpose if your business doesn’t?

In Google’s shift towards EAT, they are forcing businesses and online companies that do not have a clear value proposition or purpose to reevaluate and re-communicate their offerings online. Without clarity and focus, you don’t have a business, and you certainly don’t have an authoritative website.

Before you evaluate your website, first think about your business.

Is your mission clear?

Can you communicate what you do clearly to your customers?

If not, start with that. Your website should be an extension of the authority and mission of your company.

Building Authority Isn’t a One and Done Solution

So now what?

You’re either completely encouraged by this article or you’re saying, ‘oh shit’ that’s why my traffic has dropped lately.

If you find yourself in either camp, I have some advice for you:

Now is not the time to give up.

Authority is an ongoing project for any business. You can’t just pop up some content, put out a few social media posts and call it a day.

Smart businesses use every opportunity to build brand authority and trust.

They tell great stories. They make their customers the heroes of their brand. And they take care of their clients — you know like any business should do, offline or online.

Today’s modern world cannot give up old-fashioned good business sense.

Build a brand, not just a website and you’ll always be ahead of those who don’t.

How to do the 20-Second Gut Test to Get Your Website Branding Off to a Great Start

What You Need to Know To Step Up Your Sales Game with Dom Cappuccilli (interview)

Interview with the founder of The Clean Sell, Dom Cappuccilli

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If you can’t figure out how to make sales with your business then you won’t be able to scale your impact. Sales has become a dirty word with many entrepreneurs in the impact space but it doesn’t have to be. This is an art we all practice in one shape or form.

In this interview, we explore some of the expert strategies that have been proven over and over to help you advance your sales game so you can grow your business and impact.

Dom combines the power of a trained storyteller with the real world experience of an elite salesperson. In fact, he became an elite salesperson because he was a trained storyteller.

He is the CEO of The Clean Sell consulting firm which has helped hundreds of entrepreneurs to not only tell a better sales story but also built many of their sales efforts from the ground up.

After 10 years as a reporter, author and screenwriter, Dom found his calling when he rewrote the sales story of a fast-growing healthcare company and doubled their revenue in six months. From there, he quickly rose to be a sales leader at unicorn startup ZocDoc – currently valued at $1.8B – before he went to Arches Technology and created and sold an entirely new healthcare technology product to health systems.

During his career, Dom was amazed that almost all of the companies he saw were succeeding in spite of their sales story and strategy, not because of it. In 2016, he decided it was time to change that and The Clean Sell has been helping startups and small businesses ever since.

You can learn more at The Clean Sell

How to Build a Brand That Matters Today: Mona Amodeo, Ph.D.

How To Sell A Pen (According to Neuroscience): Selling Tips You Can Use Anywhere!

 

GetResponse vs Leadpages: Do You Need Both? Decide Here

Today I compare GetResponse vs Leadpages: One is an email marketing tool, one can help you get those email leads, which is better? It might not be that simple of a comparison, but let’s get started.

If you go to the market (or online) to get a new Desktop PC for yourself, there are two ways you can buy one:

  1. You can choose a branded, ready-made desktop PC, that already comes with all the hardware parts necessary to run your favorite games and software smoothly.
  1. Or you can get each individual PC component separately. You choose everything i.e. the motherboard, the chassis, the graphics card – by yourself.

Both these ways of buying a PC have their own advantages and disadvantages.

If you get a ready-made desktop PC, you’ll likely save a lot of time choosing the components yourself. But maybe it will have a processor that’s way powerful than you need. Or a hard drive that doesn’t have the required amount of storage you want.

On the other hand, if you build a PC yourself by buying each component, you’ll get every single component exactly according to your specifications. But it will take a lot of time doing that, plus maybe you’ll end up spending more than your original budget.

Wait a second… what does this have to do with buying marketing software?

Well, with marketing, you have different components as well. You need a landing page builder, an email marketing software, possibly a CRM and much more…

And just like the components of a desktop PC, you can buy each marketing service separately, or you can get all these services inside a single suite, like a ready-made PC.

In this article, we’ll talk about two marketing software which are just like that.

Leadpages vs GetResponse: Which Marketing Software Should You Get?

The Case For Leadpages

Leadpages is like a powerful component that will fit in your overall online marketing machine. It will do one job, but it will do it really well.

In the case of Leadpages, what it can do is build high quality, amazing landing page builders. Plus, since it does one job, in this software, you get extra features that other ‘all-in-one’ tools with landing page builders won’t give you.

For example, in Leadpages, you get the ability to directly launch a Facebook or Instagram ad for your landing page. This isn’t something you get in GetResponse.

Plus, the overall interface and every single feature which comes out is dedicated to helping you become better at creating landing pages. This is what makes stand-alone software like this unique and desirable.

The Case for GetResponse

Then, on the other hand, you have a marketing tool like GetResponse. It’s a complete, all-in-one marketing machine that gives you all the services you need to run your online marketing campaign.

It comes with a landing page builder, an email marketing tool, a CRM – and other services which you’ll need to run your complete online marketing.

And because of that, GetResponse is like a ready-made desktop PC. All the services i.e. components are there under one roof.

Now, let’s move on to discussing each tool’s features, so you can get a better idea of what each tool is capable of…

GetResponse vs Leadpages: Feature Rundown

As we’ve discussed above, both Leadpages and GetResponse are different kinds of tools. That’s why it won’t make sense to directly compare each other’s features.

Instead, we’ll look at the two tools differently from the start.

We’ll judge Leadpages as a landing page builder while GetResponse as an all-in-one marketing suite. With that being said, let’s start our feature rundown of the two tools to get an idea what’s possible with each of them.

Leadpages Feature Rundown

As a landing page builder, Leadpages is an incredible tool. If you need something to solely help you build landing pages, Leadpages is more than qualified for the job.

Here are the features you get in a tool like Leadpages:

Free Templates, Hosting and Publishing

With any landing page builder, the first thing you need is templates. Because chances are you have never built a landing page from scratch – or don’t want to. And in this case, templates really come in handy.

In Leadpages, no matter which package you get, you’ll get access to all 150+ landing page templates.

There are templates for selling webinars, courses, ebooks, services and more. Plus, you’ll find designs for specific industries like travel, fitness, and startup. And what’s more, you can sort your designs based on how their conversion rate so you can quickly select a landing page template that’s bound to get you higher conversions.

In addition, after you create your landing page, here are two great things Leadpages offers:

  • Unlimited Publishing: No matter which plan you get, Leadpages will let you publish an unlimited number of landing pages on the internet.
  • Free Hosting: After you create a landing page, you’ll need to host it on the internet. Thankfully, Leadpages will host all your landing pages for free so you can quickly launch your landing pages.

These features already make Leadpages an attractive offering. So much value right from the start!

Intuitive Drag-and-Drop Builder and Payments Service

The next thing every landing page builder needs is easy to use an editor with which you can edit your landing page templates.

You’ll be happy to know the Leadpages offers exactly that.

Its drag-and-drop builder is extremely user-friendly. Plus, it gives you lots of intuitive elements to put on your landing page, like a pricing table section, social media sharing buttons, background video wallpaper and much more.

And that’s not all.

You also get 2-step opt-in forms with which you can much more easily collect both emails and payment.

That’s because Leadpages also offers its own payments solution with which your visitors can quickly pay for your products and services directly on your landing page

Facebook Ad Builder

Once you build a landing page, you’ll want to promote it. And Facebook is one of the best places to do that.

If you’re lazy like us, you’ll appreciate the fact that you can directly create advertisements, create custom audiences and launch ads to Facebook directly from within Leadpages,

Also, Leadpages gives you the ability for quick ‘pixel placement’ which enable you to easily retarget your ads to visitors.

In-Depth Reports

After your landing page has launched and you start getting traffic, you’ll want to measure the performance of your landing pages.

Leadpages, without a doubt, comes with the most effective reports for that. You can clearly see how your landing pages are converting by looking at the data it gives you.

But yes, to be frank, the data it gives you, while easy to understand, isn’t as in-depth as you’d want it to be. For that, we recommend you use Google Analytics as well.

Its data is much more in depth than what you get with Leadpages.

GetResponse Feature Rundown

As a marketing suite, GetResponse offers nearly every kind of service you’d need to run your marketing operation. Because unlike Leadpages, which is a landing page builder, GetResponse has a landing page builder. Big difference!

Anyways, here’s the set of services you get in GetResponse…

Landing Page Builder

In GetResponse, you get a landing page builder, which is kind of like Leadpages.

For starters, GetResponse, like Leadpages, gives you access to 150+ templates. And it gives you free hosting for any landing pages you create

Plus, the drag and drop editor works just as well as in Leadpages. You get tons of elements to put on your landing page.

One notable thing which GetResponse gives you that’s not included in Leadpages is 5000+ free images from Shutterstock to put on your landing pages as well.

Email Marketing Service and Autoresponder

Once you create a landing page, you’ll want to collect emails so you can build your email list. But more important than that, you’ll want to nurture your email list so you can turn your subscribers into customers.

For that, GetResponse comes with an email marketing service.

Using it, you can send different kinds of emails to your subscribers. There are many templates available with which you can quickly create professional-looking emails.

In addition to that, you can set up GetResponse so it only sends your emails to your subscribers based on their timezone and only when they are most active.

Plus, you can also segment your email subscribers and put them into different autoresponder campaigns. Because in addition to an email marketing service, GetResponse comes with an autoresponder tool. This tool allows you to create different sequences of emails which you can then send to a targeted audience.

Webinar Service

GetResponse is one of those rare marketing tools which come with a service with which you can quickly set up your very own webinar.

The email and landing page templates with which you can market your webinar are already there. But in addition, you get the infrastructure to run your webinars as well.

GetResponse gives you the tools necessary for your subscribers to quickly go live from their PC or phone. Plus, they can chat during the webinar as well. You, on the other hand, can record the webinar, share it on social media, send files and do much more.

Overall, this is a great, unexpected tool that you’ll surely appreciate once you become aware of the importance of webinars!

Marketing Automation

This handy service is a must-have, especially if you sell a lot of products on your website or run a complicated marketing campaign.

Why?

Because marketing automation, as the name implies, can help you automate the marketing activities that are happening inside your website or emails.

For example, if someone joins an email list, buys one of your products, subscribes to services or does anything else with which you want to trigger an email, schedule a call, send a message, add to an autoresponder campaign – or do something else, this feature can help.

It’s something you should really use if you want to do all your marketing as effectively as possible.

CRM Service

After all this tiresome process of setting up your online marketing campaign, you’ll hopefully have a lot of customers. And once you do, they’ll have a lot of feedback and complaints. Plus, you’ll want to turn your existing leads into new customers by establishing a one-to-one relationship with them.

The CRM feature in GetResponse lets you do that.

To get started, you get to build a profile for each of your email subscribers. You’ll be able to see who they are, what relationship they have with your company, what email campaigns they are in, what products and services they’ve bought – and other useful information.

In addition, you’ll get the ability to set up reminders, schedule calls and segment your contacts into different lists as well by ‘tagging’ them.

The point of this CRM service is to help you improve your relationship with your customers so you can sell them more effectively. And while GetResponse CRM service isn’t as powerful as other CRMs out there, it’s more than capable of increasing your business’ sales and improving your customer service.

Pricing: Which of The Two is Worth it?

Leadpages offers simple pricing.

Paid annually, its standard plan costs $25 per month. It doesn’t matter how much traffic you get, how many pages you create or whatever you do. In this plan, you’ll be able to build a functional landing page builder.

Take Leadpages out for a test drive with a free trial here!

But if you subscribe to the bigger $48 per month plan, that’ll unlock unlimited A/B testing, which is crucial to have in a landing page builder. Other than that, you’ll also unlock the ability to provide online payment facilities to your users in this plan.

GetResponse plans are more complicated.

For example, if you subscribe to the cheapest ‘email plan’, you’ll simply get an email marketing and autoresponder tool, a basic landing page builder and a barebones marketing automation system. But it’s cheap and costs $12.30 a month per year.

But if you want to unlock the pro plan, which has the CRM, webinar tool and unlocks all the functionality of the landing page builder and marketing automation tool, you’ll have to pay $40 a month.

And here’s where things get complicated.

This pricing is for a specific number of contacts. If let’s say, you have 10,000 email subscribers. In this case, the basic plan will cost $53.30 instead of $12.30. And the pro plan will cost $60 instead of $40. And as your list grows, so will you plan cost.

But still, if you look at the big picture, Leadpages pro plan costs $48 alone. This means once you separately buy other services like a CMS, marketing automation tool, email marketing software, combined, this can move your costs to $300+ a month or more.

With GetResponse, compared to the above, pricing will ultimately be cheaper since you’ll be getting all the services under one roof.

Conclusion: Which Should You Choose?

In the end, it will all depend on what kind of marketing machine you’re trying to build.

If you want the absolute best services for each part of your marketing campaign, you should get Leadpages. It will allow you to get other powerful services that’ll fulfill your exact requirements. But keep in mind that subscribing to additional tools and setting them up will take a lot of time and money – which you might not have.

In that case, GetResponse would be a better choice. While all its tool might not be best in class, they sure are enough to get the job done. But remember this also, once you’re locked into GetResponse, migrating to another tool might not be an easy thing to do.

Take Leadpages out for a test drive with a free trial here!

We say why not try both together and build an email list that you can continue to grow!

Other resources:

Instapage Review: Does This Landing Page Tool Live Up to The Hype?

The Infusionsoft Alternatives You Need to Know About for Your Business

How Love is Project Generated $1.2M Spreading Love With Bracelets (interview)

chrissie lam change creator love is project

Interview with the founder of Love is Project, Chrissie Lam

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#LOVEISPROJECT CONNECTS SOCIALLY CONSCIOUS CONSUMERS ACROSS THE WORLD WITH A MESSAGE OF LOVE.

It grew out of a simple desire to find out what love means to people around the world, and how despite circumstance or history, love unites us all.

During founder Chrissie Lam’s extensive travels around the world, she heard the needs of local communities and saw an opportunity to partner with female artisans to create beautiful jewelry while empowering them and their families.

Many artisan groups create beautiful products but are unable to realize the potential size of their market because of a lack of resources, trend-right products, marketing knowledge, industry connections, and lack of funds which hinder artisans’ abilities to successfully scale a business. Having worked in fashion for over a decade, Chrissie understands the need to bring unique products to consumers with an appetite for new and interesting things.

A growing group of socially conscious consumers is looking for brands with social impact and inspiring stories. The #LOVEISPROJECT solves the problem of availability of socially conscious merchandise for consumers by generating creative, inspiring concepts to help create a mass market for beautiful products with high growth potential.

Chrissie found artisans – with local NGOs and social enterprises to manage productions and QC. Each bracelet designed is unique to each country’s culture and resources, while each collection evolves the concept of love.

The narrative continues from country to country, creating an ethical supply chain of economical empowerment while inspiring and connecting people with a message of LOVE.

Check’em out here to learn more!

You might also want to check out…

How Sarah Kauss Grew S’well into a $100M Company Combating Plastic (interview)

 

OptimizePress vs Leadpages: Which Landing Page Builder is Best?

Choosing the right landing page builder is more important than you think…

Here’s why:

You see, a professional chef will always use different kinds of knives for different kinds of food.

For example, if the chef is going to cut vegetables, they’ll pick the trusty all-purpose chef’s knife. This handy knife is easy is work with, and can dice and slice an onion precisely the way the chef wants.

But if the chef want to cut something tougher, like a whole chicken, they’re not going to use the same chef’s knife. Instead, they’ll probably use a cleaver. This heavy knife has a broad steel blade that is great for hacking through bone, which is just what the chef needs to cut that chicken.

The result of choosing the right knife is that the chef gets the exact result they want. The onions come out perfectly diced and the chicken pieces come out cut exactly in the right places.

And just like choosing the right knife is important for a chef, choosing the right landing page builder is important for you if you want to create the perfect landing page…

OptimizePress and Leadpages: Which One’s Right for You?

Different landing page builders let you do different things.

One might have better templates while the other might have a better drag-and-drop builder. One might offer better features in their basic plan, the other might offer more features in their premium plan.

And for you to successfully build a good landing page, you need to choose the right tool for the job. And what might be the right tool for you, might not be for other people.

And that’s ok…

Because in this article, we’ll take a look at two different, yet equally amazing landing page builders. We’ll show you how they are similar and how they are different. And in the end, you can decide which landing page builder is the right choice for you (and which isn’t).

The two tools we’ll compare in this article are:

  1. OptimizePress
  2. Leadpages

First, we’ll start by taking a look at what exactly you can expect from both these landing page builders.

Then we’ll move on to discuss their differences and pricing, after which we’ll try to come up with an accurate conclusion.

Let’s get started…

What You Can Expect From The Two Tools…

OptimizePress and Leadpages. These are the two tools we’re about to discuss. But before we can compare their differences, let’s see what you can expect from both of them…

A Variety of Templates to Get You Started

Landing page builders come with a wide variety of different templates. This is necessary because most people have never built landing pages in their life – and won’t likely know how to build one.

Therefore, both OptimizePress and Leadpages come with a lot of templates.

There are landing page templates for selling courses, webinars, products, services and more. Plus, they are designed professionally and in a way so you get the maximum conversions possible.

The only difference between the two landing page builders is the number of free templates you get with them. Other than that, both these two tools offer really beautiful landing pages for a wide variety of purposes.

And the best part?

No matter which tool and which plan you get, both of them let you publish an unlimited number of landing pages on the internet.

An Easy To Use Drag-and-Drop Builder

No matter how good a template a landing page builder offers, in the end, you’ll always need to edit it inside a drag-and-drop builder. And the one that comes with both Leadpages and OptimizePress are great.

Their drag-and-drop editors are easy to use and offer many elements for you to choose from.

For example, in addition to the traditional elements like text boxes, image, and video players, you also get complete sections like pricing tables, social media boxes and more.

This is important and exciting because it means you can add literally any feature, functionality or information to your landing page without hiring an expert.

Plus, as new updates to the tools come along, new elements get added for you to use.

Easy-to-Understand Analytics and Reports

Another important feature both the landing page builders will give you is in-depth reports on how your landing pages are performing. You’ll find out information such as:

  • How many visitors are visiting your landing pages.
  • What’s the average duration a person stays on your landing page.
  • How many people clicked on your CTA button.

… and more.

All this information will come in handy when you A/B test your landing pages.

A/B testing is when you create two seperate versions of the same landing page with one single variation in one of them. For example, you can create a duplicate of a landing page and change the heading, the CTA copy or something else and test it. The one which gets you the highest conversions wins.

And the only way you can get the data necessary to A/B test your landing pages is by looking inside the analytics report offered by your landing page builder.

Also, as far as A/B testing is concerned, both of these tools don’t let you do A/B tests in their basic plans. You’ll have to get an upgraded plan in order to access this feature.

OptimizePress vs Leadpages: What’s The Difference

By now, you’ve got a pretty good idea of what to expect from both these landing page builders. But what you really want to know is where the differences lie – and in this section, we’ll discuss exactly that.

And let me tell you in advance – the differences are pretty stark.

It’s up to you to weigh in which features matter to you so you can decide which tool to get. And we suggest you take this advice seriously because there are some major differences in pricing as well.

With that said, let’s begin comparing OptimizePress and Leadpages.

How do both tools work?

The first thing you should know is how easy it is to get started with each tool – and what it takes to set each tool up.

Leadpages

Setting up Leadpages is easy.

To get started, all you need is to sign up, pay for the plan that suits your needs (we’ll discuss plans more below) and simply get started building landing pages.

There’s no need to set up hosting or anything. Leadpages will let you publish an unlimited amount of landing page – and it will host these landing pages for you.

You don’t even need a domain (but it’s highly recommended you get one) as it helps improve your SEO and overall, makes the landing page appear more trustworthy.

OptimizePress

Setting up OptimizePress is harder than setting up Leadpages, mainly because OptimizePress works only on WordPress.

This means before you can even get started with OptimizePress, you’ll have to get a domain and hosting package on which you install WordPress. This alone can cost you up to $100/year since doing this isn’t optional like it is in Leadpages.

But to be fair, OptimizePress offers excellent step-by-step instructions on how to get hosting, buy a domain and setup WordPress. And these tutorials can go a long way to reducing the frustrations and complications non-technical people have when it comes to installing WordPress.

But once that’s done, all you have to do is install the OptimizePress plugin, buy a plan and sign in. Easy!

Templates: Which of The Two Tools Offer A Better Deal?

If you’re going to rely on templates most of the time to build your landing pages, you need to know which tool’s going to offer you a better deal on it.

Leadpages

No matter which plan you’re subscribed to, Leadpages offers all of its 150+ templates for free.

You’ll find landing page templates for ebooks, courses, webinars, upsells, thank you’s and more – all which you can sort by industry such as travel, fitness, photography etc. to help you find the perfect design.

In addition, all the landing page templates are designed for mobile as well.

OptimizePress

In the templates department, OptimizePress loses out to Leadpages in terms of value. That’s because out of the 300+ templates available on their platform, OptimizePress only offers approx. 60+ templates for free.

This is a bummer, because where OptimizePress leads ahead when compared to Leadpages is in the diverse variety of templates it offers.

Because, you see, in addition to the standard templates for landing and sales page, OptimizePress also offers:

Membership Sites Templates: Using these sites, you can give access to people to exclusive content after they successfully act on your landing page CTA. OptimizePress gives you the tools and the templates necessary to create your membership portal.

Blog Themes: Since OptimizePress works on WordPress, it offers themes for your blog section as well. This is so you can put your valuable content inside a compelling and beautifully designed blog section.

If you plan to sell courses or educational content, then these two additional features offered by OptimizePress is a must-have.

Landing Page Advertising: Which Tool Offers It?

After you create your landing page, you’ll want to advertise it in order to attract visitors and drive traffic. Because without traffic, your landing pages are literally worthless.

And if you plan to advertise your landing page on Facebook or Instagram, Leadpages is the only one of the two tools that will let you do it.

In Leadpages, after you create the landing page, you’ll be able to choose your custom audience from Facebook and place a Facebook Pixel on your landing page for easier retargeting.

But if you plan to use some other platform i.e. Google Adwords or LinkedIn, this feature is not going to be of use to you.

Pricing: Which of The Two Offers The Best Bang for The Buck?

Remember how at the start of this section we told you how pricing would play a major role – and that you should think long and hard about what features matter to you?

Well, this is where you learn why we said that…

Leadpages

The Standard Leadpages plan, provided you buy an annual subscription, costs $25/month or $300/year. In it, you get nearly all the features with the exception of unlimited A/B testing, which means you can only run A/B test a limited number of times.

The Pro plan, again if bought annually, costs $48/month or $576/month. In this plan, you unlock unlimited A/B testing, one-click signups from email, the ability to send SMS campaigns and more.

And finally, the Advanced plan, bought annually, costs $199/month or $2388/year. In this plan, you unlock the ability to integrate with services such as Pardot, Marketo and Hubspot, free Leadpages Workshops and priority phone support.

And of the three, the best plan to get is the Pro plan as it doesn’t compromise on any important features – and offers the best value for the money.

OptimizePress

OptimizePress pricing is simple. Their Core package costs just 97$/year, compared to Leadpages standard $300/year plan. In it, you get all the basic features you need to create landing page, expect that you can’t do any A/B testing.

Their Publisher package costs $197/year, which is still $100 cheaper than Leadpages standard plan and nearly 2.5x cheaper than Leadpages pro plan. In it, you unlock A/B testing, exclusive plugins archive and all other features.

And finally, OptimizePress also has a Publishers package, which costs $297/year, which is approx. 7x cheaper than Leadpages Advanced Plan, which can run you $2388 a year. It unlocks everything, gives you priority support and is the best there is.

And of the three, the best plan to get is the Publisher package as it doesn’t compromise on any important features – and offers the best value for the money.

Conclusion: Which One Wins?

Crazy though it will sound, it still depends on you.

For example, if you don’t want to go through the hassle of setting up WordPress, want access to the 150+ templates offered for free and want direct access to Facebook ads, Leadpages is one to go for.

But if you rather skip through these features, and want the core landing page building tools for a lot less of the price, get OptimizePress.

In our opinion, the value it provides isn’t just something you can say no to. No other landing page builder with OptimizePress level of capability exists in the market for that low of a price – and therefore, in the context of this article, this is the landing page builder we recommend.

From Solopreneur to 7 Figures: How to Scale Through Diversification

Looking for a new revenue stream? Here are some ideas to get you thinking about building a 7-figure business with some ways you can start right away. Here’s how to scale through diversification in any business!

Do you ever wonder how all those successful solopreneurs turned their idea into a 7-figure business in just a few years?

You hear about them all the time. You get in your car and turn on your educational podcast du jour. The usual suspects: Entrepreneur on Fire, Online Marketing Made Easy, Perpetual Traffic. Each one packed with more useful content than the next.

And then you hear those words for the hundredth time: “I created a 7-figure business” and the question bounces around in your brain: “But how is that possible?”

Even knowing what you know about creating online courses and online marketing in general, it seems daunting, even impossible, to think that your quasi-successful $20,000 launch could ever turn into a 7-figure business. You must be missing something.

Multiple Revenue Sources

The secret that everyone assumes you know, but nobody actually says out loud is the fact that successful entrepreneurs are not just talking about the sales from their last launch. They are telling you what their income was, over time, from multiple different sources.

Some of these revenue sources are not even available to you as a consumer, so why would they mention it if you are not in their target audience?

To illustrate the possibilities that diversification can open up in your business, let’s take a very common example.

Let’s take a business that creates online courses, and run it through the diversification mill.

Let’s see what we can come up with for other revenue sources:

Income Stream #1: Online Courses

This is your bread and butter. What you are known for and what you are most likely to mention in a podcast interview to get that regular entrepreneur to buy into.

Income Stream #2: Group Coaching as a supplement to the online course

Inevitably, people who take your courses will want more access to you. A great way to do this in a scalable way is to provide personal coaching help to a group through a Facebook Community.

Income Stream #3: 1×1 Coaching

This is a premium service only available to those who can afford it. Is it starting to add up for you yet?

Income Stream #4: Corporate Clients on a project basis

You have expertise that larger companies will want to take advantage of and have no interest in going the DIY route. Your time is very valuable (and scarce), so the markup for corporate clients has got to be worth the time.

Income Stream #5: Podcast sponsorships

Start a podcast to drive traffic to your content, and stay for the sponsorships. Once you reach a certain level of notoriety and popularity, sponsorships can be quite lucrative.

Income Stream #6: Affiliate marketing for other’s products

You have built an audience and a community that others will want to tap into. Turn your community into gold by offering to pitch other people’s products to your audience and get a cut of the sales.

Income Stream #7: Speaking engagements

As an expert, your presence and expertise is valuable at conferences and other audience engagements. Set yourself up as a speaker for hire and monetize your public appearances.

Income Stream #8: Book sales

You have a unique message that publishers would be very interested in propagating, especially if you have proven that your message resonates with large audiences. If you are a writer, this is a great way to generate passive income.

Income Stream #9: Merchandise

Got witty quotes, or catch phrases? Put them on a T-shirt or a baseball hat and sell them on your website.

Income Stream #10: Blog/Video monetization through ads

You are already blogging and/or creating videos as part of your outreach efforts. Turn on those ads and watch the revenue flow in.

And the list goes on.

The truth of the matter is that thinking of a single business model is only the beginning and it can open many doors.

As your business grows and you start to build a team, let them handle the heavy lifting so you can start thinking of your next revenue stream.

Are you ready to make your first 7-figures? Your move.

Keep reading:

Transformational Leadership That Gets Big Results

How Sarah Kauss Grew S’well into a $100M Company Combating Plastic (interview)