By helping streamline business processes, marketing automation tools allow eCommerce entrepreneurs to be more hands-on with their businesses. It’s a good thing, then, that there are many options available for you to take advantage of.
Kartra vs Kajabi are both Software as a Service (SaaS) applications or marketing automation tools meant to help jumpstart online businesses. Whether it is a start-up or an established business trying to build its identity online, these tools can help entrepreneurs reach more potential customers and gain more profit.
The idea is that the owner can design, sell, and oversee all the aspects of the online business in a single dashboard. That said, in what aspects do Kajabi vs Kartra differ?
What Is Marketing Automation?
Before we talk about what Kartra vs Kajabi can do, it would help to touch base on what we know so far about marketing automation. After all, not everyone is privy to how big of a role it plays in today’s day and age.
Basically, marketing automation refers to the platforms and programs designed to automate repetitive marketing tasks. The goal is to increase the efficiency of a business, thereby growing revenue faster. Among these tasks include sending marketing emails, posting on social media, and running ad campaigns.
What Can Marketing Automation Do for Your Business?
For eCommerce entrepreneurs, the availability of options to automate repetitive marketing tasks addresses efficiency issues. In the fast-paced and ever-changing nature of the virtual market and the online community itself, automating tasks is a must.
It gives business owners more time to focus on other aspects of running their online business. Even better, it has a positive impact on the consumers.
As we have established, we live in a fast-paced world, even made faster by the advancement of technology. When we are bombarded with so much data and information, getting redirected to the specific products or services we are looking for is a necessity.
Marketing automation is an effective way to personalize the experience of your consumers. Using the data gathered by the various marketing automation tools also spells efficiency across the board.
Thus, marketing automation tools help both the owners and the consumers. It streamlines how the business works and the data collected are used to improve the marketing of products. This does not only increase the chances of a successful sale. Ultimately, it also leads to a better experience for the consumers.
Kartra vs Kajabi: Key Differences
What separates one from the other? At a glance, Kartra vs Kajabi may seem similar since they both have the same purpose. Let’s examine the key differences between these two marketing automation tools to help you decide which is the better one:
 |  |
| Extensive collection of basic and advanced marketing features (email marketing, funnel building, product selling) | More suitable for people who want to create and sell online courses or other digital content through course website building |
| Aids entrepreneurs in selling both digital and physical products online | Only limited to digital products |
| Does not have the option for blogging on the created website; only short videos can be included | Provides options for blogging on the created website |
| Comes with an inbuilt Helpdesk feature | Does not have this feature, but a third-party plugin may be installed to have such functionality |
| Kartra also comes with a built-in calendar system, which conveniently schedules appointments and sends reminders to manage a busy schedule | Needs another third-party application to have this feature. |
| Offers a wide range of funnel-building processes catering to complex contents | More user-friendly interface since it has simpler and fewer options |
| Marketing through email; automation is done with multiple lists and tags | Also uses funnel building but is simpler and more appropriate for beginners |
| Uses behavioral adaptive marketing (BAM), which tracks the customer’s movement on the website. From these data, it predicts the content they would be interested to see. | |
| Integrates more third parties compared to Kajabi |
Kartra vs Kajabi: A Detailed Comparison
Making high-quality course material is essential for building a feasible e-learning business. Advertising your online course, building a tribe surrounding your brand, and generating sales funnels are all equally important.
Both platforms can do this for you, but which is the perfect fit? Let’s find out in this detailed comparison.
1. Website and Page Builder
Kartra and Kajabi are both drag-and-drop, easy-to-use editors with many features that can help users generate their page designs. Here’s where they can help when it comes to this aspect:
Kartra
Kartra doesn’t have a website template to start with. If you are a geeky design expert, you can maximize this fact by starting from scratch. This is where Kartra’s page builder comes into play.
Kartra boasts almost 200 page templates you can easily edit and customize. It has video sales, long sales pages, product launch, review pages, thank you pages, webinar registration, and a whole lot more. Kartra also allows users to generate responsive designs by optimizing pages for a mobile, tablet, or desktop view.
While it has a blog post builder, it can be a bit more manual compared to Kajabi. It doesn’t automatically update or tie to any database when you post a new update. You can, however, link these up manually to create your website.
Kajabi
Unlike Kartra, Kajabi has a website template you can customize as you see fit. It has a main theme and a collection of unique pages you can use to build your website.
Kajabi also offers a blog platform. The basic features of a blog post are already included, such as posts, categories, tags, and sidebar, which are pre-linked.
In terms of landing pages, Kajabi has some nice page templates you can choose from. Though, unlike Kartra, these templates are pretty limited. Still, you can change text, add content, and move sections easily in Kajabi.
The Verdict
Both platforms offer drag-and-drop features along with page templates to help you start your website. However, Kartra is way better when it comes to creating landing pages. Kajabi, on the other hand, is a good website and blog builder platform.
2. Course Builder and Memberships
Online courses and memberships are some of the basic functions of Kartra and Kajabi. This allows business owners to share their knowledge with others while generating income at the same time.
Kartra
To start, Kartra doesn’t offer a lot of templates for building courses. However, you can as easily add all the things you want through its drag-and-drop feature. In fact, the level of customization you can do in Kartra is insane.
Kartra gives you the option to create courses that can be password protected. You can also set comments in each post, restrict access to a certain level of membership, or limit viewership up to a certain number of days after signing up. Kartra also enables users to set up a membership and link it to a product.
Kajabi
Kajabi, on the other hand, is a user-friendly course builder and has all the essentials you will need. It has readily available course templates to choose from, such as mini-course, drip courses, membership, and coaching programs.
You can create new products and lessons and add content like videos, quizzes, audio, and other downloadable content. Kajabi also enables users to add a comment section and link their social media accounts.
This course builder allows you to lock and drip feed contents to ensure users complete their course in order. Moreover, one nice feature of Kajabi is that you can bulk upload your course content, and it will automatically generate lessons for each one of them.
The Verdict
Kajabi is much easier to set up, but Kartra is more advance and customizable.
3. Email Marketing
Kartra vs Kajabi allows users to create effective marketing emails. They offer features that segment contact lists, send broadcasts, and set autoresponders.
Kartra
Kartra has lots of built-in design templates and a diverse collection of customization features, helping users create unique broadcast emails. More than being an email builder, it also lets you create personalized emails with the aid of behavior-based automation.
This technology will target subscribers better and send relevant messages according to their actions. You can segment your contact lists based on their types for better engagements, open rates, and click-throughs.
Kartra offers advanced automation emails, helping users generate “if” and “then” rules. In other words, it automatically sends actions when particular requirements are met. Because of this, you will find the level of customization you can do in Kantra beneficial.
This also means that content and offers through emails are much more personalized. What we also like about Kartra is that it has a visual builder sequence. The split testing feature enables users to split select conditions to guarantee that the email campaign performs well.
Kajabi
Like Kartra, Kajabi offers many email templates with layouts and features you can customize as you see fit. This platform helps you segment your contact list so that you can send broadcast emails according to the types of subscribers.
Moreover, Kajabi allows users to send a series of emails by triggers (the “if” and “then” rules); however, it can be limited. On top of that, this platform also allows users to send automation emails for posts, events, pipelines, and others.
The Verdict
Kartra is far superior compared to Kajabi when it comes to email marketing. Kajabi has basic email marketing features, but Kartra has more to offer, especially its split-based email feature.
4. Unique Features
Looking at what Kajabi vs Kartra can do, you will realize that they both have unique marketing features you’ll find helpful.
Kartra
Kartra has two unique features that Kajabi doesn’t have: the calendar system and the help desk. On top of these two, you can also take advantage of Kartra’s BAM technology and its analytics.
Calendar System
The calendar feature allows its users to book and reschedule appointments by themselves in real-time. Different services offered and available slots are integrated into one calendar system.
Even better, Kartra automatically sends reminder notifications so that users won’t miss their appointments.
The Kartra Calendar helps customers book appointments that can either be free or paid. This can be integrated into Kartra Checkouts, where users can be charged automatically when booking.
Help Desk
Kartra helps improve your business by allowing your customers to voice their concerns. Full-scale customer support is needed, especially in a subscription-type business where people always have questions.
You can set up multiple help desks through live chats to assist users and generate a ticketing system so that you can specifically address customer concerns. This helps you resolve issues efficiently and promote better interactions with your audience.
Behavioral Adaptive Marketing (BAM)
BAM allows you to monitor your visitors’ behavior. As a result, you can make sure your users experience your website according to their preferences, such as colors, presentation, and marketing messages.
Analytics
One thing we like most about Kartra is that you can generate analytics for almost everything, whether it be in your emails, products, broadcast, lists, or pages. You can also get heat maps to know how your pages have performed.
These analytics tell you different factors that contribute to and affect your sales and is critical in scaling your business. It clarifies what’s happening and helps you make educated decisions for your next big step.
Kajabi
You can be sure that Kajabi won’t disappoint when it comes to unique features. Here are the platform’s most interesting tools you can use to your advantage:
Community Building Feature
As the name suggests, this feature promotes customer interactions through its own community of users. Interactions between subscribers where they can discuss and share new ideas help attract more subscribers to enroll in the online course.
Blog Platform
Kajabi lets users create, manage, and design a blog platform to promote their business and boost their online presence. Basic blog features are included, such as posts, tags, and a sidebar.
Kajabi’s Mobile App
There’s no denying that the mobile app brings Kajabi to a new level, especially since it has a version for Android and iOS devices.
With the app, users don’t need to log in through their browser when they want to view their course. This also allows subscribers to buy more products, leave reviews, sign up for other courses and connect with other users with a single tap.
The app also lets you send push notifications to the users. Subscribers just need to sign in, and they are ready to go.
5. User Experience and Ease of Use
The user interface is one of the most important things to look at when investing in an online eCommerce platform. It should be as simple as possible so that users will find the platform easy and even enjoyable to navigate.
Kartra
Kartra’s user interface is functional and easy to use. The menus displayed on the left are clean, and access is easy. Kartra apps are also integrated seamlessly. However, some might sometimes find the configuration steps of each tool quite confusing.
Kajabi
Kajabi’s user interface is nicer, cleaner, and looks more modern. One cool thing about Kajabi is that it has a search bar where you can find things easily. The dashboard is also easy to navigate. You will find different tools on the left menu where options under these categories are shown.
The Verdict
Both platforms have great user interfaces. However, Kartra has some issues regarding its usability, especially for new users.
6. Integration of Third-Party Tools
Kartra and Kajabi both integrate various platforms to give their users a seamless experience. Read more to know about the specific third-party integrations of both Kartra and Kajabi.
Karta
Kartra integrates with various platforms to ensure seamless work. These third-party integrations include the following gateways:
| Payment | SMS | Membership | Hub Connectors | Calendar | |
| Authorize.net Braintree Stripe PayPal | MailGun SendGrid Postmark Elastic Mail | Plivo Twilio Nexmo | aMember Kajabi Optimize Press Digital Access Pass WishlistS2 Member | Zapier | Google Calendar |
Kajabi
Like Karta, Kajabi also works with other providers to help you run your business more effortlessly. Its third-party integrations include:
| Payment | Analytics | Hub connectors | Lead Capture | |
| Stripe PayPal | Aweber Mailchimp ActiveCampaign Drip ConvertKit | Segment Facebook Pixel Google Analytics | Zapier | ClickFunnels |
7. Customer Support
Customer support is crucial when onboarding new shoppers. It is also important to assist long-time customers when they experience issues.
Kartra
Kartra offers a wide range of customer support. They include:
Live Chat Support
You can reach Kartra’s support team through digital chat support. Live chat hours start from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM PT and 12:00 AM to 4:00 PM PT.
Email Support Ticket
Voice your concern by submitting online tickets; however, it can take long hours to respond.
FAQs
To find quick answers to common concerns, you may opt to browse their online FAQs.
Kartraverse Online
Check out Kartraverse online. You can visit the “Kartranaut Platform Training,” which can be a fun way of getting answers through step-by-step tutorials. You’ll find loads of tutorial videos that help you enhance marketing campaigns for your business.
Kartraverse also offers “Technical Documentation” for questions about some of the advanced components of the software. You can learn about APIs, custom domains, payment gateways, and more.
As to be expected, it can be a bit harder to navigate and master. Fortunately, it comes with a sidebar menu and a search function to ease navigation.
Facebook Community
Join the growing community of Kartra. This is where you can freely ask questions and share ideas with fellow Kartra users.
Kajabi
Like Kartra, Kajabi offers great customer support. They include:
Live Chat Support
You can contact Kajabi’s live agents 24/7 through the Kajabi dashboard. However, the level of customer support depends on your subscription tiers. This 24/7 live chat support isn’t available to users with the Basic Plan package.
They can, however, submit tickets or access live chat within limited hours of 6:00 AM to 5:00 PM PT during business days.
Kajabi University
Kajabi University allows you to watch detailed training videos to learn and maximize Kajabi’s tools to grow your business better.
Kajabi Community
Just like Kartra, Kajabi also has a growing community of Kajabi users that lets you ask and discuss strategies to grow your business.
The Verdict
Kartra and Kajabi both offer similar customer support. If you are not on a budget, you can pay extra to gain access to 24/7 live chat by Kajabi.
8. Training
Onboarding support and training are also big deciding factors when choosing your automation platform. It has to have a great training plan ready. It should also be as simple as possible for the users to understand the ins and outs of the application more quickly.
Kartra
New subscribers to Karta receive welcome emails to help users better understand the platform. Users will receive log-in details with a link directing to the login page after successful log-in is a video welcoming you to Kartra and introducing you to the platform. Online training is also available that will help you understand more about what Kartra is.
Kajabi
Like Kartra, Kajabi welcomes you by receiving emails and videos from the creator to help you board comfortably to the platform. Free training programs are also offered hosted by the CEO and Co-founder of Kajabi, Kenny Reuter. This helps new users to know the platform well and gain learning to package your products.
The Verdict
Both platforms offer onboarding support with free training programs.
9. Pricing
One important factor to consider when choosing your platform is its pricing. You need to assess if the price is reasonable for the services offered. Let’s take a look at the packages offered by both Kartra and Kajabi.
Kartra
Kartra offers four subscription packages. As of this writing, monthly subscriptions to Kartra for the starter package range from $99 up to $499 for a platinum subscription. Silver and gold subscriptions are also available that cost $199 and $299 per month, respectively.
If you are still hesitant about what package to choose from, Kartra offers a 14-day trial plan without additional charges. Moreover, you can save up to a 25% discount if you opt for an annual subscription.
Kajabi
Kajabi has three subscription packages. Subscription starts from $149 per month for the basic package up to $399 for its Pro subscription. Most users choose their Growth package, which costs $199 per month.
Like Kartra, Kajabi also offers 14 day free trial to new users and a 20% less discount price for annual billing.
The Verdict
By price alone, Kartra wins since it is much cheaper compared to Kajabi. Kartra also allows you to sell more products compared to Kajabi for its starter price.
However, some users opt to subscribe still to Kajabi for its basic package. This is due to the unlimited marketing email and contact leads that Kajabi provides. This is important if you’re doing launches for your business.
Kartra vs Kajabi: The Pros and Cons
Kartra and Kajabi are both leaders when it comes to marketing automation. They both offer great features and have their drawbacks, as well. Let’s look at the detailed presentation of their advantages and disadvantages below.
Kartra
When choosing between Kajabi vs Kartra, it’s important to look at both the benefits and drawbacks so that you can decide which to pick. For starters, here’s what you can expect from Kartra:
Pros:
- Many templates to choose from. The user can build from scratch and put together a vision or choose from the available templates with over 500 varied designs.
- A cost-effective marketing tool
- Has an inbuilt helpdesk and calendar to aid in managing the time and conveniently schedule appointments. It also allows sending of reminders to avoid missing an appointment.
- Can be used for both physical and digital products
- Offers split testing to determine which is the more effective approach to gain customers
- Less expensive and more flexible plans (Offers four while Kajabi only offers three)
Cons:
- Many choices could get overwhelming, especially for users not leaning towards the creative side.
- The presence of so many steps during the configuration of each feature overpowers its multitudes of templates. That’s because the user is put in a bind between waiting time and deciding which template to use
- No free trial
- Does not have a blogging tool in it
- Puts a bandwidth limit on the video/s used, making it incompatible for users who bank on video content for the websites they want to create
- Limited course building and tools for engaging students. Features like assessments, quizzes, and having a community are unavailable
Kajabi
To compare, here are the advantages and disadvantages of Kajabi:
Pros:
- Only has six website themes; each is unique in design
- Narrows down the focus of the user to choose which template to use and can easily move on with the website’s content
- Lets you create blogs for the website
- Has a page builder/editor feature that allows further website customization, which makes up for its limited website themes
- Offers a free trial period and allows a refund if the subscription is canceled within the first 30 days
- Promotes interaction among the customers to attract more customers through shared ideas in the built communities
- Available as a mobile app
Cons:
- People with more advanced skills would prefer to personalize their websites with more varied options
- The helpdesk tools are limited (Needs a third-party plugin to provide a helpdesk feature)
- Available for selling digital products
- The payment method is limited to Stripe and PayPal only
- More expensive and less flexible plans
Kajabi vs Kartra FAQs
1. What are Kartra and Kajabi?
Kartra and Kajabi are Software as a Service (SaaS) marketing automation tools. These tools are designed for eCommerce entrepreneurs or online business owners to develop websites and automate the systems management for their businesses. They cover everything from website designing to marketing and monitoring of online businesses.
2. What is Kartra used for?
Kartra is used to aid online businesses in gaining traction by providing services to eCommerce entrepreneurs. You use it to design websites, track lead activities to improve the marketing of products, and monitor and manage the business in, ideally, one single view.
3. Who is Kartra best for?
Due to the nature of Kartra, which caters to both physical and digital products, it might best work for eCommerce entrepreneurs who sell both physical and digital products but makes minimal use of blogging features. After all, this software has limited bandwidth for videos.
Kartra would also work for individuals with an eye for design and who are heavily invested in the façade of the website, for instance, since it has a wide array of designs and templates to choose from.
4. Which is better, ClickFunnels or Kartra?
Basically, ClickFunnels and Kartra have the same goal: to help eCommerce entrepreneurs develop websites.
Kartra uses “behavior adaptive marketing” (BAM) to capture the attention of leads and increase the chances of purchasing a product from the website they are visiting. On the other hand, ClickFunnels banks on doing a follow-up with the lead, even after leaving the website they were previously visiting.
Both tools have a unique design. Kartra requires the lead to keep on browsing. That’s because the BAM technique would attempt to keep the interest by showing products they prefer with every click. Meanwhile, ClickFunnels has this feature wherein they can still reach out to the lead long after visiting the page.
In a fast-paced life, people tend to need reminders of things they are supposed to do or even of things they might need. Thus, depending on the products and the owners’ needs, both ClickFunnels and Kartra would be useful for online businesses.
5. What is the difference between Kajabi and Teachable?
Kajabi and Teachable are both course platforms where online courses are offered. However, Teachable is dedicated only to creating online courses. In comparison, Kajabi explores other parts of the business, like hosting a website and email marketing, aside from course creation.
Furthermore, while it is free, Teachable is also available at a premium plan that is more affordable than Kajabi. The feature set of Teachable is limited compared to Kajabi. Nevertheless, it might be enough to get started with a project.
Refer to the details below for the comparison of the two software applications:
|  | |
| Trial | 14 days free | None |
| Mobile App | Yes, for iOS only | Yes, for both Android and iOS |
| Certification | No built-in certification feature | Comes with various templates for certificates and allows the creation of coded certificates |
| Customer Support | Offers help documents covering a broad range of topics and are available on their help center page | Uses email and ticket-based support for customers FAQs are also available and support via phone |
| Integration | Integrates with a wide array of tools and programs (Facebook, Twitter, MailChimp, AWeber, ConvertKit, Google Analytics, Zapier) | Integrates with several third-party plugins (MailChimp, AWeber, GetResponse, Circle.so, Zapier, Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, ConvertKit, Sumo, Segment) |
Kajabi is the better option for people looking for a platform with complete marketing tools. On the other hand, pick Teachable if you are an eCommerce entrepreneur or blogger who aims to establish a course website using a less complicated interface.
6. Why is Kajabi better than other platforms?
Many people consider Kajabi better because it provides product launch features and website funnels. This efficient automation removes the guesswork needed for your marketing campaign.
7. How do you know which automation tool is right for you?
These marketing automation tools have differences that may affect their serviceability to an eCommerce entrepreneur. Based on the provided pros and cons, as well as the cited similarities and differences between the Kartra vs Kajabi, there are several aspects to consider:
- Level of expertise in using marketing automation tools
- Products/services offered
- Budget
You should choose Kartra if you are well-versed in designing websites and would see the vast array of templates as an opportunity rather than a burden. Also, keep in mind that it focuses more on marketing via email and automation.
Budget-wise, Kartra is also cheaper, even if it does not offer a free trial. What it does have are more flexible plans at a relatively lower rate than Kajabi. Even better, it already has built-in calendars and helpdesk features.
If the products you will be selling are both physical and digital, Kartra is the marketing automation tool for you. However, if you are a beginner, the simpler user interface of Kajabi might be a better platform for you.
Kajabi also offers a 14-day free trial and guaranteed refund if the subscription is put to a halt within the first 30 days. However, it is worth noting that it is limited to digital products and specializes more in course creation.
What’s the Difference Between Kartra vs Kajabi?
Kajabi is an all-in-one platform. Its primary focus is a tactic called one-course selling. Kartra is another all-in-one building platform, but its focus is on email marketing, funnel building, and product selling.
Ultimately, whatever works with the eCommerce entrepreneurs, given the capabilities and limitations of the marketing automation tool, plus the skills of the users and the products they sell, both would help reach more customers and lessen the work for the owners.
