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How are you doing in selecting your systems?

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Technology x Choice = Overwhelm

One of the most challenging problems we face as thought leaders in getting our online systems up and working is the overwhelming variety of choices we face when it comes to selecting your systems.

Once you have defined a clear business strategy for your customer journey, then you are ready to start implementing the online and offline systems that you need to support the customer journey.

In a previous article, I drew your attention to the fact that your online business platform is a custom software system. In building any software system, the first step is to understand the functional business requirements. There are four major business functions that are needed to support thought leader online business platforms. These guide your audience through the customer journey you have designed for them.

The four major business functions are:

  1. Public Content
  2. Online Marketing
  3. Online & Offline Sales
  4. Private Content

Typically, you publish free public content to meet your audience online in social media, and from there you guide them to your website, your blog articles, your videos, and the start of your online marketing conversations. This may be a web page where you offer something valuable for free such as a video or a free PDF download in exchange for their contact information. Once you have contact information, you can continue both online and offline conversations using a sequence of web pages and emails until you make a sale. After making the sale, you can deliver both online and offline private content, including such things as online subscription programs, online courses, coaching programs, and mastermind programs.

One approach to providing all these business functions is to knit together separate software support platforms, such as:

  1. A public website and blog builder, like WordPress or Wix
  2. A landing page builder, like Optimize Press or Lead Pages to support online marketing web pages
  3. An email system, like Aweber or Active Campaign to support online marketing emails
  4. An online shopping cart system, like 1ShoppingCart or Woo Commerce to support online sales
  5. A calendar system, like Calendly or Schedule Once to support offline sales processes
  6. A customer relationship system, like PipeDrive or Hubspot to support offline sales processes
  7. A live virtual event platform, like Zoom or WebinarJam to support live online events
  8. A commercial-free video platform, like Vimeo or Wistia, to support video streaming
  9. A video editing system, like Camtasia or iMovie to support video content editing
  10. A private online content delivery system, like WishList Member or LearnDash.

An alternative approach is to use fewer integrated online software support systems like Click Funnels, InfusionSoft, Kartra, or Kajabi that integrate support for multiple business functions in a single system.

There are trade-offs to consider in selecting the systems, balancing complexity, features, and ease of use. In my experience, it is best to minimize the number of system support platforms. It simply makes your life easier and will save you both time and money.

To learn more about the comparisons and trade-offs of a multiple-system approach vs. an integrated systems approach visit www.streamlineyoursystems.com. Once there you can download a free worksheet to help you assess where you are and look at your alternatives. 

To your online success!

 

If you want to get started now learning about my online business success system, you can start here for free: Accelerate Your Online Success

I’m currently authoring a book about Online Business Success, and I am sharing excerpts of that book here. You can subscribe to this full set of book excerpts as they are published by visiting www.onlinebusinesssuccessbook.com.

If you want to get a “quick start” on learning how this approach can save you loads of time and frustration, please come to my live workshop – Accelerate Your Online Success 5 Day Challenge. You can save months, if not years of time, effort, and frustration by joining me in this 5-day challenge.