Kartra vs Thinkific Comparison: Which Is The Best For Your Business 2022?

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Kartra vs Thinkific Comparison

Kartra & Thinkific are both excellent online platforms for you, especially if you are an online entrepreneur who wants to focus on monetizing your knowledge, skills, products & services.

However, both tools come with similar features, shared goals, differences, advantages & disadvantages. Due to this, it can be quite challenging to decide which one is better for your online business.

So in this post, I will give you an in-depth review of Kartra vs Thinkific so that you know which is the best for your business.

Which One Is The Best Solution For Your Business - Kartra vs Thinkific Comparison


kartra logo

Kartra

thinkific logo

Thinkific

Rating

4.9

4.4

Price Range

$99 - $499 per month

Free - $499 per month

Services

Email marketing, membership sites, page building, funnels building, video hosting, helpdesks, calendar

Membership sites, content hosting, landing pages

Key Features

  • Sales funnel builder
  • Marketing automation platform
  • Course builder
  • Affiliate center
  • Booking app
  • Video hosting
  • Helpdesk
  • Checkout tool
  • Community/Discussion forums
  • And a customer relationship management tool
    • Unlimited Students & Courses (for all paid plans)
    • Upload & Host Course In different Formats
    • Templates
    • Quizzes, Assignments and Badges/Certificates
    • Community/Discussion forums or students

    Money-Back

    30 Days Money-Back Guarantee

    Kartra vs Thinkific In-Depth Review

    Kartra is a complete, all-in-one online business platform that comes with comprehensive marketing tools to help you create, launch and sell digital products in one platform.

    Kartra includes powerful features which are;

    kartra all in one tool
    • Funnel builder & Campaigns: This helps you to create multi-page funnel flow so that you can convert your visitors into leads, leads into customers, and customers into recurrent customers.
    • Email and marketing automation: This allows you to create automated email and SMS marketing campaigns so that you can seamlessly communicate and engage with your clients.
    • Video and course hosting: These tools enable you to host your own videos and courses without depending on third-party services.
    • Course building Pages: This tool comes with a drag-and-drop page with lots of professionally designed templates that are100% mobile optimized.
    • Affiliate management: You can recruit and manage your affiliate who promote your courses & products.
    • Help Desks: This includes ticketing service and live chart to help you handle your clients issues.
    • Scheduling apps: Kartra includes a Calendar app that helps you to schedule meetings and appointments with your clients.

    On the other hand, Thinkific is confusingly known as a Learning Management System (LMS) that gives you a secure environment where you can host, manage, and sell online courses without being a tech guru.

    With Thinkific, you will have access to great features such as;

    thinkific online course platform
    • Unlimited courses & students: You don’t have any limitation on the number of courses & students.
    • Direct hosting for different course formats: You don’t need separate hosting, all are secured with Thinkific.
    • Customizable pages with templates and match the look and feel of your business or website.
    • Integrations: Thinkific integrates with other tools seamlessly to enable you a smooth operation.
    • Quizzes: This enables you to test your students’ knowledge with interactive quizzes at the end of every lesson.
    • Certificates: This helps you to award your student with a recognized certificate at the end of their module.
    • Community forums where you can market your courses and interact with students.
    • Payment Capabilities: Thinkific allows you to integrate Stripe & PayPal so that you accept payments from your students.

    So, lets dig deep into each feature;

    Kartra vs Thinkific Similarities

    Membership Site Comparison

    Quizzes, Surveys & Assignments Features

    These features help you to keep students engaged with your content.

    However, these tools are only available in Thinkific. 

    So, if you want to work with such features in Kartra, you will have to integrate it with other third-party services like Quiz Maker or Trello.

    Winner: Thinkific

    Content Hosting

    Both Kartra & Thinkific allow you to host your videos without depending on external video hosting providers such as YouTube & Wistia.

    Thinkific will allow you to host your content in any format including videos, text, PDFs and audios. 

    Kartra, on the other hand, does not allow you to host content in PDFs or Audio format. However, this might not be a big deal for you since it comes with the best Video Hosting tools and there are other external services such as Google Drive that you can use to host your PDFs.

    With Kartra Videos Hosting tools, they enable pop offers mid-way through your video, inject lead capture forms, multi-video playlists and much more.

    Winner: Tie with both tools

    Help Desks

    Kartra comes with an in-built help desk feature which is a robust ticketing system that helps you to handle your clients issues on time. 

    This tool helps you to funnel tickets by department, embed response and integrate it with every aspect of your business.

    Thinkfic doesn't have a Help Desk tool, however, you can integrate it with third party plugins which will come with extra cost.

    Winner: Kartra

    Ease of Use/Customizability

    Thinkific comes with a drag-and-drop editor for online courses. Just like with Kartra, you don’t need to be a programming expert to use the platform.

    Both tools offer an intuitive and smooth builder that lets you customize all your sections and elements the way you want. 

    With Thinkific, you can include elements like text, video, audio, downloads, quizzes, survey forms and many more.

    Kartra, on the other hand, hosts everything you upload to the platform, and with unlimited products you can host and sell, you have a lot of freedom.

    Winner: Both Kartra & Thinkific win in this category

    So regarding this Thinkific vs Kartra membership comparison, It is clear that both Thinkific and Kartra come with amazing membership features. However, Thinkific offers the best back-end membership features for your online courses. 

    Therefore, generally, Thinkific takes the win in this category.

    Overall Features Comparison

    When it comes to overall online business features, Kartra is the king. It comes with all the essential features that you need to run a successful online business. From scheduling tools to membership features, Kartra is an all-in-one tool that you will need without the need to ever depend on other third-party providers.

    On the other hand, it's no doubt that Thinkific also offers more amazing features. However, its features are only focusing on creating online courses…, so it may not contain more features to do other online business tasks.

    Winner: Kartra

    Affiliate Management System 

    Kartra offers you an opportunity to create affiliate programs for your own products. You can set up commissions and enable special discounts for your affiliate links. Then, there is also a marketplace where people can post and sign-up as affiliates for different products.

    Similarly, Thinkific also enables you to reward affiliates for sharing your courses and you can even incentivize your affiliates with customized commission rates and direct tracking.

    Winner: Both Kartra & Thinkific ties

    Pricing

    Kartra’s pricing ranges from $99/m to $499/m, each package containing a 14 days trial at only $1 as well as a 25% discount if you purchase with a yearly subscription.

    A nice thing about Kartra is that you get all features from the very basic plan. You are only limited in how many membership sites you can create and the number of emails you can send.

    The silver plan (which is the second-lowest tier) removes all the limitations in the Basic plan. So, if you want to enjoy full unlimited features such as products, emails, bandwidth, leads domains and many more, you may consider upgrading.

    On the other hand, Thinkific pricing ranges from FREE to $499 with a discount of 20% if you choose to pay annually. So, if you want a tool to launch your online content, then you might consider using Thinkific since they come with a free plan, which is entirely free.

    However, Thinkific basic plan limits you from many things and it charges 10% of your revenue as transaction fees. Upgrading to Thinkific higher-tier plans also comes with limits depending on the package you choose. Kartra does not have any limit on the higher tier packages.

    Winner: Kartra

    Kartra vs Thinkific Differences

    Special Kartra  Features NOT Found on Thinkific

    • Sale Funnels & Campaigns: Kartra enables you to create the perfect sales funnels that will increase your sales.
    • Email Automation: This is Kartra’s in-built Email Marketing feature that helps you to build a powerful email marketing campaign by automating the entire process. With Thinkific, you will need to integrate with email marketing plugins to perform automated campaigns, and this will cost you more.
    • Calendar app: Kartra comes with a robust calendar tool that works well, especially if you are a coach or consultant. This app enables your client or students to schedule their own sessions and appointments with you quickly. It comes with automatic reminders and integrates with the Kartra checkout system to provide billing support.
    • Helpdesk: This too helps you launch your own ticketing and live chat with your customer in case they have issues.

    Special Thinkific Features NOT Found on Kartra

    At this point, the difference between Thinkific & Kartra comes where Thinkific is primarily focused on providing hosting and selling courses, while Kartra is an all-in-one tool. Therefore, Thinkific has more student management and engagement features like quizzes, surveys, assignments than Kartra

    Kartra vs Thinkific Pricing

    Kartra Pricing 

    • Kartra Starter Plan at $99/m: This plan includes Kartra key features plus up to 15,000 emails per month, 2,500 contacts, 2 membership portals, 100 landing pages, and up to 20 products on this starter plan.
    • Kartra Silver Plan at $199/m: Includes all the features of the Kartra Starter plan and you also will get access to 12,500 leads, Unlimited monthly emails, unlimited membership portals and many more.
    • Kartra Gold Plan at $299/m: This plan gives you access to up to 25,000 Leads and unlimited features in the previous plans.
    • Kartra Platinum Plan at $499/m: This comes with 50,000 Leads, 10 custom domains and everything in the Gold Plan

    Important;

    It's also important to note that Kartra offers a 14-day trial at $1 in all of its plans with a 30 days money-back guarantee. It also comes with a 25% discount if you choose to pay annually, which is an excellent way of saving more while working with all the features.

    Here is a complete Kartra Pricing Review for your in-depth idea.

    Thinkific Pricing

    • Thinkific Free Plan which is 100% FREE with Limited Courses, Unlimited students, Quizzes & surveys
    • Thinkific Basic Plan at $49/m and contains everything in Free plan plus Unlimited courses & students, Coupons & Email, students.
    • Thinkific Pro Plan at $99/m: This plan includes all the features in the previous plan and 2 Site admin accounts,  5 Course admins/authors and Private & hidden courses
    • Thinkific Premier Plan at $499: This plan includes all Thinkific features without limits.

    Important;

    Thinkific also offers a discount of 20% if you go with an annual payment option.

    You also get a 30-day money-back guarantee if you decide to upgrade from a free plan to a paid one. 

    Also, the Thinkific FREE plan is a lifetime offer that gives you the freedom to test its features and functionalities as you grow your business. But for you to enjoy full features, you will need to upgrade to a paid plan.

    Kartra vs Thinkific Pros & Cons

    Kartra Pros

    • Kartra offers extensive and more comprehensive tools for any type of digital product.
    • Kartra offers a sophisticated email automation system that is easy to use.
    • Kartra comes with more Checkout & funnel tools.
    • Kartra includes advanced Affiliate Management & Marketing features.
    • Kartra comes with built-in Help Desks & Scheduling features.

    Kartara Cons

    • Kartra’s might look expensive to newbies.
    • It doesn't offer a free plan like Thinkiic; instead, it charges $1 trial.

    Thinkific Pros

    • Thinkific comes with a completely Free Plan for a lifetime.
    • Thinkific offers more extensive and comprehensive student management and engagement features.
    • It focuses on creating and selling online courses only, hence providing the best features and tools in this category.

    Thinkific Cons

    • A Thinkific basic plan has lots of limitations.
    • Compared to Kartra’s higher-tier plans, Thinkific doesn’t offer higher great value to its features. 
    • Since Thinkific is not an all-in-one platform, you will need to integrate third-party plugins, attracting extra cost.

    Kartra vs Thinkific Usage

    Use Kartra If:

    • You want an integrated all-in-one marketing tool.
    • You want to manage other marketing activities besides selling online courses.
    • You want to create high-converting sales funnels for your business.
    • You want to work with powerful features for any type of online business.

    Use Thinkific If::

    • You want to focus on online course business only.
    • If you want to try Thinkific by building a mini-course by its Free plan.

    Thinkific vs Kartra: Which Tool Is Right For Your Business?

    Picking Kartra vs Thinkific is not about the best option but the best choice for your online business requirements & goals.

    So, which platform is recommended for your business?

    Here is my best view;

    Kartra offers tons of powerful features, just from the basic plan. The good thing about Kartra is that you can use it for more than just creating an online course with more focus on the following;

    • Sales funnels.
    • High-converting Landing pages.
    • Email Marketing Automaton

    Another benefit of Kartra that we can't go without mentioning is its goal of helping you save time and money by compiling all the features into a single suite. Some of the features include calendar-booking, video hosting & helpdesk, which are essential for your online course creation and overall product success.

    Therefore, whether you want to create an online course, digital market products, or build a business, Kartra can be an excellent choice for you.

    On the other hand, if you are solely going to focus on selling online courses alone, then the Thinkific solution is a perfect pick. Thinkific offers excellent features designed to help you run a successful online course business by;

    • Building your brand and growing your audience.
    • Creating and selling compelling content
    • Scaling your business

    Finally, both Kartra and Thinkific are suitable platforms when you are looking for a solution to create, host and manage your online courses. But if you want an online solution for selling just your online courses, try out Thinkific. But if you want a platform that has all you need to run your entire online business, then you should look no further from Kartra.

    What is My Recommendation?

    If you have to choose the best soon for the long time investment, then Kartra is my #1 recommendation…

    Why?

    Here is a list of some of the reasons why I think Kartra is the perfect fit for your business;

    • Kartra is an all-in-one solution. Therefore, what Thinkific can do, Kartra can do it too and even better.
    • Despite the fact that Kartra costs similar to Thinkific, the price to value is excellent because of a lot more features.
    • Kartra comes with Help Desks to enable you to provide on-time customer support.

    • Kartra Calendars is a unique feature that allows your customers to book meetings or appointments.
    • Kartra also offers Checkout pages for selling your products, offers, or services online.
    • Kartra includes high-converting Funnels & campaigns.
    •  Kartra offers you 100% mobile-optimized pages for high conversions.
    • Kartra comes with Done For You Campaign and you can share the entire funnel at a click of button.

    KARTRA IS GOOD AT WHAT THEY DO!

    Why You Need All-In-One Business Solution Platforms

    All-in-one platforms like Kartra comes with lots of benefits, including;

    • Reduce the cost of spending extra expenses by integrating third-party service providers.
    • Ease your overall operation since you have all the tools in one platform.
    • Data is automatically passed between apps, making it easy for you to track your processes and apply automation.
    • You achieve single point security.
    • With all tools under one roof, it's easier for you to make the right business decisions and scale your business at large.

    Pro Tips for Selecting The Best All-In-One Business Platforms

    Choosing the best platform for your business requires extensive research so that you don’t end up choosing the worst tool for your business.

    So, to make your work easier, here are some of the top features you need to consider;

    • In-Built Video Hosting so that you don't incur extra cost integrating third-party providers
    • Calendars with integrated checkouts for payments that allow your client to schedule meetings and appointments.
    • Flexible Shopping Carts to enable you sell your digital products.
    • Split Testing to help you test and choose the best performing landing pages.
    • Affiliate Program Management
    • Ease of Integration with other third-party tools
    • Email Automation Service to help you run a smooth campaign

    Kartra vs Thinkific FAQs

    Q. Which is the overall better platform between Kartra & Thinkific?

    The best tool on Kartra vs Thinkific will depend on your business needs.  

    For instance, Kartra is better for selling and marketing your memberships, while Thinkific has better tools for membership (such as Quizzes, surveys & assignments) than Kartra.

    Q. Is Thinkific Free?

    Yes. Thinkific comes with a free plan, but this plan has lots of limitations compared to the Thinkfic paid plans. 

    However, it contains more than enough to get you started. 

    Q. Which platform will help me to sell more?

    If you want a platform that provides the best marketing tools, Kartra is a definite winner. Kartra includes powerful marketing tools that lead to high conversion. Such tools include; Order bumps, Upsells & Downsells, Comprehensive Email marketing tools, Behavior-based marketing, More Sales Page Templates & Affiliate Marketplace. 

    Thinkific doesn’t have such robust features.

    Kartra vs Thinkific Final Verdict

    Kartra offers you all the tools you need to run a successful online business. 

    With tons of powerful features at a more affordable price, Kartra gives you the freedom to quickly scale your online business.

    Thinkific, on the other hand, comes with one of the best features for membership & course creation. It has way more customization features, making it extremely easy to manage your students and your entire business without any limitation. 

    However, you have to understand that you will need to integrate Thinkific with more 3rd party tools since it's not an all-in-one platform like Kartra, increasing your costs.

    Therefore, choosing the best tool will highly depend on what exactly your business needs.

    So, for example;

    If your main focus is only to build and sell online courses, Thinkific is the perfect pick. 

    But if you want more than just building courses, then Kartra definitely your #1 choice.

    Bhargav Bavarva is a digital marketing consultant & affiliate marketing expert. He helps local, small & SaaS businesses to get consistent and predictable leads. He also guides people like you to find the right software tools by extensive review, comparison and personal recommendation to make informed decisions and earn more money!

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