Stitching together five or six different online marketing platforms feels like cobbling together a Frankenstein monster.
A little bit of this for emails.
A dash of that for funnels.
And suddenly, you have this bulky, unpredictable marketing “creature” that costs more than you’d like, and often stumbles more than it succeeds.
It’s alive, yes!
But it’s… barely functioning.
This is why I’m always excited about “all-in-one marketing platforms” like GoHighLevel and Systeme (both very popular right now).
And since you are here, I think you do, too.
In that case, stick around for the next 10 or so minutes and we’ll see which platform, between GoHighLevel and Systeme.io, may suit you best (without spending a single penny first).
To begin with, a brief background check.
What Does Systeme Do?
Systeme brings together most of the tools you’ll need to start a business, promote it, and make sales online and off – all within a single platform.
I reviewed Systeme in detail here. I highly recommend checking it out for a deep dive into Systeme before comparing it to GoHighLevel.
What Does GoHighLevel Do?
If you’re looking for an all-in-one platform designed for digital agencies—the kind that lets you manage multiple clients’ websites, funnels, email campaigns, and more—all from one account and a single, streamlined dashboard, GoHighLevel might just be the tool you’ve been looking for.
With a GoHighLevel account, you can create sub-accounts for each client, tailoring tools, features, and permissions to fit their specific needs—including third-party integrations. I like that it’s a flexible way to manage everything under one roof.
And if, like me, you hate hopping between tools, you’ll also like that HighLevel is designed to simplify your workflow by replacing most of your existing tech stack with one subscription and a unified dashboard.
What I like about GoHighLevel 👍
- Truly all-in-one: I can create funnels, email sequences, membership communities, websites, and landing pages all in one place. It even includes online bookings, a social media planner, and calendars.
- Unlimited everything: Unlike Systeme, Kajabi, and ClickFunnels, GoHighLevel offers unlimited contacts, users, courses, students, and funnels across all plans – at no additional cost.
- The full-featured online reputation management tool lets you pull, manage, and optimize online reviews from Facebook, Google, and Yelp – all from a single tool.
- Reseller program: If you get the SaaS Pro plan, you can resell the platform, third-party apps, and plugins to as many clients (sub-accounts) as you like.
- Robust multi-channel marketing: One of my favorites! HighLevel funnels and email campaigns can seamlessly integrate SMS, Messenger, WhatsApp, and email messages, as well as phone calls (with tracking).
- More native integrations: I noticed more direct integrations here than I did in Systeme. These include dedicated tools for text messages (like Twilio), email marketing automation (AWeber and ConvertKit), and live chat/instant messaging.
What I don’t like about GoHighLevel 👎
- Separate, usage-based billing: The monthly subscriptions do not cover email delivery costs ($0.01 per email via Mailgun), SMS (through Twilio or a similar provider), and call charges. If you have a large email list (say 20,000+), these costs can quickly add up.
- No email templates: I couldn’t find the featured email templates.
- No free plan: Meanwhile, Systeme’s free plan includes 3 funnels, unlimited emails sent, 1 course with unlimited students, and more.
What I like about Systeme 👍
- Affordable all-in-one business platform: Systeme offers a complete suite of tools at an affordable price, including email marketing, automation, landing pages, and online courses.
- Ease of use: An intuitive user interface makes setting up and managing campaigns a breeze.
- Flexible pricing: You can upgrade as your business grows with four incremental plans. No need to pay for what you don’t need right away.
- Free forever plan: No questions asked. It’s great for exploring the platform and testing your business idea.
- Native webinars: Great, especially if you intend to build a community, email list, or just monetize webinar content/training/memberships. No separate integration is needed.
What I don’t like about Systeme 👎
- Fewer integrations than GoHighLevel: Complex integrations require a Zapier connection or Webhooks.
- No visual funnel builder: Visual funnel builders make it easier to see, track, and optimize your funnel – minimizing back and forth.
- Limited branding options: Systeme’s options will suffice if you keep things simple.
Upfront bottom line
Here’s the thing: Systeme gets the job done quickly and affordably. It’s all about the essentials—funnels, email marketing, automation, and branding—wrapped up in a simple, user-friendly package.
On the flip side, GoHighLevel shines if you’re managing multiple businesses, running a digital agency, or even reselling software. It’s packed with advanced tools to help you run your growing empire.
But before you decide between the two, here are some key factors worth considering.
7 Key Differences You Need to Know Before You Switch
Let’s get right to it.
Funnel building
Systeme’s funnels are objective-based; Build an Audience, Sell, Custom funnel (build from scratch), or Create an evergreen webinar.
Your objective shapes the templated steps you’ll see, all of which you can tweak easily using the drag-and-drop builder.
There’s a solid library of funnel step templates to help you get started or spark some customization ideas, too.
Systeme does not have a visual funnel builder like GoHighLevel.
However, its free plan lets you create three free sales funnels (with up to 15 steps).
You can also create 10, 50, or unlimited funnels (with 50, 300, or unlimited steps), based on your subscription plan.
Overall, creating funnels with Systeme is a breeze, particularly if you favor simplicity over customization.
GoHighLevel funnels, on the other hand, bring out the big guns.
Expect these:
- SMS/MMS, email, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, voice mail drops, calls (with call tracking), and more built-in. Perfect for multi-channel marketing.
- Schedule bookings within funnels
- A visual funnel builder to help you visualize your customer journey and tweak things as needed.
- Create unlimited funnels and add unlimited users, emails sent, courses, students, memberships, and more.
Overall, if you need complex funnels for multiple customer journeys and stages, use GoHighLevel. Systeme is ideal for simple products or services.
Email marketing
There are a lot of similarities here. Among them are autoresponders, announcements (newsletters/broadcasts), behavior-based triggers for email marketing automation (campaigns/sequences), and A/B testing.
Both also include email scheduling and performance statistics.
Overall the Systeme email editor is simple (or basic, if you prefer more customization options). Just don’t expect polished templates as in ClickFunnels or Kajabi.
Also, I’m not sure why, but GoHighLevel no longer offers the many email templates it used to because I still can’t see any in the Template Library for emails.
Instead, there’s a pretty basic email editor with a few merge fields that are very similar to Systeme’s.
However, I like that GoHighLevel emails offer more sections/elements for customization.
Additionally, Systeme lets you send unlimited emails to up to 2,000 contacts, unlimited students, and unlimited community members—without needing a Mailgun integration like GoHighLevel does.
In contrast, GoHighLevel charges $0.01 per email for broadcasts, on top of the Mailgun fees, which can add up. That said, GoHighLevel compensates with powerful email automation features.
For instance, a GoHighLevel email campaign can effortlessly integrate SMS/MMS, phone calls (complete with tracking), and WhatsApp messages.
You can even layer in Facebook Messenger, voicemail drops, and appointment bookings—making it a stellar choice for running multi-channel campaigns!
Courses, community, and memberships
There are quite a few similarities between Systeme and GoHighLevel here, including:
- Unlimited and fully structured courses (modules, lessons, assessments, quizzes, etc) regardless of your pricing plan
- Unlimited students, community members, and users
- Unlimited blog posts
- Unlimited contacts (with all paid plans, and up to 2,000 free with Systeme)
- The ability to drip-feed courses, track course progress, lock content (useful for paid members), and issue course completion certificates.
That said, I like that Systeme offers a straightforward course builder:
Systeme offers the flexibility to upload video files directly from online storage platforms like Dropbox or YouTube. If you’re using Wistia or Vimeo, you can embed videos with a simple code snippet.
GoHighLevel, however, only allows video uploads directly from your computer, which might feel a bit restrictive if you’re used to pulling content from cloud storage.
Website builder
If you’re passionate about branding and design, the GoHighLevel platform is a standout choice.
It offers universal sections, brand boards, and a wide range of elements to work with.
In just a few clicks, you can create a complete website with the GoHighLevel templates, all of which you can easily customize to fit your style.
Systeme’s branding options are simple and to the point, which is great for usability; not so much for customization. However, the basics, such as order forms, testimonials, and checkout page elements are well-covered.
Additionally, both platforms support custom domains (your own site) and branded subdomains.
CRM and reputation management
With Systeme, capturing leads’ details and building a solid email list is straightforward.
The CRM is quite basic, but it’s intuitive enough to get the job done without much hassle.
Additionally, it supports basic tagging, so don’t be surprised that contact segmentation and other CRM-based workflows are also simple.
Compare that to HighLevel’s all-out CRM capabilities:
For example, HighLevel’s built-in calendar can do the following:
GoHighLevel steps it up with advanced CRM capabilities, including:
- Detailed lead capture forms that use merge fields to collect more information, like your customers’ locations.
- Native WhatsApp integration for faster, more engaging communication.
- A built-in social media planner that’s robust enough to replace dedicated schedulers like CoSchedule and SproutSocial.
- Call tracking to make it easier to analyze leads and follow up effectively.
- An appointment booking system that can replace Calendly, allowing you to schedule appointments directly from your funnels, web pages, or other customer touchpoints.
- Tagging and segmentation of prospects to improve targeting and boost conversion rates and sales.
And there’s more!
One of my personal favorites is GoHighLevel’s online reputation management.
It’s one of those features you didn’t realize you needed until you’ve used it.
For example, you send online review requests automatically via email and text after a transaction, making it easy to gather valuable feedback.
Also, you can automate follow-ups by creating a review funnel.
For example, if a customer does not respond to an earlier request, the system can send a review request again two days later.
You can also pull reviews from Google, Facebook, and Yelp! GoHighLevel makes it easy to manage them within a single account.
💡 Note: Find more details about GoHighLevel’s online reputation management in my full GoHighLevel review here.
Integrations and reseller program
Systeme is all about supporting solopreneurs and small digital businesses in creating straightforward workflows and marketing stacks.
Its integrations are tailored to meet these needs, although I’m not sure whether the focus is on quality over quantity yet.
Integrations are limited.
And the main focus is on essential payment processors like Stripe and PayPal. If your users want broader connectivity options, this may limit their options.
Meanwhile, GoHighLevel offers seamless integration with a wide range of third-party platforms.
This means expanded functionality and user experience for you and your clients (sub-accounts).
Besides API access, you can also use Zapier and Webhooks to further expand your GoHighLevel workflows, capabilities, and stack.
That’s not all.
GoHighLevel also boasts a robust app marketplace with additional tools and services tailored to agencies.
This marketplace includes diverse tools, from email marketing automation to live chatbots and messaging apps.
Systeme lacks a comparable marketplace. This can limit your (and your clients’) ability to expand their toolset beyond the built-in options.
GoHighLevel lets you resell these apps to your clients as sub-account plugins, potentially creating an additional revenue stream. And based on what I’ve seen in my circles, the GoHighLevel reseller program is quite popular.
GoHighLevel’s reseller program lets agencies sell its platform as a service (SaaS) through the SaaS Pro plan.
Once you’re set up, you can create sub-accounts for clients, customize their capabilities and permissions, and even add a markup—opening up another revenue stream!
Meanwhile, Systeme doesn’t have a formal reseller program, which might limit your options if you’re looking to generate additional income through reselling.
Pricing
The pricing differences between GoHighLevel and Systeme really reflect their target markets.
GoHighLevel’s pricing is geared toward digital agencies looking for advanced features and capabilities.
In contrast, Systeme offers a more flexible and cost-effective pricing model that caters to smaller businesses and solopreneurs.
Consider this:
GoHighLevel offers three main pricing tiers:
- Starter Plan: $97/month, suitable for small businesses; provides essential features.
- Unlimited Plan: $297/month, ideal for growing agencies; offers unlimited sub-accounts and advanced automation tools.
- SaaS Pro Plan: $497/month, designed for larger enterprises seeking white-label solutions and additional customization options. Annual plans are available, providing a discount of about 17% on total costs.
Meanwhile, the Systeme pricing model includes four plans:
You get a:
- Free Plan: Offers basic features for free, including unlimited emails to 2,000 contacts, unlimited students, courses, blog posts, and more.
- Startup Plan: $27/month, includes essential tools for small businesses.
- Webinar Plan: $47/month, adds webinar hosting functionality.
- Unlimited Plan: $97/month, which unlocks all features including unlimited sales funnels and emails. Systeme also offers significant discounts on annual subscriptions, making it a budget-friendly choice.
Does GoHighLevel offer better value than Systeme? Or, is it the other way around? I’ll leave it to you to decide.
GoHighLevel vs Systeme: Verdict
As promised, those are the key differences between Systeme.io and GoHighLevel. I hope this helps you determine which platform best fits your needs!
If you run a digital agency and need to manage client assets like websites, landing pages, and emails, GoHighLevel might be your best bet. I view GoHighLevel as a more direct alternative to platforms like Kartra, Groove, and Kajabi.
On the other hand, if you’re looking for a simplified and affordable all-in-one platform for basic products and services, Systeme could be the right choice for you. If it doesn’t quite meet your needs, you might also want to consider ClickFunnels.
