active campaign vs clickfunnels image

Active Campaign vs Clickfunnels? The Surprising Answer!

Active Campaign vs Clickfunnels is a rather unusual comparison because those software solutions are meant to do different things. You’ll be surprised who wins this comparison. They have some similarities in common but also huge differences. One of them is an email software the other a funnel builder. But finally, you’ll get the most out of those two software products by combining them!

So Active campaign is not a Clickfunnels alternative but an integratable autoresponder.

What is Active Campaign? 

active campaign

Active Campaign is one of the best email autoresponders that you could use. It’s very intuitive, easy to integrate, has a beautiful visual builder and tagging features. 

A lot of companies are fighting over the best email autoresponder. This one has the potential to be at least in the top 3. 

The visual builder gives you a great overview of your campaigns. You can quickly map out an email marketing system without making it complicated to connect lists, segments, and forms.  

The email automation feature is designed intuitively, simple but yet very powerful. You can utilize tagging, audience segmentation, and dynamic automations through triggers. Thus making the automation feature of Active Campaign one the most powerful out there.

Personally I’ve been using KlickTipp, Active Campaign, Sendlane, GetResponse, Convertkit and AWeber over time. Out of this list, Active Campaign was the one that needed the least amount of learning and also gave the most features for the price. Especially in comparison to the rest.

Active Campaign vs Clickfunnels? The Surprising Answer! 1

Cons of Active Campaign – Not suited for you if…

To be honest, there aren’t any technical relevant cons. Nevertheless, I’m using GetResponse now for one particular reason.

As for Affiliate Marketing, you’ll need an affiliate friendly email software. A lot of providers do not allow affiliate marketing for their email autoresponders. 

Because there are a lot of spammy types of affiliate marketers, Active Campaign, as well as other companies, suspend affiliate accounts very quickly. Those providers are in fear their delivery rates can drop through a spammy approach to affiliate marketing.

I made this experience myself, without even being spammy at all. But Active campaign was rigorous in banning accounts with any sort of affiliate marketing approach. 

There are certainly affiliate marketers out there using the software and being very cautious in their approaches to affiliate marketing. Anyways you’ll be in permanent danger of your account getting suspended. 

That can be the case for any Email software. There are just 2 providers, that I know that are affiliate marketing friendly. One of them is Sendlane. Sendlane being fairly new is affiliate friendly, because it’s founded by affiliate marketers. 

Before using it I made sure to talk to the support in order to be safe on my affiliate journey. But I experienced a buggy software not sending out emails as they were set up.

Finally, GetResponse seems to be the affiliate marketing friendliest email software out there, having years of experience and decent delivery rates. 

So if you are an affiliate marketer I strongly recommend using GetResponse, instead of Active Campaign.

What is Clickfunnels and how does Active Campaign stack up against it? 

When talking about ActiveCamapign vs Clickfunnels, it is important to understand that Clickfunnels is a funnel builder, that specializes in delivering your products and services in the best possible manner, maximizing your results. 

In contrast to that, ActiveCampaign is an email autoresponder that helps you automate your email marketing process.

Considering the Clickfunnels pricing vs Active Campaign’s there is no doubt about the winner. Active Campaign can start with $9 dollar the month for 500 contacts if you upfront annually. Of course, the price rises linearly to the number of contacts you collect.

Clickfunnels, on the other hand, will also have an email software called Actionetics, if you are willing to pay for the enterprise plan. This plan includes unlimited amounts for all features but also costs $297. 

In comparison to that Active campaign will charge you that amount in the professional plan, when you reach 10.000 subscribers. 

So when you are getting started with email marketing you shouldn’t go for the enterprise plan. It’s not worth it yet unless you are an affiliate marketer who wants to be safe.

Unfortunately, Actionetics and Actionetics MD are being sunsetted because of a major update replacing Etison Suite by the new Clickfunnels Platinum. However, in case you are looking for other email automation tools that integrate with Clickfunnels, I’ve got this article for you!

The Actionetics email software operates with his own SMTP system, thus giving you the option to just switch the SMTP (like sendgrid or mailgun) and start again. So zero risk for your account to get suspended. 

Conclusion: Active Campaign vs Clickfunnels

Finally, you can see that those two aren’t really comparable because they fulfill different needs. While Active Campaign is an email software for collecting leads and email automation, Clickfunnels is a funnel builder. 

Even more, Clickfunnels is capable of building any sort of funnel system, no matter if webinar, membership site, squeeze pages or ecommerce products.

The best possible scenario to get the most out of both is to combine them. They integrate seamlessly with each other. You can build landing pages, that redirect into your funnel systems while collecting leads and follow them up. 

As mentioned above, if you are an affiliate marketer I would rather recommend GetResponse for your email marketing. 

It has a similar price to Active Campaign and you can start to collect leads for your funnels. It integrates as well as any other software with Clickfunnels and you will get a free trial for both of them. 

By signing up for your Free Clickfunnels Trial through this site you’ll get these bonuses, that will help you get started.

Free 14-Day Trial Sign Up Bonus


clickfunnels bonus
  • Bonus 1 – My Personal Support
  • Bonus 2 – A-Z Clickfunnels Training
  • Bonus 3 – Million Dollar Ad Swipes
  • Bonus 4 – Clickfunnels Share Funnel Library
  • Bonus 5 – Ultimate List Of Lifetime Recurring Affiliate Programs
  • Bonus 6 – Full SEO Strategy
  • Bonus 7 – Organic FB Traffic Blueprint
  • Bonus 8 – OFA Affiliate Bridge Page Template
  • Bonus 9 – Full Copywriting Secrets Slide Presentation

Disclosure: I am an independent ClickFunnels Affiliate, not an employee. I receive referral payments from ClickFunnels. The opinions expressed here are my own and are not official statements of ClickFunnels or its parent company, Etison LLC.

Scroll to Top