If you have been looking for a way to create and sell online courses, then you have probably heard of Kajabi and LeadPages.
Kajabi and LeadPages are two platforms people use for creating digital products and online courses.
Kajabi utilizes its powerful suite of course creation and membership site tools and LeadPages relies on creating solid landing and website pages.
We are here to talk about which platform is superior for selling online courses.
Main Differences Between Kajabi vs LeadPages
The main differences between Kajabi and LeadPages are scope and focus.
Kajabi is an all-in-one solution for selling and marketing courses, while LeadPages is designed for landing and sales pages.
Features/Functionality: Kajabi has a more well-rounded set of features than LeadPages, so Kajabi is better.
Pricing: Kajabi starts at $149/mo, LeadPages starts at $37/mo., that’s why LeadPages is better.
Web-Building Tools: Kajabi has hosting and full-scale website builder. LeadPages is mostly focused on landing pages. So Kajabi is better.
Marketing: LeadPages has more landing and sales page options, but other marketing tools are severely lacking and Kajabi is better.
Course Creations: LeadPages does not have any dedicated course creation tools. You need a plugin for that and that’s why Kajabi is better.
Integrations: Kajabi has 10 built-in integrations including Zapier. LeadPages has a ton of integrations that are required to sell courses. Because of that LeadPages is better.
Pricing Comparison: Kajabi vs Leadpages
Kajabi offers 3 pricing plans:
- Basic: $149/mo
- Growth: $199/mo
- Pro: $399/mo
Kajabi is a bit more expensive than a lot of other course platforms out there but the catch is that Kajabi is all in one.
That means you don’t have to shell out extra for plug-ins and extensions.
Everything you need to run your online course business is in one integrated package.
Kajabi does not have a free version but you can sign up for a free 28-day trial.
You can also save 20% on subscription costs by switching to annual instead of monthly billing.
LeadPages has 3 pricing plans as well:
- Standard: $37/mo
- Pro: $79/mo
- Advanced: $321/mo
LeadPages starts off much cheaper than Kajabi, but the standard plan is pretty limited and locks you out of a lot of premium features like online payments, A/B testing, and advanced integrations.
You would need the Pro plan or higher to make some progress. LeadPages lets you opt for annual billing to get a discount and you also get a free custom domain if you sign up for annual billing..
Marketing Features
Marketing with LeadPages is strong, particularly its landing/sales pages.
LeadPages has a ton of templates for landing pages (over 500) and the templates have been created from data curated by over 40,000 LeadPages users.
LeadPages also allows for a ton of marketing integrations. Using LeadPages, you can create landing pages, squeeze pages, submission forms, opt-in forms, and more.
It’s a great tool that is uniquely designed for lead capture and conversions.
Kajabi also has good marketing tools, specifically the email marketing and pipeline builder.
Pipelines involve making sales funnels that include your landing and sales pages.
Kajabi has fewer landing page templates, the LeadPages and no A/B testing, but it is a lot easier to see and modify your existing sales funnel.
Kajabi also has many more email automation sequences than LeadPages.
Kajabi also launched Kajabi email in early 2020 to help users create attractive email designs for campaigns.
Overall though, LeadPages has excellent age building options (even though their templates are dated) and Kajabi has more well-rounded marketing tools
Website Building Comparison
Kajabi has an intuitive and simple website builder that uses a drag and drop interface. Elements and layouts can be easily changed with just a few clicks of the mouse.
The web builder can switch between templates and pages can be added using the various building modules.
Some parts of the web builder can be a bit unintuitive, such as the difference between “static” and regular pages in the page builder section.
Otherwise though, Kajabi makes it pretty simple to make a navigable and attractive site for your course business.
Kajabi also offers free hosting and free security certificates for sites.
Leadpages can be integrated with a separate hosted solution or it can be used on its own.
LeadPages offers hosting so you can host your standalone landing pages on their servers. LeadPages also uses a drag-and-drop editor much like Kajabi, but LeadPages has more templates.
Unfortunately, a good deal of these templates seem somewhat dated. The community was pretty divided once LeadPages abandoned the standard editor in 2016 and added a new drag-and-drop editor, but it seems they have made a lot of advancements to make it function better.
Course Creation & Student Engagement Tools
Kajabi’s course creation tools are geared towards maximizing your returns.
Making a course in Kajabi is similar to making a WordPress blog post. You set up the initial structure of your course and then fill it out with content.
Kajabi uses Wistia for all of its video hosting and users get unlimited hosting for course materials. For the most part, the course builder is logically arranged and easy to use.
Once you’re done making your course you can set offerings. Kajabi allows for multiple offerings and you can bundle purchases to discounts.
You can also designate specific courses to be part of your membership site.
Kajabi also has quizzes, assessments, and surveys, as well as tools for keeping track of student progress.
LeadPages does not have course building tools, but it does have integrations for those.
For example, LeadPages has integrations for ZippyCourses and Teachable, but those are extra services that will cost you more.
Theme Comparison
Kajabi runs on a theme-based design.
Kajabi actually has changed directions on themes and is not focused on developing the Premier Theme into a flexible and open-ended format.
The main benefit here is that you don’t have to worry about making sure certain themes sync up with your site; you can just pick the Premier Theme and get going.
Within the theme is 6 layout presets with layouts and elements you can further customize.
Kajabi’s take on themes is a nice transition because you no no longer have to worry about making sure relatively static themes are working with your page setup.
LeadPages does not really have themes per se as the product focuses mostly on building standalone landing and sales pages.
That being said, each template definitely has a “theme” of some kind, though templates themselves have relatively limited customizability.
Overall though, Kajabi has a superior set up for themes simply because LeadPages is not about building a single cohesive site.
Integrations
Integrations are a strong point for LeadPages. LeadPages has integrations for some of the most popular services like MailChimp, Google Analytics, Aweber, Shopify, Drip, ConvertKit, and more.
LeadPages also has Zapier which lets you set up custom integrations. These integrations are necessary though and many of them will require an extra subscription purchase.
Kajabi is all-in-one so you don’t need any integration to use it.
However, there are 10 built-in integrations including popular services like ConvertKit, MailChimp, Drip, Adsense, and Clickfunnels.
Kajabi also has the Zapier integration so integration compatibility is more than just what is explicitly listed.
Customer Support
Onboarding and support are strong points for Kajabi. Users have 24/7 email and live chat support, as well as the library of resources that is Kajabi University.
Moreover, Kajabi has managed to build a vibrant and engaged community so there are tons of places to speak with other Kajabi uses to get some tips and tricks. The devs host in-person training events and live webinars.
LeadPages does not have 24/7 support. You instead have to send an email. Most of the time you can expect a response within 24 hours. There is live chat support but it’s only available M-F 9am-5pm.
Live chat support is also only for Pro and Advanced subscribers. Otherwise, LeadPages does not have nearly as extensive a resource library as Kajabi.
There are some technical help pages and links to articles, but nothing on the scale of Kajabi University.
Conclusions: Kajabi or LeadPages?
At the end of the day, Kajabi has more functionality than LeadPages. LeadPages is fantastic for building high converting landing pages but on its own it’s rather limited.
Kajabi in contrast is all-in-one so you don’t need any extra plugins or extension for it to work. So when it comes to selling online courses, we say that Kajabi is the superior choice.
