The Software platforms featured below have been reviewed by Marketing Channel and are our top recommendations for this technology category.

Sales funnels and landing pages have become two of the most important tools in the digital marketer’s arsenal.

Although they are very different in the end results they aim to achieve, they are very similar in the technologies they require to function optimally.

What is a landing page?

A landing page is essentially any page that a site visitor can “land” on but it has the unique distinction of not having any menu links, which places the visitor in the position of either interacting with the page or leaving the site completely, some landing pages may have one link back to the sites homepage.

Landing pages are used for two reasons: Lead generation – to generate sales leads, like arranging a consultation or requesting further information. In addition these pages often provide the option to download a lead magnet (ebook, pdf, free trial, webinar registration etc) at which point the website will capture the user’s data like their name and email address, to be used for further marketing to the prospect.

These pages are usually short and to the point.

Click through pages – these pages are usually focused on attracting a visitor that is at the very early stages of awareness of a product that is on offer.

Theses are often used on an e-commerce website in order to get the visitor to click-through to a next page after being educated on the product that is positioned for sale.

Landing pages are also an excellent method for testing or validating new product or service ideas for initial interest, prior to going to market.

Your landing pages do not necessarily have to be a part of your website but it has been proven that websites with many different landing pages, which are focussed on the various stages of awareness of the client, will have much better response and conversion rates.

What is a sales funnel?

A sales funnel is tasked with attempting to make a sale to the page visitor, it is usually in the format of long-form, conversion focussed copy and design.

A sales funnel will have all the functionalities required to make the sale, including checkout via a payment gateway.

Sales funnels are ideal for selling nutritional products, books, online courses, novelty items, consulting services, and more.

There are usually upsells and downsells options available with sales funnels too.

Creating a high converting sales funnel is a very specialist task and for this reason some sales funnel software providers now offer packages with pre-made funnels available within the platform.

Because of the in-depth knowledge needed for high conversion strategies,  “funnel hacking” has become quite popular. It is the process whereby one purchases the complete range of a funnels products, purely to copy and screenshot the conversion mechanics and strategy used within the funnel.

Many businesses prefer to work entirely through sales funnels for their sales processes, instead of using a website or eCommerce store.

One major drawback of some of these sales funnel & landing page software provider platforms is the fact that once you stop paying the monthly subscription fees, you will lose access to your page or funnel, or to some of its functionalities.

The top 5 sales funnel & landing page software platforms in our opinion are:

Thrive Themes –  best for WordPress by far and comes with complete WordPress site builder

Unbounce – easiest way to get started

Leadpages – superb landing pages and templates by top internet marketers

GetResponse – good value for money and email integration

ClickFunnels – the best sales funnels you will find anywhere

Please see the roundup reviews below. Each of the platforms has massive functionality and instead of explaining each function in-depth (you can find it on the site pages), we give you a short honest breakdown of which to use and why.

Thrive Themes

When it comes to WordPress websites, Thrive Themes stand out way above anything else on the market.

Thrive Landing Pages is part of the overall suite of products and you have to purchase the whole suite. However, it is well worth it.

The landing page offering includes general pre-made templates for video squeeze pages, lead magnet downloads, webinar registration, review pages, courses, sales pages, lead generation, product launches, podcasts, personal branding as well as industry-specific pages for beauty products, auto industry, construction, finance, real estate, restaurants, medical, with more being added every month.

Payment for Thrive Themes is made on an annual basis and if you do not renew, your pages and sites will still remain as is, you will still be able to edit your pages and site with WordPress but not have access to the Thrive Content Builders.

The primary functionalities that Thrive Themes offers are:

Landing page builder – easy to use and includes default landing pages and Thrive template cloud

Thrive Themes – a range of conversion-focused WordPress themes

Thrive Leads – an email list building tool with a wide variety of opt-in forms and widgets

Content Builder – a visual editor that helps you build great looking web pages fastOther tools – includes Thrive Clever Widgets, Headline Optimizer, Ultimatum, Ovation, and Quiz Builder

Unbounce

Unbounce is the ideal platform for marketers and agencies that want to create and launch landing pages without any developer involvement.

They offer a free 30 trial, which makes it easy to get started.What is particularly exciting about Unbounce is their recently launched “Convertibles” feature, this allows to add targeted and triggered overlays to any existing web page.

For example, adding a special discount coupon page over your current product page.

There are 125+ spectacularly designed landing pages and overlay templates to choose from and the builder’s software is user friendly and intuitive.

The primary functionalities that Unbounce offers are:

Landing pages – drag and drop builder interface with integrations for WordPress, custom forms and lightboxes.

Conversion tools – dynamic text replacement based on search criteria, lead gen form builder, a/b testing App integrations – app integrations including

MailChimp, HubSpot and Salesforce.

Leadpages, is a high-end standalone builder platform for creating landing pages. The functionality is amazing but there used to be a bit of a learning curve involved with getting to know the design functionalities, this has now been improved with the introduction of their new drag-and-drop builder tool,  Leadpages does not require any specialized tech skills.

The platform helps you generate leads and sales on the web, via email, SMS and social media.

Packages start from $37 per month or $25 per month if paid annually upfront.

They have templates and marketplace sections packed with pre-made funnels some of which were created by online marketing legends such as Jeff Walker, Justin Brooke, James Schranko, Frank Kern, Brian Moran and others.

You can also sort through their template library and select the all time highest converting ones.

The primary functionalities that the Leadpages suite offers are:

Leadpages – drag-and-drop builder, mobile-friendly templates, publish to your domain or use theirs and lead notifications

Leadboxes – popup forms to capture contact information from visitors to your site

Leaddigits – allows prospect to opt-in via mobile

Leadlink – subscribers can sign up to various lists from within their email inboxes

GetResponse

GetResponse is primarily an email marketing software platform with the ability to create landing pages built-in as an additional function.

It makes our roundup list because it is the cheapest option for those who need to launch landing pages, the basic GetResponse package starts at $15 per month for the email suite and one landing page, for more landing pages, you will need to upgrade to the pro package for $49 per month.

Setting up a campaign process flow is easy, create a landing page, capture the email address, and send out you follow up series emails via their marketing automation function.

The primary functionalities that GetResponse offer are:

Full email marketing suite – with some really beautiful design templates and a page builder

Landing page builder – with some useful templates

Marketing automation – based on data and  behavior

Webinars – a complete webinar marketing solution is available on the upgraded packages

Click here to get your free trial

ClickFunnels

ClickFunnels is the brainchild of Russell Brunson, the author of Dotcom Secrets and internet marketing millionaire. Their speciality is sales funnels.

If you are into seriously high volume online product sales then Clickfunnels is for you.

ClickFunnels provides everything that you need to market, sell and deliver your products online, including website hosting, landing page software, email autoresponder software, split testing software and more.

ClickFunnels starts at $97 per month with their full suite, called the Etison Elite, coming in at $297 per month. It is definitely worth checking out though because they really have thought of everything and some of their pre-built sales funnels have been set-up for immediate success built on the very best conversion strategies.

For the more adventurous entrepreneur, it is well worth taking them up on their free 14 day trial, and running an Adwords or Facebook campaign to your sales funnel in order to see if you can build a profitable revenue system that you can rinse and repeat, using one of their sales funnel templates.

The primary functionalities that ClickFunnels offer are:

ClickFunnels Standard – professional themes & templates, international currency ready, digital asset delivery and much more

Actionetics – advanced email sequences, marketing automation, social contact profiles etc

Backpack – support webinars, page template marketplace, affiliate commissions, multiple SMPT