What Is SamCart?
SamCart is a shopping cart software designed for building advanced checkout pages. The platform makes it easier to sell digital or physical products online. You can sell e-books, online courses, coaching, create membership programs, etc. It’s a hosted service that doesn’t require any technological expertise on your part to set up.
With SamCart’s content builder and pre-made templates, you can quickly create and edit your shopping cart pages by simply dragging the various elements in place (such as text and images). This in-depth Samcart review will go over everything you need to know about this powerful marketing tool that can be a game-changer for your online business.
What you’ll learn:
SamCart Review
Pros and Cons
Anyone who sells things online will love SamCart, regardless of whether they sell courses, event tickets, publications, or even seminars. You can also use it to offer services on your website, such as consultation. Let’s kick off this SamCart review by taking a look at some of its pros and cons.
Pros
- Easy to Use – With an easy-to-use visual editor, you can create a shopping cart in under an hour
- SamCart Templates – 18+ pre-made, conversion-optimized checkout templates
- Customizable Designs – You can easily customize your checkout pages to match your brand theme using the content editor
- Powerful Integrations – SamCart comes with a number of built-in integrations that can be triggered by a variety of circumstances. SamCart also supports Zapier and webhooks
- Beginner-friendly – SamCart is generally easier to use than most other shopping cart software. As a newbie digital marketer, you’ll also benefit from the free courses and video lessons
Cons
- High Monthly Fee – While SamCart is more expensive than similar platforms such as ThriveCart, it does not charge per transaction or the number of products you sell. As a result, SamCart may actually be a steal when compared to the competition
- Support for Only One Currency – Once your default currency is established while you’re signing up, you will be unable to support any other currencies
- Weak Affiliate System – The affiliate center is perhaps the weakest aspect of the platform. If you plan on using affiliates then ClickFunnels may be a better choice. Check out our ClickFunnels vs SamCart comparison
- No Two-Factor Authentication – It’s strange that such an advanced shopping cart platform doesn’t offer two-factor authentication for administrator accounts
SamCart Features
One-click upsells
SamCart supports one-click upsells, allowing you to maximize your revenues from each sale.
If upsells are not part of your sales strategy, then you’re missing out! Amazon, the world’s largest retailer, claims that upselling generates more than a third of its revenue.
Upselling is simple and seamless with SamCart, and according to their website, once set up, it can improve customer value by up to 68.1 percent.
Bump offers
A bump offer is when you bundle a core product or service with supplementary items in order to maximize earnings from each transaction.
A great example of this strategy is when you’re at a McDonald’s and they offer you a drink to go along with your fries and burger, which in most cases you say yes to. Similarly, if you’re buying sports equipment, you might get a deal on a half-price gym membership or something similar.
With a single click of a button, SamCart makes bumped offers very easy. All you have to do is set it up, and the platform will take care of the rest, including guiding clients through an optimized checkout process. For example, if you sell laptops, you can consider including bumped offers such as laptop bags and antivirus packages to your customers.
Checkout templates
SamCart has tons of professionally designed shopping cart and checkout page templates, all of which have been shown to convert.
All of the pages are mobile responsive, and there’s a special “sandbox” mode that lets you double-check everything before publishing. Most other shopping cart platforms require you to first publish your pages before testing them.
SamCart’s templates are being used by many well-known marketers, which means you won’t have to spend countless hours building and testing them from scratch.
All of SamCart’s checkout page designs have built-in testimonials, security reassurances, guarantees, and other trust features that are designed to increase conversion rates. All you have to do now is choose a template and tweak it to match your company’s colors and style.
One page checkout
This is a one-of-a-kind tool that allows you to combine various payment methods on a single checkout page. Here’s an illustration of what that can look like:
For example, if you’re selling a $447 online course, you can use SamCart to provide a payment plan to your consumers, whereas on other shopping cart pages, you’d have to use separate checkout pages to do so. The one-page checkout on SamCart keeps visitors on the website while they pick how to pay for your product.
As an internet marketer, I’m sure you understand the value of being able to retain your visitors on-page, because if they leave for whatever reason, you risk losing them entirely.
Affiliate center
SamCart makes it easy not only to sell your products online but also to enlist an army of affiliates to help you advertise them and enhance your profits. You can automatically accept affiliates or manually approve the applications.
Affiliate marketing is one of the most powerful sales and marketing strategies. It’s not only cost-effective (you only pay affiliates for sales they generate), but helps you build credibility and social proof.
Subscription saver
If you’re selling subscription-based products or services, this feature will definitely come in handy. As I’m sure you’re aware, people don’t always pay on time. A common reason for missing payments is due to rejected credit cards.
Whenever a payment fails, SamCart automatically sends the customer an email on your behalf alerting them of the failed payment and the recommended course of action.
They will then be able to change their payment information on file directly from their inbox using a link included in the email. This eliminates the need for you to waste time hunting down customers who haven’t paid their bills.
After numerous emails, if they still fail to update their payment details, SamCart automatically cancels their subscription and classifies them as “delinquent,” so you know who they are and can contact them directly.
With SamCart’s simple and effective dunning report, you can keep track of what’s going on in Subscription Saver.
A/B Testing
A/B Split testing is a reliable way of comparing two different things (such as check-out pages) to find out which one has a better conversion rate. If you have a high cart abandonment rate, split testing can be an effective way of troubleshooting it. Even a minor enhancement can result in a significant boost in revenue. Split testing can be applied to blog post headlines, opt-in pages, email subject lines, sales pages, check out pages, etc.
When you realize how much money you can make by simply optimizing your pages, you’ll want to start split testing everything. SamCart has really simplified the setup process for creating A/B tests.
You can test a variety of things on SamCart, like the checkout pages, forms (studies show that having fewer fields in a form results to a higher conversion rate), and much more.
Pricing
SamCart has four monthly payment plans:
- Launch: $49 per month
- Grow: $99 per month
- Scale: $199 per month
- Enterprise: $399 per month
Signing up for the annual plan with save you 20% on all of these costs.
The pricing structure is straightforward. Each plan’s features expand on those of the previous one. For example, the Grow plan has all of the capabilities of the Launch plan plus a few more, such as customer management, subscription charge reminders, advanced subscription cancellations, and so on.
The same is true if you choose the Scale plan. All of the features of the Grow plan are included, as well as extras like the dunning tool, affiliate center, CRM interfaces, and A/B testing. A 14-day free trial is included with each plan, as well as a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Integrations
SamCart integrates with numerous online services to help you connect your shopping cart to the rest of your marketing stack. The following are examples of its integrations:
- Payment merchants: PayPal, Stripe, and Braintree. It’s also worth noting that the site doesn’t accept cryptocurrency payments like bitcoin or mobile payments like Apple Pay
- Email marketing services: MailChimp, Active Campaign, Drip, iContact, MaroPost, Hubspot, and Ontraport
- Membership platforms: Thinkific, MemberMouse, OptimizeMember, Kajabi, Post Affiliate Pro, WishList Member, Digital Access Pass
- Fulfillment Services: ShipStation (other integrations available through Zapier)
- Webinar Platforms: No native webinar integration, however through Zapier you can connect to platforms such as Kajabi, GoToWebinar and WebinarJam
Customer Support
You can reach SamCart’s support team via email, live chat, and even on social media. The platform also has a comprehensive knowledge base, video lessons, as well as an intuitive user-friendly interface that is designed to eliminate any barriers and make it easy for newcomers to navigate it.
If you run into a problem that requires immediate attention, the easiest way to contact SamCart support is through live chat. Although response times vary, SamCart support is generally quick to respond.
SamCart has a large Facebook community with over 24,000 members. You can also get your questions answered right from the group.
While SamCart does not provide direct contact with their support team, they do provide email/chat help during business hours (that is, 9 AM to 5 PM ET weekdays).
SamCart Alternatives
SamCart vs ThriveCart
SamCart and ThriveCart are excellent platforms for building shopping carts and checkout pages. Both have a wide array of features and integrations.
If you plan on starting an affiliate program, however, then ThriveCart may have an upper hand since it has a better affiliate center. But other than that, they are probably equal when it comes to checkout software.
SamCart vs ClickFunnels
ClickFunnels is another fantastic platform for building stunning checkout pages. Check out our full SamCart vs ClickFunnels review.
It supports a number of different payment processors, including PayPal, Stripe, Apple Pay, Android Pay, among others. ClickFunnels also has several email marketing and marketing automation systems such as Infusionsoft, Ontraport, and NMI.
Clickfunnels is a more comprehensive system than SamCart because it’s not just a checkout page software. It also allows you to create landing pages as well as entire sales funnels. It’s an all-in-one platform that eliminates the need for a slew of other marketing tools for anyone selling products or services online. You can try it out free here.
Shift4Shop vs SamCart
Shift4Shop (formerly 3D Cart) is a well-known e-commerce platform that has been around for more than two decades. The software has a number of tools that make creating conversion optimized checkout pages, making it a viable alternative to SamCart.
Shift4Shop has more than 50 free templates, each with all of the functionality and aspects needed to increase conversions. You will get access to even more templates if you purchase a higher-level plan. The premium templates are mobile friendly, guaranteeing that your mobile customers have a great browsing experience.
Shift4Shop also lets you market your products on social media, and all of the plans include $50 in ad credits to help you get started reaching out to a larger audience across various social media channels. Shift4Shop costs $19 per month for “Startup” stores and $229 per month for “Pro” stores.
SamCart vs PayKickStart
PayKickStart is a versatile shopping cart software that also comes with a sales funnel builder, a sophisticated page editor, and checkout form pop-ups.
PayKickStart has four distinct plans: Basic $99/month, Growth $199/month, Scale $299/month, and a custom plan that is tailored to your company’s needs. When compared to SamCart’s starting pricing of $49/month, it’s easy to see why most marketers prefer SamCart.
Conclusion: Is SamCart legit?
SamCart is definitely a legit shopping cart software. It has all the features to help you sell both digital products and physical products online. It is a credible platform with thousands of users globally.
The most significant downside of SamCart is its cost. Its plans range from $49 – $339 per month. But having said that, it has no transaction costs, so if you’re selling in large volumes, then it may actually be more cost-effective. SamCart is constantly developing its services and has made numerous enhancements since its inception in 2015.
FAQs
What exactly is SamCart?
SamCart is a shopping cart software for creating advanced checkout pages. You can also use it to create sales pages, marketing funnels, affiliate programs, among other things. Although SamCart is mostly used for selling digital products, you can also use it to sell physical products. It’s an ideal shopping cart solution every online business could do with.
What is SamCart used for?
Samcart can be utilized in a variety of sectors and for a number of purposes. You can use it to sell e-books, online courses, coaching, consultation, event tickets, webinars, and also physical products such as electronic devices.
Is it possible to integrate SamCart with Zapier?
Yes, you can connect SamCart with Zapier, allowing you to connect to over 3,000 marketing automation tools and apps in seconds.
Can SamCart handle VAT?
Yes. SamCart makes filing your taxes online a breeze. Simply enter your marketplace address and VAT ID, and SamCart will automatically calculate the appropriate tax rates for each of your customers and bill them sales tax accordingly.
Is it possible to use coupon codes on SamCart?
Yes. In comparison to other shopping cart platforms, SamCart not only accepts coupons, but also has one of the most extensive control options over how you use them for your products and services.
Instead of having a single discount applied to all of your products automatically, you can apply one coupon to specified products and a different coupon to other products in the same sales funnel.
Can you A/B test checkout pages on SamCart?
Yes. SamCart has a powerful A/B testing function designed to help you increase conversions. You can test every part of your checkout pages to see which versions are the most effective within your target audience. For those who are new to split testing, SamCart has in-depth lessons to get you started.
Does SamCart have a money-back guarantee?
Yes, SamCart has a 30-day money-back guarantee. Simply cancel your subscription a few days before the payment is due so you don’t have to pay for an extra month.
SamCart also has a free 14-day trial, which will reduce the likelihood of you needing a refund since you’ll have had the opportunity to test it out before purchasing one of the premium plans.
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