Keap has been automating small businesses since the Infusionsoft days, and Campaign Builder is a serious piece of software. It is also a canvas someone has to draw on — and the question is whether that someone is you.
Updated July 2026 · written by the Nova OS team
we tell you where Keap wins too
Five differences. If you only read one part of this page, read this part — everything after it is evidence.
Keap sells you the workshop. Nova hands you the finished machine.
You describe what you sell. Nova generates the pipeline, the follow-up sequences, the booking flow and the templates around it, and it checks every fact it used back against your own words before you ever log in.
The account arrives empty. You lay out the campaigns, tags, forms and sequences in Campaign Builder — with a paid implementation package to guide you, or a certified partner you hire.
Describe your offer today; the system is answering and booking leads the same day. Nothing to configure first, nothing to learn before it earns.
Implementation comes first: onboarding sessions, a data import, then the campaigns themselves. It is a project measured in weeks — and the weeks come before the first automated follow-up goes out.
“Text my no-shows at 9am.” “Add a stage for renewals.” “Write me a month of content.” Nova edits the automation itself. There is no builder to learn and no settings maze to find.
Changes mean opening Campaign Builder and rewiring goals, sequences and tags yourself. It is a powerful canvas — but it is still a canvas, and someone has to draw on it every time the offer changes.
The software, the AI, the build, the migration, the support and your message volume are one price. No wallet to top up, no per-contact tier, no setup invoice.
Published pricing starts from $249/mo billed annually and is scaled by contacts and user seats, with an implementation package priced separately and phone and text messaging priced separately again.
New leads get a real reply in under a minute, in your voice. No-shows get chased. Quiet leads get revived. Every one of those is a close you were losing quietly.
Capable of every one of those — once the campaign exists. Your follow-up is exactly as fast and as thorough as the sequence you last found time to finish.
Honest note: a dedicated texting number is $20/mo on top, with 2,000 texts a month included.
Keap is not weak software — it is one of the originals, and plenty of businesses run beautifully on it. It is built for people who build automation. If that is not your job, the maths changes.
Not a feature-count contest. Four short tables, one per part of the job.
| Built for you |
Keap |
|
|---|---|---|
| Who builds itpipelines, automations, templates | ✓Nova builds it, before you log in | ~you, guided by a paid implementation package or a certified partner |
| Time to a working systemsignup to a live system that captures and follows up leads | About 5 minutes | onboarding, then a campaign build measured in weeks |
| Day-one state of the account | ✓your offer, your stages, your copy | ~empty, plus campaign templates you adapt to your offer |
| What you learn before it earns | Nothing. You answer questions about your offer | Campaign Builder, goals and sequences, tags, forms, billing setup |
| Built for you |
Keap |
|
|---|---|---|
| Change anything in plain Englishtell it what you want; it edits the automation itself | ✓“text my no-shows at 9” → done | ✕open Campaign Builder and wire the sequence |
| AI at the corerunning the system, not a chat widget on top of it | ✓runs the whole system | ~an AI assistant drafts copy; the automation itself is yours to design |
| Adding a lead by talking | ✓type or speak it, Nova files it | ✕forms, imports and manual entry |
| Reports the moment you log inrevenue, calls, show rate, pipeline | ✓prebuilt around your offer | ~reports and dashboards you set up yourself |
| When something needs fixing | ✓we go into your account and fix it | ~support and certified partners are there; the campaign stays yours to change |
| Built for you |
Keap |
|
|---|---|---|
| Text follow-upfrom your own carrier-registered business number | ✓volume included in the flat pricethe number itself is $20/mo, 2,000 texts included | ~text marketing and a business line, priced separately from the plan |
| Speed to leadhow fast a new lead gets a real reply | ✓under a minute, 24/7, in your voice | ~as fast as the campaign you built |
| Booking with lead screeningcontact captured before the time-picker | ✓phone number first, built in | ~appointments and forms, wired together by hand |
| Dead-lead revivalquiet leads re-warmed automatically | ✓automatic, hot ones routed to you | ✕a campaign you design and maintain yourself |
| Content engineplans, drafts and ships in your voice | ✓a month planned in minutes | ~AI helps draft emails and pages; the plan is yours to make |
| Proposals, e-sign & client portal | ✓sign, pay and onboard in one branded place | ~quotes, invoices and payments are native and genuinely strong here |
| Team trackers & KPI rollupsone link per person, live scoreboard | ✓built in, no setup | ~reporting you configure, on seats you pay for |
| Built for you |
Keap |
|
|---|---|---|
| Usage chargestexts, calls, email, AI actions | ✓included, no wallet to top up | ~email sits in the plan; phone and text messaging are priced separately |
| Per-contact or per-seat pricing | ✓flat — every seat, every contact | ✕the price scales with your contact tier, and extra users are published from $39/mo each |
| Setup fee | ✓$0 — the build is the product | ✕an implementation package is required and priced separately |
| Leave any month, take your data | ✓export everything, port your number | ✓month-to-month is offered and your data exports — credit where it's due; the lower rate is the annual one |
| The damageper month, one business | $99 flat · build, AI and message volume included | from $249 billed annually · more month-to-month · plus contacts, seats, implementation and messaging |
| See if it's a fit → |
Every row here is a claim we will walk you through on a live screen before you pay a cent.
Prices and features change on both sides — check their pricing page and ours before you decide.
An illustration, not a quote: what a single coaching or service business tends to pay each month once the thing is actually running.
The left-hand card is an illustration of the shape of the bill, not a quote — Keap's own published plan starts from $249/mo billed annually as of July 2026, and what you actually pay depends on your contact tier, your seats, your implementation package and your messaging. Check their pricing page before you decide, and hold us to ours.
If a comparison page never says a good word about the other side, it is an advert. Three places Keap is the right call — and we will tell you so on the phone.
Two decades of lifecycle automation went into it: goals, sequences, tags and branching laid out visually so you can see the whole customer journey at once. If you have someone who loves designing automation, few small-business tools go deeper. Nova does not try to out-build it — Nova builds it for you instead.
Quotes, invoices, subscriptions and payments are native to Keap, on the same contact record as the marketing. For a business that bills recurring clients out of the same system it markets from, that is a real and unglamorous advantage.
Keap has been at this since the Infusionsoft days, with an established API, a long list of integrations and a network of certified partners who already know the product. Nova is younger. Our answer is that we do the building for you rather than pointing you at a partner — but that ecosystem is real and worth something.
You keep your contacts, your history and your number. Nothing gets deleted on their side until you say so — run both for a week if you want.
Pull contacts, companies, tags and order history out of Keap as CSV and send them over. We import them with pipeline stages, owners, tags and notes preserved. You do not retype anything.
Tell us what your Campaign Builder sequences currently do, or screenshot the canvas. Nova rebuilds the equivalent — follow-up, reminders, no-show chase, revival, renewals — around your offer, usually the same day.
Your business number is portable, so no lead ever texts a dead line, and your invoicing moves across with it. Once your calendar is booking out of Nova, cancel Keap. Not before.
Migration is included — there is no onboarding invoice at the end of it.
Tell us what you sell. We'll show you, on your own numbers, what a system that follows up for you is worth every month.
$99/mo flat · leave any month · your data is always yours
This comparison reflects publicly available information about Keap as of July 2026 and our own product. Keap is a trademark of Thryv, Inc., which is not affiliated with and does not endorse Nova OS. Plans and pricing change — check both before you buy.
