Expandi is a LinkedIn automation platform that combines LinkedIn and cold email outreach. In this article, we briefly review Expandi, its features, pricing and alternatives
So, you’re keen on automating LinkedIn outreach, but Expandi proved to be too much for your budget?
In that case, you’ve come to the right place since we’ve:
The factors we’ve considered when rating these platforms include:
Let’s briefly review Expandi and its features first to see what Expandi’s competitors are actually up against.
Expandi is a LinkedIn automation platform that combines LinkedIn and cold email outreach.
As such, it has some pretty nifty features up its sleeve, but it also comes with some serious shortcomings that are worth mentioning.
Expandi offers a single pricing plan at $99 per month per seat, which is quite troublesome for larger teams and agencies in particular.
That’s why Expandi offers custom-tailored plans for larger numbers of users, but their exact pricing policy remains undisclosed on-site.
Furthermore, the 7-day free trial is far too short for discerning Expandi’s actual capacity for achieving your desired goals.
Regarding Expandi’s strengths, safety is something Expandi’s users can count on, as the platform is cloud-based.
GIF and image customization is also something that Expandi is great at, as it offers plenty of easy options for creating personalized messages using exciting and original visuals.
Lastly, the solution Expandi has for cold email outreach and the possibility of combining it with LinkedIn outreach is an excellent feature if your business greatly relies on cold email prospecting.
On the other hand, Expandi’s 7-day trial is much too short, as 7 days are definitely not enough to try out the platform - so you’ll need to subscribe for at least a month to test the product thoroughly.
In addition, if you have a larger team or an agency that provides LinkedIn outreach-related services, Expandi could easily prove to be much too expensive for you since it’s charged on a per-user basis.
Finally, although Expandi has a feature that enables users to work around the LinkedIn limits, you can still send no more than 100 messages or requests per day.
So to cap it all – if you want to steer clear of LinkedIn bans and integrate your LinkedIn outreach with email campaigns, Expandi could do the trick for you just fine.
However, if you’re an agency or a bigger in-house team, make sure you’re ok with spending quite a lot of money on a tool that can’t really bypass LinkedIn’s limits that efficiently.
A short disclaimer before diving in – although Sales Robot is our tool, we were as unbiased and honest in rating it as we were with all the other software on our list. Our goal is to help you find the right tool for you, even when it’s not us.
Sales Robot is a cloud-based platform designed explicitly for automating LinkedIn, as it enables users to easily create elaborate campaigns that run on total autopilot.
Since it has plenty of options for automating various activities, Sales Robot’s a perfect LinkedIn automation tool for a wide range of users, from lead generation agencies to start-ups, sales teams, recruitment agencies, and individual small business owners.
By doing that, Sales Robot enables you to work around the LinkedIn 100 weekly limit in a way that’s both effective and completely safe, given that they’re not against LinkedIn policies;
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In addition, Sales Robot’s cloud-based, which makes it practically undetectable by LinkedIn.
There’s also a Safe mode that’s available no matter what pricing plan you opt for;
The tool uses that data for drafting a message so human-like that your leads will feel like they’re talking to an actual person rather than a tool.
As a result, people will be much more open to accepting your connection requests and answering your messages.
And if you decide to write your messages, rather than use the pre-made fully customizable templates, Sales Robot will calculate the probable response rate of those messages.
You can also set up triggers, delete pending invites, blacklist individuals and companies, skip duplicates, etc.
As Sales Robot’s interface is very intuitive, you will have no problem creating your own campaigns in no time. And as an added help, there are ready-made campaign templates to help you start and learn the ropes on the go;
That makes it much easier for you to connect with potential prospects via email, as Sales Robot will provide you with all the data you need.
It’s also worth noting that Sales Robot’s plan is specially designed for teams, meaning that it enables seamless team collaboration and management, which we’ll explain more thoroughly in the pricing section.
Moreover, Sales Robot’s team intends to include another plan at $99 per month in the near future to add some more versatility.
At the time being, Sales Robot has one pricing plan:
It includes everything you may ever need from a LinkedIn automation tool and more.
Better yet - it’s perfect for teams of all sizes, as it allows:
And as it comes with a 14-day free trial, Sales Robot provides plenty of time to try everything out and decide for yourself whether Sales Robot’s the way to go.
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Things are pretty straightforward - if you’re looking for an automation tool that’s 100% fine-tuned for LinkedIn sales and outreach, the choice will naturally be Sales Robot.
Sales Robot can bypass LinkedIn limits in as many as three different ways, allowing you to send more than 200 messages and requests per day, and making sure you stay safe at all times while doing it.
In addition, it can automate smart sequences, create elaborate outreach campaigns, and personalize your messages to the highest possible extent.
By doing that, Sales Robot makes sure that your LinkedIn outreach strategy results in a steady stream of SQLs and higher conversion rates.
Sales Robot is also a great option for teams of all sizes as it enables frictionless team cooperation and allows inviting an unlimited number of team members in a single account.
So, if you’re keen on getting a solution for achieving hyper-personalized LinkedIn outreach that can safely bypass LinkedIn’s limits and enable seamless team collaboration & management, then Sales Robot is the best Expendi competitor for you.
Linked Helper is one of the LinkedIn automation tools that’s been around for quite some time. In fact, Linked Helper has only recently been updated as Linked Helper 2.
Whereas Linked Helper was a Chrome extension, Linked Helper 2 is an app you have to download and install on your device.
However, there’s another huge red flag concerning the message limit.
Namely, one of the ways Linked Helper surpasses the limits is using an “undocumented LinkedIn feature”. That feature comes with a disclaimer in one of the Linked Helper User manual articles that warn the user that opting for this method could get them banned in a blink of an eye. So much for taking care of their users’ safety.
Linked Helper offers two pricing plans:
If you pay for 3, 6, or 12 months in advance, there are additional discounts.
Linked Helper also offers a 14-day free trial, so prospective users can take it for a test drive before deciding to buy.
Although the Standard plan is quite a steal if you want the whole deal – that is, all of its features – it would be wiser to go for Pro.
This plan provides users with many more options, especially when it comes to data export, CRM integration, lead generation, and bulk engagement.
Linked Helper definitely has some pros, as it offers almost all the automation options an average LinkedIn user might need.
However, it’s Linked Helper’s cost that makes it stand out. This tool is one of the cheapest on the market, but that comes with a price of its own.
Namely, safety is the one area where Linked Helper is significantly lacking compared to Expandi, Sales Robot and other cloud-based tools on our list, as it is an app you have to download and install on your device.
That makes it all the more likely for LinkedIn to detect the use of automation, and it also requires your device to stay on all the time if you want your campaigns to keep running.
Not to mention the “undocumented LinkedIn feature” for bypassing LinkedIn limits, which sounds particularly dubious.
When you compare it to Expandi, one thing is obvious – you’ll save a lot of money if you decide for Linked Helper, but you’ll risk being banned by LinkedIn and having to struggle with an app that can be glitchy and slow down your device.
So, if you want a tool that offers all the basic automation functionalities at a bargain price - and are comfortable with not being as safe as you would be by opting for a cloud-based tool - then Linked Helper is the suitable Expandi competitor for you.
Meet Alfred is a platform that’s designed for tackling several social media at once, so it’s a great option for multi-channel campaigns.
Meet Alfred comes with three different pricing plans:
When billed annually, you get a discount.
There’s also a 14-day free trial – no credit card info required.
Meet Alfred is a fantastic tool when you need a multi-channel campaign with the main focus on social media such as Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, in addition to LinkedIn. Creating versatile posts for every media is easy-peasy with but a few clicks, which saves you a lot of time, and that’s a feature Expandi doesn’t offer.
In addition, Meet Alfred is more affordable than Expandi, offering several pricing plans and additional discounts when billed annually.
However, customer support seems to be a nightmare at Meet Alfred, which is no small matter.
Furthermore, Meet Alfred has quite a few bugs with its UI, while Expandi has a more robust flow when put into action.
So, if your primary goal is creating a presence in multiple social media at once and managing multi-channel campaigns with as little time and effort invested, then Meet Alfred is the best Expandi competitor for you.
Octopus CRM is a LinkedIn automation software that can be used for very elementary LinkedIn automation.
It is compatible with Basic, Premium, Sales Navigator, and Recruiter LinkedIn plans.
If you’re a more advanced user, Octopus CRM will leave you with much to be desired, precisely due to its lack of more intricate features.
It comes with as many as four pricing plans, including an option for creating a custom plan for agencies.
Moreover, since it’s connected to your browser, your device will have to stay on the entire time your campaigns are running.
Besides that, Octopus CRM offers some automatic safety limits and warnings only if you subscribe to the Unlimited plan. If you go for one of the cheaper plans, you’re pretty much on your own – Octopus CRM will take no liability for your being banned by LinkedIn for using it.
You also have to manually extract all the symbols and emojis from your prospects’ names. Should you overlook this, the tool will send out connection request messages that include all the titles, symbols, and emoticons, making it evident that they’ve been sent by a machine and not a reasonable human being.
However, there’s a catch to this as well. You get this feature only if you go for the most expensive plan, and even then, you get only 500 email finder credits.
Octopus CRM has four pricing plans and an option for creating custom plans for agencies that want to automate several LinkedIn profiles with the software.
The plans are as follows:
If you opt for annual billing, you’ll get a 35% discount on these prices.
Even though the plans are cheap, they come with a catch. If you want all the vital options for LinkedIn outreach automation, you will have to choose the Unlimited plan.
The most expensive plan is the only one that includes the feature of inviting prospects by email and the options for integration with other apps, and some safety limits.
The cheapest, Starter plan, really leaves you with next to nothing, as you’ll only get the option for auto invite and a stats dashboard.
However, even if you do opt for a pricier plan, it will still be significantly cheaper than Expandi either way.
There’s a 7-day free trial no matter what plan you choose, which isn’t that much time to see whether the tool is a fit for you.
There isn’t that much to say if you have high standards and expectations of your automation tool regarding Octopus CRM.
On the other hand, provided that you have relatively modest needs for LinkedIn outreach, the fact that Octopus has a minimal number of features could be an advantage, as you won’t need too much time to wrap your head around it.
So, if you can do with a tool that offers only the basics of LinkedIn automation, and you’re okay with not being as safe as you could be, then Octopus CRM could be the right Expendi competitor for you, especially if you consider that it is one of the cheapest tools on the market.
Don’t expect to get an in-app CRM system, though, as that’s something Octopus CRM does not deliver to its users.
When deciding on which of the 4 best Expandi alternatives is the optimal choice for you, keep in mind the following:
And finally,
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