ChatGPT answers, unedited

For your use case — cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni communities — I would pick Kajabi as the default choice, unless your program is primarily a live cohort experience where community interaction is the product. Kajabi Kajabi

My shortlist:

My recommendation by business model

Pick Kajabi if you want:

• A lead magnet → nurture sequence → application/enrollment → cohort → alumni upsell machine
• Automated pre-course onboarding: - welcome emails
• pre-work reminders
• calendar links
• “class starts tomorrow” sequences
• Alumni monetization: - memberships
• advanced programs
• coaching offers
• newsletters/community retention

Kajabi’s advantage is that the same customer record can move through marketing, purchasing, course access, and community without stitching multiple tools together. Kajabi Kajabi

Pick Maven if:

• Your flagship product is a live cohort (for example, a 6–12 week accelerator)
• The magic happens in: - live sessions
• peer accountability
• projects
• cohort networking

Maven is purpose-built around cohort delivery, with course materials, events, and community in the same student experience. Maven

Pick a hybrid stack if you are more enterprise:

• Kajabi or Thinkific for curriculum + CRM/funnel
• Circle for alumni community

That gives you a stronger community experience but adds operational complexity.

What I would deploy for a serious cohort business

Option A (my default):

• Kajabi = website, funnels, email, payments, course delivery, alumni membership

Option B (premium cohort experience):

• Maven = cohort delivery
• Kajabi = marketing engine
• Circle = alumni network

Option C (enterprise training):

• Thinkific = learning management
• HubSpot/ActiveCampaign = CRM automation
• Circle = community

If you are running 3–20 cohorts/year with the goal of turning graduates into a long-term community, I’d start with Kajabi. If the cohort itself is the product and you charge premium tuition ($2k–$20k+), I’d seriously evaluate Maven + a separate alumni layer. SoloClientStack Maven

The deciding questions are:

1. Are cohorts your main revenue product, or is the funnel/business ecosystem the main product?
2. How many students per cohort?
3. Do alumni need an always-on paid community, or just a graduate network?

Given those three priorities, I’d pick Mighty Networks—with one important caveat: if your business is primarily a sophisticated marketing funnel with the community as an add-on, I’d pick Kajabi instead.

My pick: Mighty Networks

Your requirements line up unusually well with what Mighty is emphasizing in 2026:

• Cohort enrollments: Courses can be scheduled/dripped, and the course + cohort community can live together. That makes the experience feel like an actual cohort rather than “a course plus a Facebook group.” Mighty Networks Mighty Networks
• Pre-course funnels: Mighty now supports free challenges, mini-courses and live events as lead-in experiences, with landing pages, checkout and automated messages built into the journey. Mighty Networks
• Alumni communities: This is where I'd give Mighty the biggest advantage. Alumni don't have to graduate out of the course platform—the community can become the ongoing membership/network. Mighty Networks Mighty Networks
• Automation: You can trigger onboarding, nudges, milestone recognition, re-engagement and next-offer journeys based on member behavior. Mighty Networks
• Community-first experience: Native community, events, courses and mobile apps are all part of the same environment. Mighty Networks

I'd structure your funnel roughly like:

Lead magnet → free mini-course/challenge → application/enrollment → cohort space → live cohort → graduation → alumni community → advanced cohort / membership / mastermind

That lifecycle is a particularly good fit for Mighty.

Where Kajabi beats it

kajabi.com would be my choice if acquisition and conversion are the center of gravity.

Kajabi is stronger as an integrated marketing machine: landing pages, lead capture, email sequences, behavioral automation, checkout, offers, upsells and course delivery are deeply connected. Kajabi Kajabi

So I'd think about the choice this way:

My decision rule

Pick Mighty if the long-term asset you're building is a community of people who repeatedly go through cohorts together.

Pick Kajabi if the long-term asset is a marketing funnel that repeatedly sells courses/coaching/products, with community being secondary.

For the exact combination you described—cohorts + automated pre-course funnel + alumni community—I'd lean Mighty Networks 65/35 over Kajabi.

One thing I'd pressure-test before committing: how sophisticated your pre-course funnel needs to be. If you have multiple acquisition sources, lead scoring, complex branching sequences, applications, sales calls and highly personalized nurture, Kajabi may justify the tradeoff.

If you tell me roughly how many students you expect per cohort, your price point, and whether enrollment is application-based or self-serve, I can narrow this down to a specific platform + funnel architecture.

For your mix—cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni community—I’d pick Kajabi.

Why Kajabi is my pick

Kajabi's biggest advantage for you is that the funnel, email automation, enrollment, course, checkout, and community live in the same system. It can trigger follow-up based on actions such as enrollment or course progress, while its pipelines handle the lead-capture → nurture → purchase journey. www.kajabi.comwww.thinkific.comwww.thinkific.com

Thinkific is arguably the better learning platform. It now supports cohort courses, connected communities, private community spaces, live events, and fairly sophisticated email automation. www.thinkific.com But its own documentation still indicates that some more advanced email-course workflows historically required integrations, whereas Kajabi's core proposition is precisely the integrated marketing-to-learning stack. support.thinkific.com

The deciding question

I'd choose:

Kajabi → if your business is primarily marketing + selling + delivering cohorts + retaining alumni.

Thinkific → if your business is primarily running sophisticated educational programs/LMS experiences, with marketing being secondary. Thinkific is particularly compelling if you need things like deeper learning analytics, SCORM, structured learning paths, or more enterprise-style training operations. www.thinkific.com

For your specific description, I'd go Kajabi, probably structured as:

Lead magnet/webinar → automated nurture → cohort application/enrollment → pre-course onboarding sequence → cohort course → alumni community → automated alumni re-engagement/next-offer funnel.

That architecture minimizes the number of systems you'd have to stitch together, which is especially valuable once you have multiple cohorts running simultaneously.

If you tell me your approximate cohort size, price point, and whether enrollment is application-based or direct checkout, I can narrow this down between Kajabi, Thinkific, Circle + another LMS, and Maven and tell you which I'd actually buy.

For your use case — cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni communities — I would pick Kajabi as the default, unless your alumni community is the core product rather than the retention layer. www.kajabi.comwww.kajabi.com

My shortlist:

My recommendation by business model

1. You sell expensive cohort programs ($1k–$20k+)
→ Kajabi + Circle (if budget allows)

• Kajabi:
  • lead capture
  • waitlists
  • application funnels
  • email nurture
  • payment plans
  • onboarding automation

• Circle:
  • cohort rooms
  • alumni network
  • peer connections
  • events
  • ongoing membership

This is the stack I’d choose for a serious education business. pymeconia.com

2. You want one platform and minimal operations
→ Kajabi

A typical funnel:

Ad/content → lead magnet → nurture emails → webinar/application → cohort checkout → onboarding emails → course delivery → alumni membership

Kajabi handles most of that without stitching together multiple systems. www.kajabi.com

3. You are community-led (your alumni network drives referrals)
→ Circle

Example:

• Cohort Jan 2026
• Cohort Mar 2026
• Alumni founders group
• Office hours
• Job board
• Events

Circle’s space-based structure maps naturally to this. listicler.com

The decision I’d make

If I were building this today:

• Early stage (<500 learners/year): Kajabi only
• Growing program (500–5,000 learners/year): Kajabi + Circle
• Community is the main asset: Circle-first
• High-volume creator membership: consider Skool

The biggest mistake I’d avoid is choosing a “course platform” and then bolting on community later. Alumni engagement is usually where cohort businesses compound, so the platform should support both the acquisition funnel and the long-term member lifecycle. pymeconia.com

A few questions would change the answer:

1. Are these B2C cohorts, corporate training, or higher-ed/professional education?
2. What is the average cohort price?
3. Do alumni pay for continued access, or is alumni community included?

If your priority is cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + an alumni community, I’d pick Kajabi overall.

My ranking

Why Kajabi: it is unusually strong at connecting the entire customer journey: lead capture → email nurture → enrollment → course → community → upsell/re-enrollment. Its automations can react to things like purchases, course progress, and inactivity, while its funnel tooling handles landing pages, opt-ins, checkout, and follow-up. www.kajabi.com

For your use case, I'd envision something like:

Lead → 10-day pre-course sequence → cohort enrollment → onboarding → course → alumni community → re-engagement/next cohort

That can live in one ecosystem rather than stitching together an LMS + email platform + community + Zapier.

When I'd choose Thinkific instead

If these are serious structured educational programs rather than primarily creator/coaching programs, I'd lean Thinkific.

It has particularly good support for scheduled/cohort courses, prerequisites, assignments, certificates, learning paths, and live/blended learning. Its community can also be connected directly to course enrollments, including automatically giving cohorts access to appropriate community spaces. www.thinkific.com

So:

• Marketing/revenue engine first → Kajabi
• Learning experience/LMS first → Thinkific
• Community/alumni engagement first → Circle

Where Circle fits

I'd choose Circle if the alumni community is actually the center of gravity of the business. Its current platform combines courses, events, discussions, memberships, email, payments and workflows, and its workflows can automatically place members into the appropriate spaces/cohorts and re-engage inactive members. circle.so

But for a business where the pre-course funnel is a major acquisition mechanism, Kajabi has the cleaner native marketing stack.

My pick: Kajabi, unless you need a more sophisticated LMS-style cohort experience—in which case Thinkific would be my second and potentially better choice.

If you tell me (1) cohort size, (2) price of the program, (3) whether cohorts are live or self-paced, and (4) whether alumni are free or paid, I can give you a much more definitive Kajabi vs Thinkific vs Circle recommendation.

For what you described, I’d pick Kajabi—unless the community itself is the core product.

Your requirements point to three connected jobs:

1. Cohort enrollment — sell/enroll people into a defined program and control access.
2. Automated pre-course funnel — lead capture → nurture → application/checkout → onboarding.
3. Alumni community — keep graduates engaged and create a path to the next offer.

My ranking

Why Kajabi: its advantage is the connected customer journey. Kajabi natively ties courses, checkout, email sequences, behavior-based automations, funnels, and community together. For example, a prospect can enter a lead magnet → receive a nurture sequence → enroll in the cohort → receive automated onboarding → get community access → trigger post-course/alumni messaging based on their behavior. www.kajabi.com

That's much closer to your use case than simply asking "which has the nicest course builder?"

When I'd choose Circle instead

If you're really building a community-led education business, I'd seriously consider Circle.

Circle has become substantially more capable as an all-in-one platform: courses, scheduled/structured learning, discussions, events, memberships, payments, email marketing and workflows can live together. circle.so Its workflows can, for example, automatically place members into cohort spaces, welcome them, send reminders, and move them through different community experiences. circle.so

So I'd use this rule:

• Marketing/funnel → enrollment → course → alumni monetization: Kajabi
• Community → cohort → peer interaction → alumni network: Circle
• Course delivery/learning infrastructure → community: Thinkific

Thinkific is actually a strong third option for you because its current Community experience can link course enrollments to community spaces, and it supports selling communities separately, bundling them with courses, subscriptions, or order bumps. support.thinkific.com Its dedicated Funnels product also covers lead generation, nurturing and enrollment journeys. support.thinkific.com

My pick for your specific description: Kajabi. The fact that you said "automated pre-course funnels" rather than simply "marketing" is what pushes me toward it. That's where Kajabi's all-in-one architecture has the biggest operational advantage.

If you tell me (a) cohort size, (b) price of the program, (c) whether enrollment is application-based or direct checkout, and (d) whether alumni is free or paid, I can narrow this down to Kajabi vs Circle vs Thinkific for your exact operating model.

For your specific mix — cohort enrollment + automated pre-course funnels + alumni community — I’d pick Kajabi overall, with Circle as the strongest alternative if community is the center of the experience.

My ranking

Why Kajabi: it connects landing pages, lead capture, email sequences, behavioral automation, checkout, course delivery, and community in one system. That makes the pre-course portion particularly strong: someone can opt in, receive a nurture sequence, enroll, get the right course access, and then be moved into ongoing community engagement without stitching together multiple systems. www.kajabi.com

Why Circle might actually win for you: if the alumni community is strategically important — not just a discussion board attached to the course — Circle is better designed around community as the persistent home. It supports scheduled courses, cohorts, events, memberships, email, payments, and workflows, including automatically placing members into the appropriate cohort/space and triggering follow-ups based on behavior. circle.so

The decision I'd make

I'd use this rule:

• Marketing/funnel is the engine → Kajabi.
• Community/alumni network is the engine → Circle.
• Teaching/LMS is the engine → Thinkific.
• You want dead-simple community + courses → Skool.

For your stated use case, I'd lean Circle if alumni engagement and cohort experience are important enough to be a differentiator. Its current workflow system can react to enrollment, course completion, events, spaces, and other member behavior, which is exactly the sort of lifecycle automation you're describing. circle.sohelp.circle.so

One caveat: Circle's more sophisticated workflows are on Business ($199/mo) rather than its $89/mo Professional plan. circle.so

If you tell me roughly how many students you enroll per cohort and whether you're selling B2C, B2B, or both, I can narrow this down to a specific platform + plan and sketch the funnel architecture I'd use.

For your use case — cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni communities — I would pick Kajabi as the default choice, unless your community experience is the product itself. www.kajabi.com

My shortlist:

Why I’d choose Kajabi for your stated workflow

Your lifecycle sounds like:

1. Lead capture
   • webinar/masterclass/application funnel
   • waitlist
   • nurture emails

2. Enrollment
   • cohort launch windows
   • payment plans
   • onboarding sequences

3. Course experience
   • scheduled releases
   • assignments/resources
   • live sessions

4. Alumni
   • graduate community
   • next-level programs
   • referrals/upsells

Kajabi maps well to that full funnel because the marketing automation, products, payments, and community are in one ecosystem. It also supports cohort-style courses with scheduled progression. www.ruzuku.comlearnstream.iohelp.kajabi.com

When I would not choose Kajabi

I’d choose something else if:

• Your alumni network is the primary product → Circle or Mighty Networks.
• You run dozens of cohorts/year with facilitators, operators, and enterprise clients → Disco or a more specialized cohort platform.
• You need a traditional LMS for corporate training → Thinkific is often a better fit.

My recommended stack by business stage

Small-to-mid sized cohort business (1–10 cohorts/year):

Kajabi alone

Premium cohort + high-touch alumni network:

Kajabi + Circle

Academy model (multiple instructors/cohorts):

Disco + CRM/marketing stack

A few questions would change my recommendation:

1. How many learners per cohort (20, 100, 1,000+)?
2. Is this B2C creator education, professional training, or corporate/L&D?
3. Do alumni need networking (member profiles, groups, events), or mainly access to resources and future offers?

Given those three requirements, I’d pick Kajabi as the default—especially if the goal is to run the whole customer journey in one system rather than assemble a course platform plus separate marketing/community tools.

My ranking

Why Kajabi: it connects landing pages, opt-ins, email sequences, checkout, course access, automations, and community in the same ecosystem. Its community can be tied directly to offers and automations, so you can move someone from lead → pre-course nurture → cohort enrollment → course → alumni community → next offer without stitching together several systems. www.kajabi.com

For example, I'd build your funnel roughly like:

Lead magnet / application
→ 5–10 day pre-course email sequence
→ application or enrollment
→ automatic cohort-specific onboarding
→ course + cohort community
→ completion trigger
→ alumni community
→ ongoing alumni content / events / next cohort

When I'd choose LearnWorlds instead

If the educational experience itself is the product, I'd seriously consider LearnWorlds over Kajabi.

Its current automation engine is particularly strong for learner journeys: triggers, delays, branches, exit conditions, enrollment actions, tagging, emails, and community-space assignment. It also explicitly supports cohort-style courses and built-in communities. support.learnworlds.com

So I'd use this rule:

• Marketing + enrollment + community + monetization first → Kajabi
• Cohort pedagogy + learner management + sophisticated training workflows first → LearnWorlds
• Course delivery with a relatively conventional marketing stack → Thinkific

One important distinction: don't choose based on "does it have a community?" All three can do that. The real question is whether you can automate the transition between stages of your customer lifecycle without resorting to Zapier and a separate CRM.

For what you described, Kajabi is the one I'd start with, unless your cohorts have unusually complex academic/training logic—in which case I'd test LearnWorlds head-to-head.

For cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni communities, I would usually pick Mighty Networks + a dedicated marketing automation layer — unless your business is primarily a high-volume course sales machine, in which case I’d lean Kajabi. www.mightynetworks.com

My shortlist:

My recommendation by business model

1. If you run high-touch cohorts (6–12 weeks, live calls, peer groups, alumni forever):
→ Mighty Networks

Your lifecycle could look like:

Lead magnet → application → acceptance → cohort space → live sessions → graduation → alumni membership → next offer

This is where community becomes part of the product, not just a support forum. www.mightynetworks.comwww.mightynetworks.com

2. If your priority is predictable acquisition funnels:
→ Kajabi

Example:

Ad/webinar → email nurture → sales page → checkout → course → upsell

Kajabi is stronger when the funnel itself is the growth engine. www.mightynetworks.com

3. If you are building a school/company with multiple cohorts per year:
I’d consider:

• Disco for cohort operations
• Mighty Networks for alumni/community
• or Kajabi + community integration if revenue operations matter most

The stack I’d personally deploy for a serious cohort business

• Mighty Networks — student experience + alumni network
• Kit or similar — lead nurturing and segmentation
• Stripe — payments
• Zoom — live sessions
• CRM (if B2B/high-ticket): HubSpot

If you expect hundreds of learners/year and alumni revenue, I’d bias toward Mighty. If you expect thousands of leads/month and aggressive paid acquisition, I’d bias toward Kajabi. www.mightynetworks.com

The deciding question is: is the community/alumni network part of what customers are paying for, or is it mainly a place to host the course? That usually determines the right platform.

Given those three requirements—cohort enrollment + automated pre-course funnels + an alumni community—I’d pick LearnWorlds.

My ranking

Why LearnWorlds: it has unusually strong integration between the marketing funnel and learning operations. Its automation engine can trigger multi-step journeys from enrollment, inactivity, progress, tags, etc., including automatically enrolling people into courses/programs. support.learnworlds.com

Its funnel functionality also supports lead capture, course sales, webinars, upsells and cross-sells, so your pre-course experience doesn't have to live in a separate marketing system. support.learnworlds.com

And importantly for you, community is native to the learning environment, rather than being an external Circle/Facebook-style destination. www.learnworlds.com

The workflow I'd build

Lead → application/interest → pre-course nurture → cohort enrollment → onboarding → cohort experience → graduation → alumni community → next offer

For example:

1. Lead capture
   • Landing page + lead magnet
   • Segment by program/cohort interest

2. Automated pre-course funnel
   • Email sequence
   • Application/qualification
   • Webinar or orientation
   • Enrollment deadline reminders
   • Automatically assign the appropriate cohort/course

3. Cohort
   • Scheduled/dripped curriculum
   • Live sessions
   • Cohort-specific groups/spaces
   • Progress-based nudges

4. Graduation
   • Completion trigger
   • Certificate
   • Alumni invitation
   • Follow-up survey/testimonial request

5. Alumni
   • Persistent community
   • Separate spaces for cohorts/topics
   • Continuing education
   • Upsells into advanced programs

That last transition is particularly important: you're not just buying an LMS—you want the customer lifecycle to remain connected after the course ends.

When I'd choose Kajabi instead

I'd pick Kajabi if your business is primarily a creator/marketing business and the course is essentially the product being sold through sophisticated marketing funnels. Kajabi has strong native pipelines, email automation, checkout, upsells and community, all tied to course behavior. www.kajabi.com

So:

• Education/cohort-program business → LearnWorlds
• Marketing/creator business that happens to sell courses → Kajabi

When I'd choose Thinkific

Thinkific is probably the strongest alternative if cohort learning + community are the center of the experience. It supports self-paced, scheduled and cohort courses, and its Communities can be sold separately, bundled with courses, or connected to particular course enrollments. www.thinkific.com

Its funnel capability exists too, but I'd give LearnWorlds the edge for the particular combination of funnel → automation → enrollment → learning journey you're describing. support.thinkific.com

Bottom line: I'd start with LearnWorlds and only move to Kajabi if your acquisition/marketing machine is substantially more important than the learning experience.

If you tell me your expected cohort size, price point, whether cohorts are application-based, and whether you currently use HubSpot/ConvertKit/ActiveCampaign/Circle, I can narrow this down to the exact platform + plan I'd buy.

For your use case — cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni communities — I would pick based on whether your business is primarily a community-led education business or a marketing-led course business.

My shortlist:

circle.socircle.so

My pick: Circle + a strong email/CRM layer (for your exact description)

Because you specifically mentioned alumni communities, I would optimize for the relationship after graduation, not just enrollment.

A model I’d build:

Pre-course

• Lead magnet / webinar / application funnel
• Automated nurture sequence
• Cohort acceptance + onboarding emails
• Calendar + orientation space

During course

• Cohort classroom
• Live sessions
• Peer networking
• Accountability groups

After course

• Alumni hub
• Job/networking groups
• Continuing education
• Paid membership tier
• Events and mastermind offers

Circle is designed around combining courses, community, events, and memberships in one environment. circle.socircle.so

When I would choose Maven instead

If your business is primarily:

• 4–8 week cohort programs
• high-ticket professional education
• instructor-led experiences
• application-based admissions
• frequent launches

…I’d seriously consider Maven. It has cohort-specific workflows, including enrollment funnels, automated emails, student portals, and community features. help.maven.com

Maven is probably the cleaner choice if your team says: “We run cohorts every quarter and want the software to think like a cohort operator.”

When I would choose Kajabi instead

Pick Kajabi if your priority is:

• paid ads → funnel → checkout → upsell
• evergreen courses
• email automation
• selling multiple products
• minimizing your tech stack

Kajabi is very strong for integrated marketing funnels, automation, payments, and course delivery. www.kajabi.com

My ranking for your stated needs

1. Circle — best long-term learner ecosystem
2. Maven — best cohort operating system
3. Kajabi — best sales/marketing machine

A fourth option many education companies use is a hybrid:

• Kajabi for acquisition + payments
• Circle for alumni/community
• Zapier/Make for syncing

If you expect hundreds or thousands of alumni, I’d lean Circle. If you expect high-ticket cohorts with admissions and a facilitator-led experience, I’d lean Maven. If you expect a creator business selling many products, I’d lean Kajabi.

Given those three requirements together—cohort enrollment + automated pre-course funnel + alumni community—I’d pick Circle, specifically its Business tier.

Why:

Why Circle gets my vote

1. It treats the community as part of the course, not an add-on.
Circle lets you combine scheduled courses with discussions, events, live sessions, messaging, and memberships. It explicitly supports cohorts and ongoing community experiences. circle.so

2. The automation is now substantial enough for your funnel.
Circle Business includes Workflows, which can trigger actions based on audience/member conditions, apply tags, grant access, send marketing emails, and automate member journeys. help.circle.so

That means you can build something like:

Lead → application → accepted → pre-course sequence → cohort space → course → alumni space → re-enrollment/upsell

without stitching together a separate LMS + community + automation platform.

3. Alumni is where Circle really separates itself.
I'd structure the community as:

• Prospects — webinar/application/pre-course material
• Cohort 1 / Cohort 2 / etc. — private spaces
• Alumni — permanent community
• Events — office hours, alumni sessions, reunions
• Advanced/paid programs — optional private spaces

So when someone finishes a cohort, you're not sending them away to a Facebook/Slack/Discord group. They simply transition into the alumni layer.

The caveat: Kajabi

If by "funnel" you mean serious direct-response marketing—multiple landing pages, sophisticated email sequences, offers, upsells, segmentation, etc.—I'd choose Kajabi instead.

Kajabi has particularly strong automation around funnels, forms, email sequences, offers and course behavior, and it now supports true cohort-based courses with scheduled content and live sessions. help.kajabi.com

So my decision rule would be:

Community/alumni is the strategic asset → Circle.
Marketing funnel is the strategic asset → Kajabi.

For the model you described, I'd lean Circle ~70/30 over Kajabi, because the alumni community makes this more than a conventional "sell a course" funnel.

If you tell me roughly (a) cohort size, (b) price point, (c) whether applicants need to be approved, and (d) whether you're selling B2C or B2B, I can map the exact funnel and recommend the specific platform/plan.

For your specific mix—cohort enrollments + automated pre-course funnels + alumni community—I’d pick Thinkific.

My ranking

Why Thinkific: it has become unusually well aligned with this exact lifecycle. It supports scheduled/cohort courses, live lessons, prerequisites and learning paths, while its Communities can be attached to courses, bundles, groups or memberships—or sold separately. www.thinkific.com

The particularly important piece for you is Thinkific Funnels: it can create journeys for lead generation, nurturing, sales and enrollment rather than requiring you to bolt a separate funnel system onto the LMS. support.thinkific.com

I'd structure it roughly like:

Lead magnet → automated nurture → application/enrollment → pre-course onboarding → cohort course → alumni community → ongoing membership/next cohort

And the alumni piece can be genuinely integrated: Thinkific lets you package a community as a standalone product, bundle it with a course, or make it part of a membership. support.thinkific.com

When I'd choose Circle instead

If the alumni community is actually the heart of the business, I'd choose Circle instead.

Circle is exceptionally strong at combining courses, discussions, events, memberships, email, payments and workflows. Its workflows can, for example, automatically place new members into the appropriate cohort/space, send messages, and re-engage inactive members. circle.so

So I'd use this rule:

• Education/cohort delivery is the core product → Thinkific
• Community/network/alumni relationship is the core product → Circle
• Marketing funnel is the core differentiator → Kajabi

For what you described, Thinkific is my first choice, with Circle as the strongest alternative.

If you tell me roughly (1) cohort size, (2) price of the program, (3) whether enrollment is application-based, and (4) whether alumni are free or paid, I can map the exact funnel/workflow I'd build in Thinkific vs. Circle and tell you which one I'd actually buy.