Creating an Effective Sales Funne
Have you ever been on the Tornado Funnel Ride at a theme park like Six Flags? I haven’t because, well, I’m a big weenie when it comes rides. But to look at it, you can understand how a funnel works. The opening is big and then as it gets smaller you go around faster and eventually you fall through the hole.
What is a Sales Funnel?
The Tornado Funnel Ride is a good visual of how your sales funnel works. It starts out with a wide net such as people visiting your website with no commitment to buy. Then a smaller percentage of those show some interest in what you sell and start exploring your website to learn more about your products and/or services. Then a smaller percentage of those will find something really yummy that they just gotta have and they head to your checkout to buy. Bada-bing-bada-boom!
Easy-peasy right? Well, not necessarily in the digital world. It’s hard to captivate your leads when visitors land on your website, because there are so many options and distractions on the internet. Just a click of a button will send them on their way to the next shiny object.
Have you been successful with your own sales funnel? Would love to get some tips from you! Comment below.
Benefits of a Sales Funnel
The sales funnel is more than a conversion tool. Sales Funnel Marketing Expert, Zenovia Andrews, CEO ofMaxOutGroup and a Strategic Partner of the eWomenNetwork Digital Marketing team, says the marketing funnel is a tool that helps you visualize the buyer’s journey. Using Google Analytics will help you determine what part of your sales funnel is working and where the pitfalls lie.
First, you need to decide on your goal. What do you want your leads to do? For example, as Kissmetricsexplains, “You may want to track newsletter signup (Viewing newsletter signup form > Submitting form > Confirming email) or a simple page conversion (Viewing a signup page > Submitting signup).”
5 Steps to Creating an Effective Sales Funnel
As you can see, a funnel is not just about sales. In fact, Zenovia Andrews says when you create a funnel, don’t sell. Instead offer value in your sales funnel. Both Andrews and Margaret Croom, Director of Digital Marketing for eWomenNetwork, recommends the following 5 steps for creating an effective sales funnel. Notice, they all start with a goal.
What a day it was yesterday - such a big day for us!
1. Awareness
Goal: To show the value of your product or service, provide educational content and build a relationship with your subscriber.
Do: Educate, be helpful.
Don’t: Sell, give specific details of your products/services too much, try to get your subscribers to purchase.
2. Consideration
Goal: To build a deeper relationship with your subscriber, introduce them to your product/service & nurture them with contextual or targeted content.
Do: Provide educational content tailored to your subscriber, deliver content that is product specific, be helpful.
Don’t: Be too salesy, send content that isn’t applicable to your subscriber.
3. Conversion
Goal: To convince your subscriber to purchase.
Do: Talk about the benefits of your product/service, show off your product/service, offer discounts & promotions to convince subscribers to purchase, create a sense of urgency to compel subscribers to purchase right away.
Don’t: Overwhelm subscribers with sales assets & sales calls.
4. Loyalty
Goal: To retain your customers and instill loyalty by delighting subscribers with helpful content and awesome service.
Do: Give helpful information, send educational content relevant to your customers.
Don’t: Stop interacting with your customers or adding value.
5. Advocacy
Goal: To turn your customers into fans who talk about your company and refer you to their friends.
Do: Connect with your loyal customers, keep delighting your customers with awesome content and service.
Don’t: Forget about your customers.
Automation is Your Friend: Utilizing Automation to Build Your Digital Presence
Once you understand the 5 steps, it’s time to automate! After all, keeping up with your sales funnel can be daunting.
Have you heard of Hootsuite and Tweetdeck? Those are examples of automation tools … some of the first we used to organize ourselves on social media. When it comes to email sales funnels it’s important to engage with your customer. You need to know how you would respond when someone doesn’t open your email, when they open it and don’t respond, when they open it and click on a link but don’t buy and when they open it and click on a link and DO buy. What would you say to each of these types of situations? Well, you can plan your response and have your automation tool respond for you! You can use online software that allows you to automate repetitive tasks, reduce human error, manage complexity and measure and optimize your efforts.
For example, InfusionSoft is the top-tier email marketing tool that allows you to create extensive auto-responders. Many of the email marketing softwares offer auto-responding as well, just not as extensively. You decide your needs and automate away!
This is just a tip of the iceberg. If you want help creating your own effective sales funnel, click here.
Author and Curator of Fabulous Content,
Phyllis Smith, Content Manager
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