Summary: In this blog you will understand what the sales funnel is and how it works.
What are the 3 stages that a prospect commonly goes through in their purchasing process.
How you should create content and strategies for each of these stages of the purchasing process.
What is and how does a sales funnel work?
It is common to find yourself with conversion rates that are too small despite having made a great effort to attract contacts, since not all users go from the first stage of the funnel to the last. See how to convert more contacts into sales.
Understanding what the sales funnel is and how it works
The sales funnel, also called: sales funnel, marketing funnel or sales funnel, is the process in which sales opportunities are qualified and selected to turn them into real opportunities that end in sales.
The sales funnel allows you to know at what level the users are in their purchase path.
What content to create for each of the stages?
Know how to take them from one stage to another
Make all Marketing, Sales and Customer Service efforts well directed
Identify at which stages you need to double efforts or change strategy
Which actions and channels are working and which are not
To get the most out of the funnel and take the user from the first to the last stage, we will divide it into three sections:
The 3 Stages of the Sales Funnel
First Stage TOFU (Top of the funnel):
In this first stage, the criteria under which the purchase decision will be made will be defined. In this stage the purchase process begins and it is where we can help potential customers to define under which criteria they are going to buy.
- Here the company should not sell any product to users, on the contrary it should offer help and support. Any intention to sell a product will cause the user to abandon our content. At this stage we can include free products and/or services for users such as ebooks, shopping checklists, webinars or free courses.
- The responsibility for this stage falls mainly on the marketing team, although there may be co-responsibility with the customer service team.
Second Stage MOFU (Middle of the funnel):
In this stage of the purchase funnel, the future buyer will explore all the existing purchase options in the market that meet the purchase criteria defined in the first stage, if the prospect was identified from the beginning of the purchase process. we will help at this stage to define the criteria and now the job is to show you that we meet those criteria.
- This is where the company has to work on its Inbound Marketing strategy and convince it that they meet the parameters under which the category of products and/or services they are looking to buy is purchased. Some of the content alternatives are: troubleshooting guides or a course tailored to your needs.
- This stage is about building trust and credibility with the user.
- The responsibility is shared between the marketing and sales team.
Third Stage BOFU (Bottom of the funnel):
This is the last phase of the conversion funnel, since our potential client is already about to make a decision. At this time, our sales team has to be in charge of convincing the client to buy our product. Free courses and specialized webinars are some of the main incentives to convert leads.
- At this stage all efforts culminate. It is important to bear in mind that during this stage, customers are evaluating your alternative or even comparing it with that of the competition, so the work of convincing must be done here.
- This work falls mainly on the sales area, although supported by the marketing team.
As we can see, each stage has specific objectives and needs until users become customers, which is when they reach the end of the funnel, later this becomes more of a circle in which the cycle would have to start over, since it is more easy for a customer to buy from you again, to get a new customer. Here, a good job from the Customer Service team is necessary so that users feel satisfied with the before, during and after the sale, and then return.
Create content and strategies for each of the stages
Once the operation and structure of the sales funnel has been clarified, it is important to define what type of content and strategies to carry out in each of the stages to achieve conversion and not stay only in likes, thousands of visits to the website or downloads endless materials.
Content and Communication Channels for the 1st TOFU Stage of the Sales Funnel
In this stage we will use ads to generate traffic to the content that helps define the purchase criteria. The main channels are social networks and display campaigns and search network on Google.
Avoid using messages like: “buy now”, “buy today”, when the user does not even know you. Some of the materials you can use are:
- blog posts
- Check list
- ebooks
- User guides
- infographics
- Tutorial videos
- post
Another very important point to take into account at this stage of the cycle is:
A good segmentation. Quality is better than quantity.
Define your ideal buyer, to obtain the largest number of qualified prospects, since this will make it easier for you to continue taking them throughout the funnel and achieve a higher percentage of conversions. One of the objectives of generating content is to collect information to have criteria that allow you to contact and qualify your prospects, the idea is that with the valuable content you generate, you always ask for the data you need to be able to pre-qualify and later contact your prospects, never generate valuable content and don’t ask for anything in return.
Content and Communication Channels for the 2nd MOFU Stage of the Sales Funnel
At this stage we can also use social networks and Google, however the type of content and messages that we launch will not be the same as in the initial stage, since we must tell the user that we meet their selection criteria, we must also reinforce them, why? What are we a good option? How do we differ from the rest? why should you choose us?
Some of the content to use are:
- Interviews with industry specialists
- demo videos
- Market studies
- FAQ
- Guides with technical specifications
- Webinars
- Success stories
- Comparisons of your solution vs the competition
- Unboxings
In terms of strategy, at this stage remarketing strategies are very useful and practically mandatory, both on social networks and on Google, to reach customers who have already interacted with your company and who already know you. This avoids reaching customers cold, on the contrary, you reach customers who have already had interactions with your brand. This also makes it easy to “throw out”, at least for now, users who are not yet ready for the conversion stage, selecting only those who:
- Have visited a specific page on your website
- Have added products to the shopping cart
- They have made a call, requested a quote or visited your store
Content and Communication Channels for the 3rd BOFU Stage of the Sales Funnel
This is the time to convince the user to buy your product. This is where the most aggressive advertising and sales-directed CTAs come from.
This is the stage of completion of a sale and at the same time the stage of beginning with the client, so you must fulfill the task of: sale and loyalty.
Make demos of your product, give away trial periods or free samples, use retargeting with users who have completed actions closer to conversion. Use social networks, Google, mailings, calls or any other means that takes you directly to the potential client, remember that at this stage they already know you and also, they already know what they are looking for. Convince them!
Finally, the automation of the actions in the process will help you scale your business process and capitalize on the greatest possible number of sales opportunities. It is necessary to select an appropriate automation hub to achieve this, one of the most complete and with the best price ratio. Quality is Hubspot, however there are many alternatives on the market.
Do you want to go from likes to conversions?
Contact us, unlike traditional marketing agencies, we take care of the entire process of your sales funnel to achieve reach, engagement, interaction, conversions, and above all: close more sales.
Leaper Digital: is the digital marketing and e-commerce services agency, specialized in optimizing digital sales processes.
That gives you the security and guarantee of a sustainable increase in sales and profitability, investing efficiently in digital strategies.
Leaper Digital is certified by the leading digital companies specialized in optimizing the sales process, being a certified partner of HubSpot, Mercado Libre, Google, Facebook, among other market leaders.
