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Leads, as many sales as possible, and, implicitly, customers. Loyalty, popularity in the market. These are just some of the things to look for when setting up an online business. Regardless of the field of activity, it is important to be based on a sales funnel, i.e a well-established process through which to achieve your goals.
Not considering a proper sales funnel is like wanting to set up an online business without a plan. Therefore, we invite you to find out more about what a sales funnel is and what steps you can take during this process.
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The sales funnel – the ally that helps you increase your profit
Sales Funnel is the sum of all the actions you take in the online environment so as to attract traffic to your site and get leads, transform the database(leads) in customers and be able to retain those buyers in order to determine them to purchase your products or services on another occasion.
As it is a sales process, the Sales Funnel consists of 3 stages/steps that follow each other logically so that you can achieve your goals. Depending on the status of your site user, the funnel is divided as follows:
- ToFu (Top of the Funnel): is the top section of the funnel, ie the stage where you attract traffic and visitors to your website;
- MoFu (Middle of the Funnel): the middle section of the funnel, the stage in which your site visitors turn into leads;
- BoFu (Bottom of the Funnel): the lower section of the funnel, the stage at which leads turn into customers.
Although, in theory, the Sales Funnel is a logical representation of the stages that visitors go through until they reach the stage of buyers, in practice, their actions are different and do not necessarily respect this order. However, it is important to establish concrete steps to persuade site users to act as they wish.
Therefore, you will further discover ways/strategies that you can implement in each stage of the sales funnel.
How do I apply the Sales Funnel to my business?
For starters, set the final goal you want to reach, which is to consider the last section of the funnel, BoFu. That is the endpoint where you get buyers, so it is crucial to know in advance what goal you want to achieve.
But be careful not to set a much too general goal, such as “as many customers as possible.” As beautiful as it sounds, this is not a measurable goal.
Consequently, it will be difficult for you to pursue such a goal over time. For this reason, our recommendation is to set goals that are as specific as possible, measurable, and that you can evaluate on a monthly basis.
Now that we’ve clarified this, let’s see exactly what you can do in each stage of the sales funnel.
#1 ToFu
Every visitor to your site or reader of your blog posts learns about your products or services due to the promotion methods you use, i.e traffic sources. Why is it important to know exactly where those people are coming from?
Because in this way you know exactly which methods work and bring you the most visitors and which are the traffic sources that need improvement or need to be eliminated from your strategy.
Some examples of traffic sources you can use are:
- paid ads: Facebook Ads and Google Ads;
- posts on social networks;
- online catalogs or ebooks.
#2 MoFu
Depending on the set goal and the type of your business (site for selling products or services), there are various options that you can implement. Among the most common actions are:
- PDF guides / ebooks;
- landing pages; discount codes;
- promotions;
- the forms for requesting an offer.
More specifically, if at this moment you want to convince your users to purchase a certain service for which you have just created an offer, then you can choose to create a sales page dedicated to that offer. There you will explain in as much detail as the service and the offer in question, what are the advantages and of course, the benefits for the future buyer.
At the same time, you can write a dedicated article on the blog in which to inform your readers about the new offer and in which to insert the link to the sales page to encourage people to find out more details.
In the event that you have a limited stock of products or liquidation of stock, it is important to display such a message as visible as possible on your site to encourage visitors to move on to the next stage and buy. Also, if you have certain discounts for orders that exceed a certain amount or at certain times of the year, do not forget to insert them on the site.
The more visible they are, the greater the chances that users will consider purchasing products.
Whatever method you intend to apply, don’t forget to increase your email database, as a consistent list of personal data (leads) helps you to notify potential buyers about your offers or promotions or to and persuade them to leave you their contact details.
#3 BoFu
And we have reached the much-desired stage. As in the previous step, the actions you can opt for differ depending on the type of site: whether it is an online store or a website presenting services.
In the case of e-commerce, people need one last incentive once they reach the order completion form so that they can click on the button that ends the action. For example, this may be a pop-up message giving the person a 10% discount if they close the order or maybe a 15% discount for people who are your regular customers (because here we are already talking about the process of their loyalty).
For businesses that offer services, you can choose to offer free consulting to people so that they can decide which of the packages of offers you have suited them. Or you can give them a certain bonus if this is the first time they use your services.
Other methods that you can apply depending on the context are webinars, case studies or even demos (especially for applications).
I understood the theory. What do I do next?
Okay, now that you’ve learned all this information about the sales funnel, it’s time to do a little recap to know exactly what it’s best to do from now on.
Whether you are at the beginning of the road or have been active for a long time, make sure you apply a sales funnel. Analyze exactly which of the methods we talked about you apply and which not, and what other actions you can implement in the near future.
At the same time, examine the results of your actions and decide if there are any methods that are worth using in the future.
And last but not least, set your SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, accessible, relevant, and time-bound goals.
Conclusion
I hope that all these recommendations are useful for your future actions and that you will carry out everything you set out to do.
And last tip: If you are looking to have your own online business, take a look to EPROLO, and let me know how it works!
