Do you need a Funnel?
You’ve had a website for years. And like many sites, its kind of an online brochure. It’s got your company profile, address, product line and contact information for your sales rep. Its also got some nice shots of your staff, your offices, the factory and the entire management team.
What it may not have however, is a good method for turning interested potential customers into actual customers.
The way people use websites and what we expect from them, has changed.
Brochure-style websites are no longer good enough. Nowadays more than more than 75% of people research businesses online before they ever call, email or visit your location. Your site has information about you and your products but it probably doesn’t deliver that info in a customer-centric way; anticipating their needs and delivering content in the way they’d likely ask for it.
Unless you’ve created an effective funnel-style, a visit to your site is just that. A visit.
Your potential customer may have been weeks away from making a decision and by the time they do, they’ve likely forgotten all about you and your products.
Your website can do more.
It can become a part of your sales process and move potential customers from merely “aware” to informed and interested, ultimately ending with an enquiry or a sale.
So, do I toss my site and get a ClickFunnels site?
Hold on. ClickFunnels (and others like it) are web-based funnel-builders. They simplifies the process of creating funnels but because they’re closed systems, the sites you build there aren’t portable. Meaning you can’t move your site to another host down the road if your needs change. You’ll have to start all over again.
The good news is that you can create funnel sites using standard web page building software. Without the locked in platform and hefty monthly fees. Funnels are a methodology not a website replacement.
Funnel-style sites are process-oriented.
The process looks like combining seo-driven content with strategic social posts and paid ads to drive traffic to a landing page. At the landing page they get something free as an enticement for providing their contact details. Users are then added to mailing lists and segmented into specific sub-audiences which are drip-fed additional sales-oriented emails over the following weeks or months.
I’m sure you’ve experienced them.
It’s a great strategy, especially for pricier products and services as the ongoing email chain allows for longer dialogs. Via the ongoing emails you can help potential customers learn what they need to know in order to make a purchase. You can “educate them into” a sale.
When discussing your potential value to a customer can’t be reduced to simple sound bites, a funnel-fed drip email campaign can turn mild interest into strong desire and allow you to justifying your pricing by explaining your value.
How Do You Incorporate a Funnel Into Your Site?
The first step is to define then goals you have for your site. What do you want or expect visitors to do? What are their typical objections and concerns? Your sales funnel will attempt to tackle them all like an automated salesman.
To determine a strategy for your funnel, you’ll need to:
- Identify the characteristics of your ideal customer. You need to understand their needs, frustrations, and the selling points that matter most to them
- Identify where your ideal customers hang out online to determine your traffic and lead generation tactics. You may, for example, (ex: SEO, Google AdWords, Social Media, etc.)
- Develop an initial free offer to attract people to your sales funnel. Your giveaway could be an eBook, a cheat sheet or template, a free trial, a video training or whatever you can deliver as a dwonload
- Create additional content to help nurture leads and turn potential customers into actual customers. This could take tthe form of a newsletter, blog posts, webinars etc.
- Then identify closing strategies to prompt website viewers to act. For example, a limited time offer, a one-time discount, special packages, sales calls, etc.
The initial setup can take quite a while as you try to develop seo-driven content. And depending on the site and your sales process, you may even need to recreate or at rebuild your site to better align with your customers thought process. But the beauty of this is that once it’s set up, you’ve got a system for automated sales follow ups and customer nurturing.
Now you can spend your time strategizing and developing new products instead of answering email enquiries and chasing leads. Interested people will be added to your list and marketing messages will flow automatically.
I”d love to help you transition to a sales funnel style site. Just reach out and let’s discuss it.
