sales funnel

Have you ever imagined the journey your customers are going through before they end up making a purchase from your business? This buyer’s journey is mapped by a sales funnel. The sales funnel forms all the checkpoints at which your clients will engage with your business before they are ready to make a purchase.

Using the top-notch sales funnel, no matter what business you are in, can be key to getting a steady stream of happy clients. Here’s why: It allows you to find your perfect customers and create a long-term relationship with them so that they buy again and again. But knowing how to build a sales funnel is where many people struggle.

This is why we have curated a complete guide on the sales funnel from its stages to how to build it. So that no matter what kind of business you have, if there is a problem with your sales funnel you’ll be able to find the answer here.

Let’s begin.

What Is A Sales Funnel?

A sales funnel is a path that indicates where your prospect is in their buying journey, whether they have just become aware of your product/service or they are ready to become a paying customer. Moreover, it is a process that takes people from not knowing about you to becoming your customer. It consists of three parts: top, middle, and bottom.

• The top of the funnel is the marketing in which you attract your prospects through promotional or advertising activities (e.g., visiting a landing page of the EasyLeadz website).
• The middle of the funnel includes conversion like after becoming aware of your product, the customer starts inquiring about it or taking a demo of it (e.g., a prospect booking a demo of Mr. E tool with the sales professional of EasyLeadz).
• The bottom of the funnel is making a final purchase decision (e.g., a prospect making a payment for purchasing the annual growth plan of Mr. E).

Sales Funnel Example – EasyLeadz

EasyLeadz offers you phone numbers of the top management in one click via its tool Mr.E, the B2B Contact Database Provider.

Let’s dive right into EasyLeadz’s sales funnel.

Steps In The Sales Funnel:

1). Traffic: Newsletters, LinkedIn, or Blogs.

2). Homepage: EasyLeadz’s homepage has a decent background and does not interfere with the copy. There are clear CTAs to make sure of the conversion.

3). Pricing Section: There are three pricing tiers in their pricing section on the homepage: startup, scaleup, and growth. Also, a CTA along with them to install the extension.

Why The Sales Funnel Works?

Overall, EasyLeadz has a great design with a clean layout. Their message and services are really clear. You can easily learn more about it. They also have a strong lead magnet with a CTA to install their Mr.E extension. 

Importance Of A Sales Funnel

The sales funnel is the path that your prospects will take on the way to buy your product or service. Evaluating your sales funnel will help you understand where it provides results and where it does not. The other importance of building a sales funnel is that it will let you identify the holes in the various stages of your sales funnel (i.e., where prospects do not convert into customers).

It will also give insights into what clients are thinking and doing at each segment of the sales funnel so that you can invest accordingly in marketing activities that attract more prospects.

The Four Stages Of A Sales Funnel

The sales funnel has stages in it, and each stage of the funnel is designed to help you get closer to your goal of making a sale. There are four stages in a sales funnel:

1. Awareness or Attention
2. Interest
3. Desire
4. Action

Let’s break down exactly what happens at each stage of the sales funnel.

Stage 1: Awareness or Attention

The awareness or attention stage is at the top of the funnel. Its main purpose is to introduce the brand to the people for collecting leads. During this stage, you want to bring attention to your brand or business.

You can create awareness about your brand through sponsored social media posts, SEO, webinars, and infographics.  

Stage 2: Interest

Once a lead has been generated from the awareness stage, they enter the second stage of the sales funnel, i.e., Interest. At this stage, you have grabbed the lead’s attention and they want to know more about your brand.

The aim of this phase is to build a relationship with your new prospect to find what their end goals are.

Stage 3: Desire

Desire is the third stage of the sales funnel at which your lead has become a full-blown prospect. Now, at this point, they are considering to make a purchase but still are not 100% sure if your solution is the right fit for their needs. 

You can use testimonials, discount offers, customer reviews, live demos, or product comparisons for them to pull the trigger.

Stage 4: Action

The last stage of the sales funnel is the action where the action of purchasing happens, if your sales funnel works for you. After nurturing your prospect, finally you are ready to close the deal and convert them at this stage.

AIDA Model – Example

Suppose EasyLeadz – the B2B contact data provider company wants to skyrocket its sales. Then the AIDA approach for it to boost sales is like this:

Awareness or Attention: If you are looking for the contact numbers of decision-makers then you have landed at the right place, as Mr. E by EasyLeadz is here to provide you the contact numbers of decision-makers.

Interest: Business directories and local search engines charge a lot of money for business listings and contact details.

Desire: But with Mr. E, it is completely affordable. And if you compare it with any other websites, then Mr. E provides more data fields like direct phone number, email ID, company profile, etc.

Action: Contact us here to get more information about our product.

How To Build A Sales Funnel?

1). Build Foundation By Understanding Your Target Audience

You have to know your target audience before you start to build your sales funnel. You can perform competitor analysis or you can research on the following points to set a client persona:

• The problems they are looking solutions for
• Social media platforms they use
• Things that interest them the most

2). Create Your Buyer Persona

You can create different buyer personas targeting your marketing campaigns for the various segments of your prospects. Your buyer persons should be based on these questions:

• Why will they purchase your product/service?
• What will influence them to buy your product/service?
• How will their life become easy after purchasing your product/service?

3). Offer Something Valuable

You should offer something valuable to your prospects. Suppose, for the users to sign up, you must give them something in return. For example, on signing up, Easyleadz gives 5 free credits to its signed-up users.

Ultimately, this will generate leads organically.

4). Traffic Generation

If people are not aware of the products/services you sell, you will not able to sell. Thus, you need to make various lead generation strategies to drive users to your website.

You can run PPC campaigns or use social media marketing to generate traffic. 

5). Engage With Your Audience

It is really important to engage with your audience at the right timings. Remember, engagement at the right time will double your sales. As you generate a lead, contact them immediately. This will also put a positive impact on your prospects.

6). Lead Conversion

Lead conversion is the final step of a high converting sales funnel. At this phase, your prospects start converting into paying customers. While converting your leads, ensure that purchasing does not take too long.

Always keep in touch with your existing customers by thanking them for their purchases or offering them some discounts. 

Wrapping It Up

A sales funnel can help you better understand your customers, and allow you to develop an effective marketing campaign that turns leads into conversions. It will help you optimize your customer acquisition and conversion

To Use The Sales Funnel:

You begin with awareness and interest in the product, which leads to research and consideration of buying it; this is the Top of the funnel.

Next, prospects become aware of their need for your product or service in order to solve an existing problem they have in their business; this is the Middle of the Funnel.

Prospects then evaluate options available before making a decision based on price point and time spent researching various options; this is the Bottom of the Funnel.

We hope the information offered here will be beneficial for you. Happy Reading, Happy Selling!!