Stages of a Sales Funnel
A sales funnel can also be termed as a sales process, revenue funnel, or purchase funnel. A sales funnel can be defined as the journey that target buyers go through to make a purchase. The main aims of a sales funnel is to track the progress of your firm and educate your potential audience about your product or service. Your target customers will have in-depth information that allows them to make a sound purchasing decision. In addition, a sales funnel will improve your odds of maximizing sales and revenue because you’ll obtain concrete information about your clients. Based on research, there are several benefits of sales funnel: improve conversion rate, focus on the right audience, attract new leads, ranking and sorting leads, builds trust, and streamlines your digital marketing strategy.
Stages of a Sales Funnel
Before the top-most stage of the sales funnel, you should perform in-depth research about your potential clients and your firm’s main objective. Identify elements such as your brand values as well as qualities, skills, characteristics of your team. In addition, ensure you determine your brand’s personality. Gaining more knowledge about your firm will help you create a concrete foundation that’ll improve your relationship with customers. When determining your target audience, you should analyze and evaluate their problems as well as their solutions. The main aim of a customer is to maximize utility; therefore, your product should meet your client’s tastes and preferences. Below are the stages involved in a sales funnel.
1. Awareness
Awareness is the top-most stage of the sales funnel. The main aim of this stage is to improve your brand’s market share and drive targeted leads. In order to target the right audience, you should consider a large population of people. Targeting more people plays a significant role in driving organic and foot traffic. In addition, during the awareness stage, you should educate your potential customers about your product or service. Share relevant ideas and advice about your brand. There are numerous ways that’ll help you flourish in the awareness stage. They include the following:
– eBooks
– Search engine optimization
– Sponsored social media posts
– Webinars
– Infographics
– Independent research
Other ways include in-person events and videos. During the awareness stage, content should always be informative, fun, and interesting. In addition, you should add videos and photos to your content to capture the attention of your visitors. Creativity plays a great role in the awareness stage.
2. Interest and Evaluation
After converting your potential buyers from the awareness stage, they enter the second phase, which is termed interest and evaluation. At this juncture, you’ve your lead’s attention. Your potential buyers, at this point, are opting to find out more information about a certain question, concern, or idea. Note that at this stage, potential customers don’t have sufficient information that’ll help them make a purchase. The main objective of the interest and evaluation stage is to analyze and evaluate the tastes and preferences of your target audience. Build a strong relationship with your new leads. There are numerous ways that’ll help you prosper in the interest and evaluation stage. Some of these ways include:
– Free trials
– Blog posts
– Email campaigns
– Social media accounts
– Lead magnets
– Re-targeting campaigns
– Chat box
In order to track progress during the interest and evaluation stage, you should identify clicked links in the email campaigns as well as engaging social media posts. You can identify problems facing your target audience during this stage because they’ll react to your posts with their verdict. It’s important to follow up with your prospects, especially if they need more information about your product or service. Professionalism is key in this stage because clients want to associate with an expert who’s willing and ready to help.
Re-targeting campaigns can help you increase the traffic of potential clients who haven’t been converted in the awareness stage. You can either re-target your target customers through either Google Ads or Facebook. The transition between the third and second stages might not be clear as from the first stage to the second. Using the right strategies to educate your audience about your services and products, they’ll become more familiar with your offer. In addition, they’ll obtain more information about how you can solve their underlying problems.
3. Desire
At the desire stage, your targeted leads are full-blown prospects. This is because the potential buyers are interested in your service or product. Therefore, they are actually ready to make their first purchase. Note that, at this stage, you aren’t ready to close the deal. This is because your prospects aren’t sure if your product or service is the best solution to their underlying problems. During the desire stage, your prospects will determine your current business model, expected outcomes, and if the offer suits their budget. In the desire stage, include the following aspects:
– Consultations
– Testimonials
– Product comparisons
– Pricing pages
– Tutorials webinars and live demos
– Case studies
– Product recommendations and customer reviews
The main objective of the desire stage is to show prospects what to expect after a purchase.
4. Action
The action stage is the phase where you’ve nurtured your leads. In addition, this is the stage where you’ll convert your prospects into loyal customers. During this stage, you should provide your prospects with educational materials that’ll help them obtain adequate knowledge about the new solution to their problems. The content should include elements such as special offers, insider success tips, follow-up email campaigns, bundled packages, and product implementation. The first days can make or break a potential loyal customer. Therefore, you should be careful when dealing with customers or clients. For instance, don’t try to push an additional product or upsell.
5. Re-Engagement
The objective of a sales funnel is to convert prospects into loyal customers. At the re-engagement stage, you should ensure you use the best strategy to retain clients. Some key tips for re-engaging customers include the following:
– Live demonstrations
– Referral programs
– Re-engagement email campaigns
– Tutorials and product-specific webinars
Conclusion
The above-mentioned stages of the sales funnel will help you improve your sales and convert your targeted leads.