The beginner’s guide to sales funnels: For the online business
As business owners, we aren’t all conditioned to love selling. When it comes to the word “selling” or “sales”, according to research, most people associate negative words around those two words.
But what if sales and creating sales funnels in your business can be EASY? Well, you are in for a TREAT! On the poddy, I had the amazing Taylor Rae come on to talk all about sales funnels and how they can be a sacred and beautiful process easily implemented into your business to serve YOU and YOUR clients!
If you find value in this blog, make sure you share it with me on LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram! Even better, share it with your audience! You can also listen to the episode below!
Before we get stuck into the content, it is important to remind you that whatever limiting beliefs or mindset you have around selling, you must identify what these are. Then as a constant reminder, remind yourself, for people to get your help and for you to serve the right people, you need to sell! It is all about finding what methods work for you!
Listen below!
What are sales funnels?
For those who are thinking, but what are sales funnels? A sales funnel is used to serve you and your audience. It isn’t a service that is “icky” and it is all about the process of nurturing your audience so they continue to buy from you and continue to get your value!
Keeping your current clients helps you to continue to take them on your journey (see below), but it also helps you to continue to generate new clients as you become confident and comfortable in what you offer.
When it comes to selling and a sales funnel, it is all about focussing on the solution and the end goal for the client. Once you focus on that, it is more of serving your clients rather than you feeling like asking for money all the time.
A sales funnel is the journey you take your audience on in order to work with you or buy what you are offering and of course, you can do this in a number of ways!
The different types of sales funnels
There are many different sales funnels. There is no right or wrong one to use, what you need to remember is, choose the ones that feel good for you! Choose the ones you can implement and feel confident about! Of course, you can use more than one, but if you feel overwhelmed or confused, choose one and do it really well!
During the podcast, Taylor took us through the different types of sales funnels, which she has named after crystals (which is amazing).
These include:
Moonstone funnel: this is a sales liquidating funnel. So for example, using a lead magnet to process your clients into an upsell or email sequence to progress them to buy.
Selenite funnel: this could look like a x3 part training funnel where you give away a free training and then launch something off the back of that. This is about building the momentum, providing the value and selling off the back of that!
Opalite funnel: webinar funnel, this can turn into an evergreen as well! Again this could be a masterclass or a training where you sell your offer off the back of the training!
Celadonite funnel: a membership style funnel. You might do a free trial for the membership and then encourage people to continue on with you. Think of the 30 day free trial with Netflix.
Citrine funnel: this could look like an application for your high ticket. People opt-in for the application and of course you offer the discovery call off the back of the application. Nurture them through the application process and then close the deal over the phone. The important thing with the application process is the more information you give the shorter the call will be!
How much EASIER do these now seem?
Setting up the sales funnel
One thing you should remember when setting up a sales funnel is, make sure you automate it AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. Set it up so you don’t have to do all the manual labour every time someone buys from you. Yes, it might take time to begin with, but once it is done, you will be selling while you sleep!
Think about the customer experience! Say they buy from you from overseas and you send out the “thanks for buying, here is the next steps” email manually. They then have to wait for YOU to get the confirmation. Now that isn’t ideal.
Here are some amazing tips on how to get started setting up your funnels:
Sit down and map out the customer journey - think about what can be automatic
Set up a Google Doc of the emails and onboarding emails etc. get all the content out on your document
Invest the time into setting it up (you can even hire someone to help you)
Have a cart and make it safe for people to purchase (think about when you purchase, what makes you trust the person you are buying from?)
What do you have that you can automate more for purchase? Get these to work for you!!
Pretend your customer doesn't know you, map it out like they have 0 idea who you are and how you can help
Taking the time to map it out will save you time in the future!! If you have been in business for a while and don’t have anything like this, DON’T stress! You are where you are meant to be and this can all be fixed!
Tips for automating your sales funnel
Okay, so when it comes to setting up the automation for your sales funnel, here are a few tips for you:
Have a host platform for sales pages etc (think Squarespace, Kajabi, Kartra, Wix - whatever one works for you)
Have a check out process (Some of these sites have them integrated, if not you can easily find a platform that can serve as your cart, think Thrive Cart, Shopify etc)
Have the “fulfilment” element. Ask yourself, how are people getting what they purchased? Are they getting access to a FB group, a portal like Podia or Kartra?
Follow up - how will you continue to nurture these customers? Are you using an email service like Flo Desk or MailChimp to set out updates?
Think about the customer journey and make it as easy and seamless as possible. This will also evolve and change! Always review this journey!! If you have a few platforms and they don’t integrate on their own, use services like Zapier to help you! Zapier is like the safety pin, holding your systems together so they work!
When it comes to investing, think about this. If you have a brick and mortar shop, you would have to say for a LOT of overheads! In your online business, the overheads are SO much less expensive. But it is important to make these purchases to make it a better experience for your clients!
What if I feel overwhelmed with sales funnels?
REMEMBER, this is just the story you are telling yourself. Overwhelm is just something you have made up yourself. Choose one of the sales funnels listed above that works for you and then implement it. Have the systems to help you and take your time to set it up.
You don’t have to have it ALL set up right away. Take your time to get it done so it works for you!
When it comes to selling courses or content to your audience. Have the offer there and then create off the back of the purchases or interest to the course! Then you can turn things into passive income to help your business and to help your audience to have access to you!!
Remember, you are serving your audience and if you don’t make the offers, they won’t be able to get your help or your value!!
Final thoughts
How do you feel about sales funnels now?? Come over to IG and tell me!! Here are the things you need to remember:
Sales funnels are here to serve you and your customers, cut the limiting beliefs around them! They are the journey you take your audience on so they buy and continue to buy from you. It is all about nurturing the people you have!
There are many different ways you can implement sales funnels into your business. You don’t have to do them all, pick the one that resonates with you and seamlessly implement it into your business (see above for the ones Taylor mentions in the podcast)!
It is all about having the right platforms and automating as much as possible. This gives off an amazing customer experience (even get people you know to test this). Remember, not everyone knows you, so create it for someone who might not 100% know how amazing you are!
You are not available for overwhelm. Take your time setting up these funnels and remember, if you feel overwhelmed, all you have to do is choose one sale funnel and implement it!!
If you found value in this blog, make sure you share it with me on LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram! Even better, share it with your audience! You can also listen to the episode below!