What is Marketing Funnel? How Do They Work?

What is a Marketing Funnel?

Marketing is a process and an industry that has grown and developed over the last few years as brands and businesses have grown and the industry has become more centred around developing marketing tactics to draw customers in and lead them to make a purchase. The process is one that has recently begun to centre more around the customer, finding out how their experience with your brand and the tactics you use relates to a product being purchased or the desired action being completed. A marketing funnel centres around the idea of displaying the process in a graphic way, highlighting a customers journey from their first interaction with your brand until they have made a purchase. 

The reason that this graphic is called a funnel is because it is exactly that, and it aims to show how the customer process is funnelled into them making a purchase, highlighting each of the steps and processes that a customer goes through when interacting with your brand. The reason why this graphic is displayed as a funnel is because you are definitely not going to convert each and every one of your potential customers, as some may not be interested in what you have to offer. The funnel represents your audience getting smaller as you make your way through the stages. 

Understanding these different systems and having an idea of what kinds of digital marketing funnel tactics have the best possibility of resulting in a lead or purchase will better equip marketers with the tools and information they need to design the best possible marketing campaign! Marketing funnels are also geared towards helping your marketing tactics remain organised, with specific processes and steps outlined to directly or indirectly lead to an increase in sales! Having these systems organised and displayed within a graphic will outline exactly what each step of the process needs to entail. The process will consist of having a marketing funnel template that is then geared towards the specific stages that your unique company has with regards to the products that they sell and the methods they use to do so. 

What Are the Different Types of Funnels?

There are a number of different types of marketing funnels, though the idea for each of them is the same; to increase the number of conversions that a marketing tactic produces. The overall idea is that each different tactic uses a different way to increase sales and conversions through specific planning and analysis. Each of the different types of funnels will have different marketing funnel content and stages involved in each, though the final goal is the same for each one! The following are just a few of the best types of marketing funnels to consider using to increase the number of sales your brand or business gets! 

Sales Funnels

One of the most popular kinds of marketing funnels are sales funnels and they are there to convert people who visit your web page or come into your store into customers who make a purchase. These kinds of funnels are centred around processes that convince a person that your product is suited to them and that they should buy it. Every step of the sales funnel process, from the first interaction with your brand until a sale has been made, is centred around convincing a person that you are selling something that they need or something that will improve their quality of life. Sales funnels are often included in the below funnels as more often than not, your funnel will be centred around convincing someone to make a purchase or complete the desired action. Sales funnels can be included and used in a variety of different ways and through using different types of tactics. 

Webinar Funnels

A webinar funnel helps to strengthen the ability of a webinar to convert hosting one of these webinars and convert those who see and listen to it into leads. Webinar funnels are centred around looking at how to host this type of video and look into what content would generate the most amount of traffic, and how this traffic can be converted into actual sales. Many companies use webinars as a tactic to draw in potential customers as they offer the opportunity to interact with a large customer base easily, with many people being able to join in and listen to what your offers are and how they can help you. 

Email Funnels

Email funnels are centred around converting emails into sales, with the idea centring around businesses interacting with their customers through these channels. Email funnels are structured a bit differently compared to other funnels and they are often centred around people subscribing or following on to a website through the email itself. Having potential customers subscribe to an email channel ensures that they are interested in learning more about a product and are happy to hear what you have to say and potential offers that you come up with. One of the most important things to consider when it comes to email marketing is that it needs to be something that is frequent enough to remind potential customers of who you are and what you sell. Email funnels that are not used frequently enough will not be effective, and potential customers will be lost. 

Video Marketing Funnels

Business videos can be very beneficial and a video marketing funnel analyses how well this kind of video will be received by an audience. Video marketing funnels are important because you want to make sure that this expensive marketing tactic reaches the maximum number of people and results in the maximum amount of conversions. 

Lead Magnet Funnels

Lead magnet funnels are campaigns that look to generate as much high-quality traffic as possible, targeting people who are more than likely going to purchase a product or service. This type of marketing funnel is very useful, as it targets those who you think will be interested as opposed to going through wider network channels. Thi9s ensures that money is not wasted through funnels that go to people who would not be interested in a specific product. One example of this could be that a makeup supplier only targets women, as men would more than likely not be interested in purchasing this kind of product. 

Home Page Funnels

Every website will have a home page that introduces a customer to who a brand is and what they do. These homepages provide vital information to potential customers about what kind of experience they would have with a brand and how they can work to help you or supply you with a product. A home page funnel refers to a type of funnel that works on the basis of converting your home page into a lead funnel, whereby customers have actual information about certain products or services offered. This works to ensure that as soon as a person is taken to a website they are immediately filtered into the funnel, and will slowly make their way through the different stages which will hopefully result in a purchase. This funnel is a great way to grab a user’s attention from the get-go. 

What Can You Use a Marketing Funnel For?

Marketing funnels are designed to simplify the customer journey and help marketers better understand the processes that lead to conversions of sales. Marketing funnels are an important part of the marketing process and they are designed to ensure that the customer journey, from when they first become aware of the product to after they have made a purchase, is one that results in a large number of sales. Not having a marketing funnel can lead to brands and businesses not being aware of ways that they can better structure their processes to ensure a customer has the best possible interaction with a brand and that they are equipped with all the necessary information for them to purchase an item or complete an action. 

Is it Important to Use The Marketing Funnel?

Yes, it is becoming more and more important that marketing funnels be used and implemented across marketing strategies. As the competition between brands and businesses grows and more products become available that could be similar to your own, it is important that you give your business the best possible shot at converting every lead into a sale. Marketing funnels help to streamline and organise the process, finding inaccuracies and offering ways for you to fix them before they lose you sales. 

What are The Benefits of a Marketing Funnel?

The following are just a few marketing funnel benefits to consider if you are thinking about initiating a marketing funnel strategy into your business plan.

• More profit: Marketing funnels are organisation strategies that have proven to work and lead to converting more potential sales into actual purchases. The entire marketing funnel design has been created to take into account how many customers should be converted into sales, providing you with vital information about your product. These estimates will lead you to gain more profit through marketing channels and help the public to become more aware of who you are and what your brand or business does. 

• Organisation: Marketing funnels also help to better organise companies and the marketing tactics that they use. In order to carry out a good marketing funnel campaign, you have to have information about your product, target audience and the market you are selling within. this information may have not been sourced if you had not created a marketing funnel. 

What are Examples of a Marketing Funnel?

There are a variety of different types of marketing funnels and the following is a good marketing funnel example of what an email funnel would look like and what it would consist of. Let’s say that you have a business that sells fruit and produce from an online platform. As with any marketing strategy, the first step of the process would be to determine who your target market is and where the best place to attract their attention would be. For fruit and produce businesses, the target range would be quite large and range from an age group between around 25 to 70 years old, and it would include both male and female participants. You have determined that this group of people spends a lot of time on Facebook, and so that would be the platform that would be best for you to use. You would need to decide whether you are going to use paid for ads or are going to design your own page to be centred around targeting potential customers. While it is possible to bring in and generate leads on your own, it is better to use paid-for advertisements as they generate leads quickly and with little attention needing to be paid to these advertisements. 

Once you have advertised your product through Facebook, you will need to convince people to sign up to receive your emails, ensuring that you have a viable way of interacting with these customers and letting them know what you are selling and any updates that may come through. The emails that you send should be geared around converting leads into customers, with updates around your product list, but the information you provide could also be centred around educational things, maybe a few snippets of how your produce is grown and what sets you apart from the competition. you could even add in a few videos on how a customer can start their own vegetable gardens! You can add incentives around the email blast, maybe offering a percentage off! You have now created an active funnel whereby your audience can be turned into potential customers. 

How to Create a Powerful Marketing Funnel?

Get An Idea of Who Your Audience Is

Before you can begin the process of creating a powerful marketing funnel, you need to have an idea of whose attention you are trying to attract. Having a good understanding of who your audience and target market are will equip you with information about how you can best draw their attention. Not only do you need to know who your target audience is to better create your marketing funnel plan, but it can also help to know how these customers interact with your webpage, things that may have issues with and could probably be updated. Finding out this information can be done in a variety of ways, but one of the easiest tactics is to start with your current clients, find out who they are and why they enjoy your brand, and you can even ask them about a few things that could be changed to make their experiences more enjoyable! Knowledge is everything when it comes to creating a marketing funnel, so be sure that you have a ton of information to help you design your strategy. 

Determine How Many Stages Your Plan Will Have

Coming up with a powerful marketing funnel involves determining how many stages your plan will have. Having the right amount of stages to match what you hope to achieve is important as this ensures that you have absolutely everything you need to do planned out well within your strategy. Each stage should be detailed and have enough information that a team could work on it and know exactly what to do and how to do it. When it comes to marketing funnel visualisation and output, this is one of the most important parts of creating and implementing a powerful marketing funnel! 

Plan Marketing Tactics For Each Stage

A well explained marketing funnel will ensure that you have set out tactics that monitor the effectiveness of each of the different stages. Planning these tactics out and having an idea of what each one will involve will ensure that you are aware of the strengths, weaknesses and effectiveness of each stage that is planned. Marketing tactics may vary across different stages, as within each new stage, a new part of the plan becomes more important than others. It is important to ensure that each of the tactics laid out is detailed and well-defined, as this ensures that the tactics will go according to your marketing strategy and have effective results.

What are The Marketing Funnel Stages?

There are a number of different marketing funnel stages to consider when preparing and planning what your funnel will look like and what you hope to achieve. Ensuring that each and every stage is dedicated to producing a funnel that is going to help you to achieve your marketing goals is an important part of the marketing process! The following are each of the stages and a brief look into what each one involves.

Awareness

The first marketing funnel stage is that a customer becomes aware of your brand. A marketing funnel’s lead generation capability will be high if you are able to attract the right kinds of customers! How a customer becomes aware is dependent on the type of reach that a company has and the platforms that it uses to promote itself. Many companies are using social media platforms as a way to get customers aware of who they are and what they do, and social media pages on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and many others have resulted in tons of people becoming more aware of brands and businesses from around the world. Getting users to notice your brand is an important step in the process and having good platforms and ways of seeking this attention can greatly improve the chances of customer interaction leading to leads. 

Interest

The next step of the process is piquing a customer’s interest. Now that they have become aware of your brand and more than likely have a vague idea of who you are and what you do, you now have to work on providing insight into how you can help them. In terms of social media, this step of the process would be when a potential customer follows up and looks at your page because of a post that they saw that piqued their interest. It is important that your social media pages have interesting and informative information to ensure that you keep them interested in what you have to offer. 

Consideration

The consideration step of the process is when your funnel begins to get a bit narrower. Those whose interests were not piqued would have bowed out and moved on, but those who are interested in the product will begin to consider making a purchase. There are many different ways that consideration can be shown, many people may add an item to an online shopping cart and do a bit of research on products similar to the one you are offering. 

Evaluation

The evaluation step of the process is where a potential customer is just one step@ away from making a purchase. They will more than likely have to think about purchasing the product, and they may even leave your website altogether and wait a bit before making a decision. This is where marketing comes in and brands and businesses need to make sure that they are sending updates and reminders about their intention to purchase. This can be done through emails and notifications, or even by letting the customer know when the item up for purchase is nearly sold out. 

Purchase

The action of purchasing an item is also included with the steps that make up a marketing funnel plan, and it is important that the process of purchasing be easy. Many sales are lost through consuming payment plans, and if the process is not simple and quick to complete, you may lose a few customers. By creating purchasing processes that are centred around the convenience of your customers, you can be sure that every converted customer will complete their final purchase. Once a purchase has been completed, monitoring the marketing funnel conversion rates will help you to monitor whether or not your funnel is meeting the goals and expectations you have set for it. 

How Does a Marketing Funnel Work?

As with any marketing tactic, a marketing funnel has specific levels and steps that come about when a person is looking to make a purchase. It is important that marketers understand each of these different levels as they lay out how a potential customer will come about recognising and looking for a specific service or product. The following is a brief look into the different levels that make a marketing funnel work! 

Problem/Need Recognition (TOFU)

The first step of the buying process is when someone notices that they have a problem and that they need something to solve it. This awareness comes about in different ways for different things, some may notice something wrong in their homes or at work while others may see something that someone else has and recognise that this item or service may be of benefit to them. 

Information Search (MOFU)

Once a problem or need has been recognised, the next step is to do a bit of research on the various products or services that may be able to help you solve the issue. Many people take to Google and perform a search to find ideas about different products while others may venture to the shops to see if they can find an item that would be of use to them. The time that this stage may take will differ between products, and those that are quick and cheaper will probably take less time compared to bigger and more expensive purchases. This stage is important as determining the most common ways that your target market looks for various items will determine how you market for this certain group of people.  

Evaluation of Alternatives (MOFU)

Any person who is making a purchase will more than likely find a few alternatives to decide between. This ensures that they are getting the very best and making sure that the purchase they are completing is worth the amount of money that they are spending. Having easy to read and understand pricing guides of all the inclusions that a customer purchase will provide them with ensures that they have all the data that they need to make an informed choice about your product. Some brands and businesses use free trials to offer the customer a chance to see that their product is the best in the business and worth the money that a customer is about to pay. 

Purchase Decision (BOFU)

Now that a potential customer has compiled all of the necessary information and has decided on the best product or service to suit their needs, they will make a purchase. Ensuring that your payment systems are easy and safe will ensure that a customer completes his or her purchase with no second guesses or worries. Ensuring customer safety at this step of the process is incredibly important and making sure that you give them all the information about the safety systems you have put in place to protect their information is vital. 

Post-Purchase Behaviour

Just because a purchase has been completed, it does not mean that the process is over. Once a purchase has been completed, it is important for customers to know that if they are not happy with the product, there are systems in place that will help them, either more information on the product or service or a personal number that they can call to help them through the process of refunds. If no systems like this exist, a customer is likely to write you a bad review and tell their friends and family about the bad experience. This could cause you to lose more potential customers! 

Which Marketing Funnel Metrics Should You Track?

While each of the marketing funnel levels or stages are designed to help you create your funnel, it is also important that you monitor them. Each of the following metrics should be used to evaluate how much exposure and how well your marketing funnel is doing. 

Volume

A marketing funnel in digital marketing should always measure the volume of customers that make their way onto a webpage and start through the funnel process. A funnel is designed to ensure that a certain percentage of people will not make it to the final purchasing stages, but if you are going to monitor and track this amount, measuring the volume of customers who begin and end the journey is important. It is also imperative to know when a customer is exiting the funnel and what was perhaps the reason for them not completing a purchase. Having this information on hand will provide you with vital information on how your marketing funnel can be improved. 

Velocity

The speed and amount of time that it takes for a customer to make their way through your marketing funnel is another important metric to measure. Issues with speed and timing can often cause potential customers to lose interest in your product, rather opting for a website that has a speedier solution to their issue or need. Measuring velocity is also important for your brand or business as this can impact the revenue you see over a certain period of time. If you, for instance, have a free trial period of one month, you can determine that those who are interested in your product will more than likely only make an actual purchase in one months time. Having this information built into your marketing funnel plan will ensure that you are equipped with all the information to make informed decisions about how your funnel works and the tactics you use! 

Conversion Rates

Your conversion rates are incredibly important to monitor as they can determine whether or not your marketing funnel is actually working. While the funnel does account for the fact that not every person who comes across your brand will make a purchase, a good marketing funnel should result in a high turnover rate, with many items being purchased and many customers making their way to the final stages of the funnel. If your conversion rates are lower than you like, this may be a sign that one step of the process needs to be adjusted. 

How to Build a Content Marketing Funnel?

Building a content marketing funnel takes a lot of time and effort, with considerations needing to be made with regard to a number of different things. Scoping out and understanding your target audience, finding out the best platforms to use to attract attention and designing web pages that function as a sales tactic can all take a ton of time and resources. WIth the Markethinkers team on your side and our professional SEO consulting and SEO copywriting experts, building a marketing funnel has never been easier!