What is a Sales Funnel and Why Does Your Small Business Need One?
Prefer to listen on Spotify? Click here: What is a Sales Funnel? or here: How to Build A Sales Funnel.
Most small business owners are winging it when it comes to marketing. They’re posting on social media, emailing, doing SEO, but it’s all kind of random and there’s no method to the madness. There’s no overarching strategy to funnel people into buying.
A sales funnel is a strategy and framework that ties all of your marketing efforts together and leads people to buy. So, if you’re tired of doing lots of marketing that doesn't seem to work, it’s time to develop a sales funnel.
In this blog we talk about what a sales funnel actually is, and why you need one as part of a comprehensive, strategic marketing plan. (Yes, even if you’re making under $100K and your audience is small.)
What is a Sales Funnel?
A sales funnel is a map of your prospects’ journey, from finding out you exist to buying.
It’s usually shown as a funnel with four or five stages. The top is the widest part. This is where people first discover your business. As they move down, the group gets smaller and more qualified. The very bottom of the funnel, the spout, that’s where the purchase happens.
Some models break the sales journey down into a dozen+ micro-stages, but they’re all variations of the same core phases: awareness, consideration, and conversion.
We use the sales funnel to understand the psychological, emotional, and practical concerns of a prospect as they move through the buyer’s journey. This helps you create content that speaks to where your buyer is, clarifies their problem, and positions your solution as the right one.
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Okay, now let’s look at each of the phases in more detail, and what content is most useful at each phase.
The 3 Phases of a Sales Funnel
For the purposes of understanding the key principles of a sales funnel lets look at 3 key phases:
1. Awareness
This is the top of the funnel. Your prospects learn you exist, so it’s their first impression of you. It’s what happens during lead generation. The lead may be cold, and not fully aware of their problem yet. Or they may be a warm, targeted lead actively looking for solutions but not quite ready to buy.
Goal at This Stage: Be findable
Best Content for This Stage: Educational content including FAQs, how-to guides, lead magnets and free templates. Anything that speaks to a prospect’s pain points and sparks interest in a solution. Why? Because this is the content they’ll find when they start searching for answers.
2. Consideration
This is the middle of the sales funnel. Your prospect is a little more serious about solving their problem. They’re exploring options, and getting to know your brand and the solutions you offer. They’re curious and trying to figure out who or what is a good fit. They’re in the door, it’s your time to hook them!
Goal at This Stage: Build trust
Best Content for This Stage: Examples of the solution in action. Share case studies that tell the story of how your product or service solved the problem (or at least one very closely resembling theirs). Outline the before and after using your solution, and showcase all the ways your solution helped fix the problem. It’s also a good time for an email nurture campaign that agitates their pain and paints the picture of how amazing life will be once the problem is solved. Longer form content, like webinars and workshops, that showcase your expertise, give prospects a look behind the scenes at how your sh*t works in action, and comparison guides of why your solution beats all the other options out there are also valuable while folks are considering whether or not to work with you.
3. Conversion
This is the bottom of the funnel. The little spout, where they need a tiny push, so they’ll buy in. They convert from prospect to paying customer.
Goal at This Stage: Make it easy for them to say yes. Make it even easier for them to give you money.
Best Content for This Stage: Demo videos that highlight a better world with the problem solved because of your solution. Trial or promotional offers to sweeten the deal. Guarantees to reduce their perceived risk. Testimonials, reviews, success stories, and social proof to build confidence that your solution has solved this problem before. Clear CTAs so they know exactly what to do next. And a conversion-optimized sales page is pretty handy, too.
Bottom line: a sales funnel is a process that leads your prospects in a logical, orderly fashion from finding out your business exists to making a purchase. By building a sales funnel for your small business, you shift from random and accidental to intentional. Now, instead of chaos, there’s a method to your madness!
Why Do Sales Feel Random Without a Funnel?
If you don't have the funnel framework mapped out, your customer’s buying experience is likely chaotic and may not convert all that well.
People show up at random times in their purchasing process and if you don’t present the right content to them at each stage to drive them deeper into making a purchase, they’ll probably fall out of the funnel. Without a clear process everything gets muddled up.
Here are some example symptoms of this problem:
People find you, but don’t convert
You’re always selling to cold leads
You’re guessing what to say next, and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesnt.
This isn’t a sales problem, it’s a funnel problem. There’s no process or strategic plan in place that tells you, your team, or your leads exactly what to do, so they just do whatever.
Here’s a quick highlight reel of common funnel mistakes that could cost you leads:
Jumping straight to conversion without nurturing leads
Making every piece of content a sales pitch
Forgetting to include a clear next step for prospects
What Your Sales Funnel Should Do
By definition, funnel means to guide or channel something through. In the case of a sales funnel, we want to guide leads to your cash register.
A good sales funnel should do a few things:
Attract the right people. The shape of a funnel starts out wide, which means all kinds of folks with all kinds of problems can wander in to find out you exist. At the top of the funnel, your job is to provide helpful and relevant content so people can recognize themselves and their problem, and hop in.
Qualify the right problems. Your product or service is not the right fit for everyone. Your solution may not be the right solution for certain problems. The shape of a funnel helps us understand that. As the funnel gets closer to the spout, it gets narrower. It’s only designed to funnel problems of a certain shape and size through it. This makes the sales funnel a great tool for prospects to self-qualify. If the right types of content are available to them at the right stage of their journey, they’ll be able to decide for themselves if your solution is the right solution for them. This is why a holistic marketing strategy is so important. In addition to a well mapped funnel, and content designed for each stage of the journey, you also need accurate user personas, great small business branding, and a clear offer. All marketing works like a puzzle, and when all the pieces fit together it makes a pretty (income-producing) picture.
Nurture their interest. Not everyone is ready to buy right away, especially if what you sell comes with a high price tag or a time commitment. Use email campaigns, follow-up content, and social posts that meet prospects where they are emotionally and practically. Keep them engaged, answer their questions, and guide them through the journey (without pushing too hard.) Your goal is to simply show up helpful, and stay relevant and helpful until they’re ready to make a decision.
Tailor content to their stage of the journey. Different stages need different messages. Don’t give beginners a testimonial, they won’t relate. And don’t hit someone who’s ready to buy with more educational guides, they already get it. Matching your content to where the prospect is in the journey makes your funnel work smarter, not harder.
Pro Tip: We’ve outlined exactly what content to offer at each stage so you can get it right. 👆
Make it STUPID-EASY to buy. By the time someone reaches the bottom of your funnel, don’t slow them down or make them take a detour. This is the moment to get the sale. Skip complicated forms. Skip the 300-page manual. Make it fast, simple, and friction-free. Streamline payment options, and let people sign up or purchase with minimal effort. We’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: the easier it is to buy, the more likely they will. For us, all we need is name, email, and payment info, done.
Your Small Biz Sales Funnel in Action
A sales funnel is a path, a map of the journey your prospects take on their way to becoming customers. By turning random marketing into a deliberate, organized process, you guide the right people through the right content to the moment they’re ready to buy. The result is a clear, organized path that guides your prospects straight to yes.
Still not sure how to make a kick-@$$ sales funnel for your growing business? Set up a 15 Minute Call with your Marketing Besties! We’re here to help.
