Creating a sales funnel can sound like a formidable task but a necessary one if you want to be in business online. I discussed what a sales funnel of offers is and why business owners need one in this past post. One of the questions many businesses struggle with when building their first sales funnel offer is “How long should it be?”
This is difficult, because there is no easy answer. It needs to be just long enough to accomplish your objective, which is to get people to buy your core offer and stick with you.
The optimal length for your sales funnel depends on your core offer, your audience, and your industry, so there’s no one-size-fits-all solution.
There’s a common myth about funnels that “longer is better”. It argues that if your sales funnel is long, this gives you more opportunity to build relationships and qualify leads.
But actually, the longer it is, the more opportunities you’re also giving your customers to leave. This doesn’t mean you should make it too short either! It needs to be just long enough to accomplish your goal.
So, rather than length, it’s best to think of a sales funnel in terms of how customers are thinking when they make a decision to buy something.
Understanding how they are thinking and then offering customers the right product at the right time is the key to success.
Here are the stages of the thought process that your leads and customers go through, as they make decisions about the offers in your sales funnel:
1 – Awareness. First, they are looking for a solution to their problem, so you need to get their attention. In the early stage of a sales funnel, they’re just learning who you are.
2 – Interest. During this stage, the customer is checking out your content and learning about the value you have to offer.
3 – Decision. The decision stage is where customers are looking for purchases to help solve their problems and weighing the different offers you present to them.
4 – Action. This is when the customer is ready to buy.
This is called the AIDA sales model.
Start with your final product and think about what offers you can make at each stage to qualify leads and start converting them to buyers. Then, make your sales funnel just as long as it needs to be.
For example, in stage 1, people may find you through a blog post, article, social media post, podcast, or video tip. In these you’re just giving out content to grab their attention.
For stage 2, you could offer your lead magnet. This can solve a small part of a bigger problem and help viewers get to know you.
For stage 3, they might want a taste of your products or services and you can offer a low-cost product.
For stage 4, these people are ready to solve their problem and you can offer them your core product.
If you haven’t made sales funnels before, they can be baffling. But I have you covered with my “Sales Funnel Planner.” It walks you step-by-step through the process of creating a sales funnel that will help you more of the right buyers. And I have it at a special price right now of $17 (normally $37), so get your copy here: https://iaplifecoaches.org/sales-funnel-planner/
