The sales industry isn’t what it used to be. Advancements in digital have without a doubt changed the entire marketing, advertising and sales landscape. Back in the day, you may have managed to get peoples attention by using email marketing, cold calling, and billboards, but these days you should focus on reaching your audience where they usually are – on their phones. And how do you find your ideal audience, prospects and clients? By using sales funnels!
It’s impossible to speak about the future of sales, without understanding how sales funnels work. I recently did a Facebook Live training dedicated to this topic. If you want to hear what I have to say about “sales funnels”, and how you can get started- simply read to the end of this article and I’ll share that link with you.
When It comes to generating leads, it’s clear that a lot of companies are still living in the past. These companies obtain cold data and then they call individuals in an attempt to set up meetings with them to discuss their products or services. The problem with this, however, is that no one wants to receive phone calls from people trying to sell them something! Instead of imploring this futile method for your business, set up a sales funnel instead!
Every salesperson needs a sales funnel. Whether you’re selling houses, cars, a book, or even financial services, using sales funnels will help you attract the right clientele to grow your business. But it’s important to note that not all sales funnels are the same. There are different results and outcomes with each kind of sales funnel, so it’s essential to know which one works for you and your business.
Here’s how I set up my seminar funnel:
First of all, I create a landing page. Then I set up an advert that I promote on Facebook and Instagram that will take people to this landing page when they click on it. In the case of my seminar funnel, it would be a video advert of me speaking about an event that I’m hosting, and why you should attend. These video adverts are targeted to a select group of people that already fit my target market. Facebook makes it incredibly easy to target people based on age, demographics, interests, and more. Once people click on this ad, they’ll be taken to my next landing page where another video will appear. In this case, it would be the opportunity to come to a seminar where I’m going to be talking about the products and services that I offer, or the free training that I’ll be giving. Should they want to register for the event, there will be a button on the page that they can click, and this will take them to another page where they can input their details.
Then, after registering, if these people want to download a free eBook from me, they’ll give me permission to contact them on Facebook messenger. I now essentially have their names, phone number, email address and Facebook messenger information. The reason why their Facebook messenger information is so valuable is because people are far more likely to read Facebook messages than emails these days. And so if I have a choice of how I communicate with potential clients, I’ll always go with Facebook first! But since I’ve got all their contact information, I’ll communicate with them via email, Facebook messenger as well as a text message about the upcoming event. Throughout this entire process, not once have I had to pick up the phone and call any of these people. We’ve simply run an advert, sent people to a landing page, sent them to a second page to gather their details, and then out of the final registrants, we’ll have a set number of people attending the event that we will send the relevant communication to. Surely you’d agree that this approach is 100 times more effective than cold calling?
The next sales funnel that I’m about to launch will be for an exclusive seminar with only thirty attendees. These thirty people will have access to me and my teachings for a whole day. Because this event is so valuable, I’m going to charge them an upfront registration fee but instead of running the ads on Facebook and Instagram like with my other sales funnel, I’m going to run this ad on LinkedIn. Why LinkedIn this time? Because I want to target this training to specific business people with specific job titles. If I want to target CEO’s in a certain industry, who are based in Dubai, then advertising via LinkedIn will be the best platform to do this. The sales funnel after this will be similar. The ad will once again take them to a landing page which will give them more information about me and will include case studies and client recommendations, then it’ll take them to the registration page and they’ll pay here. We know from statistics that about 25% of registered attendees won’t show up on the actual day of the event. So if we have 30 seats available, then we need to get 40 paying delegates.
Because we’re asking these people to pay upfront, we also reassure them that should they not be 100% satisfied with what they’ve learnt after my training, we will give them a full refund of their money. This then becomes a no-brainer. It’s a win-win situation, therefore there’s nothing for them to lose by signing up and paying.
Once again, I haven’t spoken to any of these delegates prior to the event. I’ve created a landing page, created a valuable video, and sent these people through my sales funnel that I run using the ClickFunnels software (should you want to read more about ClickFunnels, you can read my article here).
The above examples that I spoke of mainly deal with services, but you can also run sales funnels for products! Click here to watch my full Facebook Live training where I show you how you can do this.
At the end of the day, sales funnels are changing the way sales professionals do business. But a sales funnel will only be as successful as you are, so you’ve got to be committed to being the best, and give people what they really need and want. Your skills will attract people to your sales funnel and will keep them engaged and interested in what you have to offer. So if you haven’t ever created a sales funnel, then today’s the day to get started!
If you’d like help with anything, I’m just an email or social media click away!
