What is a marketing funnel?

How do you turn leads into customers? With marketing funnels! Marketing funnels are one of the most important concepts in online marketing, but they are also often poorly understood by marketers and business owners. This article will provide an overview of how to use marketing funnels effectively and how they can be used to help your business succeed. 

But first, what exactly is a marketing funnel?

The marketing funnel is simply a visualization for understanding the process of turning leads into customers. The idea is that, like a funnel, marketers cast a broad net to capture as many leads as possible, and then slowly nurture prospective customers through the purchasing decision.

Marketing funnels take many forms. Their purpose, however, remains constant: to turn as many leads into customers as possible. Funnels can be used to create any sort of conversion system, from one that pushes leads to sales and support staffs to another that turns website visitors into email subscribers. To define your own funnel, you need only identify its top and bottom funnel points—the widest and narrowest spaces through which prospective customers must pass.

The top of the marketing funnel: attract

Before you can create a marketing funnel, you have to attract some attention at the top of your funnel. Attracting attention at the top of your funnel means producing compelling content (like infographics or video) that will help potential customers learn about and understand what your company does and why they should care. At its core, it’s about establishing thought leadership as well as credibility within an industry.

The middle of the marketing funnel: nurture

The middle of your funnel process (middle of your marketing funnel) consists of lead nurturing tactics that will help generate more sales-ready leads for you. These tactics could be something like creating lead magnets and building email lists. Your goal at this stage is to engage prospective customers and convert them into leads. You can nurture leads by giving them something of value in exchange for their contact information (such as an ebook or other exclusive content). This allows you to continue your relationship with prospective customers even after they have left your website.

Bottom of funnel: outreach

Nurturing your prospects in the funnel through email campaigns, surveys, or one-on-one sales calls to follow up will help them go from prospect to customer. The best part of bottom of funnel outreach is that you already know what they want (since they told you at top of funnel), so it's easier to tailor your message and close them as customers. Pro tip: Be careful not to come across as too aggressive in these emails or calls though - it's easy for new businesses to spam their contacts! A better approach would be drip emails and messages over time.

Contact us today to see example funnels we've created for clients.