A marketing funnel is used to connect the dots between your leads and your marketing strategy. Another way to think about this tool is the process of starting at step zero to ensure that you develop a successful marketing strategy. They are very important and aid in reaching out to prospective clients.
The ultimate goal of the marketing funnel approach is to ensure that you maximize your time. By creating an automated marketing system, you are also creating active advocates is basically like creating a free advertiser for your brand!
Stages of a Marketing Funnel
A marketing funnel consists of various stages that your leads go through before committing to a purchase from your business. The stages are listed in the following order:
- Awareness
- Consideration
- Conversion
- Loyalty
- Advocacy
What are the Parts of Funnel Marketing? Segments of The Funnel (TOFU, MOFU, BOFU)
1. Top of the Funnel (TOFU)
These are the initial stages of a marketing funnel that a business must start to consider when approaching its marketing strategy. This is when you begin outreach to a demographic audience, and is considered part of the awareness stage.
This is the first step. You are likely handling viewers and visitors to your website at this point. These people are simply fans or followers but have no commitment to anything regarding your brand.
Ways that you can interact with this demographic of followers could be with engaging content and online ads. You can create short videos or posts that tell stories. You want to produce something that will spike their interest and differentiate you from other brands.
2. Middle of the Funnel (MOFU)
At this point in a potential client’s journey, they are more likely consistent website visitors. Perhaps your initial content intrigued them and they regularly visit your platform. They may read your content and now they are considered a lead, as they enjoy something about your brand.
The middle of the funnel is generally regarded as the consideration and the conversion phase. You can encourage engagement by optimizing your website for SEO which will increase the chances that people will find your business online.
You can do this by creating blog posts, including how-tos and video tutorials. You can also share customer stories and reviews. You want to make your brand and product or service look more desirable than your competitors. You are trying to convert your leads into customers at this stage.
You will want to develop a landing page, where potential clients can sign-up for a newsletter of some kind. This can route them to a thank you page that not only makes them feel valued and appreciated, but can expose them to your other content and online presence elsewhere.
You want to really draw these interested audience members to engage and ultimately purchase from your brand. Offer free mini-courses and community events to provide incentives for further interaction. Provide a sales offer at some point.
3. Bottom of the Funnel (BOFU)
The sales offer an aspect of the conversion stage that brings you to the final phase of the funnel marketing approach. At this point, a lead has been converted into a prospect, and then finally they have become a customer. Success!
Now you want to ensure that this customer becomes not only a repeat customer but a brand advocate. You want to create a community of followers that feel a connection to your brand and product or service, which will encourage others to do the same and provide a new customer base.
At the loyalty stage, you want to facilitate the feeling of a community between your brand and the customers, as well as between the customers themselves. Provide loyalty rewards programs if applicable. Make your platform more interactive with customer FAQ sections and forums.
Once you reach the final point of the advocacy stage, you are almost more than likely to succeed. Here you create a brand advocate out of a dedicated consumer. Encourage followers to engage with your social media through contests and giveaways.
Still Not Convinced?
A marketing funnel is an extremely useful strategic tool business can use to structure the way they interact with customers. This tool allows a business to track the different experience levels a potential client goes through before they are converted to a full-on customer.
This organizational tool not only shows you where you are succeeding but can also highlight where exactly you are losing your leads as well. This can ultimately help you improve and perfect your marketing strategy and consumer engagement approach in the long run.
