You want to grow your business online and know that funnels are important - but how do you know how many you need? And how do you know what those funnels should be?
There's no clear rulebook on funnels. You aren’t getting the leads or sales you need with your current funnels, time for a new one, right? Well, maybe, but also maybe not. You just need the constant questions and "maybes" to stop! Right here and now you will find the definitive and individual answer to the question, "How many funnels do I need?"
But before we begin, let's answer a simpler question:
What Is A Funnel?
Funnels are how you connect to people and collect their contact information. Funnels are what turn strangers into leads and then into paying customers. There are funnels for all types of businesses and audiences; retail sales, coaches, repair services, local businesses, and so on. There are many different types and styles of funnels, some simple and others incredibly elaborate.
You can learn more about sales funnels specifically here.
No matter if you are wanting a simple funnel or need a complex one - you will figure out your perfect number of funnels following these steps:
Note: As I walk through these steps I will be using a business coach as my example.
Step 1: Where Do You Connect With People
Pull out a piece of paper, open a Google Doc, or grab a bunch of sticky notes (my favorite method, I'd recommend 5 different color sticky notes). You will want four different columns and in this first column write how you’re connecting to your audience. This business coach has an active Facebook Page, Instagram profile, gets found through internet searches, is an active member of Toastmasters, and receives client referrals. This is how they are initially connecting to new clients.
You may realize you aren’t connecting with anyone in a consistent way and maybe that’s why you’re business isn’t growing. If that’s the case for you, put where you want to be showing up consistently for your audience.
Step 2: What Are Your Sales Goals?
Next, go to your last column and write what your ultimate end goal is. There may be a few, but be specific. The more specific you are about your goal, the more you can understand how your funnels are helping you achieve them.
This business coach wants to get 3 new coaching clients, on a 3-month contract, every month. They also want to 10 new students every month, in their on-damnd business building course for small business beginners. Whether you have one or five goals, list what you want to be achieved on a monthly basis.
Now you want to connect where we connect with people and your end goal. Like solving a maze to your business, we have traffic coming in from one direction, our funnels should be guiding them to our ultimate goal.
Step 3: Where Do You Send People On Your Website?
Let's move to the second column, label this one "Website" and list all the places you send people to on your website. For our business coach, they send people to their homepage, to a landing page for a free download of how to create a business plan, a landing page for setting up a free 15-minute consult call, and they send them to their blog. This coach has more pages on their website than just these four, but these are the pages they want to use to convert. If this business coach had any pop-ups on these pages for action, include those in this column as well.
You may notice something when you do this step, a gap in your flow. Maybe you're not currently sending any of your connections to your website, maybe you don't even have a website! Highlight this section or use a different colored sticky note to emphasize where you want to be sending people. This is where you'll first discover the funnel you're missing, not utilizing, or utilizing too much of.
It can be really easy to get caught up in this column and distract yourself from your end goal (I'm guilty of this myself) - saying to yourself, "I need this perfect 20-page website before I can move forward and start collecting new leads or sales." Here's what I have to say to that:
Bologna.
You are looking for your straight shot to sales and repeat customers unless those 20 pages are
vital, they are not necessary to start growing your sales. I'm not saying don't have a 20-page website, but make sure that you have income-producing activities working for you before you add anything else into your to-dos! If you realize you have no funnels and don't know where to start. check out this article on
building your funnels and this one on
creating your first lead magnet to give you an idea of where you need to be sending people on your website.
Step 4: What Funnels Drive To Your Sales Goals
Your final step is how your funnels are driving your sales goals. What is the action you want website visitors to take? And how are you driving it?
This includes things like, as soon as they download their free guide to creating a business plan, what emails are they receiving? Or when they schedule a consult call, what emails do they receive before the call? What about after the call? Are there autoresponders put in place to follow-up if they don’t purchase?
Essentially, how are my opt-ins, my lead magnets driving to my sales goals?
First, this business coach has their free download of how to create a business plan and then with that, a series of 5 emails, the first one delivering the free download and how to use it. Second one showing an example business plan and a business I worked within the paid course, the third one showcasing the course and resources for growth in it, fourth one answering common questions in the download and once again promoting the course, and fifth taking about how to use the business plan for growth and making it easier with the step course.
You want to repeat this process for every opt-in or lead magnet you have. And if one of your drivers for sales is just having a webstore, list out how you deal with people who add to their cart and leave, such as follow-up with reminder emails.
This is the step where you see if you’re providing a higher level of service and trust-building before you ask for the sale versus going from your initial touchpoint to a sale.
You will see how many funnels you need to drive action, to drive real sales for each of your goals. It may be 1, it may be 5 - only you can see what’s going to work.
Working Through Gaps In Your System
I mentioned this before, but going through this activity, your customer roadmap, you may discover gaps in your system. This doesn't need to hold you back from figuring out the journey your customers need to take. You want to fill these gaps with the simplest steps possible. For example, if you have a gap in your first step, you're not currently connecting with anyone and driving traffic. Don't fill that gap with an intensive 10 part connection strategy utilizing guest blogs, a podcast, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, SnapChat, and Tumblr. Focus on starting with one option you believe will drive the most traffic.
Don't get bogged down on the perfect way to grow your business, look at the realistic steps you will accomplish in a timely manner instead.
Ultimately, you want to know all the actions driving to your goal and how specific funnels are going to support those actions! It doesn’t matter if your funnel is as simple as building your newsletter email list or as complicated as a multi-step webinar sales funnel, this process will show you what will help drive real action for your business.
How many funnels does your business need? Let me know in the comments below!
First things first: determining who you're marketing to. We’ve made determining your ideal audience easy, with our free Discover your Avatar worksheet
- click here to download today!