The marketing funnel has stood the test of time as a framework for organizing marketing goals and marketing activities. However, it is time to reshape it into a conversion funnel to emphasize its ultimate goal: converting visitors into customers. Using this terminology, we can focus on achieving our main goal and simplify our work.
The Essential Elements of a Successful Conversion Funnel
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The main goal of the conversion funnel
The ultimate goal of the conversion funnel is to convert visitors into customers. This goal seems simple, right? However, the road from website visitor to customer can be a long one, especially for B2B businesses that offer more complex products or enterprise solutions.
The conversion funnel is not a single, substantive get a quote conversion from visitor to customer. It is a series of progressive conversions: from visitor to contact; from contact to potential customer; from potential customer to customer.
Identify the buyer personas you wish to attract
A buyer persona is a fictional version of your ideal customer. You may have more than one buyer persona, but choose one for your conversion funnel. What is this buyer’s most pressing problem or challenge regarding your product or service?
Create a quote that highlights your solution.
This offer could be a white paper, a checklist, a case study, or some other downloadable, gated asset that goes in-depth on how you can solve your futuristic style on the web buyer’s problem. Whatever you choose, it should be a “fair trade” for a site visitor’s email address.
Create a “story” around your proposal
The other content elements in your conversion funnel should all be directly related to your offer. Imagine you’re working with a white paper on how to protect against emerging cybersecurity threats. You’ll need at least one blog post on the topic (preferably several) and one case study or customer success story to use in your funnel. In other words, the entire funnel should have a coherent theme and message, with each element exploring a different aspect of the topic.
Create a seamless path to discover your products
How will your buyers find that great cybersecurity adb directory white paper? The most common route is through your blog. Visitors may find the blog post directly through search or PPC advertising (more on that later). The most important thing is that the blog post is closely related to your product. Second and most important is an easy path to get your quote: the blog post should have a prominent “call to action” (CTA) that leads visitors to a simple landing page where all they need to do to get your quote is provide their email address.