Save Me From the Sales Funnel

If you’re like me, then you’re probably sick of sales funnels. They’re depressing. This cat picture I found on the internet does an incredible job of depicting the dramatic level of depression I feel because of sales funnels. I have just never seen one that I thought was accurate or relevant to what we do.

On the rare odds that this overweight Internet cat (I shall call him Ned) is as upset as I am about inaccurate sales funnels, I thought we could cheer him up a little.

Introducing the “Internet Marketing Sales Funnel”.

First – The Basics:

All of the Internet marketing campaigns we choose to take on at Muller Consulting are driven by research and discovery:

So how does the “Discovery” process work?

Internet Marketing is about controlling the message. We want to make the message relevant to the search, and to the one searching.

Traditional rules of thumb on Internet marketing say:

• If you want 1 client, you need an average of 2 leads. (Assumes 50% Close Rate)
• To get 2 leads, you need 100 engaged visitors on your site. (Assumes 2% Conversion Rate)
• To get 100 engaged visitors, you need 200 visits. (Assumes 50% Bounce Rate)
• To get 200 visits you need 10,000 impressions (Assumes 2% CTR)

It all looks something like this:

This is the common Internet Marketing sales funnel. The problem is that it leaves a LOT of potential business on the table.

Imagine if we could affect this funnel at any one point? The results would be exponential.

Each of these steps have a number of controllable aspects and tasks, and a number of tools that can be applied to improve the funnels efficiency.

Working backwards:

• What if we could help our clients improve the conversion rate of their leads?
• What if we could increase the conversion rate of those 100 engaged visitors even 1%?
• What if we could decrease the bounce rate, and increase the number of engaged visitors?
• What if we could get the same number of visits with fewer impressions?

Internet Marketing Sales Funnel enters stage left.

Our Process Funnel is a way of displaying how we apply the marketing tools and metrics at our disposal to our Client’s sales funnels:

Research is divided into Keyword Level and Inbound Method. That means determining which relevant keywords and phrases are the most commonly searched, then finding what the intent and medium for those searches was. Where did the searches come from, and by whom? Additionally, you will want to know what direct marketing and offline efforts exist in the specific geographic areas.

1^st Impressions last longest, but you only get one shot at it. Applying our newfound client insights allows us to create a strategy for each keyword and method. Crafting banners and ads that draw potential clients in, along with page titles and descriptions that speak to real live people.

Web experience should be as unique as the search experience: geographically relevant, search term relevant, search method, and search intent relevant. Are you relying on a static website to do all the heavy lifting, or are you hyper-targeting search experience and linking to web experience?

Conversion optimization is a process of systematically identifying the reason why some clients convert, and others do not. It is the process of removing “pain-points” to encourage action while on the site; and getting potential clients to return to the site if they do leave.

Client acquisition is the often forgotten piece of the puzzle. How do you handle and manage your clients? How do you increase the lifetime value of that client? How do you encourage additional referrals?

Feeling a little confused?

This is a LOT of information to squeeze into 5 paragraphs. I’m pretty sure Ned (the fat cat) was ready to pass out after reading all of that jargon. The fact is, each of those steps contains a lot of confusing and complex information. As well as a lot of tasks, methods and measuring tools. That’s the very reason we decided to create the sales funnel to try visualizing our structured internet marketing process.

Fear not though, future blog posts in this series will consider each step, one by one. You’ll either be well informed, bored to death, or maybe both. Only time will tell.