Know-How Monday

Sales Funnels & Buyer Journeys: What are They?

The Basics

When running your business there are some things that are sometimes overlooked while you are working on the day to day operations. One of the most prevalent examples of this is generating leads & tracking them throughout the process to purchasing one’s product. Because this process sounds daunting and so hard, normally it is left for later on when more pressing things are a foot.  So what helps you create this structure to be able to track it?

The Answer: mapping out the customers journey & creating a sales funnel that hones in on how customers end up purchasing your product. 

A sales funnel is a description that is used to describe the process of a consumers path from being introduced to your brand to then being nurtured to the point of purchasing to become a customer. 

Within a properly constructed sales funnel is the buyers journey, which is described as the stages within the sales funnel that a customer takes to becoming a loyal regular consumer of your good or service.

So how do you go about constructing a sales funnel and buyer journey that leads to track-able positive results? Click below for further details.

A Buyer Journeys: The Set Up

An Overview

Within any sales funnel that is created it is paramount to think of the customer’s experience throughout the process. For instance some simple questions everyone has asked themselves are: How do customers interact with your brand? What questions do we ask as we decide on purchasing a product or not? 

Keeping these questions in mind, there are normally about 5 stages a customer goes through when considering purchasing a product or service from a brand. They are:

Awareness:

Acquiring traffic, trust, and interested buyers is the first stage of this process. No one can purchase from you unless they know who you are and feel you are a credible business, right? The easiest way to introduce people to your brand is via a blog post, social media, & ads for this stage.

Consideration:

Now, you have attracted a site visitor to your physical location or website. They are interested in your product or service but need more information in order to make a decision to purchase. During this phase it is important to offer educational material about your product and a lead magnet to entice them to provide information to reach out on other occasions.

Intent:

During the intention phase, the customer decides if your product is right for them & the business is evaluating if the customer is a qualified lead for them. By providing information and answering questions you are able to learn what the customers are looking for to become comfortable in choosing a good or service. 

Purchase: 

During the purchase phase, you have converted an interested customer into a buyer. If the customer has reached this phase, congrats! You got a sale!

Loyalty/Advocacy:

Once you have gained a client, your job is not done! You now have an opportunity to reengage previous clients for repeat business during this phase.