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Another free Sales article for you by Bryony Thomas
Titled: Sales Funneling - A Marketers Guide
Sales Funneling - A Marketers Guide
Article Summary: A short guide to managing the tone and volume of marketing content you use at different stages through a stepped sales funnel.
Many sales are lost, not because people don't want your product or service, but because your communications have failed to move them through the decision-making process. Giving people too much information too soon, or trying a rational appeal to a person in an emotional state of mind, are often the causes of blockages in your sales funnel.
Many of us will have experienced a sense of 'information overload' where we simply switch off, or the frustration of wanting to know more about a product or service before we commit and not being able to find it. Both happen regularly, and when they do - you've lost a sale.
For all but the most simple purchases, the decision-making process is broadly similar. Typically, and particularly for more complex purchases, our thinking will go something like this: 'My laptop is heavy - I saw that ad for really light weight ones, who was it again?' (Latent need); 'I saw that ad, I remember... it was X-Computers' (Awareness); 'I'll just check out their site' (Interest); 'Hmm, well the weight certainly compares well, but can I afford it, what are the other options?' (Evaluation); 'I'll pop into Y-shop to see what it feels like and ask a little more about it' (Trial); 'I've researched the best price, I'll get it from there' (Purchase). Kotler and others have spelt out various different versions of this process, there's bound to have been one modelled for most markets. So, our step-by-step decision-making process is something like 1) Awareness, 2) Interest, 3) Evaluation, 4) Trial, 5) Purchase.
Against this process you should map and measure your sales funnel, you'll steadily whittle down your audience at each step, with interested parties moving through the funnel and those who either don't want what you offer or who are turned off by your messaging going elsewhere. By considering two key elements and managing them appropriately across the sales funnel, marketers can maximise the chances of conversion; tone and quantity.
What do I mean by tone? As short-hand, think emotion. Against the sales funnel, there is an appropriate tone at each step. If you imagine a continuum from emotional to rational, typically your marketing material will need to start at emotional and move to rational through the funnel. To really get noticed, you need to appeal to our most human side, our emotions. If you hit a nerve, they notice you. However rational you are, e.g. 'we're cheap', if they don't feel a need for what you're offering they're unlikely to notice your communications in the first place. Successful emotional appeals, in marketing terms, usually hit on a negative feeling and say that you can take it away. This is called finding the point of pain. Once you've established that emotional appeal, your communications need to move into more rational territory, where proof is needed. As a sanity check on the tone of your marketing materials, map out each stage of the sales funnel and look at the material (offline, online, sales person, in-store, etc.) and then judge the emotional appeal - are you delivering rational messages too soon? Is your material providing further emotional messaging, when your buyer is looking for rational proof?
Quantity, in regard to sales funnelling, is a fairly straight forward concept - start 'short and sweet' and then provide more information at each step. Where most organisations fall foul of this is on their websites. Home pages are often jam packed with information. In a typical sales funnel, an organisation's website is the second or third step - this means that people typically reach you looking for an emotional appeal (what's the benefit for me?) and they are looking for key messages. Again, map out your journey and assess the quantity of information you are serving at each stage, it should start small and increase at each step.
So, if you're experiencing lots of web traffic, but low numbers of enquiries - or lots of footfall and low sales, think about the sales funnel. An initial assessment against tone and quantity will signpost where your blockage might be and put you on the path to a free flowing sales funnel that has a tangible link to your bottom line.
Copyright (c) 2008 Bryony Thomas
Article Source: http://www.upublish.info
About the Author:
Bryony Thomas
Bryony Thomas is a marketing consultant and coach working in Bristol, UK. Her specialisms include business-to-business thought leadership programmes and powerful skills transfer into organisations who want more from their marketing. For more information, go to: http://www.clear-thought.co.uk
Keywords: sales+funnel, sales+and+marketing, sales+and+marketing+management, sales+conversion, sales+and+marketing+tips, prospects, business+sales+and+marketing, sales+funnel+management
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