How to Understand Your Company’s Sales and Funnel stages
Learn how to understand your company’s sales funnel—ella’s way
All customers go through the same journey when they’re making a purchase, and your company’s sales funnel is a model for that journey. The number of prospects you have at the beginning of the sales process is quite large, and as you move through the stages of the process that number grows smaller and smaller—making your prospect pool look like a funnel as it shrinks.
That shrinking isn’t a bad thing, though. The sales funnel is typically broken into three main stages:
The top of the funnel (ToFu), which includes the entire body of prospects that are aware of your product (or being made aware of it via marketing)
The middle of the funnel (MoFu), where some prospective buyers have been weeded out as a result of lack of interest or need
The bottom of the funnel (BoFu), where whoever’s left will either decide to purchase your product—or not
Prospects at each stage of the funnel require a different approach in order to move them further down. Here’s what you need to know about each stage to better understand your company’s sales funnel:
The very top of the funnel is the ‘awareness’ stage.
As a salesperson, your involvement at the top of the funnel might be minimal (unless part of your strategy is to send cold emails, in which case you’re actively involved). Here, your company’s marketing efforts are targeted primarily at building awareness and casting a wide net—ideally drumming up some inbound leads for your sales team.
A little further down: the ‘interest’ stage.
One of the best feelings ever: someone clicks on the scheduling link in your cold sales email (or fills out the form online to download the white paper, or chooses to “contact us” on your website). These prospects have moved beyond the awareness stage and have expressed interest in what you’re selling—though it’s still difficult to gauge exactly how deep their level of interest is. Now it’s time to nurture those barely warm leads—reach out with value-added content that helps them understand how your product solves their pain, invite them to an upcoming webinar, and continue to warm them up (or weed them out).
Getting warmer: the ‘desire’ stage.
If your prospect is still with you at this point, they’ve likely expressed something deeper than interest: desire or need for your product. That doesn’t mean they’re ready to buy, though. This could be for a number of reasons, some of which are out of your control (e.g. they’re not the decision maker and you need to talk to a different contact). If you’re talking to the right person and they’ve made it this far down the funnel, they’re ready to talk details. Be prepared with easy-to-understand collateral about packages, pricing, customization options, and anything else they need to know to make the decision to buy.
The bottom of the funnel: action!
You’ve moved your leads all the way down the funnel and have reached the moment of truth: decision time. While some of your customers will make a purchase at this point, others will not—and that’s okay! A “no” from a customer who made it to the bottom of the funnel often is just a no for now.
Did you approach them when they’d already completed their budget? Are they still stuck in a contract with a different vendor? Whatever the reason for the no, don’t Ctrl+X that prospect from the database. Touch base when your product has an update or your company creates fresh content that’s worth sharing. Keep you (and your product) top of mind.
Now that you have a better understanding of your sales funnel and the details of each of its stages, you can proceed with confidence—and more targeted messaging. Prospects that are lost at any stage of the funnel may not be lost forever, so use your sales tools to keep those contacts on an appropriately segmented list.
Happy selling!
ella
Sales Sidekick
esellas