A sales funnel mirrors the path your prospects take to become a customer.
All leads begin at the top of the funnel. They move down the funnel as they learn more about your business and its offerings. There could be hundreds of touchpoints and interactions that take place before a customer makes their decision. As such, you have to pique your prospects’ interest, build trust, and encourage them to take action at every step of the way.
But here’s the rub – the sales landscape is constantly evolving. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to stand out and fill a sales funnel with prospects. That said, brands must adapt accordingly if they’re to survive, let alone turn a profit in a competitive business environment.
Social media marketing along the sales funnel can help you build brand awareness and increase sales and conversions.
What is a Social Media Marketing Funnel?
So, how does social media fit into the sales funnel?
The ubiquity of mobile devices and social media means buyer journeys are becoming more fragmented, thus increasing the need to drive demand and brand awareness across multiple channels simultaneously. What’s more, social media marketing for business is now a must-have tool. It’s a keyway to increase brand visibility, reach your customers, generate sales, and grow your brand.
The social media marketing funnel consists of five phases: discovery, intent, action, engagement, and loyalty.
1. Discovery
The social media marketing funnel begins with prospective customers finding your brand and becoming aware of your products, services, and brand identity. At this point, the goal is to expose prospects to your brand. It’s therefore important to focus on social media advertising with the aim of brand awareness.
Typically, the posts that work include video posts, blog posts, and creative images that pop and grab user attention. The goal is to familiarize potential customers with your brand, so make sure to avoid any hard sells of your products or services.
Even though the targeting criteria at this stage tend to be broad, it’s still a good idea to have a clear understanding of your target persona. This way, you can tailor your social media ads according to characteristics such as gender, age, location, job titles, and interests.
2. Intent
As prospects move down the sales funnel, they’ll start looking for specific information about your brand. This includes researching why you’re better than your competitors. Essentially, the user is deciding whether they wish to use your products and services. As such, you should focus your social media advertising on lead generation ads with the aim of providing users with information that will guide them into the action phase.
3. Action
At this point, the prospect has been exposed to your brand and has shown intent to purchase. All you have to do now is show them how and give them the incentive to make a purchase.
While you can engage the services of a social media manager at any point in the sales funnel, their usefulness is more evident at the conversion stage. They can provide you with analytics to measure whether your ads are receiving attention and whether conversions are leading sales.
4. Engagement and Advocacy
It’s important not to forget about your customer once you’ve made the sale. You still have to nurture the relationship in order to build loyalty. So, stay connected and make them feel like they’re part of the community.
But you don’t have to stop there. You can take the funnel one step further by converting customers from fans into brand advocates. For instance, you can create a platform where they can share opinions and even photos of their purchases.
Keep them engaged by providing them with useful information about new launches or promotions and encourage them to share their journey with friends.
Making Social Media Work for You
Every funnel should be designed for how your customers buy, not how you sell. With a social media marketing agency, you’ll get access to resources and analytics that will enable you to personalize social media marketing campaigns and increase the efficiency of your sales funnel.