Marketing funnels explained for dummies

The word funnel is probably one of the most popular in the world of digital marketing.

In fact, on almost all websites about Internet business, such as the DELSOL software blog , it is easy to find some entry related to this topic.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about when I refer to the term funnel , you should read this article , because I’m going to explain to you in a simple way everything you need to know about this topic.

What is a sales funnel

Imagine a hose with a powerful jet of fresh water directed towards a funnel.

The first thing that happens is that the funnel fills with water from the top, while only a small trickle of water comes out of the bottom .

The same thing happens when you try to sell any product or service on the Internet.

The funnel in an ecommerce

Let’s assume that you sell a single product. For example: pink boxing gloves, size small.

Chances are that many people have come to your website who have searched the Internet for information related to boxing gloves.

That would be the top of the funnel, towards which the powerful jet of water is directed, which in this case would be the readers looking for generic information about boxing gloves.

But not all of those visits will end up as purchases.

In fact, many of them have not even considered buying pink boxing gloves, let alone a small size!

It is even possible that some of these visitors may want to buy boxing gloves, but in black and extra-large size.

For this reason, some of these users will go deeper into the funnel and start searching through the different sections of your website to see if you also sell other types of gloves .

And when they see that only pink ones are available, many of them will leave your website in search of another e-commerce that sells the gloves they need.

Fewer users, but more willing to buy

As with any funnel, the lower you go, the narrower the tube becomes, so that only those people who want to buy pink, small-sized boxing gloves can get in.

But even if you offer them exactly the product they want to buy, not all of them will complete their order on your website.

The reasons for this are varied: perhaps your price is higher than others; they do not consider it the best time to place their order; or the shipping costs are too high.

Another of the big mistakes made by many online stores is making the purchasing process so complicated that the potential buyer gets tired and abandons the website .

Therefore, in the end only a few remain, who will be the ones who end up buying.

And those are the ones you will see appearing—metaphorically speaking—from the bottom of the funnel, in the form of a thin, narrow, clean, and crystalline stream.

Conversion funnels

Funnels are not exclusively oriented to the sale of services or products.

If you offer, for example, a lead magnet on your website, you will also have set up a conversion funnel , although in this case there is no monetary transaction.

Capturing leads for your subscriber list

Let’s imagine that you are capturing leads to have more subscribers on your list (whom you may later include in a new funnel to sell them information products or services).

In this case, the wide side of the funnel would start at Facebook Ads or Google AdWords .

If you have designed a good creative for your ad, of all the people who see it, only a small percentage of them will be attracted to your message and the lead magnet you offer them.

These will be the ones who click on the link in the ad.

I mention good creativity because if the ad is bad, the number of people who click on the ad can be very low, which will cause your campaign costs to skyrocket.

If everything is set up correctly, you will have driven a powerful stream of readers from Facebook to the registration landing page at the top of the funnel .

Clean, distraction-free landing pages convert better

In this second part of the conversion funnel, you enter the leads who have to give you their data by filling out a form.

From here, the funnel narrows .

That is: of all the users who entered, not all will end up downloading the lead magnet . For this reason, you must try not to distract them and lead them directly to the form.

Complexity, the enemy of a conversion funnel

When your conversion funnel becomes too complex—due to intermediate steps like double opt-in (email confirmation) or by asking for too much data from the potential subscriber—you may end up losing some leads along the way.