This is why you NEED a Sales Funnel (and how to do it!)

I love a good sales funnel. They’re the BEST way to consistently bring more people onto your email list – so you can nurture your relationship, add value & convert them into buyers.

{Video below – scroll down if you’d rather watch than read!}

And if you believe marketing is simply about helping people – as I deeply believe – then sales funnels are a powerful way to connect with your audience & build trust. 

Marketing’s not about who can shout the loudest any more. It’s not about interrupting people; stealing their time & or making over-exaggerated promises.

Instead, it’s about finding new ways to help & serve your audience. To help them solve the problems they’re facing. To make their life easier & help them move one step closer towards the things they really want (whether that’s more time, more money, better relationships or the other deep motivations that drive us all).

When you adopt this marketing mindset, everything gets easier in your business & a whole lot more fun!

You know your audience & your ideal clients. You know their pain points; what keeps them awake at night & what they’re struggling with.

And when you make all your marketing about providing the answers to these problems – creating resources; talking about them in your blogs, emails, social media content & videos – it feels amazing. You’re doing some actual good in the world. And when people engage & are grateful for your help, you get these little endorphin boosts & the movitation to do more & more.

You attract more of your ideal clients to you – the people who value what you do & are happy to pay for it – because they ‘get’ you. They get to know you; like you & trust you, as someone who can help them.

Of course, you have to ask them to buy! Marketing has to drive sales. But when they ARE ready to buy, it’s you they’ll choose. Because it’s you that’s put your time, energy & soul into building those relationships.

It’s not a quick win. But it works. It works for us; for our clients; and for every other business out there, who knows this already.

And this is where sales funnels come in.

The beauty of a sales funnel is that you build it once – and it’s there forever, to consistently build your list.

Once you’ve created the first funnel, you can easily replicate & edit the lead magnet, landing page & automated sequence, to do it again & again.

I don’t know if you have a sales funnel (or several) already? Maybe you do, but it’s not performing as well as you’d like? Or maybe you have no idea what a funnel even is?

There’s a lot of ‘gurus’ & rah-rah crap on social media about funnels at the moment. But in truth, they’re very simple:

• Create something that helps solve a problem for your audience (a downloadable PDF; video masterclass etc)
• Create a landing page, where people can enter their name & email to get access to your freebie
• And then create a series of 5 x emails, where you begin to immerse them in your world, build trust and ask them to buy.

It blows my mind that you can do all this for FREE.

Canva is free, to create your PDF. YouTube is free, to create a video. MailerLite or Mailchimp are free, to build your landing page, send your emails & manage your list. Social media is free, to get it out there to the world.

Of course, you can make your funnel as complex as you like (adding ‘trip wires’ and other stuff). You might need to run Facebook ads etc, to promote it. BUT in reality, they really can be very simple.

Actually, simple is best. Build a very simple funnel first, test it & get it working. And THEN you can always go back in & add more stuff in.

There’s no point investing hours of your life to create a complex, shiny funnel if your basic offering isn’t what your audience wants.

And Facebook ads are really just paid content. If people who already know you don’t want or engage with your freebie, there’s little point putting ad spend behind it (unless it’s to try & reach a whole new type of audience).

So! Grab a notebook – here’s the full LIVE session from our Facebook group, The Copywriting Project.

It’s all about:

• How to come up with a ‘lead magnet’ (freebie!) that your audience really wants;
• How to create your funnel (a bit of tech);
• Writing your email nurture sequence;
• And how to get more people into your funnel!

Skip to 1m 30s to forward through the intro chat 🙂

There’s a FREE Cheat Sheet that goes with this session too – the simple, proven structure for writing your nurture email sequence.

To grab your copy, just come over to your (free) Facebook group, The Copywriting Project & you’ll find it there (under ‘files’ – no opt-in required, ironic as we’re talking funnels!).

So! It was a super popular session in the group. And I do hope it’s been a tiny bit helpful for you, too.

I bang on about this stuff like every week – from copywriting basics to getting through the ‘dip’, when it feels like no-one’s reading; no-one’s watching & no-one’s listening to you.

So for more like this, do come join us. It’s turning into a lovely community of people like us & we’d LOVE to welcome you in.

And yes – I do know funnels are a bit of work. BUT when you see more & more people coming onto your email list every day, it feels amazing. They’ve put their hand up & they’re interested in what YOU have to say. Compared to relentless cold ‘hustling’ – who wouldn’t want that?!

Until next time

 

 

YES! Send me more copywriting tips & inspiration like this (no spam - ever. Promise. Unsubscribe any time!)(required)

Your name(required)

Best email?(required)

Submit

Δ

 

 

 

 

 

Your 30-Day Content Plan!

Content is tricky. We all KNOW we need to be putting more stuff out there – to grow our audience, earn their trust and (ultimately) get more people buying from us.

And it comes up in our Facebook group, time & time again.

• What the heck do you talk about?
• Should you do weekly emails? Blogs? Videos? Podcasts?
• Which social media should you be on?
• How do you find the time, to get it all done?

It’s tough.

So this week’s blog is all about Your 30 Day Content Plan.

Here’s a quick taster from our Facebook group – CLICK HERE for the full 40-min LIVE session!

Just to be clear, I do NOT mean rigidly scheduling every single social media post for the next month.

That’s not what I mean by ‘content’ and I don’t think it works anyway, to keep people’s attention & respond to the challenges they’re facing right now.

Instead, it’s about getting clear on the topics you’ll talk about – week by week – to help & serve your audience.

It’s about reducing the overwhelm, so you’re never sitting at your desk feeling like you should be doing something, but not sure what that something is.

It’s about breaking it down into manageable chunks, so you have real clarity. And instead of just posting everywhere randomly, you start creating content with purpose.

So! In a nutshell (there’s more in the live session!), here’s how it works…

1. ONE topic, every week.

Just one topic that you talk about – week by week – in everything you do.

In your blog posts; emails; videos; FB lives; on your social media. Everywhere.

Your message is 100% consistent. It makes life SO much easier for you, when you know what you’ll be saying in advance. And you save time because you can properly leverage your content (more on that later!).

What are your audience’s pain points? The people that you want to help – what problems does your product or service solve, when they buy from you?

What are their biggest problems? The things they’re struggling with most? Their biggest headaches & challenges? What’s keeping them awake at night?

Brainstorm a list of at least 6-8 things (although you’ll probably think of a ton more!).

• If you’re a nutritionist – are they struggling to make healthy choices for lunch, when their boss is stressing them out?
• If you’re a coach – are they feeling stuck in their business & not sure how to move forwards?
• If you’re a beautician – are they struggling with dry skin, from all the heating / air conditioning?

Let’s take us (Tell My Story) as an example. We write awesome copy & content for business owners who love what they do & care deeply about their clients. All good.

In this blog & FB Live, we’re talking about content. Because I KNOW figuring out what to say, where & how is a massive challenge for lots of us in business!

Other weekly topics include:

• Ggetting through the ‘dip’ – when you’re putting all your content out there, but it feels like no-one’s listening / watching / reading.
• Writing & creating sales funnels – to consistently bring more leads onto your email list.
• Getting your blog seen by more of your ideal clients…

…and loads more. I know these ARE challenges because we talk about them in our FB group. So all the content we put out is around helping other business owners to overcome them.

Obvs it’ll be different pain points for your audience, but the same principles apply.

(I do get that getting clear on your client’s pain points isn’t always easy. So if you’re struggling with this, do come over into the FB group & I’m more than happy to help – we do this a lot!).

Once you’ve brainstormed your list – pick 4. And those are your weekly topics, for the next 4 weeks!

Either the 4 biggest pain points or the 4 you’re most comfortable talking about.

2. What action do you want people to take?

Sounds obvious – but this is NOT about creating content for content’s sake!

It’s about using content to drive sales. To connect with your audience; help them get to know, like & trust you (that old cliche!); keep you top of mind; understand you really CAN be the solution they need; and get them raising their hand to come & work with you.

So each week – what’s the point? What do you want them to do next?

• Do you want them to come into your FB group?
• To book a discovery call with you?
• To click a link to find out more?
• To read your blog?
• To make an online purchase?

Getting clear on this REALLY helps. It makes you feel so much purposeful.

Like if you’re growing your Facebook group, ahead of launching your new course in 3 months time, then you know each week you’re driving towards that aim. To get people to join your group.

And in everything you write, you can create strong calls to action & spell out exactly what they need to do next, step by step.

3. What platforms should you focus on?

Your audience, the people you want to serve – where are their eyeballs?

You can’t be everywhere (well, you can try!). But trying to keep up with Instagram / FB / Twitter / LinkedIn / YouTube / Pinterest etc etc etc is tough.

Instead, it’s about about picking one or two core platforms – where your ideal clients spend their time – and going deep.

For us, it’s Facebook, LinkedIn & growing our email list.

You will know what’s right for you & where your focus needs to be, over the next 30 days.

4. Start with ONE thing – and leverage your content.

For us, it’s Facebook Lives.

We know our topic for the week. So we start with a Facebook Live session, where we talk about that ONE thing in a way that helps our audience.

That FB Live then gets embedded into a blog post (ta-dah!). Sometimes we get it transcribed. Sometimes I write very little & just share the video. Sometimes I write some more words (esp. for popular Lives & long videos, like today).

Then we turn the blog post into a shorter email & send it to our list.

All our social media posts that week are about that one topic – sharing the blog & FB Live, questions, polls, inspirational quotes, pictures, stories etc.

If the FB Live gets loads of comments (like this one did), I might turn that topic into a new resource. A free download or lead magnet for a new sales funnel. A new resource for our clients.

You get the drift!

It might be different for you. You might start with the blog post (I just find it easier to talk first & get the instant feedback from your audience, as to what’s helpful!).

But it means from one topic & one core piece of content, you can leverage it over & over (and save SO much time).

I managed to bang on about all this for a good 40 minutes on the Live. So to watch the full content planning session –  or if I can help in any way – here’s the link to join your (free) FB group, The Copywriting Project.

Have fun (and if you do try it out, I’d LOVE to know how you get on!).

 

YES! Send me more copywriting tips & inspiration like this (no spam - ever. Promise. Unsubscribe any time!)(required)

Your name(required)

Best email?(required)

Submit

Δ