Let’s discuss SALES FUNNELLS?

And specifically how to look at a sales funnel from a Human to Human Marketing lens.

Yep, the H2H is something I am ALWAYS going on about, so it shouldn’t come as a shock that I’m going to focus on this when talking about sales funnels.

Sales isn’t hard. It isn’t easy either, but it should be simple or at least simpler – just like marketing.

So, let’s look at how sales funnels used to work.

• Promote to as many people as you can – doesn’t matter who, just people
• Promote EVERYTHING you do – all your products, all your services, just keep shouting
• Convince people to buy – talk to them, keep talking to them, until you have FINALLY convinced them to buy (they probably buy to shut you up)
• Apply pressure to make people buy
• Push people to make a decision
• Make the sale and move on – new customer new person to wear down for a sale

Sound familiar?

You can image it can’t you?  You can absolutely see in your mind, these exact selling principles in play. I know I see it every day. And quite honestly, it’s tiresome and off-putting.

For example, a few months ago I had an email from a person landing in my inbox almost daily, wanting to be on my podcast. So not only was I being constantly bombarded, the emails themselves went from politely pitching themselves, and morphed into an aggressive “What’s wrong with my ideas” style – yep, I kid you not.

(A tip for anyone who is looking to be featured in my podcast – I will NEVER have someone on my podcast has hard sells to me, because imagine what they’ll do to you when I put them in your ears!!)

And another side note – remember marketing is everything – everything you say and do says something about you whether you meant it or not. Never forget that!

Ok, back on track.

The hard sell/anything to everyone sales funnels outlined above, is the OLD way.

The new way that cuts through the noise in the human to human marketing way is this:

• Niche your area of expertise
• Provide answers to prospects problems, solve their roadblocks and challenges
• Start with enormous value upfront
• Position your expertise with evidence – e.g. testimonials (My podcast 98 covered exactly this – jump over and check it out)
• Invite your prospect on a journey, invite them to take the 1^st step
• After they are in your world, and they know like and trust you, introduce them to your full range of services

Bam!  This is a “discovery” Sales Funnell that CONNECTS!

And what is a Discovery Sales Funnell?

By this I mean the following:

It’s not your job to try and CONVINCE anyone to buy from you, instead you must help them DISCOVER AND ANSWER THE QUESTION OF – WHY YOU!

You see selling is broken down into two simple components CONVINCING SELLING or DISCOVERY SELLING and most people (unfortunately) drop automatically into convincing mode.

Your job is to help people DISCOVER why they need you.

How do you do that?

Simple…

Talk to them about THEM!

I know, it’s a revolutionary idea! 😊

Here’s the thing, we all have the same favourite subject – and that is, OURSELVES.

This may come as a shock, but your prospects don’t care about YOU as much as they care about THEMSELVES.

They don’t want to hear about YOU, what YOU DO or how brilliant YOU ARE at it. At least not until you’ve done one thing first.

LISTEN TO THEM.

All your prospects want is to feel understood.

This means your marketing is about THEM, THEIR challenge and how THEY can eliminate whatever problem or challenge you specialise in helping they with.

In other words, you help them DISCOVER the answer to “why you” by talking all about them!

You can talk until you’re blue in the face trying to CONVINCE the world why they should buy from you, or you can do the work and create a message that helps people DISCOVER “why you”.

So, take a look at your sales funnels, take a look at your marketing and ask yourself:

“Is it about me, what I do, how well I do and how long I’ve been doing it for – me me me.  ..” See, that is the Convincing style.

Or am I listening, trying to understand my prospect, seeing it from their point of view and seeing the gaps on how I can help them solve their challenges or problems – this is the Discovery selling style.

Can you see the difference there? We all know someone who is a convincing seller, but is it you? Or can you transform into a connected, discovery seller and really get to the heart of what your potential customer or client needs from you?

Changing this one thing, in your sales and your marketing, could transform your business into one that directly connects with your customers.

Got questions on this? I would absolutely love to chat to you about it!

Head into my Like Minded Business Owners Facebook group and ask away, leave a comment or send me a DM on Instagram or a good old fashioned email jenn@jenndonovan.com.au!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jenn Donovan is a marketing strategist and social media extraordinaire, coach and mentor to savvy business owners.  Owner and Founder of Social Media & Marketing Australia.

With a passion for making business simple, because it’s isn’t easy but it should be simple or at least simpler, she’s built a reputation for helping other small business owners simplify their marketing and businesses so they can reach their goals, be more profitable and live the dream (finding the freedom they set out to achieve when they started … the illusive small business owner freedom dream …!)

Jenn believes in giving before asking and that’s why she’s the host of the popular Small Business Made Simple Podcast