*** IN THIS ISSUE ***

– Back Track to the 1.5 Issue!
– Structure of a Sales Funnel
– Notes from Paint Chip

Back Track to the 1.5 Issue!

I sneaked an extra business report into my auto-responder series.  If your sign-up time clashed with my update, you may not have received the notification.  If you missed Issue #1.5 you can go back and catch it online.  Included in that issue was information about RSS and why you should offer it! Check it out now.

Structure of a Sales Funnel

The success of many Internet companies is the concept of the sales funnel. The most well known and highest paid web-preneneurs dominate their business niche by developing strong sales funnel marketing programs. Literally everyone has been exposed to and is a part of sales funnels. It’s not a trap or a marketing gimmick. It’s simply a way to identify us as customers and recognize the potential buying position we represent.

Holding a funnel in your hand and pouring something into a funnel works something like this: You see the largest part of the opening is at the top, and you can pour a large amount of something into the funnel from this opening. The middle section of your funnel is slightly smaller and continues to get even smaller as it moves downward. The bottom part of the funnel is narrower and allows only a small portion of your funnel contents to come through and usually at a slower pace. But it’s small enough that you can have much better control over the direction of what flows through it. If you plug the hole at the bottom of the funnel nothing can get through and the funnel fills up and then begins to overflow. If you cap off the top of the funnel, nothing can come into it.

In the business setting, what moves through a sales funnel are the company’s customers. The purpose of a sales funnel is to help the seller attract prospective customers and lead them to take the natural path of becoming a buying customer. The funnel also filters our clients into identifiable groups so we can market products and services to them according to their purchasing practices. It’s the number of people, the choices of products/services, and the cost of those choices in each group that represent the funnel shape.

The top of the funnel is made up of the largest group of people and these are prospective clients whose attention you hope to attract. Marketing to this group involves providing free products and services. Free doesn’t mean low quality. Whatever you are gifting to this group of people is like a calling card or a resume. So if you deliver to them something of no worth or of poor quality, you may have attracted their attention, but you won’t hold it long enough to help them become a buying customer. Examples of attention grabbers I see often in the digital scrapbooking industry include free downloadable digi-art products, free information through public websites (like blogs), or free electronic publications (e-pubs).

The next level of the sales funnel represents our prospective customers who are actively participating by “opting-in” to continued marketing. The term opting-in simply means the person has agreed to let us continue communicating with them. This group of people haven’t actually purchased anything… yet. With online businesses we see this group of prospects as people who have signed up for continued services or products of some sort. In the digital scrapbooking world these folks are the ones who are members of free community forums, subscribers to newsletters, etc.

From this group of participants emerges a smaller group of people who actually begin purchasing products from the seller. This group of customers have already sampled our free offerings and become actively involved in our business by allowing us to continue marketing to them. They saw something they liked or needed that had a price tag on it and agreed to make a purchase. In this portion of our funnel it’s assumed the products and services being sold are low-priced goods and services and are represented by a large variety of offerings. Digi-kits, small scrapping contracts, low-cost software products are examples of what might be sold here.

Moving into the smallest group of customers and the last part of a sales funnel marketing program is where you’ll find the customers who are hyper responsive and are willing to make larger purchases and/or longer, more serious commitments. These people have moved through the funnel and into the most lucrative part of your business. A wise business manager realizes that these customers are responsible for a significant portion of their profits. Your products and services at this level of the funnel must represent a significant value to the customer. If they don’t see your product or service as something of high worth, they won’t be willing to shell out the high dollars to make the purchase.

Sales funnel marketing is very reliable and filled with powerful sales opportunities. In my opinion it’s also one of the strongest ways to gage the success of your product placement strategies, marketing campaigns, and your customers buying habits.

Notes from Paint Chip

Using a sales funnel to generate high-ticket sales is how small businesses turn into large businesses. Its how part-time
entrepreneurs earn a full time salary. Capturing the full potential of a sales funnel isn’t easy. It’s hard work and requires a clear understanding of each type of customer, each type of product or service offered and how to match them up to maximize your earnings.

Want to learn more about marketing your Digi-Scrap business? Check out the marketing articles in our networking forums.   NOTE: forum articles are available to business associates only. If you aren’t a member yet, you can get your free membership at: http://dsd-pro.com/association. See ya on the inside!

I hope that after reading today’s briefing you have gained some knowledge that will help you in your digital scrapbooking business. We are always open to suggestions for future articles as well. If you have certain subjects you would like for us to research and address for you, please drop me a line and let me know what they are.

Very Respectfully,
Cindy Angiel (aka - Paint Chip)
paintchip[at]dsd-professionals[dot]com