By Sean Tinney Could 28, 2024
E mail advertising and marketing is a conversion-driving machine.
In reality, electronic mail has the highest conversion rate of any B2C advertising and marketing channel (and the third-highest for B2B audiences, narrowly behind thought management and public talking).
However you received’t benefit from the sales-generating advantages of electronic mail advertising and marketing until you:
- Construct a dependable pipeline of leads
- Clarify your worth proposition successfully
- Give new email subscribers a cause to purchase
How are you going to do all of that?
By designing a watertight, streamlined, high-converting electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel.
What’s the advertising and marketing funnel?
The advertising and marketing funnel is a device that helps you visualize the client journey, or the trail a prospect takes as they change into acquainted with your organization, from introduction to conversion (and hopefully past).
Your advertising and marketing funnel ought to embrace the next 5 phases:
1 – Consciousness
2 – Consideration
3 – Conversion
4 – Loyalty
5 – Advocacy
An electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel is a sequence of emails designed to nurture new leads and current clients till they’re prepared to position their first (or subsequent) order.
Efficient electronic mail funnels are tailor-made to serve the completely different purchaser intents at every stage of the client journey. Alongside the way in which, you’ll educate leads about your services or products, share social proof, present them with incentives to purchase, and encourage them to put in writing a optimistic evaluation or suggest you to their family and friends.
Get your electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel proper and also you’ll drive extra gross sales and increase your buyer lifetime worth.
E mail advertising and marketing funnel vs conventional advertising and marketing funnel: What’s the distinction?
E mail advertising and marketing funnels and conventional advertising and marketing funnels have the identical objective: persuading your viewers to purchase from you by feeding them a gradual stream of knowledge and incentives.
Nonetheless, they’ve alternative ways of reaching this objective in numerous methods.
The normal advertising and marketing funnel makes use of a wide range of advertising and marketing instruments and channels — website positioning, paid advertisements, social media, electronic mail, and extra — to maneuver clients by way of the completely different shopping for phases, whereas the e-mail advertising and marketing funnel is all about selling your services or products to folks in your electronic mail record.
5 advertising and marketing funnel phases
Now that you simply perceive what the e-mail advertising and marketing funnel is, I’ll describe every stage and supply you real-world examples for shifting your viewers by way of these phases.
1. Consciousness
Consciousness is the primary of the advertising and marketing funnel phases. Throughout this stage, prospects which might be strangers to your model and firm. That is your alternative to begin constructing a trusted relationship with them.
It’s your job throughout this stage of the advertising and marketing funnel to reveal your worth to prospects by way of free, academic content material. They’re not prepared to purchase from you but — as a result of they don’t but perceive what you convey to the desk.
The right way to use electronic mail within the consciousness stage
Undecided what free content material to ship in your emails? Let’s say you’re a private coach who’s attempting to show your prospect into paying clients and also you’re utilizing electronic mail as your essential supply of communication. Listed here are some concepts for content material you could possibly embrace in an automatic electronic mail sequence to your prospects:
- Weblog posts about diet or health
- A meals monitoring calendar worksheet
- An book that explains the well being advantages of being match
- A stay 30-minute exercise webinar
(Listed here are 25 brilliant lead magnet ideas to grow your email list right now.)
Right here’s one other instance:
Health influencer Massy Arias builds a relationship with prospects by providing customized steering on coaching and diet by way of a quiz on her web site:
Prospects who land on Massy’s quiz landing page reply a bunch of questions on their age, physique kind, health objectives, and extra. Then they hand over their title and electronic mail tackle to obtain their customized health plan.
With this technique, prospects get a helpful piece of content material tailor-made to their particular wants, whereas Massy will get one other subscriber to her electronic mail record.
It’s a win-win!
Right here’s an instance:
Health influencer Kayla Itsines builds a relationship along with her prospects by exhibiting her experience and demonstrating the worth of her companies by giving her prospects a free week of her Bikini Physique Information exercise program.
When prospects join, they obtain an book with a full week of exercises to allow them to check this system and see the worth of it for themselves.
2. Consideration
As soon as a prospect strikes previous the attention stage of the advertising and marketing funnel, they enter the consideration stage. Within the consideration stage, a prospect is keen to think about buying your companies or merchandise. They’re occupied with studying extra about you and what you possibly can provide them.
Since you already know extra about your prospect on this advertising and marketing funnel stage than you probably did in the course of the consciousness stage, you possibly can ship them extra focused content material that addresses their particular pain points. This helps construct belief between your prospect and your model, since you’re exhibiting them that you simply perceive them.
The right way to use electronic mail within the consideration stage
So what sort of content material do you have to ship your prospects in the course of the consideration stage?
Let’s say you run a web-based retailer promoting outside furnishings. Potential clients might need a ton of questions on your model and product. Is your furnishings well-made? Does it seem like the images? Is it definitely worth the cash?
It’s your job to reply these questions in your electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel by sharing content material like:
- Testimonials from current clients who love your merchandise
- Evaluations from thought leaders and trusted publications
- High quality and security scores from unbiased trade our bodies
Let’s check out how this works in observe.
Right here’s an instance:
On this electronic mail, outside furnishings model Outer shares a few of its greatest buyer critiques:
These critiques sort out among the frequent points which may put somebody off shopping for from Outer. Extra importantly, the solutions come from actual clients moderately than the model, which makes them far more persuasive.
Sharing critiques is particularly helpful once you’re attempting to transform first-time consumers, on condition that 98% of consumers say they’re extra prone to learn critiques for a product they’ve by no means bought earlier than.
👉 Be taught extra: How to get Google reviews: A step-by-step guide to boosting your sales
3. Conversion
It has lastly arrived: determination time. As soon as your prospect is aware of the worth of your product and you’ve got educated them on the product itself by way of the usage of social proof, webinars, weblog posts, and different academic content material, they’re able to resolve whether or not or to not buy.
When you’ve reached this advertising and marketing funnel stage, you can begin speaking about why your product and repair is healthier than your rivals’ and why it’s good to your prospect. Concentrate on the advantages of your product/service moderately than simply explaining options.
The right way to use electronic mail within the conversion stage
Listed here are just a few techniques you need to use to persuade your prospects to buy:
- Invite prospects to a gross sales webinar the place you present them your product/service and inform them the advantages
- Create an automated email series that describe a distinct good thing about your product/service
- Provide a free trial or give away samples in order that prospects can see the advantages for themselves
- Ship prospects an electronic mail that gives a sale or low cost for buying inside a sure timeframe
Right here’s an instance:
By providing reductions and offers by way of electronic mail, Thrive Market creates a way of urgency round their merchandise. If prospects are occupied with buying however haven’t but, this electronic mail convinces them that now could be the proper time to take motion.
4. Loyalty
As soon as a prospect turns into a buyer, chances are you’ll be tempted to pat your self on the again and transfer on to the subsequent prospect. Nonetheless, forgetting about your clients is a foul thought.
Except you may have a plan for growing buyer loyalty, you’ll most likely lose lots of your clients, losing loads of your prior advertising and marketing efforts in the course of the earlier advertising and marketing funnel phases.
Keep in mind the Pareto Precept? Repeat clients are too helpful to disregard. So what sort of electronic mail content material will increase loyalty and retention?
The right way to use electronic mail within the loyalty stage
Let’s say you may have a web-based espresso retailer. You promote subscriptions to your coffee-of-the-month membership, and also you don’t need your coffee-of-the-month members to lose curiosity and cancel their subscription. Listed here are just a few concepts for helpful content material you could possibly embrace in your emails to extend retention:
- A month-to-month stay stream to YouTube that describes the coffee-of-the-month and offers espresso brewing greatest practices.
- A survey that asks clients how joyful they’re with the coffees they’re receiving and what other forms of espresso they’d prefer to get.
- Academic content material concerning the historical past of espresso.
- A 20 p.c low cost to clients that buy a yearly subscription of your coffee-of-the-month membership.
Right here’s an instance:
SaaS device Zapier reaches out to customers after they’ve constructed their first automation by way of the platform:
This electronic mail makes clients be ok with themselves by (metaphorically) patting them on the again for establishing their first profitable automation.
Extra importantly, it suggests some extra automations they’ll create, thereby encouraging them to get extra worth from the platform. And the extra helpful they discover it, the extra possible they’re to remain subscribed, boosting Zapier’s buyer lifetime worth.
👉 Be taught extra: Increase repeat purchases with these 5 easy tips
5. Advocacy
Advocacy occurs when your clients change into one thing greater than clients: they change into followers.
Bringing clients to this stage of the advertising and marketing funnel is extraordinarily helpful. The best advertising and marketing is referral advertising and marketing. That’s when your buddy tells you a sure product is superior, you might be more likely to buy that product since you belief your buddy.
The right way to use electronic mail within the advocacy stage
What are some methods to make use of electronic mail to show your clients into raving followers?
- Determine clients that love you and ship them an electronic mail asking them to refer you to their buddies
- Embody a survey in an electronic mail to find out how you could possibly enhance your services or products
- Begin an affiliate or loyalty program the place clients get incentives for referring you
- Have interaction together with your advocates by replying to their emails, posting on social media, providing incentives for writing critiques and collaborating in testimonials
You additionally wish to accumulate suggestions throughout this stage. The extra you hearken to your clients, the extra you possibly can study and enhance your content material so it’s in keeping with their challenges, wants, and needs. Instruments like SurveyMonkey and SurveyGizmo make accumulating suggestions simple.
Professional tip: Inside AWeber’s platform, you could find survey templates, too. All it’s a must to do is add your individual content material into the templates and ship it to your clients.
Right here’s an instance:
To make their clients really feel particular, trend model Torrid sends them an unique low cost on their birthday:
Even when recipients don’t benefit from the provide, this tactic positions Torrid as a model that cares about its viewers.
Which, in flip, makes clients extra prone to suggest Torrid to their family members.
👉 Be taught extra: Birthday emails: How to boost subscriber loyalty and make more sales
5 tricks to construct a high-converting electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel
Now that we’ve defined the worth of the e-mail advertising and marketing funnel, let’s take into account 5 tried-and-trusted techniques to generate extra leads and gross sales:
1. Use your web site and social channels to develop your electronic mail record
For greatest outcomes, guarantee your electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel is repeatedly topped up with new leads generated by way of your web site and social media.
YouTube development coach Matt Par (AKA Make Cash Matt) is a grasp at utilizing YouTube for lead gen. Let’s check out how he does it.
First up, Matt created a video explaining how you can generate income from YouTube with out truly publishing your individual content material:
He clearly hit on a standard ache level, as a result of it had racked up 1.9 million views at time of writing.
The video is step one in Matt’s advertising and marketing funnel.
He makes use of the YouTube description to steer viewers towards the subsequent step — his free coaching provide:
Clicking that hyperlink takes you to a devoted touchdown web page on Matt’s web site that spells out the advantages of signing up for the coaching.
When you hit the CTA button…
…you open up a lead seize type that prompts you to pick out the popular date to your coaching session and hand over your electronic mail tackle.
Now Matt can attain out to you by way of electronic mail when he launches new companies or particular provides.
Intelligent stuff!
👉 Be taught extra: 5 Proven ways to grow your email list using YouTube
2. Ship welcome emails to new subscribers
You realize what they are saying: you solely get one probability to make first impression.
Welcome emails are your alternative to reassure new leads that they had been proper to enroll in your e-newsletter. Use them to share helpful data like:
- Your model story and worth proposition
- Explainer movies about your product / service
- Weblog posts tackling frequent viewers ache factors
And you need to take into account including some form of promotion or incentive to drive first-time purchases, too.
Cosmetics model Duradry has constructed a killer welcome sequence.
For starters, they share some background about their model and the way they created their first antiperspirant merchandise:
Then, within the second step of their welcome sequence, they go into extra depth on how their merchandise work:
Lastly, at step #3, they incorporate a bunch of buyer testimonials (together with video critiques for added credibility), adopted by a 20% cashback incentive to encourage first-time purchases:
👉 Be taught extra: Welcome email campaigns: How to onboard new subscribers
3. Drive conversions with limited-time provides
Quick-term reductions and promotions add an air of shortage and urgency to your emails, which will help you flip e-newsletter subscribers into paying clients.
For instance, on-line coding lessons platform Codecademy shared a limited-time provide giving electronic mail subscribers 50% off their premium membership package deal:
That preliminary electronic mail was adopted 5 days later by a last warning that the promotion was about to run out:
This mixture of a beautiful low cost and a looming deadline provides potential clients all the motivation they should purchase now.
4. Encourage subscribers to advertise your model by way of critiques
On-line critiques play an important position in changing people who find themselves on the consideration stage of the advertising and marketing funnel.
How very important?
Effectively, 98% of shoppers say critiques are a necessary useful resource when making buy selections, whereas 45% received’t buy a product with no obtainable critiques.
So it pays to construct a relentless stream of critiques. Make it occur by asking individuals who’ve not too long ago purchased a services or products to evaluation their buy. Then share the outcomes as a part of your electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel, identical to pet food model Sundays did right here:
5. Ask clients to refer family and friends
Evaluations aren’t the one means your clients will help you drive conversions.
They will play an much more direct position within the path to buy by encouraging buddies, household, colleagues, and random folks they meet on the street to purchase your services or products.
How are you going to flip current clients into model advocates? By constructing a referral program and sharing it together with your electronic mail subscribers, identical to digital advertising and marketing company Circles did right here:
This tactic is especially efficient on condition that referrals enable you attain extra helpful clients.
Certainly, an analysis of just about 10,000 new German financial institution accounts over a 33-month interval discovered that referred clients:
- Are extra loyal
- Generate greater revenue margins
- Present a better buyer lifetime worth
Create your individual electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel
Develop your email strategy with the advertising and marketing funnel in thoughts. Doing so, you’ll convert extra prospects into clients and extra clients into followers, which suggests extra money for your online business. Yay!
And with a device like email automation, it’s simpler than ever earlier than to maneuver folks by way of your funnel towards advocacy.
Automation options let you give every prospect the content material, data, or merchandise they want after they want it most. It personalizes their expertise in any respect areas of the funnel.
And as soon as it’s arrange, you by no means need to carry a finger! You’ve successfully arrange an engine that generates passive revenue to gasoline your ardour.
Begin implementing your electronic mail advertising and marketing funnel in your AWeber account. Don’t have an account but. No drawback, signing up is fast and straightforward.
