In its simplest form, each level of the marketing funnel points to where a customer is at on their specific journey. Maybe they have just heard about you, attention. Maybe this is a repeat customer that’s telling their friend about the best product they just bought from you, action. No matter where the customer is at, there is a place for them inside the marketing funnel.
A marketing funnel’s end game is to have the user perform a specific action, whether that be actually buying an item, signing up for your newsletter, or filling out a form to get more information. Each marketing funnel has a target action step they want their customers to make.
Not only are we funneling out consumers to actual buyers, but the funnel can correlate to the content that you are creating for that level. The farther along in the funnel the customer is, the more refined the content becomes for that customer.
In this blog, we will cover the four levels of a marketing funnel and what to do in each level to help move a hopeful customer on to the next one.
Level One - Awareness
At this level, your potential customer has realized their problem and has started seeking to resolve it whether it be a product or service. This is where your advertising and keywords come into play. For instance, when your potential customer search "weight loss," they will begin seeing more from businesses that include "weight loss" in their posts, websites, and advertisements. Anyone that has seen your post or ad is now aware of your brand or a certain product you offer. You have gotten them into the first level of your marketing funnel.
This post may bring the customer to your site, your Facebook page, or maybe even email you with a question they have. Whatever the first step that they take is, they are now in the awareness phase.
There are many different types of content you can utilize in this stage to grab a potential customer’s attention. Content could look like any of these:
Marketing events
Webinars
Blogs
Direct mail marketing
Social media post
In this stage, information is pulled from each potential customer’s interaction with the content. We take that information and use it at a further level along the way to move the customer along. We also correlate this stage with lead generation.
Level Two - Interest
A potential customer has now learned about you or your product and is wanting more information. You are now nurturing this potential customer onwards down the marketing funnel.
Using the information obtained from level one of the funnel, you can now utilize items like emails, newsletters, or targeted content to move them to the next level.
Customers in this stage want information. Information about you, your product, and your industry. It’s essential to feed them that information with your content so that you can start to build that relationship with them.
Level Three - Decision
This is where the user crosses that line into a prospective customer. The content becomes even more refined and targeted towards this specific customer and the action step you want them to take.
In this stage, consumers have learned a lot about your company and the product they are interested in and may be ready to take that next step. Content can be curated towards this customer by using things like free trials, case studies, and email offers.
Level Four - Action
The last step in the marketing funnel is the action step. This is where that potential customer becomes an actual customer. This could mean they purchased the product they were first interested in, or they signed up for a masterclass you offer. Whatever it may be, you have accomplished adding another customer to your list.
The work doesn’t stop here. You could say that the funnel continues to create loyal customers and even brand advocates, but for the sake of this blog post, we will end it at four.
Even if your action step is taken and you think the work is over, it may not be. Maybe you get this customer to move into a different marketing funnel. They purchased a product from you but now you want them to sign up for an online class they can take. If that’s the case, you start all over again from the beginning.
Conclusion
All businesses need a marketing funnel template to utilize when creating content for their customers. Not only is it important to understand who you’re marketing to, but also what you are marketing towards. Is it to get the customer to click on the link? To sign up for a newsletter? Or make the purchase?
Thankfully, Elemental Plans has you covered. If you need help creating a marketing funnel and its end goal, please don’t hesitate to reach out. We are experts when it comes to social media and digital marketing management!
Resources
Neil Patel, “How Marketing Funnels Work (The Easiest Way to Create One), Neil Patel, https://neilpatel.com/blog/how-marketing-funnels-work/, Accessed October 10, 2022
Skyword, “How the Marketing Funnel Works From Top to Bottom”, Skyword Staff, October 2 2020, https://www.skyword.com/contentstandard/how-the-marketing-funnel-works-from-top-to-bottom/, Accessed October 10, 2022
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