E-commerce: Why do you need to master the sales funnel?

[muskanislam44]

With the growth of online shopping since the beginning of this year (2020), competition has increased and standing out has required a little more knowledge of the digital universe. In other words, knowing how to connect the sales funnel with the marketing funnel will be your differentiator.

Let's go?!

Marketing Funnel & Sales Funnel
The first thing you need to do to gain visibility for your e-commerce is to understand the 3 basic stages of the funnel: Top – Middle – Bottom, which is directly linked to the purchasing journey; which in turn is becoming less and less linear. The consumer profile has changed a lot and people are becoming more and more discerning.

Top of the Sales Funnel and Top of the Marketing Funnel
While marketing considers this phase of the funnel as “learning whatsapp names discovery,” the sales funnel is the phase of “ prospecting leads,” preferably qualified ones. This prospecting is done with the help of the marketing team through many digital tools, such as Landing Pages.

This is the moment when the solution that the business has to offer to the market is contextualized. The sales team prospects with learning content that sparks the interest of the lead in a subtle and often indirect way. In other words, using an analogy with a marital relationship, “it’s the beginning of a relationship.”

Still at the top of the funnel is the problem recognition phase as a stage in which the marketing team works with content and materials that “narrow down” the attraction themes, while the sales team uses marketing conversion tools to begin qualifying their lead bases to “go after them” in a more direct and assertive way.

So, it's time for the sales team to identify which bases will be prioritized. If you have an e-commerce site and don't yet have a digital tool that identifies carts that are abandoned in the middle of a purchase, it's time to review investments to boost sales. In the logic of the funnel, it's from the top that you reach the bottom; which in this case represents the sale!

Middle of the Sales Funnel and the Marketing Funnel
When top-of-funnel strategies move forward assertively, which does not mean that this happens in a linear fashion, we reach the middle of this process. Marketing calls it “consideration of the solution” , sales is already preparing to “present the proposal” .

When sales is about to present a proposal, it is because marketing has done a good job and the customer has already recognized that they have a problem and considered who could solve it. As already mentioned, it is not a linear process, because, even considering that we are in the middle of the funnel, there is the “ negotiation of the proposal” by the sales team, while marketing is already preparing for a possible “loyalty” of this customer, with strategies and enchantment materials.

But why isn’t it linear? Because while the negotiation stage is ongoing, the lead can return to the top of the funnel ; that is, start researching again to see if they can “discover” new solutions now that they have “recognized” their problem; and now they even have a possible solution. This is the time to have an “ace up your sleeve” that will set you apart from your competitors.

And this ace up your sleeve is knowing your client's pain well and presenting a solution that really resolves it; without promising what you can't deliver .

But if your business is an e-commerce, sometimes this negotiation becomes more difficult, because there is no direct contact, right? Show, with objective, highlighted content, that you know the bottlenecks and differentials that your lead may be looking for there.

Tips & Examples
If there is a WhatsApp channel to speak to a customer service representative, highlight it. Do you work with a shipping company and not with the post office? Make this clear – “no strikes delay our deliveries” . If there is free shipping above a certain amount, make your lead see this value . If the payment method is different, show it as well. And finally, just to wrap up these tips: if your product or service is recognized and recommended – use this social proof to your advantage. We will talk more about this later in this text.

Bottom of the Sales Funnel and the Marketing Funnel
Finally, we reach the bottom of the funnel, where what marketing calls the “purchase decision” stage is called the “close the sale” stage by the sales funnel . This is the stage where the customer makes their final assessment and reflection on cost-benefit, differentials that make sense to them, such as: free shipping, easy payment, data security , etc. But they have already researched all of this. The more information of this type you have in your e-commerce with accessibility, in a responsive and organized manner, the better your customer’s experience will be in your virtual store. This will be decisive in closing the sale!

Woohoo! Sold! Is it over? Of course not! Perhaps the last step that closes this cycle, which has been conventionally called the “funnel”, is the most important of all. After all, it is easier and cheaper to sell again to a customer who has already bought from you than to invest efforts in this entire process again; even though it is a practice that is part of the business.

Well, now that this cycle is complete, it’s time for after-sales to come into action, which the marketing funnel calls the “nutrition” stage. Is after-sales sales? Yes!

In e-commerce, this post-sale service generally works through email marketing, after all, the conversion page used at the top of the funnel finally appears to integrate the process. Or even a WhatsApp broadcast list – which may also have been data captured on the Landing Page form . Email flow, social networks and many other digital mechanisms that will nurture your lead so that they remember you; or, more than that, direct and systematic contact, made after a certain period of time after the purchase, such as a satisfaction survey, to find out if the customer was satisfied.

Social Proof
After making a sale, investing in after-sales support is essential for e-commerce to gain social proof. In other words, good reviews and recommendations, among other metrics that involve social proof. These two factors – reviews and recommendations – have been increasingly valued among online consumers.

It is very common for people to look at the seller's rating and the buyers' comments before making a purchase on a marketplace. In the case of e-commerce, this is also very common, in addition to searching on websites such as Reclame Aqui and others that report problems with deliveries and product or service quality. And also websites or tools that evaluate responses and feedback regarding the resolution of the problems pointed out.

Requesting recommendations and reviews on social media are also methods used by brands and online stores as social proof of product quality or service.

Purchasing Journey and the Change in Consumer Profile
As already mentioned, the purchasing journey follows the stages of the funnel, but not in a linear fashion. Between learning and purchasing, there are factors along the way, such as identification, research and evaluation of the cost-benefit ratio, which are parameters that influence the new consumer's decision.