How To Develop a Top-Performing Lead Generation Funnel

Think of a lead funnel like a giant cone. It starts out wide at the top and gets narrower as you go down. At the top of the funnel, you get lots of potential customers. These are called leads.

As they move down the funnel, some will lose interest. That’s okay — but the ones who are most interested keep moving down until, at the very bottom, they become your paying customers. 

There are three main stages in your lead generation funnel:

• Awareness: This is where people first learn about your business. Maybe they saw your ad on social media platforms or found your blog post on a search engine.
• Consideration: Now they know who you are and are curious to learn more. They might be comparing you to other options.
• Conversion: This is the big finale. Here, a lead finally decides to buy your product or try your service.

It’s important to remember that not everyone follows the same path. Some people might jump right in and buy. Others might need a bit more convincing. Your lead funnel helps you figure out where each lead is at and how you can best help them move to the next stage.

To make your lead generation funnel work, you need a few key pieces. Let’s start with one of the most important.

The Lead Magnet

With a lead magnet, you offer something valuable to potential customers in exchange for their contact information. Why do this? Because if someone is willing to give you their email address, they’re probably already interested in what you have to offer.

Here are some popular types of lead magnets:

• Ebooks: A short ebook can share helpful tips or information about your industry.
• Webinars: Hosting a live webinar lets you teach something valuable and get to know your potential leads in real time.
• Free Trials: This works great for software or services, letting people try before they buy.
• Templates: If you can create helpful templates people can use, it’s an easy way to get their contact info.
• Case Studies: Show off your success stories and how you’ve helped businesses just like theirs.

The Landing Page

The landing page is where you send people to get your lead magnet. A good landing page does two things:

1. Clearly Explains the Value: Tell people in simple terms what they’ll get and why it’s worth their email address.
2. Makes It Easy To Sign Up: Keep the form short and sweet. Only ask for the info you absolutely need.

Think of your landing page as the doorway to your lead funnel. Make it inviting.

The CRM

A CRM stands for customer relationship management. Basically, it’s a fancy name for a database where you store all of your leads’ information. 

A good CRM will help you:

• Remember where a lead is in your funnel. Did they download your ebook, or are they already asking for a demo?
• Track your communication. You’ll see every email you’ve sent or call you’ve had with a lead.
• Stay organized. A good CRM saves your sales team a ton of time and headaches.

CRMs can get complex, but the main idea is to have a central place to manage all your potential customer relationships.

You have the basics of your lead funnel figured out — a compelling lead magnet, a snazzy landing page, and a CRM to keep things organized. Now, it’s time to put it all to work. 

In this section, we’ll walk you through a step-by-step plan for attracting those perfect leads and guiding them toward becoming your customers.

Step 1: Mapping the Customer Journey

Before you can build a super effective lead generation funnel, you need to understand your ideal customer. 

How do they think? What problems do they have? Where do they go online to find solutions? This is called mapping their customer journey. It’s the foundation for creating a funnel that actually works.

Here’s how you can get inside your customers’ heads:

• Surveys: Ask your current customers questions about their challenges and how they found your business. You can use online survey tools to make this easy.
• Customer Interviews: Set up a quick call to have deeper conversations with some of your best customers. Ask how they first learned about you and what convinced them to buy.

Mapping the customer journey takes some effort, but it’s incredibly valuable. The better you know your ideal customer, the easier it is to attract them to your funnel.

Step 2: Choose Your Attraction Methods

Now that you understand how your ideal customer thinks, it’s time to decide where to find them. This is where you choose your lead-generation strategies and tactics. 

Let’s look at some popular options:

• Social Media: Platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, or Instagram are great for reaching specific audiences. You can use organic posts and paid ads to target people who fit your ideal customer profile.
• SEO: This stands for “search engine optimization.” Creating content like blog posts that target the right keywords can help people find your website when searching online.
• Email Marketing: Even though it’s been around for a long time, email marketing is still a powerful way to nurture leads. Regular email newsletters with helpful content keep your business top-of-mind.
• Webinars: Hosting a webinar lets you share valuable information and showcase your expertise. It’s perfect for attracting those in the middle of the funnel.

The key is to choose the methods that align with where your potential customers spend their time. Your customer journey map should give you some clues on where to start.

In reality, even with the best planning, you won’t know for sure which attraction methods work best until you try them. Test different things and track your results. This way, you can focus your time and money on the channels that bring in the highest quality leads.

Step 3: Craft Your Lead Generation Offer

Remember that your lead magnet is like a gift in exchange for a potential customer’s contact information. Your offer needs to be so valuable that they can’t help but say “Yes.” 

Here’s how to make sure your lead magnet hits the mark:

• Solve a Real Problem: What keeps your ideal customer up at night? Create a lead magnet that offers a solution or gives them the tools to start solving that problem.
• Showcase Your Expertise: Your lead magnet is the perfect chance to show off what you know. Teach something valuable, or use a case study to highlight your success.
• Make it Easily Digestible: People are busy. Keep your ebooks short, or aim for a webinar under an hour. People are more likely to use your lead magnet if it fits their schedule.

Great lead magnets make people excited to learn more from you. The more value you offer upfront, the more trust you build with potential leads.

Step 4: Build Your Sales Pipeline

Your sales pipeline is like a step-by-step roadmap for your sales team. It shows how a potential customer moves from being a new lead to becoming a paying customer. 

Every company’s sales pipeline looks a bit different, but here’s a common outline:

• Lead Generation: This is where you use a content marketing strategy and a social media strategy to attract new leads and get their contact information.
• Qualification: Is this lead actually a good fit? Your sales team will reach out to determine if they have the right problem and budget for your solution.
• Product Demo: For qualified leads, it’s time to show off your product or service. This might be a one-on-one demo or a more extensive webinar-style presentation.
• Proposal and Negotiation: If the lead is still interested, your sales team will provide a formal proposal with pricing and work out any final details.
• Closing the Deal: This is the exciting part. Once the contract is signed, this lead officially becomes a paying customer.

Your CRM needs to have clearly defined sales pipeline stages. This way, your sales team always knows where each lead is in the process and what to do next. A good CRM also lets you track leads as they move through the pipeline, giving you valuable insights into how to optimize your sales process.

What’s next? Once a lead reaches the bottom of the funnel, they’ve become a customer. But your work isn’t done. There’s more to learn, so let’s check out the remaining step.

Embed: https://twitter.com/matt_gray_/status/1745883778709426220

Step 5: Decide Where Marketing Hands Off to Sales

Traditionally, marketing was in charge of generating leads. They’d give those leads to sales and wish them luck. However, the best companies these days have marketing and sales working as a team to nurture leads throughout the entire funnel. 

Here’s how this works:

• Marketing at the Top: Marketing still has the primary job of attracting new leads. They use tools like social media, SEO, and content marketing to reach your target audience and get the lead magnet in front of them.
• Sales in the Middle: Salespeople are experts in understanding customer needs and answering tough questions. Increasingly, they’re getting involved in creating content that helps potential customers in the middle stages of their journey. This might be blogs, case studies, or even hosting webinars.
• Collaborative Nurturing: Modern CRMs make it easy for your sales and marketing efforts to work together on nurturing leads. Marketing might run automated email campaigns to provide regular value, and sales reps can follow up directly with the hottest leads.

So, when’s the right time to hand off a lead from marketing to sales? This is where qualifying leads is important. Here are some ways to determine if a lead is ready for a sales call:

• Lead Scoring: Your CRM can track how a lead interacts with your content. Did they attend a webinar or download your ebook? This suggests they’re interested, making them a better fit for a sales call.
• Contact Forms: If a lead fills out a form requesting a demo or more information, that’s a strong sign to pass them over to sales.
• Direct Communication: When a lead reaches out directly to your company via email or chat, those usually go straight to the sales team.

The biggest benefit of this collaborative approach is a smoother experience for your potential customers. When sales and marketing teams communicate well, the customer feels taken care of and understood throughout their entire journey. This leads to happier customers and more closed deals.

You’ve put in the work and set up an awesome lead-generation funnel. But don’t think your work is done yet. The best funnels are always evolving and improving. 

Here’s how to keep yours working its best:

• Test and Track: Don’t be afraid to experiment. Try different headlines on your landing page, or test sending emails at different times. Your CRM should help you track results so you can see what works and do more of it.
• Revisit Your Target: Business changes. So does your ideal customer. Review who you’re trying to reach on a regular basis. Do their problems or online behaviors still match up with your strategies?
• Refresh Your Magnet: If your lead magnet has been around for a while, it might need an update. Offer new insights or consider switching up the format, like transforming that old ebook into a quick-start guide.

Here at Founder OS, we’re passionate about helping businesses create lead-gen funnels that deliver results. Our program offers in-depth training, tools, and support to fine-tune every stage of the funnel. We can help you attract even more high-quality leads and turn them into loyal customers.

Building a successful lead generation funnel takes effort, but the payoff is huge. Here’s the most important thing to remember: the better you understand your ideal customer, the better results you’ll see.

Offer genuine value with your lead magnet to attract potential leads and engage with your brand. And remember, the sales funnel and lead generation process is ongoing. Keep optimizing it over time and test new things to keep seeing improvements.

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