From the course: Small Business Marketing

Exploring the marketing funnel

From the course: Small Business Marketing

Exploring the marketing funnel

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- Insufficient marketing coverage will lead to poor conversions and costly mistakes. You see, a consumer must move through a series of stages before they're ready to buy. If you don't have marketing aligned to each stage, i.e. insufficient coverage, well you're not maximizing the likelihood that your consumer converts. We use the marketing funnel to outline the stages of a consumer's journey. At the top, the widest point of the funnel, is where a buyer starts their journey, and the bottom, the narrowest part, is where they complete it. And it's narrow at the bottom because you'll have a lot fewer consumers reaching the last stage than those reaching the first. At the top is awareness. A prospect has to become aware of two things, their need or want and your solution. It's in this stage that your brand is exposed to the prospect alongside your competition. And then below awareness we have interest. At this stage, a consumer begins to explore the products or services available to them. And below this comes desire, which we can also call consideration. It's here that the prospect wants to make a purchase but it may or may not be with your brand. They're in the final stages of evaluating whether or not to commit. And finally, action, they're either going to buy or they're not. They may select your company, another company, or based on their findings, decide that they're not making a purchase at all. Now this is the foundational funnel, and we often reference these different segments as top of the funnel, middle of the funnel, and bottom of the funnel. So the top is awareness, the middle is evaluation, and the bottom, conversion. Now this is our basic funnel with our four segments, and on its own this will serve you well. But it is common to add a fifth segment called loyalty or advocacy. It's really unwise to think that just because the user has completed the sale that their journey is over. After the sale is an incredibly important aspect of marketing, so it's important that the funnel reflects the notion that a customer can choose whether to purchase again or if they're going to recommend your products to others. When you're aware of these stages, you can better evaluate your marketing coverage. You must have marketing in place that covers top, middle, and the bottom of the funnel. Many small businesses neglect to recognize this need. So one of the most important things you can do in your marketing is build coverage for the entire customer journey.

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