Running a business is hard. Dealing with prospects and trying to convert them into paying customers is harder. Now, having to do all these alone and manually, is the hardest part of being a business owner.

To take away this difficulty, it’s best to use sales funnels. Not just any sales funnel, but automated sales funnel.

An automated sales funnel helps you save time and energy by managing the process of turning prospects into loyal customers and increasing your revenue.

If you’d like to learn how to create automated sales funnels, it’s your lucky day! In this article, we’ll go over EVERYTHING you need to know to create an automated sales funnel.

Let’s get started.

What is an Automated Sales Funnel?

An automated sales funnel, as the name implies, is a sales funnel that operates on automation as a way to ensure things keep moving smoothly and steadily.

The huge advantage of sales funnels automation is that you can generate a large number of leads and more revenue by putting in less effort.

A sales funnel, on the other hand, is a marketing concept used to describe a customer’s buying journey. It shows you the processes your customers go through before finally making a purchase.

The model uses a funnel as an analogy to describe the various stages of the customer’s journey. Usually, the top of the funnel is the largest part of the funnel to which all your customers are directed.

Then the bottom of the funnel is where customers who buy from you are placed. Whatever happens in the middle of the funnel determines if your customers will move down the funnel or away from it.

As the prospects pass through each stage of the funnel, it shows they have a more substantial interest in the product.

Learn How to Easily Create and Sell Digital Products Online

Why Should You Automate Your Sales Funnel?

Automation saves time, produces more results, and requires less effort. As your online business grows, you’ll need to cut back on the stressful methods of running your business and focus on creating products/services that lure people to your business.

There are a million reasons to choose automation over traditional methods of tendering to customers. Here are a few of them;

#1. Saves time

The first reason you should automate your sales funnel is to save time and money. Why hire people to send emails to anyone who downloads your lead magnet when you can automate the entire process?

Here’s a common scenario;

You build a sales page using Selar’s page builder feature, host your free ebook on it and drive traffic to your page.

50% of 1000 people who visit your page get attracted to the book and proceed to download it by entering their email addresses.

Automatically, they move to the next stage of the funnel and you can see the email addresses of the 500 people who downloaded your book.

Now, you have to manually upload them to your emailing tool and send them targeted emails to get them to take another step. Whether it’s to read an article, register for your upcoming webinar, or watch a Youtube video.

According to your schedule, you send them emails manually. Those who click one of your links show a deeper interest in your business, so you separate them and send them more emails because they are more likely to convert than those who just opened your email.

While we are down at the funnel, let’s not forget that the page gets new visitors, and as usual, you have to manually upload them to your mailing tool, and send them targeted emails because they came late to the party.

This cycle of segmenting your audience and sending targeted emails continues, leading to a stressed and burnt-out you.

True or Nah?

#2. Higher conversion rate

With automation, you have a greater chance of converting qualified leads than when you manage things manually.

As soon as your lead is attracted to your bait, immediately send a welcome email that lets them know what they’ve gotten and can get in the future. Leads are 9x more likely to convert when businesses follow up within 5 minutes.

So how do you make sure your sales team responds in time?

Through automation.

By equipping your team with high-quality automation tools or CRM, you stand a chance of converting potential customers.

Stages of a Sales Funnel

Think about all the times you’ve used a regular funnel to fill a larger bottle. There was a process.

Firstly, you got a funnel and a large bottle you wanted to fill and fixed the funnel to the large bottle. Then you used a cup to scoop water from another storage bottle and poured it through the funnel into the large bottle to fill it up.

Likewise in marketing, your customers wouldn’t automatically get into your funnel because you’re pretty and you want them to. They go about their daily lives, while it’s up to you to grab their attention.

Understanding this psychology helps you to easily optimize your sales funnel for conversion at its various stages.

There are 5 main stages of a sales funnel. They are;

• Awareness: You run ads to lure people to your online business.
• Interest: You pique their interest by offering something of value in exchange for a lead contact (email address).
• Desire: You strategically position your content to arouse the interest of your customers and prepare their minds for purchase.
• Action: You offer a discount they can’t resist that gets them to make a buying decision. Afterward, you modify your marketing efforts to retain them.
• Loyalty: Here you have customers that can stick with you through thick and thin. They become loyal to your brand and will always buy what you sell.

As prospects go down each stage, they show a stronger interest in your product and are more likely to become loyal customers. The best part? You can automate this entire process and not lift a finger.

Let’s look at the stages of the sales funnel in detail.

Top of the Funnel – Awareness

This is the largest part of the funnel structure. Here customers have a specific problem and are looking to find solutions for it. They are not ready to buy yet. They just want to fix their problem. In this case, they run a quick search on Google to find answers.

• A lead for a nutritionist can ask, “What foods should I eat to lose weight?”
• A prospect for a sales funnel expert can ask, “Why are my products not selling”
• A prospect for a digital marketing consultant can ask, “How can I run ads for my product?”

At this stage, all you need to do is to educate them on the best ways to fix their problem. Writing an article or recording an explainer video will do just fine.

Middle of Funnel – Interest

In this stage, the customer has a deeper interest and is not just looking for quick fixes anymore. Here, they want to understand the problem they have and the best way to fix it such that they never have the same issue again.

Possible questions prospects can ask here include;

• How can I go on a diet?
• How can I market my products the right way?
• How can I increase the conversion rate of my ads?

At this stage, you need to go deeper to explain your topic. Create ebooks, mini-courses, and thought leadership courses to buttress your point.

Want to create a mini-course? Read this guide; How to Create a Mini Course to Kickstart Your Online Business

Bottom of the funnel – (Desire, Action, Loyalty)

Here, your prospect knows their problem and the type of solution they need. They just need to decide who to get it from. Your content and sales funnel strategy determines if they trust you enough to buy from you.

Here’s a typical scenario;

A woman trying to maintain her weight first runs a google search on “How to maintain your weight.” Then to research further, she searches for “What foods to eat to maintain weight.”

Combining these results she sees that she needs a meal timetable that helps her eat the right foods in the right portion to maintain her weight. As a nutritionist seeking this type of customer, you can have an ebook, spreadsheet, or mini-course on foods to eat on a diet and put it up for sale.

The content you’ve fed this prospect combined with your brand positioning determines if she’ll buy from you.

Additionally, in this stage, your prospect assesses their best options by asking comparison questions like Nutritionist A vs Nutritionist B; Who’s better?

Redirect them to you by feeding them all the right content they need to decide that you’re the best. Content ideas in this stage should reinforce your unique selling point and why they should keep coming back to you.

Have a course to sell? Read this guide; How to Create a Sales Funnel to Sell Your Online Course

How to Build an Automated Sales Funnel: 7 Steps That Work

Here are 7 practical steps to create an automated sales funnel to sell your digital products.

#1. Develop a content strategy

Automating your sales funnel typically takes an attract-offer-retain structure of operation. This means you attract customers, give them an irresistible offer and retain them. The best way to attract customers to your business is by first offering high-quality valuable content.

Now, you must understand that “value” is relative. A post on “How to Lose 5kg in 3 Weeks,” is highly valuable to someone trying to lose weight. However, that same post becomes highly irrelevant to an underweight person looking for healthy ways to gain weight.

So you must discover the pain points of your audience and create content tailored to their needs.

Additionally, you’d want to create content that supports their stage in the funnel. Customers at the top of the funnel require different content from those at the middle of the funnel. 72% of consumers only engage with marketing messages that have been personally customized to their interests.

Hence, develop a range of content in various formats like; blogs, videos, emails, case studies, quizzes, etc that address your audience’s needs.

Repurpose this content into short-form email messages that would be sent to prospects as they progress down the funnel. If your content is good, chances are they’d stick around, wanting more, moving down the funnel till they eventually buy from you. Remember, the end goal of building a sales funnel is to make sales.

#2. Decide on an email marketing automation tool

Once you’ve decided on a content plan for your prospects, the next step is to decide on an automation tool to do the job.

Typically, email marketing is your primary method of communicating with your leads and nurturing them till they eventually make a sale.

Email marketing helps nurture leads because you send them campaigns directly to their mailbox that either helps them solve a problem or add value to them.

Hence, to automate your funnel you’ll need a solid CRM. A CRM helps you keep track of your leads, track engagement, monitor behavior, and create segmented lists of users based on behavior.

You’ll also need a marketing automation tool that helps you to send email messages to your customers and automatically add users to your email list. Typical email marketing tools used include ConvertKit, MailChimp, Sendpulse, etc.

With Selar, you can integrate your favourite email marketing tool and monitor the progress of your business all from one robust dashboard.

Here’s a video that shows how to integrate Mailchimp and Convertkit to Selar.

Under normal circumstances, your CRM and emailing tools should work together. It is a great way to manage your campaigns, see insights, monitor performance, and create better campaigns.

#3. Have an irresistible offer

The phrase “what’s in it for me?” doesn’t only apply to real-life ninja/assassin trade-offs. It applies to business and leads capturing as well.

By creating unique offers, you increase your chances of attracting qualified leads to your sales funnel who have higher chances of converting.

To create a unique offer;

• Clearly state your brand’s unique selling proposition (USP). That is, what do you offer that’s highly beneficial, and why should prospects choose you over your competitor? If your USP is more than one, make sure to capture them individually using bullet points.
• How can you package your offer to make it appealing to your customers?
• What results can you promise from using your product/service?
• What features of your products can be translated to benefits for your customers?

Most business owners prefer to offer discounts as a way to lure customers. However, being the cheapest option in the market isn’t an effective strategy for having a successful business.

#4. Drive traffic to your funnel

Creating an automated funnel simply involves developing systems that help you manage customers who show interest in your business.

This means before you create an automated sales funnel, you need to have traffic in the first place.

A good way to drive traffic to your funnel is by sharing valuable content online. 95% of B2B consumers admit that they view content as a reliable marker when evaluating a business. Sharing high-quality valuable content that helps your customers solve a problem builds trust and brand authority in your field.

As customers continue to take advantage of your content, you make them dependent on you for solutions to subject matter problems. This dependency causes them to buy what you have to offer.

Consider creating content such as how-to articles, videos, podcasts, case studies, reports, etc. 55% of companies say that articles and blog posts are the most effective way to move prospects through the sales funnel.

Since you are dealing with various types of customers, you want to make sure you create all forms of content if you have the resources for it.

At the end of each content, make sure to have a call-to-action in your content that clearly states what you want them to do.

This method of sharing valuable content online to attract customers is known as organic traffic. Another effective way to drive traffic to your channel is through paid traffic.

Paid traffic helps to supplement your organic traffic by increasing your content reach through ads. Run ads for various stages of your funnel. For the top of the funnel, your ad should capture attention by speaking about a common problem. This sparks interest in your prospect and causes them to want to know more.

We recommend that you run ads on your content or lead magnet as a way to generate leads. Then use the content strategy through your funnel to convert those leads. Trying to directly sell to cold traffic without any prior offer rarely works, and has a low conversion rate.

If you’ll like to learn how to learn more about driving traffic to your sales funnel, Here’s a guide on How to Drive Traffic to your Sales Funnel.

#5. Offer a lead magnet

A lead magnet is a free product or item given to potential buyers to lure them to you. By giving out free products, you have a greater chance to capture the attention of your audience, collect their email addresses, and pitch your paid products to them.

This is why lead magnets are an essential part of your marketing strategy. Once you’ve collected their email addresses, it’s up to you to nurture these leads until they become a paying customer.

The best lead magnets have the following characteristics;

• Are highly valuable
• Must be specific
• Delivers on its promise
• Easy to use
• Shows your expertise

For instance, Selar created an ebook with 12 other industry experts titled, The Ultimate Digital Product Manual.” We’ve strategically placed this ebook on all relevant blog posts to lure more creators to download it and 10X sales of their digital products.

We’ve already gone into detail about lead magnets in this guide on Lead Magnets and how to use them to grow your business.

#6. Create an email schedule

Once you’ve created a lead magnet that helps you to lure customers into your funnel, it’s time to create an email schedule.

Thanks to your content strategy, you already have pieces of content created for specific users at different stages of the funnel and with different needs.

Now, it’s time to combine your killer content strategy with an email schedule for the best results.

Depending on your audience and business structure, an email schedule can look like this;

• Day 1: Welcome email
• Day 2: Free content
• Day 3: Free content
• Day 4: Free content with another free resource
• Day 5: Free content
• Day 6: Offer a free trial
• Day 7: Offer to buy your product (You can offer discounts here too)
• Day 8: Follow-up emails

Always remember to send targeted emails and make sure to keep them unique. The average email user receives 147 emails per day and deletes 71 of them right off the bat. 

Additionally, ensure you set your emails to be sent early. Most people report wanting to read emails between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. This totally makes sense because asides from social media, the first thing people do when they wake up is check their emails. So make sure to be in their faces.

#7. Monitor, Improve, Optimize, Repeat

The best way to check if you’ve successfully created an automated sales funnel is to monitor and check the results.

Key metrics to look out for in your campaigns include;

• Open-rate: Since most automated sales funnels are centered on email, you need to keep track of how many people open each email you send.
• Click-through rate (CTR): This refers to the number of people who click any link within your email. CTR is the easiest way to track audience interest in a particular message.
• No. of Unsubscribers: As the name implies, this refers to the number of users opting out of your email list. A large number means you need to take action.
• Conversion rate: Probably the most important of all, this refers to the number of people who take the desired action at each stage of the funnel.
• Bounce rate: This refers to the number of messages that returns to you undelivered. A large number indicates you require a database cleanup.

The best ways to evaluate the performance of your sales funnel include;

• A/B testing: This involves segmenting your audience to experiment with two different factors to observe results. You can experiment with headlines, email time, copy, CTA, etc.
• Google Analytics: Using Google Analytics, you can track all kinds of metrics and customer movement.
• Mailing tool: Using your email service provider, you can track email metrics like open rate, click-through rate, no. of unsubscribers, and so much more.

In general, as you monitor your funnel, you’ll see places where you need to improve and optimize for better results.

What’s Next?

It’s your turn to create an automated sales funnel and take the stress off your sales team. An automated sales funnel reduces hours of work and helps you convert more leads to customers.

Create your digital product, sell it on Selar, and implement these steps to automate your sales funnel.

The clock is ticking!