How to Automate an Online Sales Funnel

eCommerce: How to Automate an Online Sales Funnel

In this post, we will delve into the world of Sales Funnels specifically for eCommerce businesses. This is a must-read for online store owners who spend significant time and money on paid advertising but are not seeing increase in sales. We cover the anatomy of a sales funnel in the eCommerce industry, the different stages involved along with examples, and advice to automate a sales funnel for eCommerce businesses.

Let’s start off with the basics.

What is a Sales Funnel?

Imagine a Sales Funnel as a voyage that guides your prospects towards becoming your customers.

(On our blog, we talk a lot about sales funnels. If you’re interested in learning more about sales funnels in general, please check out this page on Sales Funnels for more foundational knowledge)

In a nutshell, a typical sales funnel is comprised of the following stages:

Let’s go through each of the stages now and learn what it means for your online store.

AWARENESS STAGE

Awareness: At this stage, your potential customers are just becoming aware of your brand and what you offer. Your goal is to capture their attention, get them to visit your website and make them interested in learning more.

Examples of ways to do this include:

• Social media ads targeting people who fit your target customer profile
• Blog posts or other content that address topics or pain points relevant to your potential customers
• Collaborating with influencers in your industry to reach a wider audience

INTEREST STAGE

Interest: At this stage, your potential customers have expressed some interest in your brand and what you offer. Your goal is to deepen that interest and build trust with your audience.

Examples of ways to do this include:

• Offering a lead magnet such as an eBook, a first-time shopper discount, or a free trial that provides value to your potential customers and helps to build your email list
• Providing case studies or testimonials from satisfied customers that demonstrate the benefits of your products or services
• Offering a free trial or sample of your product to give potential customers a more hands-on experience

DECISION STAGE

Decision: At this stage, your potential customers are considering whether or not to make a purchase from you. Your goal is to address any concerns or objections they may have and make it as easy as possible for them to take the next step.

Examples of ways to do this include:

• Offering a special promotion or discount code to encourage potential customers to make a purchase
• Providing a clear and compelling call to action that makes it easy for potential customers to take the next step (such as “Buy Now”)
• Addressing common objections or concerns in your sales and email copy or on your website (such as shipping costs or return policies)

ACTION STAGE

Action: At this stage, your potential customers have become paying customers. Your goal is to continue to build a relationship with them and encourage them to make repeat purchases or refer others to your brand.

Examples of ways to do this include:

• Providing exceptional customer service that exceeds your customers’ expectations
• Offering loyalty programs or referral incentives to encourage customers to make repeat purchases or refer others to your brand
• Sending personalized follow-up emails or surveys to gather feedback and show your customers that you value their business

Why is having a defined Sales Funnel important for an eCommerce business?

Having a defined Sales Funnel is crucial for an eCommerce business because it helps to streamline the entire sales process, from the initial awareness stage to the final purchase stage.

If you know what to do at each step of the sales funnel, you can make your marketing and sales work better so more people to buy products from you.

We can help you define your very own sales funnel for your online store. At Bumper Leads, we specialize in mapping out customer journeys and we love creating sales funnels for business owners across all verticals, including eCommerce. We’ve worked with a high number of eCommerce business owners so we know what works and what doesn’t in a sales funnel. We know where the major bottlenecks are in the funnel and because of this, we can save you loads of time automating your sales and marketing efforts.

As an eCommerce business owner, where do you start if you want to automate your sales funnels?

As a busy store owner, you don’t have time to follow up with prospects and customers at every moment. As your online store traffic grows, thanks to all the marketing activities you’re doing to attract prospects, you’ll get to a point eventually where you’ll need help with automating customer communication. You’ll need help automating your entire sales process.

The first thing to automate on your online store is building your email list.

Choose a platform such as ActiveCampaign or Klaviyo, sync it to your store and start collecting your prospects’ email addresses.

To get people onto your mailing list, you’ll need something called a Lead Magnet.

A ‘Lead Magnet’ is at the ‘INTEREST’ stage of a sales funnel.

What is an effective lead magnet for an eCommerce business?

The best lead magnet for an online store we found is offering a small discount that someone can use on a first purchase.

A small discount would solve the problem of customer’s hesitating when wanting to try your products for the first time. They’re not familiar with your brand, so it’s a good idea to offer them a small discount to try your products out. This is a very simple lead magnet you can implement today that works in building your mailing list.

If you can offer free samples of your products, then this can really accelerate your list building.

For example, we worked with a client in a fashion niche, who ran Facebook ads to drive people to her store. When prospects landed on the store, they were greeted with a pop up offering them a free sample. This lead magnet worked well for her and she was able to build her mailing list in a very short time. (Check out our other Case Studies here.)

How to automate your Email Marketing?

After you choose your lead magnet, sign up to an email marketing platform, you now need to plan your marketing emails.

We’re now at the ‘DECISION’ stage of your sales funnel.

This is where you’ll need to plan your marketing emails that overcome prospects’ objections. Think hard about the potential doubts they might have about your products. Offer a solution to their doubts and concerns, and insert a clear call-to-action to entice them to purchase from you.

The first thing to do is to automate something called a ‘Welcome Email Series.’

The Welcome Email Series is a sequence of emails that greet your prospects, introduce them to your brand, showcase your products and enable prospects to make a purchase.

If you’ve decided to go with a platform like ActiveCampaign, and would like to create your first welcome email, follow the steps in the video below to create your first welcome automation email.

How to create a Welcome Email Automation

Tools and metrics to track the effectiveness of your sales funnel

We recommend using email automation platforms like ActiveCampaign or Klaviyo to automate your email marketing because these tools gather valuable data about your prospects and customers, enabling you to make data-driven decisions. By analyzing the data obtained from your marketing efforts, including email marketing and sales funnels in general, you can easily identify areas where sales are decreasing and where you should focus your efforts next in the funnel.

These platforms make it so easy to look at your marketing data, that you’ll be able to make an informed decision quickly and potentially double your store revenue.

This is why it’s important to invest in a good marketing automation platform.

OVER TO YOU

The words ‘Sales Funnel’ can sound intimidating at first. But as you start looking at how a stranger comes into your business, engages with your lead magnet, gets added to an email list, engages with your emails – you’ll start to get a pretty good visual of your very own sales funnel.

If you’re stuck or short on time, we can help you visualise your customer journey, set up your email marketing platforms that will automatically add people to your email list and also help you automate the whole sales process.

We can save you time and money and help you create your own automated sales funnel, i.e. marketing growth system.

If you’d like to chat to us about this, click here and one of our marketing automation experts will reach out to you.

When you’re ready to scale your business and talk sales funnels, simply click here to book a chat with us directly.

FURTHER READING

How to create a lead magnet that converts

How to build a sales funnel the right way

3 Ways to boost eCommerce sales with Marketing Automation

Automate Client Communication to Boost Sales

What Is Lead Generation and How Does It Work