Copy And
The marketing podcast where online service providers learn how to write copy that sounds like them, but converts BETTER.
I’m Sam Burmeister, your guide on this copy adventure. As a conversion copywriter & sales psychology expert, I learned the ‘right way’ to sell in my decade-long sales career.
Now, after spending the last 6+ years writing copy for hundreds of successful launches and helping dozens of entrepreneurs write better copy every week…I know what sells and what’s working in online business right now.
And what’s working is copy AND – Copy and messaging, design, strategy, navigating AI and more...
Together, we’ll put the pieces of the marketing puzzle together - and you will write copy that both serves AND sells.
Copy And
21. How Funnels Work In Small Businesses - Funnels 101
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I'm going back to basics with this one because honestly, I felt confused about funnels earlier this year and figured I wasn't the only one.
After being talked off the ledge by a few biz besties, I'm discussing the basics of funnels including:
- A fun funnel vocabulary lesson
- What goes into a funnel
- What copy your funnel needs
- The goal of a high-performing funnel
In the next few episodes, I'll break down each stage of the funnel so that you can write your copy while you listen along!
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Hello friends and welcome back to Copy and to the marketing podcast where I teach you how to write copy that sounds like you, but converts better. Today we're gonna start talking about funnels. In fact, we're starting a series that I'm calling Funnels 1 0 1 and class is in session. Today we're gonna talk about the basics of funnels. What are some of the words that you're hearing around funnels? Who needs them? And not just how do we get people from one part of your funnel to the next, but what is the science and the data behind each of these funnels? I learned this stuff from a very formal standpoint, and I think a lot of times what we lose as business owners. Is that formal education around why are we doing what we're doing? Because we see other people putting freebies out into the world. We see other people converting. We see other people looking at their data, so we think we need to too. And all of these things are important. However, I wanna be sure that as you are talking about funnels, potentially increasing your conversions, reaching your marketing goals, that you know what you're doing and why, so that you can move through your funnels smarter. And so that you can stand out in your industry. So let's dig in. What's a funnel? A funnel is basically people's path to working with you. You get to create that path and the whole thing gets to be on brand. It should sound like you and it should convert, and not every stage of conversion is a purchase. Sometimes conversions are clicks. Are people giving you their information? Are people interacting with your content? And then ultimately they become a client at the bottom of the funnel, which is where they give you their money. But there are conversions happening throughout this funnel. There is interaction with your brand happening throughout this funnel. I like to picture it like those things that we used to have at like the mall in the grocery store when I was a kid. Where you'd put a coin in and it would slide down a slide and go around and around and around and around until it eventually fell down the bottom and it became a donation probably to like a local charity or something. That's basically what a funnel is, except that change that lived in your pocket was not in the funnel yet, and then it became part of the funnel and eventually dropped out the bottom where it became a client. Think of a funnel like that. Three stages that you will hear funnels talked about is top of funnel or tofu, TOFU, top of funnel, mofu, middle of funnel, and bofu, bottom of funnel. Top and bottom of funnel are super important here as we move through. Top of funnel is typically gonna be where people have not yet paid you. They are receiving your ads, they're seeing your content. This is where you get to be really educational. Bottom of funnel is where you become a bit more convincing, where you start to sell. This is where you're focusing on conversions and persuasion more than simply education. A funnel. Typically, we like to see it as an upside down triangle. Why? Because of quantity. There are infinite people out existing in the world. Those people are problem unaware, and those would be considered in marketing terms, your market potential. Those are people who have not yet found you, not yet interacted with you, and likely you don't even know that there is something to solve. Then they interact with you and they become your market. This is where they become problem aware, and this is where they officially enter your funnel, is that they know of you. They know that there is a problem, so they become your market. They are problem aware, however, they might not have given you any of their information yet because they're still solution unaware. They don't know what the solution is, they just know that a problem exists. So they go from being your market to when they interact with you, they become what we would consider suspects in marketing terms. But that just means that they're solution unaware, but that they have looked to your content to solve their problem. When we picture the upside down triangle, that is a funnel. Fewer and fewer people make it to each stage. There are infinite people who are problem unaware. Who are just out existing as market potential. That number gets smaller when there are people who recognize that they have a problem and become the market again. I'm gonna use this Red Bull example'cause I use it all the time. There are billions of people in the world. However, people realize that they have a problem when they start to get super sleepy midday. So they become aware that there's a problem. Sometimes marketing informs them that there's a problem. They might be aware that they're tired midday. They didn't realize the rest of the world is going out, just having infinite energy. So that's where they became the market. They're on the market to solve a problem. Then Red Bull comes along with an ad and offers a solution. You don't have to feel tired all day. That is where they become a suspect. They start to think about they have an awareness around the product. So we see these numbers get smaller and smaller after they are solution unaware. It is your job to make them solution aware and really center yourself as the solution. This is where people become prospects in marketing terms. This is where they have a desire to solve their problem. They know that in Red Bull's example, that they're tired. They know that Red Bull now exists as a solution, that there is something that will help them be less tired and that Red Bull exists. Then when they go to the convenience store and buy their Red Bull, that is where they fall through the bottom of the funnel and become clients. This is where they have taken action. So this is problem unaware at the top. Problem aware, solution, unaware. Solution aware, and then they become clients. In my marketing textbooks, this was called ada, A IDA at the top was awareness, then interest. Then they made a decision, and this is a big one, is advocacy. Very rarely do people buy one Red Bull in their lives. Very rarely do your clients work with you or buy one thing from you. This is where they become advocates. This is where they now go on social media and they say, I didn't know that I needed this until I met you. They become advocates. They start talking about the problem, and you as the solution. This is where people go to Costco and buy Red Bull in bulk because they are now advocates as clients. They've made the decision and they're going to continue to make that decision. So that's a funnel. This has been funnels 1 0 1 is that a funnel is simply how you lead people to you. In the online business space, we typically talk about a freebie that converts to a low ticket offer, that converts to a mid ticket offer, that converts to a high ticket offer. That would be a very common funnel to have in the online space. Sometimes that low ticket or free offer is a webinar or a downloadable A PDF, something that they can attend, a challenge that they may opt into to work with you. There's infinite ways to make this funnel work for you. However, does everybody's funnel need to look the same? Does everybody need mid ticket and low ticket offers? Not necessarily. Also, what happens when people have multiple offers that are potentially low, mid, or high ticket? That means that people are gonna leave the funnel, but could potentially end up in a different part of your funnel or more of a funnel ecosystem. Don't get too caught up thinking about these funnels. This is something that I worked with a lot when I was in corporate. I would have meetings every Monday where I defended my funnel. But you're over here running your own business. So what I need you to know is that people behave differently and you have a different responsibility to people at each stage in your funnel. And a lot of times that responsibility comes down to communication via text, a k, a copy. Because your copy at every stage of the funnel is going to get people to convert. It's going to get people to take action until they pay you. So when people are problem unaware and they're just floating out around in the world, this is where they need educational content. This is the content that tells them you're tired and that's not normal. Like in the Red Bull example, this is the content that shows up where it might be case studies that you're publishing, where you're saying this is a problem someone else had. This might be ads, blogs, conversations happening organically on social media. This is where you make people problem aware. You take all the people that you don't know yet and you give them content to make them aware that there's a problem. That could also be ads. High search intent content like blogs and podcasts and social media as well. Again, there's gonna be a lot of overlap. Sometimes you have to remind people that they have a problem. So there's a lot of overlap in gray area. It doesn't just move from one thing to another until people convert into another area of your funnel. So you can make them. You can take them from problem unaware, to problem aware with things like ads, social media, and high search intent content. Now, when I say search intent, that means what are people searching for? So they may search for something that says, is being tired, normal? This is where you would make them. Problem aware. However, if they're searching how to be less tired, this is more purchase intent. So that type of blog content would take them from problem aware to solution aware, so they may even skip the solution unaware. They may say, okay, I know there's a problem, and now I know that there's a solution. So they could skip that solution. Unaware phase. So problem unaware is gonna be educational content. Problem aware is gonna be educational with intent to lead them to the solution. When people are solution unaware, they may have downloaded something from you. So your solution unaware content might be, Hey, I know you have this problem, come here to learn how to fix it. And that's gonna be your guides, your webinars. Typically the content of your free offer is going to take them from solution aware to a solution aware. You of course, are the solution. This typically happens at the same time, and when you make them solution aware, you would be doing them a disservice. Not to let them buy from you. So you then take them from solution aware and you offer to make them a client. This is where you put the offer in front of them. This is your sales pages, sales, emails, tripwires, upsells, downsells, cross sells. It basically gives them an opportunity to buy from you and it offers them the opportunity. To become advocates for you so they could end up in different parts of your funnel. Your content that they pay you for could also lead them to other parts of your funnel where they become problem unaware in other areas, and this helps you to sell other offers that may be low ticket, mid ticket, or high ticket. So again, that's Funnels 1 0 1. I really moved through the copy part here of what Copy goes in each stage, because that's what I'm going to cover the next few weeks.