Getting people interested in your brand and products and convincing them to buy are not easy tasks for business owners and marketers. To achieve this goal, you create something called a sales funnel. This is a series of marketing strategies that makes a brand image known to prospects and, little by little, wins their trust first in order to subscribe to a newsletter or download a lead magnet, and then to make the first purchase.
A sales funnel is not easy to create and to maintain. It does not have a magic formula that works for everyone. But there are a few common elements for all sales funnel. The first element is the basic structure of the funnel. Its purposes are to attract:
- Attention
- Interest
- Desire
- Action
Another common element is the type of content created and shared during a sales funnel. It usually consists of brand awareness articles, lead magnets (tutorials, cheat sheets, etc.) and testimonials.
When is the Right Moment to Share Testimonials during a Sales Funnel?
A fully functional sales funnel depends not only on the type of content you share, but also on the timing. Sharing testimonials too early or too late in the sales funnel will significantly reduce their impact.
For instance, in the initial phase—the top of the funnel—people have no idea what your business does. They need to become familiarised with the brand name first. At this point, it is useless to start sharing testimonials: they will mean nothing to your prospects.
Once you have a group of leads who are already familiar with your business and its products, you can start including testimonials in your content strategy. This is when the leads start being interested in the products, and you want to move them towards desiring these products and taking action (making a purchase).
How do you Include Customer Testimonials in the Sales Funnel?
- Show a Case Study to a Website Audience
Create a video ad campaign for a custom audience created from website visitors who have taken a specific action, such as:
- Subscribing to your newsletter
- Visiting a product page
- Visiting your contact page
This campaign is meant to reinforce trust and create interest in your products. It is important to be selective about the audience for this campaign. Otherwise, you will spend money for inviting people to watch a video that will not encourage them to take any further action.
- Use Product Reviews in Paid Google Advertising
Google AdWords ads are known for the restrictions on the number of characters for the headline and the body of the ad. Since you do not have a lot of space to persuade your prospects, let your current customers speak for you.
Instead of working to create copy, share a product review you already have on your website or on social media.
- Spice Up your Instagram with User Generated Content
Instagram ads or posts are very popular for visual products such as fashion, cosmetics, jewellery, food, etc. Instead of working hard on that perfect image for an Instagram ad, challenge your customers to share how they enjoy using your products. Pick the best image and make someone famous for a day (and get your leads warmer and closer to the first purchase).
- Enable Social Comments for Product Review and Feedback
Social comments are a must-have for your website: with one simple comment tool, you create valuable content for your site (full of long tail keywords to help your SEO strategy) AND brand mentions which will appear on social media platforms.
Every once in a while, curate some of the best comments you get in this manner and use them as copy for your social media ads and your sales funnel strategy.
Remember, testimonials do not only mean less work for you in creating content, but also powerful word of mouth endorsements which are more persuasive than any copy you can write.