See the marketing funnel in action
If you have a business that has a handful of customers, and you’ve got a tentative marketing strategy in place, then you have a marketing funnel. You may never have thought about your strategy in the context of the funnel before, but it’s true. Let's walk through what this looks like in action.
Map your tactics to the funnel
A healthy marketing strategy will ensure the right marketing tactics are active at each stage of the funnel, helping the customer along their journey and minimizing ‘drop-offs’ at each stage. A prospect or customer ‘drops off’ when they don’t move on to complete the next stage of the funnel, either languishing forever in ‘awareness’ or never reaching the ‘retention’ stage.
Remember that this is normal. There’s a reason that the funnel is shaped like a funnel: broad at the top and narrow at the bottom. It isn’t possible for every person who comes into the top of your funnel to reach the bottom, but the goal of your digital marketing strategy is to ensure that as many people as possible who fit your ideal customer persona do make it to the bottom of the funnel. With that in mind, you’ll want to tailor every aspect of your marketing to the personas you designed in the last lesson.
The customer journey should feel seamless, with each experience feeding into the next so that your customer doesn’t even notice that they’re being guided. Tab through the gallery below to see some examples of tactics that work at each stage of the funnel; you may even recognize some from your own marketing strategy!
Awareness
Awareness: The moment someone hears about your brand.
How to raise awareness:
- Instagram ads
- Organic SEO strategy
- Targeted podcast ads
- Flyers/stickers in appropriate spaces
Interest
Interest: The moment someone becomes interested in what your brand has to offer.
How to gain interest:
- Sign-up form
- Organic Instagram or Tiktok content
- Branded search terms
- Company reviews
Desire
Desire: When someone specifically seeks out a product or service from your brand.
How to increase desire:
- Product placement
- Influencer marketing
- Visual merchandising
- Product reviews
- Email campaigns
Action
Action: When someone takes action and places an order.
How to spur action:
- New customer offer
- Instagram retargeting
- Product reviews
- Free delivery
- Abandoned cart email
- Cross-sell at checkout
Retention
Retention: Consistent engagement over time, in which the person becomes a loyal customer and places follow-up orders.
How to support retention:
- Review request
- Loyalty program
- Winback campaigns
- Post-purchase cross-sell email
Some tactics, like acquisition ad campaigns and product reviews, might fit in multiple stages of the funnel, and that’s OK. In the digital age, the customer journey can be a non-linear thing, and stages of the funnel will naturally bleed into each other: in fact, that’s necessary for the creation of a seamless customer experience.
Visualize your own funnel
Now open the funnel workbook and fill it out, following the steps below.
Brainstorm your current marketing tactics
Using what you now know about the funnel as a guide, think of every marketing tactic you use. Feel free to list these out on paper.
Remember, marketing tactics aren’t limited to ads and email campaigns.
Displaying testimonials prominently on your product page? That’s a marketing tactic. Sending an abandoned cart email? Also a tactic.
In short, a marketing tactic is anything you do that supports your broader marketing goals and can be measured by a specific success metric, like click rate, conversions, or views.
Categorize your tactics by funnel stage
Based on your knowledge of the funnel and how the example tactics above are organized, categorize your marketing tactics by each stage using the ‘Tactics by funnel stage’ table (Section 3 in your workbook). This is a helpful visual aid that allows you to:
- Strategize how one marketing tactic flows into another.
- See what stage(s) of the funnel you’re giving customers the most help and guidance, and at what stage(s) you aren’t providing as much help.
A brand that invests 70% of its time and resources into awareness and interest is unlikely to succeed simply because it does not invest in the marketing tactics needed to nurture customers in the middle or bottom of the funnel. These stages are essential and should be given just as much attention as top of funnel.
If you aren't sure which stage a tactic fits into, think about what feeling or motivation you’re trying to elicit from a customer.
Ask yourself: Are you trying to...
- Make them aware that your brand exists? That's attention.
- Hook their interest in what makes your brand unique or worthwhile? That's interest.
- Ignite their desire for a particular product? That's desire.
- Drive them to take action in the form of a purchase? That's action.
- Encourage them to shop again? That's retention.
Ask yourself the following questions…
Ask yourself:
- Do I have enough marketing tactics in place to support the customer journey at every stage of the funnel (e.g., at least 3-5 ideas)?
- Where can I be doing more to help my prospective customers move forward in the funnel?
- Which of these marketing tactics do I know are not really working for me, and do I have any hypotheses as to why?
What's next?
By now, you should have an ideal customer persona and be able to visualize your full marketing funnel. Next, it's time to reach, convert, and retain customers.
The rest of the certificate is divided into 3 courses, corresponding to the top, middle, and bottom of the funnel. Each of the remaining lessons in the certificate will explore a specific marketing tactic and focus on how to use that tactic to boost core funnel KPIs. Additionally, each lesson will feature a subject matter expert from Klaviyo or beyond who will share valuable insights and real-world experience on the topic.
Continue on to test your knowledge and explore all of the courses that make up this certificate!