Building An Ethical Sales Funnel
feel-good sales funnels, without the ‘ick’
You know you a sales funnel could help you drive more sales on auto-pilot, and you get the basic principles. But I’m guessing you’ve also entered into a few kinda gross sales funnels in your time too and that’s making you wonder - can I build a sales funnel without gross sales tactics?
The short answer is YES!
I am all about building sales funnels that don’t feel gross. I’m NOT about to tell you to pressure people, using false scarcity and other grossness, to buy your product. NOPE!
There is a feel-good and genuinely value-driven approach to building funnels that aren’t about ‘capturing leads in the first 72-hours, and instead about building an audience of people who feel good about buying from you, and rave about your business long-term.
First, what’s an unethical sales funnel?
Now, obviously this is always going to be up for debate. But to me, being unethical is firstly about being dishonest, and secondly about pressuring, manipulating and panicking people into buying.
There are a few really shady sales funnel strategies that I believe fall into this category and therefore class as unethical.
Pretending your webinar is live… when it’s not
Using countdown timers to create a false sense of urgency and pressure people into buying
Making it difficult to unsubscribe
Bombarding your subscribers with email within 72 hours of them signing up for your lead magnet
A ‘surprise’ extended payment plan… you were always planning on doing that, C’mon!
These are sales funnel strategies that are sold as a ‘must have’ by so many funnel gurus. And yes, they will improve your sales conversion in the short term.
But I’m more interested in helping you set up a funnel that’s going to create long-term raving fans of your work who feel good about buying from you.
What is an ethical sales funnel?
There’s often a bit of confusion about exactly what a sales funnel is, so let’s make sure we’re on the sale page first.
The confusion stems from the word ‘funnels’ being used for two things in marketing. Firstly there’s what I would call your Marketing Funnel and then there’s a Sales Funnel. Let’s break those down:
Marketing funnel
A strategic and intentional process for helping your audience move along your customer journey, where you will be doing things, and having marketing channels in place to…
Help the right people DISCOVER you and your brand
NURTURE your people from just discovered you to becoming a raving fan of your work
Inform your people of what you do, how you can help them and INVITE them to buy from you.
And also, DELIGHT your clients with excellent service so they keep coming back
Sales Funnel
A sales funnel is a system you put in place to automate your sales process, so you don’t have to be there in person, hustling for every click, sign up and sale.
Through harnessing the power of tech and building a sales funnel, you can automate the NURTURE and INVITE TO BUY part of your customer journey. And through ads, you can also automate the DISCOVER part of your customer journey too, to ‘feed’ your sales funnel.
The most traditional sales funnel you will be aware of is where you…
Opt-in to receive a free offer which adds you to a mailing list segment
You will then receive a series of emails that automatically do the job of NURTURING you as a new member of that brand’s audience, and then INVITE you to buy the most relevant offer from that brand.
Ethical sales funnel
Making your sales funnel ethical, is simply about building your sales funnel with integrity. It’s about building your sales funnel in a way that feels honest and focussed on delivering value and helping your audience. And when it comes to the selling part, selling in a way that feels good to you, and your audience.
Don’t forget that selling is being of service!
Your product helps your audience overcome a struggle, problem, challenge and helps them reach their goal, meet their wants and needs or make a desired change. Making sure you audience know about what you sell, how it can help them, and inviting them to find out more and buy, is being of service - not pushy and manipulative.
Do I need a sales funnel? Will it work for my business?
The short answer is - if you’ve got a proven digital product (you’ve run it live a few times, you know it sells and delivers great results) - you need a sales funnel. You can also set up a sales funnel to drive enquiries for your 1:1 coaching or live programmes.
Sales funnels are the bomb if you’re an introvert, find constant launching exhausting and struggle to keep up with social media all the time.
A sales funnel is the answer to driving some of your sales on auto pilot (providing you’re feeding your funnel constantly - ie. have a continuous stream of people signing up to join your funnel or mailing list).
What could a sales funnel do for you?
The average conversion rate for a sales funnel is around 2% (perhaps a little higher for an introductory price offer). That means, for every 100 people opting-in to receive your free offer and joining your sales funnel, you can expect to see 2 sales.
Time to do the maths on your sales funnel potential
[The number of people joining your mailing list each month] X 2% = the number of sales you’d get at a 2% conversion rate
X [the cost of your product - course/ membership/ digital product] = the income you’d expect to make from having a sales funnel in place.
This is based on what you’d expect to see if you made no other changes in your marketing.
So play with this equation based on where you think you could boost your monthly subscriber numbers to if you powered up your evergreen marketing, improved your website-visit-to-subscriber conversion, or ran ads).
When is the best time to build a sales funnel?
You can build a sales funnel at any stage in business. BUT. The stage where it’s really going to kick-in and have a game changing effect on the bottom line is when:
You’ve got a proven product - AKA a product you know that sells, AND delivers a brilliant result for your customers/ clients. You’ve probably live-launched and run it a couple of times before making it an evergreen offer.
You’ve built a sizable audience - either on social media or through organic traffic to your website, and you’ve got a load of people on your mailing list (I’m talking 5,000+)
You’re getting in front of new people all the time - whether that’s through ads, PR, outreach, Pinterest, or SEO AND (and this bit’s important) you’re getting a steady rate of new mailing list subscribers each month.
Here’s the BIGGIE with sales funnels…
…you need to feed your sales funnel!
It’s great having a sales funnel in place, but you’ve also got to be gaining new subscribers all the time to create the result you want to see from having it there - SALES!
If you’re looking at those numbers thinking ‘eeek, I’m not there yet’. I still think it’s great to build a sales funnel so that it’s in place, while you focus on building your traffic and continuous trickle of subscribers.
If you’re looking at those numbers thinking ‘tick, tick, tick - yep, got all or most of thos’ - get your sales funnel built asap!
What tech do I need to build a basic sales funnel?
Once people ‘get’ funnels, it’s the tech that tends to stand in the way of getting it built. That may well be how you’re feeling right now!
I’ve already talked about not using countdown timers or pretending you’re running a ‘live webinar’ when it’s a recorded workshop (ooooh I HATE that tactic that so many people use).
The benefit of NOT using these shady tactics, and building an ethical sales funnel is that you don’t need a super complex tech set up or to subscribe to a ton of additional tech tools. Yay!
A barebones tech stack would consist of:
A lead page for your opt-ins - flodesk or mailerlite opt-in form
A mailing list provider - Flodesk or mailerlite
A proven sales page for your product on your website
A stronger tech stack would be:
A lead page for your lead magnets
A mailing list provider - my preference is convertkit as it has great tracking and data
A proven sales page on your website
Possibly also a hidden page to host a webinar if you offer one
How do I build a sales funnel that doesn't feel GROSS!?
So, you know you want to set up a sales funnel. BUUUT you don’t want it to be the kind that hounds your audience with emails, panics them into taking action by using countdown timers, or pressures people into buying with false scarcity.
I hear ya! Seriously, if you’re anti false-scarcity & panic-inducing countdown timers - you’re in the right place.
We’ve all opted into some freebee and been sent 100 pushy sales emails overnight. We’ve all felt pressured into buying something we weren’t 100% confident in.
That is not. REPEAT, NOT! The vibe you want with your sales funnel. (even though many ‘funnel gurus’ will say the opposite).
Because, here’s the thing…
Will your sales funnel convert better with a countdown timer and some false scarcity thrown in? Yes.
Does that mean I recommend building your sales funnel this way? No!
Here’s why
While most ‘funnel gurus’ will recommend you absolutely need countdown timers and false things to create sales funnel success, I just don’t think it feels ethical. AND wouldn’t you rather feel good about your sales?
There is a way to build a sales funnel that feels good to you and your audience AND delivers feel-good sales. It’s all about providing your subscribers with VALUE rather than pressuring them with scarcity.
To build an anti-ick sales funnel you need to get away from the traditional sales funnel headspace that’s all about ‘converting leads into customers within 72-hours’ and more towards building an audience who know, like and trust you, AND will remain adoring fans for months and years to come.
The anti-ick funnel is not a quick-win, bang-a-few-ads-out-and-deliver-6-figures-in-minutes solution. It’s the long-term, sustainable solution to building a business with adoring fans who feel good about buying from you, and will buy from you again.
For this, you need to really understand your audience. Create value-packed emails that give them what they need. And share a part of yourself with them, that they can connect with and get to know, like and trust.
And finally, with the sale, it’s about helping your audience make a confident YES or NO decision about whether to buy from you. NOT pressuring them to buy something that isn’t quite right.
How to build your anti-ick sales funnel
Ok, we’re going to do the whistle stop tour here because this is a big ol’ question.
Start by DEEPLY understanding your audience. What are their challenges, struggles and pain points? What are their goals, aspirations, wants and needs? This understanding of your audience drives everything that comes next in your sales funnel build
Gather your ingredients.
Pick the product(s) you’re going to focus on for this funnel. You’ll have a main product the funnel is leading towards, but perhaps also a ‘tripwire’, Self Liquidating Offer, or downsell.
For the main product you’re selling in your sales funnel, decide which one or two lead magnets you’re going to use to drive opt-ins.
Map out your sales funnel. From your lead magnets, through your email sequences, to your final product - visually map out all of the steps and elements in your sales funnel.
Assign topics to each of the emails in your sales funnel. You’ll want some emails that NURTURE your audience by delivering some seriously juicy values, and other emails that INVITE your audience to buy from you.
Write your copy - email copy and lead-magnet opt-in form copy
Build your sales funnel! Bring everything together that you’ve done so far by building out the emails, lead pages, workflows, automations and segments in your mailing list programme.
Test your sales funnel. Send all of the emails to yourself as a test. Check all of the copy. and test the links are working.
And finally, set your sales funnel live!
What NOT to do with your sales funnel
Get desperado…
The job of your sales funnel is to help your audience move along your customer journey before you invite them to buy form you. Selling too soon will only end in tears… or at least, a shit conversion rate.
Have essay emails
Get brutal with your editing. Cut down the copy, make them easy to read by cutting down paragraphs and using headings, and keep them snappy, all tied up with juicy subject line.
All the unethical things I mentioned up top
I get it, you hear about the kinda shady funnel tactics, you see tons of people using them and you start to think, it wouldn’t hurt… and I could do with the extra sales.
Look, I ain’t judging, we’ve all been there. But the benefits of the ethical sales funnel far outweigh the short-term wins you’ll get form those shady tactics, by building an audience of fans who stick around, love what you do, and buy from you time and time again.
Measuring the success of your sales funnel
Once your funnel has had 200-500 people go through it, have a look at the results. ~Don’t Skip this bit!~
Check out the open rates, and ClickThrough Rates of each email. Are they looking as you’d expect? What could you tweak to improve conversion?
At a standard conversion rate of 2%, if 500 people have been through your sales funnel, you’d expect 10 sales. Has it hit that level?
If the sales funnel emails look like they are getting good open and click through rates, what can you tweak on your product’s sales page or in the check-out process to improve conversion?
People’s habits and behaviour around marketing is always going to be evolving and changing. So, once your sales funnel is up and running create time each month to check in with how it’s working. And constantly optimise it as you go.
I’m excited for you to get your sales funnel live!
If you need a hand with building your sales funnel, I can help!
Check out my done-for-you sales funnel build service for coaches, course creators and change makers who are scaling their business.
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