Building your prospect funnel

- So let's talk about building your prospect funnel. What we're really talking about here is getting from where you are right now with a prospect, somewhere out there, to being face to face with that person, making a sale. Now, the main phases of this funnel are awareness, interest, desire, and of course, action. My take on this process from many years in business is that it's really less of a funnel and more of an ongoing cycle. So let's talk about the prospect cycle. It's a cycle because it is quite costly to acquire new clients. So once you get somebody over the hurdles of knowing who you are, what you're capable of, and making a sale, it's great to build a loyal customer or client who wants to keep working with you on future projects. So let's break down the segments of the cycle a little bit further. We talked earlier about pain points and customer profiles. Those are helpful tools as you build a marketing strategy to educate potential customers with the goal of reinforcing the good feelings that they start to have about you and your company. Moving a prospect from awareness to interest is all about ensuring that they know your skills, they know how you work, and specifically how you and your team could help them solve their problems. I like to use tools like Calendly to schedule appointments with prospective customers after I've given a workshop or talk. You can also use email campaigns, e-newsletters, and just personally reaching out to them with information that tells your prospect you hear them and you understand their needs. Now, creating desire is a step where we business owners sometimes stumble. It's just not good enough to say you have a great product or service. You need to help the prospective client overcome their quite natural fear of risk when trying a new vendor. In your creative work, you may already be aware of the classic marketing strategies, but maybe you hadn't thought of applying them for your own business. So some of them include FOMO, fear of missing out. So businesses that use this strategy will do special offers or give special opportunities to clients maybe at certain times of year when they have less business. Also freebies, okay? You could give something away. For example, a free 30-day trial. Authority, if you can build up your company as the trusted brand in your niche, whether that's drone photography or motion graphics, then you're relying on the authority tool. And validation. That's incorporating the words of key influencers or bigger brands or other people who recommend you. So whether you're putting together a pitch or placing an ad or discussing a proposal face to face, you can incorporate one or more of these strategies. Building a relationship. Nothing beats that direct relationship building when you're engaging with a prospective client. And so this is where I really put the energy in my business, because everything truly is personal. Even if you're in a bidding process in a very large field with a very formal corporate structure, for example, or a government process, you still need to attend any pre-bid sessions and have those personal relationships built up and learn to think about the prospective buyer from their own point of view. And that's really only something you can do once you meet that person and get to interact with them on a one-on-one level. You can also meet people at community events or answer questions one on one after a presentation or grab a cup of coffee virtually or in person. These are all ways to connect and build those relationships, because after all, we're all human and we would prefer to do business with other humans who have a relationship with us. We talked about your brand promise and how the experience someone has working with you and your company, even throughout the sales process, is as important as the end product. When a prospect becomes a client, you need to ensure that the experience they have at every step of the way is a positive one, as that reflects back on your brand and it will affect future business with that customer and with others. So be sure you are very focused on the experience from the beginning to the end of the process. Anytime you can get a client engaged in helping you connect with other possible clients, that's a win. Whether they write a glowing review of your company online or refer to your project in a blog post, that engagement will help you build a stronger relationship with them as well as with other potential clients. And you know if you're in a creative business, there is a lot of back and forth with clients as we develop the work together. So a stronger relationship means much smoother project workflow, better outcomes, and a good experience for both companies. Plus, it can lead to more opportunity, both with that client and with others that they know.