Do you want customers flying through your online store doors like crazy? Are you fed up of paying lots of $$$ on advertising that isn’t getting you anywhere?
What if I told you there is a really simple 3 step process to lowering your ad spend while keeping customer conversion high?
It’s super simple and it involves an age old strategy of sales funnels. In the digital space we use sales funnels to find our customers, appeal to them, and then persuade them to make a purchase with us.
So whether you are a digital marketing veteran or have no idea what you are doing, let us break down a basic funnel for Facebook Ads that still converts visitors into clients!
What is a funnel for Facebook ads?
A sales funnel is a process or audience classification method which is used to rank people within your sales process. This then allows them to be targeted specifically to create the highest possible chance of conversion.
Sounds complicated right? But it isn’t let me break it down.
Just like with a normal funnel, things go in at the top and move down towards the bottom. In our case, your audience starts at the top of the funnel and the aim is to slowly move them down the funnel.
How do you do that? By targeting them with specific content, advertising or communication. For example, people at the top of the funnel are much more interested in finding out more about your business than they are about what you sell. However, people at the bottom of the funnel already know this information and are much more interested in taking action!
If this is still confusing, bare with us. Let’s dive into why we use this process and how you can implement it in your strategy.
Why do we use funnels?
Sales funnels are used in every industry and in every marketing or sales department. It has proven time and time again to have the best conversion rate of any sales strategy.
They are a compromise between spending too much $$$ on being marketed in front of the largest number of people and spending much less in targeting a very specific audience. Not only that, but sales funnels can also help you determine your exact target audience!
So let’s get into it, how can we create a basic Facebook ads funnel?
Basic Facebook ads funnel, explained
For simplicity, we will create 3 stages of this funnel: top, middle, bottom. The top of the funnel is where all of your audience will go in and the bottom of the funnel is where your customers come out from.
The basic idea is to generate as many leads as possible. To do this, we will create 3 completely different Facebook ads campaigns. We do this to target the specific audience at the said stage of the funnel.
Stage 1: Top of the funnel
At the top of the funnel, we will have the broadest audience. Realistically we will not see a huge amount of conversions. We will be targeting our ideal audience, as well as a broad and unspecified audience to let Facebook match us with potential clients.
Budget wise, we dedicate about 60-70% of our budget here. This is so our ad campaign will be shown to as many people as possible, giving us the highest chance of them converting.
Targeting should be comprised of open ad sets with no set targeting, interest based targeting and lookalike audiences. That way we allow Facebook to use its powerful machine learning to show us in front of the best possible audience, for the best price per impression.
Ad copy and media wise, use broad language. In your first sentence, you can directly call out your audience. For example:
“Are you a stay at home mum?”
“Do you enjoy football?”
“Digital marketing experts, listen up!”
The goal here isn’t to get leads or sales. The goal is to gather as many potential clients as possible. Then we can filter these clients out to the middle stage of the funnel where we can engage with them in a better, more targeted way.
Stage 2: Middle of the funnel
This stage is the make or breakpoint of our funnel for Facebook Ads. You have taken your prospects from a wide range of people and piqued their curiosity. Your audience at this point is keen to find out more! However, you need to target them properly for them to take action.
Budget wise, we dedicate 15-20% of our budget here. We are not trying to go for quantity of audience anymore, but more so for conversion quality. We do not need to spend as much money as we have a more targeted, smaller audience.
Targeting should be focused on people who engaged with the top of the funnel content or ads. As well as that, people who engage with our social channels (e.g. follow us on Instagram). We no longer need to target any broad audiences, but we also don’t need to target people who visited our website or took action.
Ad copy and media should be super specific and targeted. We need to create ads and material that will resonate with this audience. For example, if you are a fitness brand you need to target people who are into fitness. You should create ads that call them out for their interest with an image that works alongside it, for example:
“We love fitness as much as you!”
It doesn’t have to be super detailed, but you need to speak to their subconscious curiosity!
The goal at this stage is to encourage people to take action. You should use a very strong call to action that tells people to either visit your website or go to your store. We are aiming to get as many people potentially interested in our product or service!
You will see a huge increase in conversions compared to stage 1 of the funnel, but it is only going to get better!
Stage 3: Bottom of the funnel
This stage is our last chance to convert our audience into customers. At this point, they would know who we are, what we do, and have taken some sort of action but haven’t quite purchased or sent us a message.
We are allocating the remaining 15-20% of our budget here, but as you will find out this stage creates incredible return on investment.
Targeting at this stage should be for people who are interested in doing business with you, but need that final push. Offering incentives such as discounts, offers or creating a sense of urgency is a great way to do this. However, make sure you don’t make the customers feel unpleasant or forced to take action. You have their interest and they are keen to buy, but just need that one final incentive.
Ad copy and media needs to follow the brand of the other two stages. You need to create ads that aren’t too dissimilar from the previous two stages. This ensures that when your audience see the ads, they recognise the brand straight away. In turn, they are far more likely to stop and see what you have to offer.
The goal at this point of our funnel for Facebook Ads is to give one final reason to persuade people to buy. As mentioned before, discounts and offers are a great way to do this. Usually at this point, we suggest offering things like free shipping. This is because it has the highest conversion of any offers present. People love free shipping!
At this point, you will see the biggest conversion rate out of any of the funnel stages. People at this stage will be unlikely not to take action, and are far more likely to buy than top of the sales funnel.
Conclusion
We hope this article helped you create a basic Facebook sales funnel!
We also have an article about choosing a Facebook Ads campaign objective. Alongside this article, it will massively help you decide how to approach your ads at every point of the funnel!
What do you think? Have you used a sales funnel on your digital marketing strategies before? Let us know in the comments!