Forget traffic, subscribers, email lists, software and websites. We’re going to explore exactly what your marketing funnel business needs in order to sell marketing funnels.
If your main business is going to be selling marketing funnels, you’ll need to understand that you’re in a very competitive market. Even if you build the best funnels in the world, the best “product” doesn’t always win.
Look at VHS compared to BetaMax or even Coca-Cola vs. Pepsi. Blind taste tests show that Pepsi is preferred.
The market is MASSIVE for marketing funnels and the potential is growing everyday. But this isn’t a product that customers are searching for. They want leads and sales, not knowing that a funnel is necessarily their best option.
When we build our own marketing funnel businesses, selling marketing funnels is obviously a core component. But larger than that is how we reach customers and how they understand that we can help.
If you want to stand out from your competition, get clarity on running your marketing funnel business and know what your priorities are, then you need to follow this 6 step process.
The 6 core components of a marketing funnel business
Market
First, who’s your market? Businesses are defined by the market the serve, not the products they sell. Without a clear idea of who your market is, nothing else is going to matter.
Think about who you serve best? Who are you helping? What do they look like? What are the characteristics for their business?
If you want examples of over 100 niches that funnel builder could go after, check out this post here.
What is that market’s biggest problem? What are they struggling to solve themselves? You have to know what you’re helping them do if you’re going to add any value to that market.
There also has to be something that sucks in that marketplace. Something that doesn’t work or that’s broken or could be better. What are your current customers doing to try and solve that big problem above?
Finally, do YOU like that market? For a long time I worked in insurance market. And it bored me to tears. So I got out. If you aren’t willing to talk every day to that market and immerse yourself in those customers then you’re never going to get far. You have to be willing to answer the same questions, talk to the same people and say the same thing over and over until you’re blue in the face.
Category
Category is how you separate yourself from the competition. I’ve spoken about being a world #1 expert or category leader here. Essentially, it’s about understanding that all your competitors are trying to climb the same ladder and be the top of the ladder.
Instead, you’re going to own the ladder. You’re going to create a new ladder that you own. You’re not better than all the other options out there, you are the only option for that customer.
You can become #1 at something overnight, if you can create the thing you’re #1 at. It’s well beyond a USP. It’s about owning a word and creating a space within a market that you can dominate. If you create the category, you can own the space and be #1. No one else can compete with you.
Think about the space that you can create within a market that no one else wants to be in. It’s like niche marketing, but defining that niche so well that you can give it a name. Think about part of the process that you’re great at, or a particular type of customer with a particular characteristic and problem.
For example, let’s say you work with auto garages to get them more clients. The part of the process you love more than anything is email follow up. You know that auto garages with 1000 email addresses work best as you can get them better results than garages with no emails. Their main problem is people missing appointments and leaving spaces in their diary which they need to fill.
You could easily sell a funnel to solve that problem. But there are probably THOUSANDS of businesses with that problem. So why not create a category for it and own a word? Auto garages that need to book appointments on automation with email follow up, in order to prevent lost earnings and missed appointments. That could be called Appointment Blocking. Or Earning Loss Emails. Be creative and BE the #1 in the world at Appointment Blocking.
Even in crowded marketplaces this works. Take cars for example. There are hundreds (maybe thousands) of car brands. But who makes the safest cars in the world?
Volvo. Volvo owns the word “safe” in regards to cars. You can do that too.
Vision
With a market and a category, we have to know what you vision is. This is what most people skip and get stuck on. They can’t be bothered to craft a vision that defines their business and it’s a massive mistake.
I’ve written about “purpose” and vision before here. And I understand it can be difficult to break free of the idea that you can’t change the world. But you can and frankly, you should be trying to.
In your market and with your category, what’s the change you want to see in the world? What do you want to accomplish and what does a better world look like?
Using our example above of auto garages and Appointment Blocking. It could be as simple as “I want to live in a world where auto garages don’t miss out on earnings because customers miss appointments”.
That statement is WORLD changing. Imagine if you could help EVERY auto garage in the world stop customers missing appointments. That’s massive and you could be at the forefront of that.
Notice how we’re not selling funnels or “better than a website”. We’re creating a space and identifying a problem that customers know they had, but didn’t realise they were going about it all wrong.
What’s your vision and what does a better world look like? Finish the sentence “I want to live in a world where…”
Last, how are you going to get there? That’s a big question and we can’t answer that in a paragraph. But look at your category and your process and write down a simple 6 step plan for helping ONE person achieve that vision. That’s how you’re going to help 100’s of people reach that vision.
Community
Service businesses are no longer sustained by their products, they’re sustained by their community.
You have to become an authority in your market and to push your category. People follow authorities, not companies. They want people to go look up to, not faceless companies. If you can lead a group of people with your vision and category, you can add MASSIVE value to the market by leading a group of people.
If you can facilitate customers talking to each other, via a network that YOU own, talking about YOUR category – you’re unstoppable.
Community is where software and service companies will start to grow. Businesses need community and to educate that community in order to grow. Notice how we haven’t even got to PRODUCTS yet! Your business isn’t built on products, it’s built on community and helping that community grow.
Overall, your job is to be helpful. Be helpful to that community and help them grow. If they grow, you grow.
Brand
Your brand isn’t your colours and logo. It’s what people say about you when you’re not in the room (Jeff Bezos said that).
Your brand is about the message you’re bringing to people. What’s the vision and message you’re bringing to the market. You have to repeat that message over and over and over and over and over and over and over until you’re blue in the face.
What are the values that you stand for? What do believe is right or wrong in the market place? You need to have opinions and be willing to share them.
Publicity is what promotes a brand. However, publicity works best when you promote the CATEGORY. It just so happens that when you push a category to a market, you’re also the world’s #1 expert at it.
Use publicity channels to promote a category and you’re promoting everything the brand stands for. Cloud software – Salesforce. Portable computers – Compaq. Safe cars – Volvo. Original cola flavour – Coca-Cola.
Products
FINALLY we get to the product. This is the VEHICLE that you’re going to offer to your community, to solve the category. What are the products that you offer to your market to solve their problems?
What product is going to lead the category? This is where you build #1 status.
This is also where you apply advertising. Adverting is what you use for products. It’s about dragging attention back to a product.
Your product might be better than everyone else’s. Funnels are a smarter investment than a website. But that isn’t what sells. If you want to TRULY compete in the fastest growing market in the world – you need to follow the steps above.
