How data changed the marketing/sales funnel

Over the past decade, we have seen a very fundamental change to the classic marketing/sales funnel model. This blog post will describe exactly what has changed and why businesses should try to adapt to the new funnel.

A few days back I stumbled upon the model below while I was doing a bit of research regarding marketing and sales funnels. The model shows the “Then” and “Now” of when leads switch hands from marketing to sales teams.

In this post, I’ll try to explain what has changed and how businesses should try to adapt to the new marketing/sales funnel.

The above model was first published on Steve Patrizis blog.

The model shows the traditional and new version of when a handover between marketing and sales happens.

A funnel consists of several stages, where it typically starts with some sort of awareness phase. The awareness stage represents the beginning of the customer journey, where the customer becomes aware of a product or service. This can be achieved through various marketing channels such as advertising, content marketing, and social media.

1. Later In this stage, the customer shows an interest in the product or service, and they start to research and gather information.
2. Consideration: This is where the customer considers your solution. The customer has developed a desire for the product or service and is considering making a purchase. Typically this was where sales got involved earlier.
3. Intent: The customer
4. Evaluation: The customer takes the final step and makes a purchase.
5. Loyalty: After the purchase, the customer may become a repeat customer and advocate for the brand, leading to increased customer loyalty.

This image is a representation of the traditional sales and marketing funnel, but it is important to note that the customer journey is not always linear, and customers may move back and forth between stages. Additionally, the funnel is not static and may change based on the product, target audience, and other factors.

Essentially, what this model shows is how marketing today covers a much wider part of the overall funnel and sales only address those leads who are at the phase where they are looking to make an active purchase decision.

Although these reflections are generalisations of the modern way of doing marketing/sales, it is clear that the average company has changed its approach to marketing/sales. This change is highly accelerated by the introduction of content marketing and marketing automation tools (like Hubspot or Marketo).

Old vs. new

Traditionally businesses did one-to-many mass communication in order to get their message out. ”Spray-and-Pray marketing”. When a potential lead would contact and show a bit of interest, the business would have their sales teams reach out to their leads at the first point of contact in order to figure out if they were ready to buy or not (qualification) and then do what they can to close the lead. This old model heavily relied on cold calls and sales reps visiting customers. This still happens a lot, especially in early-stage startups as they just need to learn about their (potential) customers.

What we see today is that the line between when sales teams get involved has moved. Today, most businesses do most of the lead qualification using lead scoring techniques within their preferred marketing automation tool. In that way, sales teams receive their leads much warmer than what they have previously got, ensuring maximum efficiency among the sales force.

If you are looking to model your funnel, then I can recommend Unvault.io which will pull your marketing data into Google Sheets, from where you can then build your funnel.

Creating a stream of predictable revenue

Cover of Predictable Revenue by Aaron Ross and Marylou Tyler

The book Predictable Revenue by Aaron Ross and Marylou Tyler is most likely one of the best books ever written about how to build a predictable sales funnel for your business. If you have never heard of it before, then you need to get a hold of a copy. The principles laid out in the book have become the new normal for how businesses do marketing and sales today.

The title is not only a catchy title. The proposed approach helps companies make a predictable marketing/sales funnel which helps them accurately forecast their sales a few months in advance. By taking this approach, you can almost, based on the website visitors, tell if sales are going to hit their target a few months in advance. This is how data can truly change the way you look at your business.

When you get this setup right, and your customer acquisition cost< lifetime value, then it’s all about adding more fuel to the marketing engine and then scaling your business.

So if you haven’t switched over to the latest setup, now is the time. The internet gives you all possible options to test this new model and see if it works for your business.

If you are looking for more books on sales funnels like this, check out my other blog post 4 Infographics With Key Insights From Best Books on Sales Funnels.

Have you succeeded with this new model?

Would love to hear your thoughts on this post. I got a lot of feedback on my previous post and even though you have already reached out, then I’d still love to hear from you. Drop me a line at bomannmertz@gmail.com if you have any experience working with these kinds of inbound marketing methodologies.