What are the intended results you want to achieve with each of the products and services in your funnel?

It’s beneficial to determine this before creating or offering the product or service as your answers will influence your marketing strategy.

For example, you may offer a free audio as an incentive for website visitors to join your ezine. If you want to introduce your subscribers to your expertise and style, you may choose to give away the audio of a teleclass that gives subscribers three or four action steps they can take to start resolving their challenge. If you want to introduce subscribers to the first product in your funnel, you may offer a sampler audio of that product. If this product is an ebook, then you could offer a free chapter instead of an audio.

This complimentary item may be in the form of an ebook, audio, video, ecourse, membership trial, or combination of these.   These incentives can also be used to entice people to follow you on Twitter or other social media sites. Your freebie needs to have a compelling title that invokes the curiousity of the reader. We’re bombarded with messages all day long so you need to stand out and catch your visitor’s attention. The item has to contain valuable content that is related to the challenge the person is trying to resolve.

Some people create a free ebook and encourage others to pass it on to their friends and colleagues. Usually you’ll find links inside that promote their lead product, their other products and services, or affiliate products. If it’s a brandable ebook, affiliates replace the original links with their affiliate links for the products and services. That way they can give the ebook away to their list and get credited for any sales.

In 2000, Seth Godin first released “Unleashing the Ideavirus” as a pdf ebook in exchange for a name and email address. He gave away over 200,000 free copies before a hard cover edition was even available. When this self-published version was released for sale online, eight weeks after he started giving away the free ebooks, 26000 copies were sold in three weeks.

As you can see, there are many different strategies for how to set up the top of your funnel.

Build a Relationship via Your Ezine

Once someone has subscribed to your list or ezine (and thereby entered your funnel), the next step is to develop a relationship with your subscribers. You do this by delivering quality content in your ezine on a regular basis. If you only send your ezine out periodically, it’s easy for your subscribers to forget who you are and report the email as spam.  Let your personality show so people get to know you. While some people will purchase your products right away, most will want to get a taste of what you offer and your style. Remember to weave in offers for your products and services in your ezine.

Some of you may be thinking, “but I don’t want to be pushy or keep selling to my subscribers.” Time for a perspective shift. If you have a product or service that can truly help your prospect resolve their challenge or answer their questions about an issue – which is likely how they found your site in the first place – you’re doing a disservice if you don’t let them know about it.

You don’t need to be pushy. This can be done tastefully and subtly. I recall authour Cheryl Richardson sharing she did this at the end of her free monthly teleclass by stating that she had a few coaching spaces open. There is an art and a science to obtaining the right balance of the two.

What About Follow-up Messages?

In addition to your ezine, you may decide to send a series of follow-up messages to new subscribers to your ezine. The purpose of these emails is to support the subscriber to read or listen to your freebie and to remind them or even introduce them to your products or services and how they can support them to solve their challenge.

The first email would contain the link to the page where the person can download the free audio etc. that you offer. The next couple of emails can support or encourage your new subscriber to read or listen to the freebie.  If you’ve ever downloaded a report that you intended to read later but forgot, you can see the benefit of this type of follow-up message.  You may also point out parts of the report or audio that you think are important. Of course, you also need to include links to your product but these can be woven in naturally or included in the p.s.

Some people may consider the second email and beyond spam, as they never asked to be subscribed to a series of follow-up messages – just your ezine. You could state in the first email how many emails are in the series of follow-up messages and your reason for sending them. Let the person know they can unsubscribe at any time by clicking on the unsubscribe link. Always include a link at the bottom of each email so people can unsubscribe.

On the next level of your funnel, you have lower priced items for sale. Once someone makes a purchase, send them a series of automated follow-up messages. The first email would let the purchaser know how to download the product and include trouble-shooting instructions. The next couple of emails could support the purchaser to maximize their use of the product (especially if it’s software). In one email you could send them an unadvertised bonus. In a later email you could recommend a related product or service to the purchaser. This approach can also be used on subsequent levels of your funnel.

As you can probably guess, there are a variety of strategies and philosophies about follow-up messages (purpose, frequency, content etc.) so you’ll need to choose the right one for your business and your subscribers. If in doubt, keep it simple.

I’ve tried several autoresponder programs, including those that are bundled with shopping carts. The one I use and highly recommend is aweber. It’s a third-party service, meaning the software is hosted and managed by the company on their servers. I’ll write more about autoresponders in a future post.

Until then, plan your funnel!

Part 1 of the Series: Creating a Funnel for Your Coaching Business

For Part 2 of the Series: What Do Your Prospective Clients Want?

Say only 1% of prospects hire you as a coach, what happens to the other 99%?

Do you have an email newsletter visitors can subscribe to so you can develop a relationship with them? Do you have other products and services they can purchase at a lower price?

Let’s face it. $250+ a month for a coach is a big investment for most people, especially if they’ve never experienced the benefits of coaching before.

While some prospects will intuitively know that you’re the right coach for them. Others will need to get to know you better before spending their hard-earned money. You need to prove you’re credible and can support them to get the results they want.

But I offer a free complimentary session…

The complimentary session is a great way for people to experience coaching. Unfortunately, everyone who visits your site or reads your marketing piece will not take action to sign up for the complimentary session the first time or even the second or the third time…

Their reasons may vary. The prospect may not understand the benefits of coaching or what a complimentary session is. They may be in a hurry or just having an off day. They may not be ready for coaching.

So what’s the solution?

One solution is to create a funnel of products and services.

Mentally picture a funnel. The funnel is larger at the top, where the liquid is poured, after which the circumference decreases.

With a coaching business (or any business) you need to have products and services at different levels in the funnel. The more hands-on or involved you need to be in providing the service, the higher the price.

You need free or inexpensive offerings that a large number of prospects can access. A percentage of these people will buy your next priced product or service, such as a teleclass or mp3 audio program. A percentage of these purchasers will buy the next priced product or service, such as group coaching or a teleclass series. And a percentage of these purchasers will buy your in-person seminar or personal coaching etc.

The funnel approach allows you to increase your sales by selling more products and services to more people.

A Funnel for Coaches May Look Like This:

A funnel of products or services for a coaching practice could include some of the following items at various price levels*:

*Note: The fees and products/services in the above example are for illustration purposes. You need to decide which fees and products/services work best for your business.

Hint: People learn by seeing (visual), hearing (auditory), or experiencing (kinesthetic). You’ll cater to more people if your funnel of products and services includes at least one item for each learning style. An ebook for the visual learners, a real audio or CD for the auditory learners, and a seminar or boot camp for the kinesthetic learners.

The Win-Win of the Funnel Approach

At the top of the funnel are the free or less expensive items, such as ezines or free teleclasses. An ezine or free monthly teleconference call are great ways to entice a visitor to give you their email address. This allows you to build your list and more importantly, build a relationship with your list. You’ve probably read that it takes a prospect at least 7 exposures to you before they finally remember you. An ezine or series of free calls is one way to do this.

You must deliver quality, usable content and/or coaching in your contacts with the people on your list. This builds trust and credibility. Over time some of your prospects will buy your products and services. They may even tell their friends and colleagues about you.

Part 2 in this series: What Do Your Prospective Clients Want?