• Strategy

Using DX to Strengthen Your Sales Funnel

Companies spend a lot of time creating and distributing marketing content. But the reality is a fraction of prospects who see your content become paying customers. For ages, there was nothing that marketers could do about it. But now, powerful tools can help you nurture these leads to bridge the gap.  

At Flywheel, we help companies shape digital experiences to turn qualified leads into paying customers. This post will help you plot your content as touchpoints that drive a user to perform specific conversions. By guiding your prospects along their journey, you can measure the impact and effectiveness of your content. Based on our latest DX Workshop, we’ve outlined the steps to get you started, along with a link to a helpful worksheet. 

Before you read on, you might want to read our posts about personas and journey maps. These give you clarity into the exact people you are building the experiences for, and the exact steps they take (or should take) as they go from strangers to customers, donors, or whatever the final outcome is you are hoping for. This might also be called the sales funnel. 

Now let’s look specifically at two main steps in the journey: 

  1. Acquisition. This is the step that comes to mind most when we think of marketing. The goal is to get users to engage with an advertisement or content to take an initial action, such as visit a website, go to a retail store or do another type of branded experience. I like to say this phase gets all the attention: brainstorming the idea, crafting the ad or content, ensuring the right distribution, etc.

    2. Touchpoints in the acquisition phase include: 

    • SEM ad 

    • Social post 

    • Media coverage 

    • Content 

    • Referring site 

    Conversions in this phase could be: 

    • Clicks 

    • Views/sessions 

    • Sign-up/new contacts 

  1. Nurture. This is the unsung hero of the journey. While it would be nice if a person who sees an ad becomes a customer right away, that’s just not realistic. The nurture phase’s goal is to get prospects to engage with content that reduces barriers and increases confidence towards a sale or opportunity. Think of this more like sculpture, where we make incremental changes to let the true prospects get revealed. 

    2. Touchpoints in the nurture phase include: 

    • Landing page 

    • Content offer 

    • Book a demo 

    • Free trial 

    Conversions in this phase could be: 

    • Opens 

    • Additional views/sessions 

    • Engagement 

    • Meeting or demo 

Technology is vital to strengthen the funnel 

Let’s pause here to underline that you must use tools to plan, deploy, measure, and attribute the content in each phase. The good news is, powerful tools like Sitefinity and HubSpot can be easy to use. And while they come with a cost, they often pay for themselves. As you consider the steps below, remember the right technology makes all of it possible, ultimately enabling you to see what works best in your prospects’ journeys. 

Now let’s apply this thinking to your business or organization, starting with the Acquisition phase. Download this worksheet and fill in the sections below: 

  1. Stage – where are your prospects in their journey? (e.g. acquisition, nurture) 

  1. Goal – what do you want them to do at this stage? (e.g. brand awareness, provide email address) 

  1. Touchpoint – list the content that will move them up the funnel or to the next phase of their journey 

  1. Conversion – the metrics that indicate success of the content 

  1. Attribution – what touchpoints help achieve a conversion? Here you’ll want to compare touchpoints to each other and see which work best. 

Did the worksheets help you? What did you learn about the touchpoint that will enhance conversions? 

Back to Top Arrow Up
Back to Top Arrow Up