An Inbound Marketing Funnel is similar to your traditional sales funnel. You break down your marketing process into steps and include all inbound strategies that will be used at every step in the funnel. Doing this allows you to more effectively target your potential audience at every stage in the buyer’s journey. But before you create this funnel, you must define an overall goal. This could be to increase your sale qualified leads or to increase engagement. Whatever your goal is should be identified and all of your strategies should work toward hitting this goal. Now the big question is, what should my inbound funnel look like?

First Step: Plan

This is the top of the funnel and the first step you need to take. As said before, you need to create an ultimate goal and build all your strategies around this goal. Once you have done that, you can move onto the next step.

Second Step: Reach

Here is where you will figure out strategies like what search engine, social media, blogs, brochures, emails and press releases you will use to reach your targeted audience. One thing to keep in mind at this step in the funnel is that it is all about getting your product or brand out to potential leads.

Third Step: Act/ Educate

Begin by educating your visitors with your website, blogs, videos and any other rich content that your audience would be interested in. Keep in mind, inbound marketing is all about engaging with your leads at every stage in the buyer’s journey. This stage in the funnel is also where you can start being seen as a thought leader in your industry. The more content you have, the more opportunities you have to show your knowledge.

Fourth Step: Convert/ Contact

Converting your visitors into leads is really the ultimate goal of any marketing strategy. This is the step in the funnel where your visitors have now requested more information or scheduled an appointment to talk to you. Now, here is where you will pass off the lead to your sales team deeming them as a sale qualified lead.

Fifth Step: Engage

You don’t want to ever stop nurturing your customers. When you stop is when they will start looking at your competitors. With rich content, you can continue to engage with your customers and even those that have not yet become a customer. Remember, it’s all about keeping the customer engaged and building a strong relationship.

So now that you know what an inbound marketing funnel is, it’s time to create your own! Remember, the key to any funnel is knowing what your goals are.