[ ]GET INSIDE YOUR BUYERS HEADIMPROVE CONVERSION RATES
WHY DO WE NEED
A GROWTH PROCESS?
MyProduct.com
HOW IT WORKSDESCRIPTION
Our collaboration
product allows you
…
BUY NOW!
Only $9,999
In a perfect world…
WHY DOESN’T
THIS WORK?
BUYER QUESTIONS
AND CONCERNS
BUYING PROCESS
How do we respond?
Break the process down into a series of steps…
Design a series of steps
that we want customers to go through
Website Free Trial Purchase
Results in a Funnel
Not all people entering the first step will get to the second, etc.
Studying Funnel Blockage Points
Suspects Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
The Source of most Problems
Vendor
Centric
NOT MOTIVATED TO DOTHAT THEY ARE
CUSTOMERS WILL DO
SOMETHING
YOU ARE HOPING YOUR
A better way to approach to Funnel Design
Buyer
Centric
Buyer-Centric
THE BUYERS JOURNEY
THE BUYERS JOURNEY
Awareness Consideration Purchase
Mismatch:Sales often handle every lead as though they were in the Purchasing phase
I’m paid to sell. I better be selling.
Likely Distribution of Web Site Visitors
Vendor
Web Site
80%
Awareness
15%
Consideration
5%
Purchase
Different Dialog and Content for each stage
Awareness Consideration Purchase
• Create Problem & Pain
awareness
• Discuss how people are
solving
• Discuss benefits people are
seeing
• Don’t mention your product
• Don’t sell!
• Help in choosing a particular
solution
• Explain how your Product
can solve their pain
• Free Trial / Demo
• Customer stories
• Nurture with regular content
(Newsletter)
• Case studies
• Results achieved
• How you helped achieve
them
• Other proof points
• Customer references
• ROI data
• Just lost my data in hard drive crash• Backup software/service
• Starting a new software project• Dev Tools, etc.
• Performance issues with existing app• APM tools
• Difficulties tracking bugs across multi-tier apps• Bug tracking software
TRIGGERS
Buyer PersonaeWho is involved in the buying process?
Champion Economic Buyer
/ Decision Maker
IT required for sign off
Getting to know your Buyer Personae
• Identifying Characteristics• Company Profile (your ICP)
• Any special characteristics relevant to this purchase• E.g. Developers:
• Don't have a budget
• Prefer Open Source, and don't like to pay for software
• Professional Role• What does a day in their life look like?
• Key business goals?• What does their Boss expect of them?
• How does our product help them achieve those?
• Motivations / Aspirations?
• What would make their job easier?
Getting to know your Buyer Personae
• What pain do they have that we address?
• Is it latent pain, or obvious pain?
• How do they describe the pain and what they are looking for?
• (Helpful for messaging)
• Is solving this pain a high priority for them?
• If not, what features would make it a higher priority?
• What are the triggers that cause them to buy?
Getting to know your Buyer Personae
• Are they searching for a solution?• If yes, how do they go about doing that?
• Who influences them? (Sites, organizations, and people)
• (Helps us figure out how to market to them)
• Most important features? Decision criteria?
• What are their reactions to our product/company?• What will they like?
• What will they not like?
• What are the main questions and concerns they have?
• What competitors will they also evaluate?• What will they like or dislike about each of those?
FUNNEL DESIGNGET INSIDE YOUR BUYERS HEAD
Designing a Growth Process to match Buyer’s Journey
Strangers VisitorsAttract CustomersCloseLeadsConvert PromotersDelight
Awareness PurchaseInterestPost
Purchase
Top of Funnel
Drive the right traffic
that matches your
ICP and convert to
raw leads
Middle of Funnel
Convert raw leads
into MQLs
Sales
Convert MQLs into
closed deals
Customer Success
Onboard, support and
ensure customer
success as measured by
a customer KPI
Designing a Growth Process to match Buyer’s Journey
Strangers VisitorsAttract CustomersCloseLeadsConvert PromotersDelight
Credit: HubSpot
Awareness PurchaseInterestPost
Purchase
Top of Funnel
Inbound Marketing
Paid Marketing
WebsiteStrangers Conversion
Event
Raw
Lead
Outbound
SDR’s
Account-based Mktg
Targeted
Strangers
Mktg
Qualified
Lead
Qualify?
Account Based Marketing
• ICP powers all marketing
• Ideal Customer Profile
• Build lists of matching accounts
• Discover.org, Lead Fox, ZoomInfo, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, etc.
• Track who is in buying cycles
• Visiting G2 Crowd, Bombora
• Track which companies are on your website
• Targeted outreach
• Aircover from Ads
Thanks to Eric Spett, Terminus
Middle of Funnel
Raw
Lead
Lead
Scoring
Lead
Nurturing
Database
High
Low
Nurture
Webinars, events,
newsletters, etc.
Enrich
Use software like
ClearBit to enrich
the email address
to identify company,
job title, etc.
Segment
Identify interesting
segments based on
attributes (verticals,
job functions, etc.)
or actions
Mktg
Qualified
Lead
Yes
No
Qualify?
Mktg
Qualified
Lead
Sales – Lead Stages
QualifySales
Qualified
Lead
CustomerCloseDiscovery
CallOpportunity
Ready to
buy?Sales
interaction
Note: Your process will likely be different, and there will be more Opportunity stages in your CRM pipeline
Initial Guess at Growth Process
Website Free Trial
Map Buyers Process to Your Steps
ResearchShortlist
Vendors
Check
Review SitesEvaluation
Website Free Trial
BUYER
VENDOR
ROI &
Justification
GET INSIDE YOUR BUYERS HEAD
How are they
reacting as they
go through our
funnel steps?
What are they
thinking as they
go through their
process?
ResearchShortlist
Vendors
Check
Review SitesEvaluation
Website Free Trial
BUYER
VENDOR
ROI &
Justification
Optimize Your Steps to Fit
ResearchShortlist
Vendors
Check
Review SitesEvaluation
Website
BUYER
VENDOR
ROI &
Justification
Free TrialROI
Calculator
Competitive
Features
Matrix
Optimize Your growth process to Fit
ResearchShortlist
Vendors
Check
Review SitesEvaluation
Website
BUYER
VENDOR
ROI &
Justification
Free TrialROI
Calculator
Competitive
Features
Matrix
Incent
customers to
do reviews
ADDRESS ALL DECISION CRITERIA
Address
Security Concerns
3rd Party
Security Audit &
Whitepaper
BUYER
Is this a safe vendor
to choose?
• Customer Stories
• Safe Channel
Partners
Choosing a Go-to-Market Model
FreemiumViral
No TouchSelf-
Service
Light TouchInside Sales
High TouchInside Sales
Field SalesField Sales with SE’s
How I assumed the two would relate
A rough estimate of CAC versus Sales Complexity
FreemiumNo Touch
Self-Service
Light TouchInside Sales
High TouchInside Sales
Field SalesField Sales with SE’s
$0-$10
$50 –$200
$1,000 -$2,000
$3,000 -$8,000
$25,000 –$75,000
$75,000 –$200,000
Rough Estimates of Cost of Customer Acquisition (CAC)
The relationship is roughly exponential
Clearly adding
Human Touch
dramatically
increases costs
Sales Complexity
CAC (logarithmic)10x
10x
10x
The Obvious Take-away
• Do everything you can to remove human touch
from sales and onboarding
What creates Sales Complexity
• High Price point
• Complicated to evaluate?
• Integration needed with other systems?
• Multiple people involved in purchase decision?
• Risk to business of a bad buying decision?
• E.g. loss of data, business unable to operate if system is down, etc.
• Requires purchase of other products / services to complete the solution?
FreemiumViral
No TouchSelf-
Service
Light TouchInside Sales
High TouchInside Sales
Field SalesField Sales with SE’s
Start with the buyer
Understand the Complexity of your Sale
• Price point• Larger investments need greater justification, & more levels of sign off
• How complicated to evaluate?• Single person, or multiple people?
• Integration needed with other systems?
• How many people involved in the purchase decision?
• Risk to their business of a bad buying decision?• E.g. loss of data, business unable to operate if system is down, etc.
• Does it require other products or services to be purchased to complete the solution?
FreemiumViral
No TouchSelf-
Service
Light TouchInside Sales
High TouchInside Sales
Field SalesField Sales with SE’s
Land & Expand
Much easier to get a large order
once the product is proven
Product-Led
Growth Models
$1
$10
$100
$1,000
$10,000
$100,000
$1,000,000
Freemium No Touch Inside Sales Channel Field Sales
Sales Complexity
CAC Logarithmic
Fixing broken funnels
by getting inside your
buyer’s head
FRICTION CONCERNS
Find the worst blockage point in your funnel
MOTIVATIONS
FRICTION CONCERNS
Re-design, or try to use what motivates them
EXAMPLE BLOCKAGE POINT
WEB SITE EMAIL CAPTURE FORM
Typically a low conversion step
FRICTION CONCERNS
Problem: Buyer’s fear Email Overload and Spam
MOTIVATIONS
FRICTION CONCERNS
We try to motivate with good content
But frequently irritate the buyer with the barrier that stops them
from getting at the content, and lose them at that step
Drift Redesign
OUTBOUND COLD CALLING
Outbound Cold Calling
Cold Call
Arrange
Meeting with
Sales Rep
FRICTION CONCERNS
Problem: No Buyer wants a cold call from a salesperson
MOTIVATIONS
FRICTION CONCERNS
Get inside your buyers head – look for a suitable
motivation
Redesign
Cold Outreach
Invitation to…
(something of
value)
• Educational Event
• Meet their peers
• See data that is of value
• See their own data in a new way
• Etc.
Build
RelationshipBuild Trust
Use publicly accessible Data to build personalized assessments
Hi Barbara,
In doing a bit of research on fortinet.com, I noticed that you’ve lost a significant amount of traffic to the site (4,400 visits) over the past month. Is this something the team is aware of or have any idea what could have contributed to it? I also noticed while you folks dropped off the 1stpage of Google in 11 searches, there are tons of opportunities for your team (916 search opportunities!)
See below:
USING CHROME EXTENSIONS
CLEARBIT LEADS + DATA ENRICHMENT
New Leads
Enrich Existing
Leads
CLEARBIT
• Data Quality
• Highly skeptical• Seen lots of products like this before
• Enrichment data wasn’t good
• Data Coverage
• Skeptical• What % of our leads would be covered in this database?
Buyer’s Key Concerns
I have to go through IT to
get Salesforce connected
FREE TRIAL BLOCKAGE POINT
Connect to
Salesforce
SOLUTION: CHROME EXTENSION
Browser
connection to
Salesforce
See enriched
data in
Salesforce UI
Judge quality
of data
Report shows
data coverage
%
Chrome
Extension
CHROME EXTENSION
• Easy to install
• Low buyer concern
• Re-write the page’s HTML
CLEARBIT CHROME EXTENSION - ENLARGED
ELIMINATE STEPS
THAT HAVE
DEPENDENCIES ON
OTHER PEOPLE
Freemium, Free Trials, Open Source
The Product is
your sales person
WHAT IS YOUR TIME TO
WOW! ?
Thanks to Gail Goodman of Constant Contact
DEFINING WOW!
Thanks to Gail Goodman of Constant Contact
A moment where your buyer sees
something cool and exciting• Motivates them to continue exploring
The moment when your buyer
gets excited enough to want to buy
Mini Wow!
Full Wow!
TIME TO WOW!
• How many steps?
• How much time does it take?
• How much FRICTION is involved
REMOVE STEPS
& REMOVE FRICTION
EXAMPLE
As eCommerce shoppers…
… what makes us buy?
Photos
Feature Summary
Recommended Accessories
Rich description
Video
Reviews
Detailed Specifications
Answer: Rich Product Content
Salsify – Product Content Supply Chain Automation
Brands
Photos
Videos
Text
Specs
Etc.
Retailer
Portal
Retailer
Portal
Retailer
Portal
Retailer
Portal
Salsify’s Original Trial Experience
Sign up
Wait for
email with
Account
Open the
App
Learn the
UI
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Landing Page
Lots of Fields
Next,
Wait for Email…
Sign In… Now What?
• Lots of work still required
Get Inside your Buyers Head and Analyze for
Problems
Sign up
Wait for
email with
Account
Open the
App
Learn the
UI
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Redesign Trial Steps for Problems (Friction, Concerns,
& Motivations)
Sign upWait for
email with
Account
Open the
App
Learn the
UI
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Delay causing
major drop off
First Step in the Redesign
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Sign upLearn the
UI
New Landing Page: JUST YOUR
Motivation: “If these guys are
using it, it must be pretty good…”
Still leaves a problem:• Locate & Export Content
• Then import to Salsify to have
something to play with
Then:
Land directly in App
Major Friction + Other people involved = Long Delays
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Sign upLearn the
UI
Offer a chance to
start with Sample
Data
Sign upImport
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
They now have the
MOTIVATION to
import their own data
Play with
Sample
Data
Mini Wow!
Learn the
UI
Eliminate the risk that they won’t find the path to Wow!
Learn the
UI
Import
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
• High friction
• Too much risk they
won’t find the path
to Wow!
Sign up
Guided Navigation
Human Help available
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Before After
Trial Request ->
Logged into App
Trial Request ->
Product Page
Trial Request ->
Taking action 3x Overall Improvement
Uplift - % Conversion, Before and After
Next Problem Area…
Sign upImport
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Export to
new
Retailer
Sign up
with new
Retailer
Play with
Sample
Data
• High Friction
• Long Delay
Google Shopping
Problem Solved – Export to Google Manufacturer
Center
Sign upImport
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Play with
Sample
Data
Export to
Last Remaining Problem Area…
Sign upImport
Content
Locate &
Export
Content
Play with
Sample
Data
Export to
• Huge Friction & Delay
• Other People involved
Scrape publicly available data from existing retailer’s
pages
Sign up
Play with
Sample
Data
Export to
No import
needed
Scrape
Content
for them
• They have my content in here already
• They’re showing me all the issues
Mini Wow!
Eliminates Need for Sample Data
Sign up
Play with
Sample
Data
Export to
See their
own Data
Scrape
Content
for them
Final Redesigned Process • Fast Time to Wow!
• High conversion rates
Sign upExport to
See and solve
problems with
their own Data
Scrape
Content
for them
Funnel Optimization Meeting
Suspects Suspects
Suspects
SuspectsSuspects
Suspects
Suspects Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Suspects
Funnel Whack-a-Mole
• Solve for blockage points
• As you fix one, the problem will move elsewhere
SILOED THINKING
MARKETING SALESCUSTOMER
SUCCESS PRODUCT
THE NEW GROWTH TEAM
MARKETING
SALES
CUSTOMER
SUCCESS
PRODUCT
USE FUNNEL FLOW CHARTS
Website Free Trial
Handle
other
questions
Proposal
High Level Overview
xx xx xxx xx xx xxx
MicroFunnels where needed
Treat your Buyer like a Bank Account
Make a
deposit
before you
try to make a
withdrawal
Selling can be the worst way to sell
Build
TrustConsult
SellFirst Contact
First ContactBuild
Relationship
Design a funnel that
Delights
Entices and
Motivates
[ ]FOR MORE INFORMATIONWWW.FORENTREPRENEURS.COM