What is an example of a Marketing Funnel for a Small Business?
Here’s what a plastic surgeon’s marketing funnel looks like.
During the awareness stage, people can find you on social media or Google. Perhaps you received a recommendation from someone.
The next part is the interest & consideration phase.
This is usually a process where they see your website. They will look at your social media. You are probably looking at reviews on other sites.
And finally, often the action takes place on your site.
In some cases, you have someone who is on Google and they see you in the map results and call you directly from their phone without actually going to the website, and usually to some website or directory.
where will your list be? You need to understand what this funnel looks like for your customers. The first question you need to ask yourself is:
Are people looking for the work I do or what I sell explicitly under that name? People will search for a dentist by name.
In other words, a dentist near me. They will search for an appliance removal company near me and search for a junk removal company.
They will look for doctors in New Jersey who accept Blue Cross Blue Shield insurance.
Now there are companies that people don’t search for on Google. My wife is an intensive care unit doctor.
When an ambulance arrives at a dying person’s house, they don’t take out their phone and Google me.
Her clinic will not generate any income if her ranking is high for such queries. The same is likely true for gas stations.
For gas stations near me, a good Google ranking is unlikely to help you sell more gas.
Everything is as it is. First, understand whether people are searching on Google for what you sell or the service you provide.
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If so, then search engine optimization and potentially paid search, Google advertising, should be part of your marketing mix.
Can your small business benefit from developing relationships through social media?
Second question: Are you offering a service that is similar to a one-time transaction or something necessary to develop a relationship or can provide value?
Let’s take the example of a waste removal company. They come in and clean out collectors’ houses, or if you have a garage that you’ve been storing stuff in for 30 years, they’ll clean it out for you, that’s not where you need to develop a relationship.
You want your basement to be clean. You are deleting Google junk near me.
They go out. They’ll clean it up and hopefully, you won’t need them again for another 30 years. A junk removal company really shouldn’t waste time building relationships on social media.
On the other hand, a medical spa will greatly benefit from a social media presence where they will strengthen relationships with their existing clients.
Maybe someone came in for Botox, visited your medical spa, and now you’re posting a video about the newest sun spot-removing device you have, or you’ve started offering a new type of facial.
This is a great way to develop relationships, find out what’s going on in your business, new offers you have, special offers that excite you, and a great way to get clients back.
if you have the type of business you want. needed, and More importantly, your customers want to know what’s going on, and what new offers you have and strengthen relationships, then you need to focus on developing an organic social media strategy.
Do you have a Business Where People Find you on Social Media?
Several local restaurants in our area. I know people who have posted stuff on their Instagram, or influencers who have made like TikToks of what this authentic Sicilian restaurant in New Jersey looks like, whatever.
I can tell you that I very, very, very rarely Google anything to find a restaurant with a specific food in my area. This doesn’t mean that restaurants can’t benefit from SEO at all, but I can tell you that social media can probably benefit your local Italian restaurant more.
Understand, do you have a business that people would be interested in learning about on the Internet, or social networks?
Do Customers Know You Have a Service?
For example, we had a medical spa client we worked with who received a new type of machine that could supposedly reduce bags under their eyes.
There aren’t many machines, cosmetic procedures, injections, or anything else that can be done if you have dark circles under your eyes.
Anyone looking to find a local business that can do something like this for them won’t know how to find it. Nothing will help you like a Botox procedure or injection.
In this case, SEO is not an option. Google Ads wasn’t an option. If people aren’t searching for it, you can’t advertise it on Google.
Again, this is where social media, particularly paid social media, can come to the rescue. Organic social media is great for building relationships with people already involved in your business.
In some cases, TikTok and YouTube can help people learn about your business, but there’s no real targeting involved. What I mean is that you really just create content, post it online, and hope the right people find it.
With paid social media, we can target specific demographics, income groups, and genders by letting them know about a new offer, such as this device, that can reduce dark circles in their eyes.
If you have that type of service that people don’t know about at all, then paid social media is the way to go.
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Now all these different questions I’m asking are about the discovery, the awareness part of that marketing funnel that I showed you earlier. The next thing you need to consider is the idea phase.
This usually involves looking at various social media platforms, looking at reviews on Google, Yelp, etc., whatever your market is rating.
hint. Google whatever you’re into and just put the best word in front of it, like best dentists in Cherry Hill NJ, best vegan restaurants in Cherry Hill NJ, and whatever directory they’re in were there, you need to be there.
This is one case where you can see if advertising like Yelp will work for you or not. We have an electrician that we work with who essentially built his company on Yelp Ads.
I’ve also talked to plenty of business owners who spent years on Yelp and never saw a return on their investment.
A lot of this is driven by the fact that Yelp or any other directory, Healthgrades, or whatever, ranks your local market on Google when people want to compare all the different options they have there.
In some cases, your blog can be useful here too. We work with an email provider where we collected a whole bunch of different accounts comparing their services to Gmail and Microsoft Outlook and so on.
At this point in the review, people were Googling our client’s name Gmail, and we have an article that compares the two services very honestly.
There may be something here specifically for your business. Understand what this consideration stage looks like, how people compare your business to other existing options and act accordingly.
Develop a Methodology For Studying Distribution Channels
Step Three: Develop a Testing Habit. The takeaway from this video shouldn’t be that you’ve decided that my people are searching Google for what I do by name and I need to get into Google advertising and I need to get into SEO.
There’s still potential, but my main recommendation is that you should check it out. Testing doesn’t mean you try for a couple of months and then stop.
Come up with a methodology, and come up with a game plan before you do anything.
For example, if you’re trying Google Ads on your own, don’t just try it, see if it works and then decide if you’ll continue.
You may not run Google ads. But apparently, you don’t do this for a living. You are not a professional, and sometimes a professional can give you a better return on investment.
How Much Should a Small Business Spend on Marketing?
Step Four: Figure out what budget and resources you will allocate to this effort.
Businesses should spend between 10% of their revenue and 2% of their revenue target, and possibly higher.
This is all that means everything you will spend with your SEO specialist, your Google advertising budget plus the commission they are going to charge you for managing the account.
Take this budget into account and decide how you want to allocate it between Google Ads, social media, Yelp Ads, and any channels you advertise on.
Measure how they impact your bottom line, and then allocate that budget to the channels that have the biggest impact.