How to Make Passive Income Using Sales Funnel Marketing on Your Blog

Starting sales funnel marketing, or setting up your sales funnel may seem like a mystery to a lot of bloggers. I remember telling myself several times “please you are not ready to go into that executive aspect of blogging yet”. lol. I wish I started setting up funnels immediately I launched my Canva template shop.

So, what did you tell yourself about setting up a simple sales funnel?

let’s demystify setting up a sales funnel because it is as easy as, writing the first paragraph of a blog post.

What is a Sales Funnel?

Sales Funnel Definition: this is a series of steps or journey a potential customer goes through before making a purchase. Just like a funnel, a lot of liquid (customers) passes through the top at a time, but only a few can get down finally (make a purchase).

Sales Funnel Examples:

Have you ever been on Pinterest searching for something, and you clicked on a pin that pops up your feed?

It may be a link to a blog post, a freebie or a blog post with a freebie attached as a content upgrade, but you do not end there.

After signing up to that freebie, a few minutes later, you find yourself making an unplanned purchase just because it is a low-cost offer and probably promises to solve the problems you have at that time?

What about having a good time on Facebook and you see a freebie that catches your interest, a few minutes later, you are making an unplanned purchase after clicking on this awesome freebie you saw on Facebook?

Probably, you are on your favourite blogger’s blog reading those awesome blog post, but this time, there is a call-to-action inviting you to a free masterclass “how to grow your email list”.

Yippe! you accepted because it solves your problem, and after signing up, you are directed to another page with an offer “email swipe files for growing your list” and the cost is between $7 to $12. Wow, you love this almost free offer and you make a purchase immediately.

This whole idea is called “sales funnel marketing” and you were attracted to your favourite blogger’s sales funnel and she just earned some cash too.

Why Have a Sales Funnel?

1. To create passive income:

If you want to make passive income and do not want to hop on every Facebook group singing about your products like you are begging for a sale, you need a sales funnel.

If you want to go from making a few random bucks a month to consistent monthly income, you need to have a sales funnel.

When I started selling Canva templates a few months back, I constantly pushed away from the idea of selling with a funnel. Because I felt I wasn’t ready.

Finally, I decided to set up a simple funnel with this lead magnet (5 free pinterest template), I got my funnel ready in place about 3 hours later. I created pinterest images, pinned them, and included it in a blog post.

A few weeks later, I got an email notification telling me I just made a sale of $12, and for a few minutes, I sat down trying to understand how this happened because no Canva template in my shop goes for $12.

Well, it was a sale from a Downsell in a sales funnel I created about 2-weeks ago and from that day, I have been getting these $10- $12 mail frequently.

But, before I created that funnel, I had about 200 subscribers sign up for that freebie between may-June. Holy Moly! Imagine how much I could have made if I had a funnel placed earlier.

2. You can make money when you are not having a Live Launch;

when you have a passive income sales funnel in place, you will make money when you are not having a live launching.

The Simple Stages of Sales Funnel Marketing

There are five main stages of sales funnel marketing, this includes:

1. Awareness Stage:

The awareness stage is the first stage in the sales funnels marketing stages. It is the stage where potential customers will come in contact with your product.

But, this is not like saying ” Oh hey, here is my product“, you need to solve the problem of your reader.

The awareness stage of a sales funnel starts with actually solving the problem of your readers. They will become loyal readers when they understand that you can solve their problem.

The question may be, so “if I don’t let them know, hey here is my product, how can I invite them into my funnel?”.

When your potential customer searches for something on Google or Pinterest and your page pops up or they come in contact with your freebie, If they find it interesting, useful or it solves their problem.

Maybe they find your blog post on social media that has answers to their problems, they will want to click and get more answers. They will stick around and consume more information, and this will lead them to the interest stage in the sales funnel stages.

2. Interest Stage:

In this stage, potential customers start to become interested in your products and what you have to offer, and at this point, they are ready to take actions like subscribing to your email list, download your freebie, check out the products you are directing them to.

While some potential customers will go ahead and take actions, others may “peace out” immediately from this stage one, and I will explain why later.

3. Evaluation Stage:

This is a sales funnel stage where your potential customers are hooked, or find your offer interesting, but they have seen something similar, and they are trying to compare between your products and that of your competitors.

In July, I wanted to purchase mockup templates from Creative Market, and I found myself comparing products from 3 different shops before finally purchasing from one. Do you do that too?

I think everyone wants the best products, and we all go through this evaluation stage before making a purchase.

So, what happens next after your potential customer evaluates your products?

4. Decision Stage:

This is the stage in your sales funnel marketing where your Potential customers decide to either make a purchase and become an actual customer or exit that page.

This stage is a bit tricky because most potential customers after entering your sale funnel may not make a purchase immediately.

some will purchase between 6-12 months later, this may be due to the price of your product or you are yet to gain their trust.

5. Retention Stage:

The retention stage is the stage where you build relationships and make your customers come back for more.

Some bloggers and online business owners do make the mistake of ending their sales funnel at the decision stage. Hence, they do not have time for their email list or subscribers in their funnel or email list. I made that mistake too.

Have you ever heard this saying that the money is in your email list?

I will say, your email list is Gold, and that is where you find people who are interested in what you are offering”.

You need to continuously build relationships with those who sign up to your freebie, and there may be a problem when you use the wrong email marketing tool. So, let’s chat about that soon.

Steps and Resources You will Need to Set up Your Simple Sales Funnel Right Now

1. Create a Banging offer:

one common blogging mistake many bloggers make is creating an offer that is not related to your niche or creating an offer nobody wants. You need to create an offer that is related to your niche.

One question you may be asking is;

“Why should I create an offer related to my niche anyway? when I could just look at what others In my niche are doing and copy it straight up.

The simple answer is, what works for others may not work for you and there will be nothing different about your offer and that of your competitor if you copy their exact offer.

You need to create an offer that hits your audience pain point and is also related to your niche.

The formula for picking a blog niche is = your audience problem + your skill – your passion + your sweet spot (something that makes you different).

After creating your offer, you need to create relevant blog posts and freebies people will be searching for, because, no wants to waste time on something of less value, that is why you need to create and draft out contents that solve a problem.

ii) Create an Awesome Blog post:

One of the best ways to get people effortlessly into your funnel is borrowing traffic from Google, pinterest and other relevant search engines.

Example 1: you created an offer, maybe a course or masterclass on “how to start affiliate marketing”. You can build a series of blog posts on the best affiliate marketing platforms.

Also, pick out one of your affiliate marketing strategies and share it for free in a blog post while inviting your reader to your masterclass (offer) to learn about your other strategies. This sounds awesome, right?

When you search for “Blogs for sale” on Google, a site a Blog brokerage site by Chelsea of Herpaperroute comes up and just beneath it is an article by Chelsea Clarke on where to buy websites pops up, this article helps to drive traffic and sales to her Blog brokerage website.

Note: One of the ways to get your ideal potential customers into your sales funnel is through creating a valuable blog post that ranks in search engines such as Google and Pinterest.

iii) Create an irresistible offer as a freebie or lead magnet:

What happens when you attract those ideal potential customers to your blog post but have no means of getting in touch with them? This is why you need an irresistible lead magnet to convert your blog visitors to subscribers.

What is a Lead Magnet?

A lead magnet is something you offer to your subscriber or reader in exchange for his/her email address. Your lead magnet could be a simple checklist, an ebook, a workbook, a pdf.

But, your lead magnet should be something related to your niche and solves your audience problems.

You can’t create a freebie nobody wants.

A few months ago, a blogger put up a question in a Facebook group asking other bloggers, what she could offer as a lead magnet, lead magnet topics were shared with her.

But, I know offering a freebie that will not solve her readers will lead to zero conversion. Who wants a lead magnet that doesn’t grow their list anyways?

I gave her a simple tweak on creating an irresistible lead magnet, and she has been wowed by the result over time.

There is nothing wrong in seeking other people’s opinion but, you can’t create a freebie like guesswork.

It has to be something related to your niche, something that is solving your audience problems.

Why something related to your niche?

Because your niche is = Your audience problem+ skill + passion. I will always say, add your sweet spot (something you can do better than others).

PS: Do you want to save time designing a lead magnet that speaks your brand style?

check out these beautiful and professionally designed lead magnets, ebook and workbook templates in the FOB Template shop. Use this coupon code (bff10 ) to get $10 off if you snag any template right now!

2. Plan Your Offers:

Plan your offers, blog content, carefully spreading out the goal of each blog post and freebies will help you understand your mistakes when growing your blog and building a consistent sales funnel marketing strategy.

When creating your freebies, plan how you want to make money from it.

Note; Your paid offer may not be a course or something very big, it may be a simple checklist, a swipe file, a simple guide, a webinar, an ebook or workbook and it can even be a page directing them to your affiliate products.

Example 1; Angela from Stray curls has 7 email sequence swipe files she used for one of her product launches that generated $3k in a week, and she is selling it for $29.

Example 2: Ell is sharing her best strategies for growing her pinterest accounts to over 1 million views and blog traffic to 100k session/month in this detailed Pinterest course put together as a PDF, no video or audio. Your offer doesn’t have to be so big, it just has to solve a problem and offer value.

You need to plan and create the goal of each freebie using a planner or spreadsheet. I plan my blog post and everything I need to get things using my blog planner from Straycurls.

Example 1: Your freebie maybe a checklist for new bloggers on everything they need to do to get their blog running. In your freebie.

You can create a resource page showing all resources they will need to get their blog running, and if you are an affiliate with some of those resources, you can include your affiliate links right in the freebie, please ensure you have an affiliate disclaimer.

All ebooks, workbooks and lead magnet Templates in the FOB Template shop have these strategic resource Library pages that you can use to promote your affiliate resources and other paid offers.

See Example of a page of a resource library page from an ebook-workbook template called Melyssa in the FOB Template shop

I was reading a blog post about sales funnel on Straycurls, and I ended purchasing a Workbook for $7 and a few days later, she was pitching an ebook on sales funnel for $67. I loved it, she has my trust, I could easily buy from her.

2. You Need an Email Marketing Software:

Have you ever heard that email marketing is the king and that your emails will convert better than social media when you want to make sales?

After creating your lead magnet, you will need an email marketing software to host your lead magnet, so when a reader subscribes, they get your freebie while you have their email address in return.

When setting up a sales funnel, you should invest in a good email marketing software, if you want to optimize your conversions.

When I switched from Mailchimp to Flodesk, my email opening rates tripled, and Flodesk has amazing email designs and templates written by professionals that will guide you if you are a newbie.

If you signup to Flodesk with my link, you will get 50% off for life, that means you will pay $19 monthly instead of $39, no matter the size of your email list.

Below is a beautiful email signup form I created using Flodesk.

PLEASE NOTE: If you are to collect people’s email address, you need to protect your blog legally, you need a privacy policy document, affiliate disclaimer if you want to promote affiliate products, to protect your business from getting sued.

You can save yourself the stress by getting these templates written by a lawyer who is also a blogger, Amira understands your needs. Save more when you get all templates you need in one big legal bundle pack.

3. Set up your Awesome Converting landing pages

There 3 or 4 main types of pages you will need when creating your sales funnel, they are your sales page, your landing, Your thank you page with tripwire offer and Upsell or cross-sell page (This is usually optional).

i) Your Lead Magnet landing Page:

This is a page in your sales funnel marketing, where you have your lead magnet displayed, and your readers get to sign up to your lead magnet.

It is the page that either leads them to your freebie or paid offer. You can easily promote this page on your social media and Pinterest.

2. Create an Awesome Sales Page:

the sales page is a page in your sales funnel where you have your paid offer displayed.

Your sales page contains your paid offer, the solutions you will be offering to your potential customers if they buy from you, and some frequently asked questions. You can also include testimonials from your previous customers.

iii) The upsell page:

After the countdown timer, you can redirect your subscriber to your higher price offer usually called an Upsell or you may do this using well-written email sequence.

Your well-written email sequence and any form of communication afterwards are called the retention stage in the email funnel stages.

Are you worried about designing and setting up a page that converts?

You can easily set up your sales funnel in minutes using these pre-made, well-designed landing pages, opt-in pages and tripwire pages in a simple bundle from Bluchic and they are customizable.

4. Host Your Easy Checkout Page:

After setting up your funnel, you need to host your digital products with a page that will allow your readers to make payments seamlessly.

Your checkout page needs to be easy to navigate and very direct.

I use Woocommerce to set up a sales page for my Canva Templates, once a customer makes a purchase, they can download it right away, but setting up Woocommerce can be a little bit complicated, especially when you are a non-techy.

If you want to have your products hosted, and even set up affiliates for your digital products, without going through hassles, I recommend you use Sendowl.

When you put all these resources and tools in place, your sales funnel is almost ready to roll in passive income, but you need simple tweaks in your sales-funnel marketing strategy to make it consistent passive income.

If you want all the secret sauce about sales funnels marketing strategy, learn everything you need to know about setting up an evergreen passive income sales funnel in this Passive Income Sales Funnel Ebook from Stray curls.

It contains undiluted information that will teach you how to set up a passive income sales funnel for an investment of $69, or you can grab the Passive income bundle for more value.

Final Though on Creating passive income sales funnel with your Freebie;

BONUS TIPS: After learning how to create an amazing passive income sales funnel, you need to drive traffic to your freebies or blog post leading to that funnel (sales page and landing pages).

One hack I use to grow my email list daily is that I create at least 5 Pinterest Pins templates for each freebie and blog posts leading to my funnel, then I pin them to Pinterest. I tend to switch the pin designs.

This way I drive consistent traffic from Pinterest to my blog and I get signups daily, sometimes you may not get tractions immediately but with time, you will start getting signup and sales from Pinterest, ones your pin takes off.

Sometimes, you may not get tractions immediately, but with time, you will start getting signup and sales from Pinterest, ones your pin takes off.

Do you have a sales funnel for your products or affiliate products, or will you start building one today and convert your hanging traffic into dollars?

Let me know in the comment section.

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