It’s been one year since I’ve been a full-time blogger.
I work about 2 hours a day, sometimes 4 if I’m lucky, 4 days a week.
I spend plenty of time with my 1.5 and 3.5 year old girls and my wife stays happy with me being home all day, while she works on her business.
She’s also able to buy pretty much anything she wants.
How am I able to work so little, spend time with my family, travel, and live stress-free?
Sales Funnels! (Like these here)
In this article I’m going to cover:
- What a sales funnels is and why you probably need one (or a better one)
- 3 reasons every blogger will perish without at least one sales funnel
- How to set up a simple sales funnel for your blog in 20 minutes
- The 4 different types of sales funnels I use that took my blog from $0 to $10,000/month in 9 months
- Finally, I’m going to give you 3 of my high-converting sales funnels absolutely FREE
What is a sales funnel?
Simply put, a sales funnel is a way to “funnel” your readers into paying customers
Can your blog survive without a sales funnel?
Yes, but only .001% of blogs on the internet are making REAL money with ads, sponsored posts, and affiliate marketing.
If you sell anything via your blog (services, physical products, digital products, affiliate products, etc.) then you already have some sort of funnel.
If you want to turn your readers, browsers, or followers into raving buying fans and customers, you need to have a system in place.
And that system starts with your sales funnel or sales funnel.
Start a FREE 14-Day Trial of ClickFunnels, the ONLY software I use to take my blog to the next level
Your blog…on autopilot
One of the first concerns I get when discussing how to blog for money is: “But I don’t have time to work 10 hours a day on my blog to sell my digital product or build a sales funnel!”
I have great news for you if that’s something you’re struggling with or thinking.
Once you invest a little time creating your first digital product and take a few hours building your first sales funnel, you can “set it and forget it.”
How to set up a simple sales funnel for your blog in 20 minutes
There are many different ways to set up a funnel for your blog but the simplest and most effective is:
Traffic >> Landing Page >> Email Opt-In >> Autoresponder >> Sale
I’m going to go over each aspect of the above funnel with screenshots, but I thought I would shoot a video of me creating a sales funnel from scratch in 20 minutes:
Start Your FREE 14-Day Trial of ClickFunnels (I’m throwing in $997 worth of bonuses if you try it under my link)
Traffic
Every blogger thinks the Holy Grail of a successful blog is traffic. And technically, they are right.
Without traffic, your blog will die a slow and painful death.
The beauty about adding sales funnels to your blog is you can make significant money with very little traffic if you have a high quality sales funnel in place.
You don’t need to have millions of visitors a month or spend tons of money on advertising to get enough traffic to make an impact.
There are plenty of free ways to generate traffic: guest blogging, Pinterest marketing, social media marketing, etc. However, one of my favorite strategies for driving traffic into funnels is Facebook advertising.
Landing Page (see example here)
This is where you’re sending the traffic you’ve worked so hard for. You want to, NEED to collect an email address so you can keep marketing to people who you’ve impressed or helped.
You’ve built a little bit of trust, now it’s time to lay in on thick. Offer your reader something of VALUE. Something that will help them achieve a desired result.
Create what’s referred to as a “lead magnet” that is valuable and actionable.
Email Opt-In
Within your landing page, you’ll ask for an email address in exchange for your lead magnet.
In order to have a successful blog on autopilot you need some type of email marketing provider, such as Actionetics, Getresponse, Aweber.
Email Autoresponder Sequence
This is one of my favorite parts of the sales funnel: the autoresponder.
This is where you take autopilot to another level. Making sales while you sleep.
The fact is, a VERY small percentage of your audience and visitors will buy from you right away. It could take up to 9 “touches” or engagements to convince, persuade, or motivate someone to buy something from you.
Enter your autoresponder. A good autoresponder will:
- boost your credibility and expertise
- share your story, passions, and purpose with your reader
- edutain (education + entertainment) your reader with great content and personality
- pitch your offer
Sale
The end result of a good sales funnel is asking for and making a $ALE!
This one is pretty straight-forward, you create and market yourself to make money, so a good sales funnel, makes a sale.
ClickFunnels makes making sales really easy, since you can create stunning websites, high-converting landing pages, and awesome looking order forms.
Now that you know the flow of a good sales funnel, let’s get more specific.
The 4 different types of sales funnels I use that took my blog from $0 to $10,000/month in 9 months
Most blogpreneurs sell one of these four types of products or services:
1. Physical product
2. Low-price digital product (ebook or intro course)
3. High price digital product (premium course)
4. High-price service / coaching
Believe it or not I just ONE of the above funnels to make $10,000 every month. Funnel #2.
I used and customized one of the free funnel templates inside of ClickFunnels, (see them here)
If you decide to try ClickFunnels for 14-Days I’m going to give you $997 worth of bonuses just for signing up under my affiliate link.
My bonuses include how to create and profit with a digital product in 12 weeks or less, a 1-on-1 call, and a ClickFunnels Success Course.
Just click HERE to start your 14-Day Trial
Once you do, just email me at nick@bloggingwithfunnels.com and I’ll send you a link with the bonuses.
Happy funneling!
Great post! Lots of very useful information, thank you 🙂