The Social Media Conversion FunnelBy HiSocial.com

1. The ConceptWhen approaching social media marketing, we should be aware of the processes that are used to

generate new leads and sales from the available traffic sources. To this end we will use the concept of a

conversion funnel. The conversion funnel is the process from the point at which a user first makes

contact with us, to the point at which they become a customer. This process is represented graphically

below:

Let’s take a closer look at the first three stages

of the funnel:

• Discovery: This is the point at which a user

first discovers the existence of our company

through a social network. This is also where our

first challenges appear; let’s take a look at some

of them:

Image source:

Seomoz.

o It is obvious that reaching our potential audience is vital to spreading our message. If we have

no followers on Twitter or any fans on Facebook, our message is simply not being heard.

o Even with a significant base of followers on a range of social networks, our message will have to

compete with many thousands of others. We should not be surprised then, to obtain click

through rates well below 1% for any links contained in our messages (click through rates refer to

the number of times a user clicks on a link for every 100 times it is seen). Put another way, if we

have a base, for example, of 1000 followers, and send each of them a tweet containing a link, a

click through rate of 0.3%, would result in only three people following that link and reaching our

site.

1. The Concept

• Realization of need. This is the phase where the users that have reached our site (which, as we saw

earlier, resulted from clicks on a link contained in our messages) can find any services or products that

interest them. The problem here lies in the word “can”. If our fan base does not have the “quality”

required, the chances of sparking their interest are really very low. To do this more effectively we must

tailor our marketing strategy in the social networks towards reaching a target audience that is

potentially interested in the products we offer. We will return to this in more detail later as it is a vital

aspect in our marketing strategy.

• Consideration. To ignite the interest of our potential customer does not necessarily mean getting a

conversion. Before making a decision, the visitor will often consider other offers and proposals from our

competition. Our goal therefore, is to maximize our loyal social base so that, as far as possible, this

does not happen.

1. The Concept

It is beyond the scope of this article to draw comparison with every type of funnel that results from the

myriad of different traffic sources on the internet. We will instead concentrate on the traffic that comes

directly from search engines (both organic traffic, which we can enhance with SEO, and traffic resulting

from advertising, typically via the AdWords program). How does this funnel differ from the

previous one?

2. Comparison with other traffic sources

The main difference lies in the way the traffic

skips the first two phases and instead enters the

funnel directly in the “consideration” phase.

Here’s why: when a user goes to a search

engine, it is generally for a specific reason

(logically they are there to search for

something) and they already have a need they

wish to fulfill – therefore we shouldn’t try to

further convince them of this need. If we are

well positioned in the search engines, our

visitors will already have a strong predisposition

to be interested in our products – far more so

than those visitors coming from social networks.

The objective we must set ourselves when looking to fully maximize the success of our social media

strategy, is to cut the length of the funnel by shortening the steps leading up to the conversion phase.

By doing so, we will significantly increase our sales and/or conversion rates. In the following chapters

we will see the different methods to achieve this aim, but for now we will set out what some of our

objectives here should be:

• To reduce the discovery step by making sure our message stands out from the others and offers more

value to our followers.

• To reduce/eliminate the realization of need step by ensuring that our followers are interested in us

precisely because we offer them a solution to a need that already exists.

• To reduce/eliminate the consideration phase by ensuring that our followers find real value in our

brand, and don’t feel the need to compare us with our competition.

How to get more fans on Facebook

3. Shortening the funnel