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You will read about:

• What is a sales funnel
• Advantages of structuring a sales funnel
• B2B Sales Funnel Model

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What is the sales funnel

The sales funnel portrays the sales process as it is: in the beginning, there is a large volume of leads, but as it progresses, the volume decreases and, in the end, only a few of them become customers. It is a tool to manage business opportunities, as explained in the video below. 

It is a simple way to visualize and understand all negotiation steps. 

The  is divided into 4 phases and is known as the AIDA model, an acronym that identifies the initials of the words attraction , interest , decision and action . These are steps in the purchase journey from the customer's perspective. In short, it works as follows: 

Attraction

Get the attention of the potential customer through marketing.

Interest

Keeps the lead involved in the subject

Decision

The lead is ready to purchase and is considering options. 

Action

When the deal is closed. 

This simple and traditional division serves as a guide, but it can (and should) be enhanced to be more faithful to  each company's . After all, the main objective of this tool is to monitor and manage business opportunities step by step. Through it, it is possible to organize and control the commercial process. Next, let's understand why creating a sales funnel is worthwhile.

Advantages of having a well-structured sales funnel

In general, B2B businesses have longer and more complex sales processes. When they are not well structured, they lead to a series of problems: very long sales cycles, low conversion rates, high Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) - and so on. Creating a sales funnel is the first step in figuring out how to streamline the process and sell more. Among the advantages, we can mention:

opportunity management

One of the main benefits of creating a sales funnel is organization. With well-defined steps and clear criteria for a lead to advance in the sales process, it is possible to have full control of the progress of negotiations. 

Salespeople know exactly how many leads are at each step, what actions they need to take, and how each step evolves. Managers can track conversion rates at each step, have sales predictability and make strategic decisions based on the results. 

more efficient SLA

The standard structure of the B2B sales funnel is as follows:

Lead MQL SAL SQL Customer

But when can the lead advance? When are you qualified? When can it be forwarded to sellers? These are issues that always generate conflict. The SLA (Service Level Agreement) between marketing, pre-sales and sales is an agreement that establishes the criteria for passing leads from one team to another. These criteria are defined from the sales funnel steps. As a result, the process flows smoothly and becomes more efficient. 

If you want to know more about this subject, read the post “ 

Optimization of conversion rates 

Another advantage of working from a sales funnel is the ability to look at conversion rates step by step. With this, the manager is able to identify bottlenecks in the sales process, know at which stage opportunities are being lost and make specific improvements. This is crucial for making more assertive decisions and optimizing performance. 

After all, the problem with sales is not always the salesperson's negotiating skills. It could be that the criteria for MQL need adjusting or that SQL is not ripe to buy, for example. This all impacts the sales conversion rate. The sales funnel helps you see these aspects and act quickly. 

effort calculation 

How many calls does a pre-salesperson or salesperson need to make in a month to be able to schedule X # of meetings? What X # of meetings results in what conversion rate to sales? 

By reverse engineering the sales funnel, the manager can calculate the effort needed to achieve a desired result, considering the salespeople's productivity history. Thus, sales planning, goal setting and forecasting is based on data and on the team's actual productivity. 

B2B Sales Funnel Model

The sales funnel can be adapted according to each company's business process. Here, we are going to present a B2B sales funnel model that is divided into 5 steps:

Attraction

The sales funnel starts with attracting and capturing leads . It is the step that feeds the entire sales process. In it, the focus is to obtain contact information and profile of potential customers so that they are qualified by Pre-sales and approached by Sales. 

Lead generation can be done through inbound or outbound marketing (also called passive or active prospecting). In general, the combination of these two techniques is what guarantees a steady volume and flow of leads to supply pre-sellers and salespeople with opportunities. 

While it's important to generate leads in large quantities, quality is crucial. So, in this step, the first filter must already be done. The MQL ( Marketing Qualified Lead / Marketing Qualified Lead ) criteria must be in accordance with the company's Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). It can be, for example, someone with an influencer or decision maker position, and ask for a business contact. If you meet these criteria, you can proceed to the segmentation step. If not, go to the nutrition step. 

Segmentation

Lead segmentation is the second step in the B2B sales funnel. This is when data-rich analysis is performed, considering technical and situational purchasing factors. 

It consists of qualifying the MQL received with rich data in Pre-sales. That is, more in-depth information about that lead is generated. Once this is done, the SQLs ( Sales Qualified Leads or Qualified Leads for Sales ) are delivered to the Sales team . It is the stage in which the pre-salesperson schedules a meeting between the potential customer and the seller.

To learn more about Pre-sales and how it helps to optimize the sales process, read our article:

Nutrition

This step in the sales funnel can occur both after attraction and after segmentation. When leads don't meet all pre-set criteria, they're not dropped, but nurtured. Nutrition is important for the lead to mature, that is: learn more about the solution and be more educated about the purchase. In general, nutrition is done through educational content, but depending on the complexity of the sale, it can also be done through meetings. 

Traction

This is the moment of negotiation itself. If the seller accepts the SQL as an opportunity and proceeds with the negotiation, the lead is considered SAL ( Sales Accepted Leads or Leads Accepted by Sales) and proceeds with the sales process. 

At that moment, the seller is armed with all the data collected in the previous stages, such as pain, situation and purchase decision maker. Technical arguments, persuasion methods and mental triggers are used to close the contract. 

The salesperson makes the commercial proposal and follow-up, until closing, when SAL becomes a customer . 

This sales funnel model works for most B2B sales processes. Retention can also be considered a step in the sales funnel, even if it is after the sale. The purpose of this step is to maintain customer satisfaction. In any case, organizing the sales process into clear steps is essential to succeeding in sales. 

Source: https://businessworld.com.pk/