Happy November! What a year it has been! As I mentioned in my Content Marketing Musings article this week, I hoped to use this month’s posts to launch a new venture.
But, alas, life happens, and I haven’t had the time to prepare the content. Instead, I will devote this month’s content to the customer journey and how their engagement with a brand should impact a company’s marketing. In that first article, I discussed how the traditional customer journey has changed with the addition of digital marketing to the media mix. It’s become more of a spiral, where customers engage and leave a brand interaction multiple times before making a decision to buy. It is not really a linear path any longer.
For this post, I thought I’d mention how this change in the customer journey affects the traditional sales funnel for many B2B companies. Many of them are still holding on to that notion of a linear customer journey by continuing to follow the traditional sales funnel. It’s time to shake up the status quo and find a new normal for sales and marketing. Let’s discuss.
The Traditional Sales Funnel
The traditional sales funnel is often depicted as an inverted pyramid, with a broad opening at the top representing a larger pool of potential customers and a narrow opening at the bottom representing the smaller number of customers who reach the final purchase stage. Each stage narrows as individuals progress through the funnel, reflecting the decreasing number of prospects who move from one stage to the next.
Also known as the sales pipeline, the funnel represented the traditional stages that a potential customer goes through before making a purchase. It was a visual representation of the customer journey, outlining the steps from initial awareness to final conversion. It does not take into consideration the modern buying process that has evolved with changes in consumer behavior and technology. Let’s review some of the differences between the sales funnel and the new customer journey.
Key Differences Between Sales Funnel and Customer Journey
Some of these differences were present in the traditional sales funnel and some are new. All can be barriers to success for a sales and marketing team.
Perspective:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: The sales funnel is a seller-centric model that outlines the stages a potential customer goes through from the seller’s point of view. It focuses on the steps a business takes to lead a prospect to the point of purchase.
- Modern Customer Journey: The customer journey is a more customer-centric concept that encompasses all interactions and touchpoints a customer has with a brand, including pre-purchase and post-purchase experiences.
Pathway
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Typically represented as a linear and sequential process, often depicted as an inverted pyramid. It emphasizes the progression of leads through distinct stages. It focuses on the traditional steps in a customer journey, which may not be relevant.
- Modern Customer Journey: Represented as a more dynamic and non-linear process, acknowledging that customers move back and forth between stages and in and out of the process itself. It considers the holistic experience, including customer research, asking for recommendations, and post-purchase interactions.
Focus:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Primarily focuses on the steps taken by the business to convert a lead into a customer. It emphasizes sales and marketing efforts to guide prospects through defined stages.
- Modern Customer Journey: Takes a broader perspective, considering the customer’s entire experience with the brand, from initial awareness through the entire lifecycle. It includes all customer interactions with a brand from initial research to post-purchase advocacy.
Timing:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Typically emphasizes the pre-purchase phases, starting from awareness and leading up to the purchase decision.
- Modern Customer Journey: Encompasses the entire relationship between the customer and the brand, including pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase stages. It recognizes that the customer journey extends beyond the moment of transaction.
Transaction-Driven vs. Relationship-Driven:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Relies on sales to measure success, often focusing on metrics like conversion rates and lead generation. The focus is short-term transactional results.
- Modern Customer Journey: Prioritizes relationship-building and customer experience. It recognizes the value of customer engagement, satisfaction, and long-term relationships. Metrics may include customer lifetime value, customer satisfaction, and advocacy.
Flexibility:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Often seen as a more rigid and structured model, with a defined sequence of stages.
- Modern Customer Journey: Recognizes the flexibility and variability in the paths customers may take. It acknowledges that customers may enter the journey at different points and follow unique routes based on their preferences and needs.
Touchpoints:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: Typically concentrates on specific touchpoints related to marketing and sales efforts, such as advertising, lead nurturing, and conversion.
- Modern Customer Journey: Encompasses a broader range of touchpoints, including online and offline channels, social media, customer reviews, peer recommendations, and post-purchase interactions. It acknowledges the complexity of the digital landscape.
Business Roles:
- Traditional Sales Funnel: The business roles of the sales and marketing teams are more rigid in the traditional sales funnel. Marketing teams focus on lead generation, awareness, and consideration stages, while sales teams take charge of the decision and purchase stages. There is a specific point in the sales process where marketing turns over a lead to the sales team to close the deal.
- Modern Customer Journey: This is where businesses lose when they don’t transition their sales process to reflect the new customer journey. The variability of the customer journey and the focus on relationship building requires seamless collaboration between marketing and sales. This collaboration ensures that potential customers receive consistent, compelling, and personalized messaging throughout their journey, at the right time and in the right place. There is no “hand-off” any longer.
The traditional sales funnel is a specific framework designed to guide prospects through the stages leading to a purchase. It is no longer the best way to achieve revenue through sales. The new customer journey is a broader concept that considers the entire spectrum of a customer’s interactions with a brand, both before and after the sale. It provides a more holistic and customer-centric view of the overall experience. Smart business leaders understand that this new customer journey is an opportunity build strong customer relationships and brand awareness through a collaboration between sales and marketing that meets customers where they are with customized content that speaks to their individual journey.
Let’s work together! I’d love to talk with you about your marketing content needs! Contact me today.
