You already have a website for your company, where you display all your products and services. Additionally, you might also have several landing pages to generate and capture leads. You might ask yourself, why on earth do you need a Sales Funnel? The answer is simple! A funnel will get you more leads and materialize more sales than both of those platforms combined. In this article, I am going to compare Sales Funnels vs Websites vs Landing Pages.
I know that as entrepreneurs, we are ALL trying to sell sell sell! Well, a Sales Funnel could be your new best friend. Think of Sales Funnels as a “conversion optimization tool.” In simple terms, a Funnel is a strategic website designed to help you turn prospects into customers.
I already wrote an article on “What exactly is a Sales Funnel, and how can it get you more Sales?“. In that article, I go over the general structure of a Sales Funnel in detail. I provide a real-life example of each of the pages that typically compose a Funnel.
Additionally, I explain how simple creating a Sales Funnel actually is. You don’t need any technical background. You will simply use a Funnel Building platform like Builderall or Clickfunnels. Those platforms will give you free templates you can use, so you simply “drag & drop.”
In this article, we will compare and contrast Sales Funnels vs Websites vs Landing Pages.
At the end of the article, we will understand the advantages a Funnel has over either of them. My goal is to help you make an educated decision on whether you need a Funnel or not. Funnels are not the right fit for certain businesses, but they are a great fit for the vast MAJORITY.
You will benefit from a Funnel if your business sells products. Regardless of your specific industry. You can use a funnel if you’re a gym supplement company or an e-commerce store. If you provide online courses, sell jewelry, or clothing.
You can also benefit from a Funnel if your company provides services. For example, if you’re a Real Estate Agent, a Chiropractor, Hair Salon Owner, a Fitness Trainer, or even a Plastic Surgeon!
Sales Funnel achieve sales by taking your leads in an optimized “Sales journey.” These Funnels give you the capability of designing your customers’ buying experience. Enabling you to guide them each step of the way.
You can navigate their journey with simple actionable commands. Essentially, “holding their hand” until the sale is executed. Last but not least, Funnels gives you the capability of not only getting more sales but also bigger sales! This is accomplished with “up-sell pages” in the final stage of the Funnel.
What is a Sales Funnel:
Funnels are “pre-engineered” digital marketing websites. They are designed to achieve a couple of specific tasks. Mainly lead generation and selling a product or two. Funnels consist of a series of simple webpages, typically four. Each page has its specific purpose and consequently achieves a clearly defined goal.
As the Funnel “engineer,” you will define what is the most adequate purpose for each page. Thus, you gain complete control over your customer’s journey.
Similarly, to acting as a “chaperon” for a customer inside a big department store. You can hold the customer’s hand and take them directly to the aisle that has the product you are aiming to sell. Then you can pitch the product to them, and take them to the cash register.
Generally, Sales Funnels achieve this by presenting 4 simple pages. Each of these pages represents a strategic step. With each step, your leads will walk towards conversion.
Page 1 (Landing Page/Opt-in):
Create interest, capture the lead’s contact info. (This acts as the “landing page” of the funnel.)
Page 2 (Sales Pitch Page):
Warm up the customer with convincing information about a low-ticket product. This “easy to digest” information is generally presented in video format. The video is usually complemented with testimonials. After this, execute the sale using a “call-to-action.”
Page 3 (Order Page):
Capture the customer’s payment info to accomplish the first sale. Store the info safely so the customer can conveniently make future purchases without having to re-enter his credit card.
Page 4 (Thank You/Up-Sell Page):
Thank your customers for their first purchase. Take advantage they are already “warm” and sell them “complementary” higher-ticket products.
Advantages over a Website:
A large Company Websites contain a vast array of information. It presents several products, several services, about me page, etc. Websites act as a “company brochure.” Unfortunately, they are not very good at selling specific products.
Websites can confuse customers in a sea of information. Customers might not know where to find the precise product they want to buy. Customers could also get confused between “competing” products offered by the same company.
Similarly, to visiting a large brick-and-mortar department store. The customer entered with the intent or idea of buying one product but got lost between all those aisles. Customers get bombarded with information on a website.
When you present them so many options, it is hard for customers to make a decision. Have you ever heard the saying “the man who chases two rabbits catches none”? Well, that tends to happen often on websites. Navigating through all that information might confuse your customers. This results in them leaving without making a purchase. Websites are generally “multi-purpose”, but sometimes “less is more.”
Essentially, websites present too much info, which is hard for leads to digest. But, websites also have another key problem! Large websites don’t have “call-to-action” commands to encourage sales. Websites are more of an information library or catalog, not really a “BUY NOW!” platform. Sales Funnels are tailored particularly to execute a sell. Providing an immediate call to action and incentive to buy a specific product promptly.
Conclusion – Sales Funnels vs Websites: Funnels have a bigger capability of materializing a sale when compared to a Website. They avoid the risk of your customer getting lost in a sea of products and “leave the store” without buying anything. Funnels also have call-to-actions to encourage sales to happen “right then and there.”
Advantages over a Landing Page:
A landing page is a polar opposite to a large website. It has very limited specific information, with a very clear and goal in mind. They focus on just one product or service. Landing Pages are similar to Funnels. As a matter of fact, the first page of a funnel conceptually acts as a “landing page.” But, the funnel accomplishes substantially more after that first page.
Funnels have a couple of subsequent pages, after their “cover page.” These pages continue the “buildup.” These pages providing more details and compelling information to the leads until the sale are executed. A landing page is “too narrow.” Generally, a landing page’s sole purpose is capturing the email from a lead interested in one of your products. With their email, you can later re-target the lead and provide more info about the product later on. For example, through an email marketing campaign.
If you’re lucky, and that customer is already “warm” you might be able to sell your product with just your landing page. But that is it! You can’t warm “cold” customers with a landing page. Sales Funnels “warm-up” customers using the pages that “follow up” the landing page. These pages are used to “complement” the landing page and continue increasing the lead’s interest in the product.
Essentially, Landing Pages are somewhat “incomplete”. They “start” the journey, but don’t really “finish it”. Funnels don’t leave the customer “hanging”, they complete the entire journey. Once they can capture leads’ information (with the 1st page), they continue the sale process.
Last but not least, you can’t pitch additional products with a landing page.
After you execute a sale with your Funnel, you can pitch a secondary product on the “thank you page.” This is great because you can take advantage of a customer that has materialized their intent to buy. This is the best customer you can have; you shouldn’t let them go without trying to “up-sell” them another product.
Sales Funnels maximize the potential of customers that have already purchased. This is done organically, by pitching them another related product on the last page of the Funnel. The most you’re going to get out of a landing page is accomplishing one single goal (if you’re lucky).
Conclusion – Sales Funnels vs Landing Pages: Landing pages are incomplete and leave money on the table. Funnels start with a landing page but take it a couple of steps further. They continue warming up leads. They “seal the deal” converting those leads into customers. Funnels also pitch subsequent products to those customers, generating higher ticket sales.
Landing pages are “one-dimensional”, Sales Funnels are not.
Conclusion for Sales Funnels vs Websites vs Landing Pages:
The Sales Funnels is a great balanced approach that steers away from either end of the spectrum. Funnels are not “too broad”, or “too narrow”. They seem to hit the nail on the head, with just the right amount of info displayed strategically.
I like to think of Sales Funnel as the perfect mixture between a big “Website” and a small “Landing Page.” Essentially, creating a more powerful and efficient “hybrid” from a” Sales Conversion” perspective. A “Landing Page on Steroids” if you will. Don’t get me wrong, both websites and landing pages have a purpose. A Funnel simply takes it one step further in terms of sales efficiency. When you analyze Sales Funnels vs Websites or Landing pages, you can see a Funnel has all their strengths and none of their weaknesses!
My Actionable Tips regarding Sales Funnels vs Websites vs Landing Pages:
I strongly encourage you to incorporate a Sales Funnel into your marketing arsenal. Regardless if your business is big or small, if you have a product or service to sell, a Sales Funnel will certainly help you.
There are dozens of different Funnel Building programs available, but not all of them are created equal. Some of them are much harder to use than others. If you want a powerful mechanism to quickly generate more leads and optimize your sales, I suggest you take a look at the following two leading Sale Funnels builders.
The two of them have a FREE trial, so in theory, you could try both, and decide which one resonates with you more. My advice is for you to take action and begin your free trial with either today. Get your hands dirty and experiment with the power of Sales Funnels. Once you start using them, you will see they are very easy!
Builderall
Builderall is one of my favorite Sales Funnel building platforms because it is an extremely powerful “bundle.” Builderall actually offers a wide range of tools and features ASIDE from the capability of creating Sales Funnels for your business. As their name implies, they truly help you “build-it-all.” The “extra” bonus perks you get with this Funnel Building Platform are massive (so this is worth considering in your decision).
Essentially, Builderall is a “one-stop-shop” that has everything you could possibly need for your online business. Just to name a few of the 30+ tools they provide you with:
- Sales Funnel Building Platform.
- The capability to create mobile applications for both Android and iOS.
- Blog, Website, and e-commerce platforms.
- Webinar hosting platform.
- Facebook Chatbot.
- CRM (Customer Relationship Management).
- email marketing platform (Mailing Boss).
- Search Engine Optimization tools.
Additionally, Builderall has a FREE 14-day trial and is the CHEAPEST priced alternative on the market!
I believe the learning curve is a little steeper than with Clickfunnels. Meaning you might need to practice a little more with their Funnel Builder Platform before you develop your finished product.
That being said, Builderall’s Funnel builder is very user friendly. They even have pre-built templates that you can use! This means they have already generated and tested these Funnel templates for you. You don’t have to “re-invent the wheel” to create powerful Funnels. You can simply “drag-and-drop” using their templates.
Click HERE to visit Builderall and take advantage of their FREE trial!
ClickFunnels
Clickfunnels is another one of my favorite Funnel Builders because it is extremely easy to use. I consider this Funnel building platform the easiest to use in the entire industry. Like Builderall, ClickFunnels also offers a wide selection of pre-built Funnel templates that you can use. ClickFunnels calls these easy-to-use templates “Share Funnels”, because they are sharing them across all the users of the platform.
Russell Brunson is ClickFunnels founder and a world-renowned digital marketing expert. He has written multiple books which complement the ClickFunnels software extremely well. For example, “Traffic Secrets” which covers how to get traffic into your Funnel.
You can get the books for FREE here:
If you’re an entrepreneur (of any kind), I highly suggest you get these FREE books. Even if you don’t even up using a Sales Funnel. These books add tremendous value from a marketing perspective, which will come in handy for ANY type of business owner.
Additionally, Russell Brunson has created several challenges/summits/training boot-camps to teach you how to use all the power of Clickfunnels: