If you want to scale up your business, increase conversions or learn how to upsell, understanding how Multi-Steps funnels work should be your priority. Before we start, let’s dive into what a multi-step funnel really is.

What is a Multi-Step Funnel?

A Multi-Step Funnel is a more complex sales funnel that takes the prospects through more steps or more thoroughly designed steps. Multi-Step funnels are the most effective if the product or service you are offering is straightforward. More often than not, these kinds of sales funnels are optimized to run for about a week, and then you recreate another, which becomes a repetitive process. This can be automated.

Why do most multi-step funnels exist for short periods of time?

Imagine you’ve managed to collect a database of emails, that people willingly subscribed in a funnel. You send them one email, two, a follow up on the next day, promotions on the fourth and so on. You continue for six, seven days, and then, what? Are you going to compose emails forever? This is the main reason why these last up to a week, you don’t want to get tied to sending emails every day. Sadly, these kinds of funnels tie you to working every day, and when you are unable to, your business gets a decreasing momentum.

That’s why we use Automation. Automating your lead generation is one of the best and most cost-effective investments you can do for your online business. Imagine generating 30 days worth of leads in one day of work. Imagine 60, Imagine a whole year! It’s doable and you wouldn’t have to move a finger afterwards. This is the sole purpose of complex funnels – extending the lead lifetime to a high maximum.

How to extend the lifetime of your leads?

If you have more than one funnel and all of them are lined up for the entire duration of a month or two, to lead conversion, then at one point or another the content sent at the individual’s would become repetitive. Even if it doesn’t, the conversion down the funnel would still be the same. And some of them, if not most, would’ve already converted. That means you might actually push some of them away by bombarding them with nudges.

They’ve already signed up with you, so send them straight to the sales page by eliminating this process of repetition. On the other hand, by doing this, you aren’t utilizing the full potential of your generated leads.

Okay, if you take things slowly and you build your campaigns with detail and if something is working out perfectly, then you make it a constant funnel. For example, you notice that a certain seven days funnel is working properly and after the period ends, you send the people to a new list. Every first day of the week you start sending out a new seven-day email series and when that period ends, you check the results and re-evaluate the effectiveness of the campaign.

If the process generates results beyond your expectations or matches it, then duplicate the process and prolong the period by 30 days, or even 60 or more. When a lead expires your list or finishes it, then send it over to the next sales page.

Retarget properly and don’t overkill it

Don’t bury your leads with constant offers just for the sake of it. If you do too much too soon they might unsubscribe or even block you. There are ways to capture the email addresses of potential clients who reach check-out but never finish it. Follow up with an email by retargeting them. Simply reinforce their desire to finish the purchase.

Your goal is to send them right back to the sales page of the same product. In some cases recommending other product as well is a good idea.

How many steps does a Multi-Step Funnel need?

Most of the time, it takes at least four-five steps or more to make a funnel work well. Moreover, considering the amounts of offer you should include in the funnel, you should allow users to choose from at least two. More often than not, three is optimal, especially for subscription-based services, where you get to nudge the individuals toward a certain preferred plan with discounts, value, and other techniques.

Furthermore, if you are selling a course on how to become a good motorcyclist, the next step might be the promotion of relevant gear. You can even create merchandise for your course and sell T-shirts at the end that celebrate the completion. These types of moves have to happen on the go. There shouldn’t be a waiting list for the prize T-shirt. People want to celebrate at the moment.

Let’s analyze the most needed stages in a Multi-Step funnel.

#1 Sign Up page (Opt-in)

In most cases, you would normally have one opt-in page and then the leads should be guided through the funnel toward conversion. Usually, between these steps, there are the so-called “bridges” or “bridge steps” which allow you to survey the leads and guide them through the process with questions.

This makes them more committed to you and allows them to feel as if the service is better tailored to their needs even if it isn’t so. The more you get to know about your leads, the easier it is to hit them with a better tailored email response. For example, if you quickly throw in a survey that asks the client why are they interested in your product. If you’re selling SAAS software, you might ask the field of work their company is in and for each response you create a niche automated email sequence to target them.

Moreover, you could construct upsell pages for all of the options you give as answers to your question. That would further allow you to tailor the user’s experience and increase the conversions rate. With a similar level of user segmentation, you can not only divide them in more efficient lists, but you can also treat them differently and send them different messages. There is no need to completely redesign your pages for each person,  you can change just a few things like the headline, the text and a few lines. Well, sometimes, that does all the difference in the world.

If your supposed client is busy, use more readable, smaller portions of text. Be straight to the point. If they aren’t, well you got it right, tell them all about your product. You can get that information with bridge steps in your funnel.

What would be a good Opt-In rate?

In most cases, email lists usually get between 5 per cent and 15 per cent sign up rates. The most successful companies usually get between 15 and 30 per cent, whereas the top of the top gets above 30 per cent. And if you’re wondering about the bottom of the funnel conversions. It varies per industry segments, countries and pricing, but overall the average is 2.35 per cent. Generally, there also exist highly converting pages with conversion rates above 10 per cent.

But the top 25 per cent of businesses usually convert more than 5 per cent. And speaking of a direct email sign up a list like a newsletter, everything more than 2 per cent is considered healthy.

#2 Sales Page

Depending on the type of product or service a different sales page would yield different results. The main reasons for that are:

• Different buyers. (B2B, B2C, Small Business, Big Companies, etc.)
• Different price range (Cheaper products can be bought with less information.)
• Product benefits should be listed to match the needs of your audience.
• Complicated products need to be explained. Day to day items, clients are already familiar with don’t need to be explained as often.

So what you can do here is evaluate your product. Is it familiar? Do people need a lot of explanations to purchase it? What are the main benefits? You can always list a few of these in bullets. Avoid large walls of text on this page and eliminate all distractions. Moreover, you need to devise a clear CTA (Call to action), which usually works best when positioned on the right part of the screen.

Furthermore, don’t be scared to change things and rearrange them. Do A/B testing when you can, in order to see what works and what doesn’t.

What conversion rate to aim for?

Aim for as higher as possible. Conversion rates greatly vary and are greatly influenced by the state of your traffic. If your traffic comes cold you are more likely to have a lower conversion rate. If they are warm or hot you can jump as high as 20 per cent. But usually, for cold traffic, the industry average is around 2 per cent, for warm traffic around 10 per cent and for hot – above 15 per cent.

How to work out pricing?

Pricing can be tricky, since giving the cheapest price to your clients doesn’t always result in an increase in conversion rates. The reason for that is the fact that people are perceiving cheaper products as non-trustworthy and non-valuable. If you are conducting online research in desperation to find the perfect motorcycle helmet and you see a certified helmet for the cost of $79 when the industry average is $399, you wouldn’t hop right on the sale, would you?

To make certain you don’t push your clients away, research your competitor to stay within their price range. Of course, if your product is 10 times better than anything else on the market and brings your client the value, raise your prices accordingly.

Do Discounts work?

Offer more value for a lesser price. Your price can be higher than your competitor prices but the cost for value can look better in the eyes of your customers if presented properly. Yes, sometimes discounts allow you to push your leads even harder to commit to a purchase, especially if it is a one-time deal for new customers. But how often should you use them? This question is hard to answer on the go, and you should test it with your products, as it greatly depends on the product or service.

Talking from personal experience, giving a timeframe (12 – 36 hours) for a certain product to be bought with a discount usually works wonders with most clients, products, and services.

Think about the Upsell page in advance

Regardless of you still finishing your sales page, think of what is the next thing you can offer your already converted clients. People who’ve purchased from you are more likely to order more right away. So don’t wait for a week or a month to pass, congratulate them for their order and send them to an upsell page in the same particular moment. Even more, you can offer them an exclusive one-time discount here, since they’ve already paid once.

#2 After you’ve sold – Upsell Page

If you are generating a good amount of revenue, and converting a lot of your leads, and you don’t have an Upsell page, rejoice. This is the time where a simple page would greatly boost your sales. Don’t neglect the upsell pages, since the leads that convert the most are the ones you’ve already sold to.

Deliver bonus value for a lower price with the upsell page. This tends to work in most segments and cases. Upsells typically are slightly better than the initial offer. For example, you sell a service like Spotify but for niche podcasts with an initial fee and a subscription base. When someone subscribes you offer them access to other libraries and no ads just for 10 per cent more of their initial investment.

Do Upsell Conversion rates differ?

Although, we’ve said it is easier to sell to someone who’s already purchased, that doesn’t mean the conversion rate would be higher here. It means that you are skipping the entire process of generating a lead and pushing it down the sales funnel. Here, you have the lead at the end, so squeeze it.

Try different upsells, and sometimes even offer a few. Test things out and see for yourself what works best.

How to optimise Upsell pages?

Automate whatever you can, systemize it and scale up as much as you can. Avoid opt-ins for upsells and offer them on the go, right after purchases. During or before check-out, even. Page structure should be different for your upsell pages. That means you can make another sell page, you need to present new information and benefits to the lead, and most importantly offer more value.

Focus on the results and go with a glamorous headline. Put testimonials on the upsell page, and display socially happy customers. Show the trust you’ve earned and the relationships you’ve built. Demonstrate who’s chosen your upselling services, if you have famous clients, that is.

#4 Follow up with Emails

To be honest, most people get stuck after making a successful sale. You don’t need to be a professional in marketing or copywriting, in order to come up with a working email sequence. If someone has already purchased from you, and you are not converting them to a loyal customer or to repeat purchase, you are missing out on insane value.

Emails are an essential part of most funnels

Over time, this is how you communicate with your established audience in the long run. First of all, you will start by trying to promote products and services and convert your leads into sales. But later on, you want to establish a connection with your already converted clients.

Offer discounts, special coupons and a one-time loyalty deal to your returning customers. Do everything you can to convince everyone on your list. And the more email templates you device over time, the easier it gets.

How should your emails look like?

Make your emails clear, with a standalone heading and write something catchy but congruent with the offer. Don’t write headings that are not linked to the contents of the email. People tend to unsubscribe from such, even without reading the contents.

Usually, putting the product’s name at the beginning of the title is a good way to go. Include a brief text or bullet points describing the exclusivity of the offer. Why are they getting this, they should know. (Because they’ve purchased a previous product or because they signed up a list, etc.)

And never forget – include a clear CTA (Call to action). If you are feeding your subscribers engaging information through the emails, add an ending like “Stay tuned for the next piece of advice in two days!” Moreover, you can also try to make them reply to your emails, as yours will automatically get whitelisted if this happens.

Know when to stop. How much Email is too much?

Avoid sending emails every day even if your system is completely automated. The most often email sequence you can do is one email per two days. Emailing prospects every day is not only a waste of time and resources but will most likely also push them away.

Decide the email sending frequency for yourself, based on your audience and on previous results. Group and segment your audiences. There might be businesses of people and unemployed ones. This means one of the segments would be more inclined to open emails more often. Address them properly.

Conclusion

Regardless of your experience as a copywriter, or your lack of such, you can easily devise email sequences to target and retarget your leads. The amount of businesses missing out on upselling their products and services is astonishing. Don’t be one of the guys who miss out on more than a 20 per cent increase of revenue just from creating a simple Multi-Step funnel with two extra pages.