Fortune in the Middle of the Funnel (MoFu)

Who doesn’t want extra traffic and sales with a shorter sales cycle?

Everyone does.

Does everyone have a plan?

As a marketer, your main purpose is to keep your user moving across the funnel to prevent them from dropping off at any point.
However, sometimes this point sometimes overwhelms us and we are obsessed with growing new plants and ignore the hanging fruit which is already there. This fruit is meant to be the middle of the funnel (MoFu) that needs to be nurtured.

In this article, we will zoom in the Middle of the Funnel subscribers to see how can we make the best out of this fruity part of the funnel.

Who is The MoFu Subscriber: (The fortune of the Funnel)

The bad news is:
79% of marketing users never convert into sales. Lack of nurturing is the common cause
of this poor performance.

The Good News is:
Nurtured users make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured ones.

In other words; MoFu subscribers are the subscribers you got their attention and they continually surf your website but never take action or engage by adding any products to their cart.

This makes them the most important part of your funnel. They need lots of information and enough space to take the decision. Now it’s your job to guide them through this journey and this is what we call Nurturing.

How to know more about my MoFu Subscribers?

Any marketer would classify their total audience into different segments and layers according to the recency of the subscriber and their behavior (For example: How often do they visit your website and how far do they go; either by going to the same page for several times, adding to the cart or buying). You - as a marketer - will absolutely not act the same and will not display the same ads or content for everyone alike.

For Some you will put a display Ad,  Some on social media ( Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Linked In), others on emails or Web Push Notifications.

Be careful ...

Many marketers fall in the fault of sending so many ads, emails, messages or notifications. This will, of course, backfire a negative result which we call 'Brand Fatigue'. They will not see your brand or will block all your ads away. I am sure no one wants this.

Hence..

Be attentive to the ratio or the ways you use to retarget your audience.

We will display three elements in this article which we believe that having the three of them all together in the right ratio is the key to a Healthy and Efficient Marketing Funnel, where the velocity of movement for a user is faster from a level to a level (Top - Middle - Bottom)

The three elements are (Marketing Channel, Recency of the user: how recent your user or subscriber is and the Frequency of Communication: how often will you send them a reminder about your brand, or often will you make an Ad for them) 

Google Analysis

Google Analytics will be a tool that you will obviously have to use to track your e-commerce performance.

Know your MoFu statues by measuring:

1- Time to Purchase ( Days to Transaction - Sessions to the transaction )
2- Retention Ratio of users

1- Time to Purchase ( Days to Transaction - Sessions to a transaction )

 Source

Days to Transaction data tells you how many days a visitor takes to purchase. If most of the users converted on the first day of their visit, it indicates that you have a good landing page which serves their needs and makes it easier for them to find what they want.

On the other hand, if they do not convert on Day 0 (first day of their visit) there are a number of possibilities – either they are not finding what they are looking for or are going through different online stores to find the best available offer.

2-  Retention Ratio of users

In the given chart you can find that the number of retention decreases as days pass by. So by this, you can check a suitable time to push a certain campaign and how frequently to push it

How to Retarget Middle of The Funnel?

In the upcoming section, we will show you the different marketing channels which you can re-target your customers through.

1- Drip Campaigns:

MoFu Subscriber Drip Campaigns’ main purpose is to increase the desire of the prospects/subscriber to convert into a customer. In this case, personalized messages /campaigns are the most effective. MoFu  Subscriber Drip Campaigns has to give the clear value, why should I buy and why should I buy now.

Here are different types of Drip Campaigns can be used to the MoFu subscribers:  

• Product Features Drip Campaigns
• Promotional Discount Drip Campaigns
• Up-selling Drip Campaigns
• Cross-Selling Drip Campaigns

• Product Features Drip Campaigns:
  

  This contains more information about the product’s ex. Running Shoe color, the weight of the shoe, and interesting information and values that you can mention in your campaign to motivate your MoFu Subscriber to buy.
  Example for an easy scan picture:

• Promotional / Discounts Drip Campaigns:
  

  Let’s say, Alex is a person who keeps on visiting your website and going to running shoe category more than once. How will it be if you send them a personalized drip campaign introducing offers and discounts with limited time?

• Up-selling Drip Campaigns:
  

  Show a more priced, advanced product (Ex. Camera) with advanced features. Show them how unique will this be from any other. Here is a personalized email example for Upselling a Camera from Amazon.

• Cross-selling Drip Campaigns:
  

  Applying to the same person who is searching for a Camera. Why not offer related items like lenses, camera bag etc..

There are also a couple of things that you need to consider while writing your drip campaigns:

• Who is your target audience of the campaign?  As you saw in the previous examples: a  “Running shoes” Surfer (MoFu Subscriber)
  
• The content of this drip campaign is most important
     - Offer Value for example
     - Avoid Blisters and Other Pains
     - More protection to your knees and ankle than regular shoes
     - Prevents Injuries
     - Entertain and educate your customer
     - Make your content scannable and easy to go through by being easy and straight to the point that
  a reader will not miss your offer, read it completely and reach for the call to action.
• You should also consider the stage of your funnel to fit the content accordingly
• Set the timings and frequency of sending the drip campaign:
  - The MoFu subscriber will need variation in the frequency of sending the notification. You can send drip campaign three-four times a week.
  - Frequency can also be dependant on holidays or events. For example, A Marathon event that is really popular you can send more drip campaigns with a focus on the running shoes.
  - Holidays or special events will be a good time to highlight your offers and discounts

Tools for Drip Campaigns:

• Emails
• Web Push Notifications
• Display Ads

2- Do Surveys with your existing customers:

Surveying leads you to continuous improvement, will give you on ground feedback on how to be present, what are the most effective ways to attracts MoFu subscribers and what are the most effective channels.

3- Build Trust on your website:

Building good amount of valuable and trusted reviews as 88% of the online MoFu Subscriber trust reviews.

As previously mentioned in the article it will reduce the suspiciousness of the MoFu Subscriber

The Psychology behind a buyer decision

To move the MoFu subscriber from a website scroller to an actual buyer you have to be aware of the psychology of the buying decision and start hitting on it.

Before we dive deeper into understanding user psychology, it is important to understand that buying process is not linear as many marketers perceive it to be. The decision of buying a product involves multiple factors, that can affect the decisions and make them fly by night.

Let’s Introduce you to some of the psychological facts that might affect the buyer's decision,

Logical and Analytical (Left Brain):

1- Economically

This point explains the purchasing power of the customer depending on their economic
the capability of buying your product.

To work on this point it is always suggested that you carefully know your target segmentation because your pricing strategy will be hugely dependent on this.

For example, don’t target the middle class and assign higher class prices, you will definitely not get a satisfying conversion rate. For example: Don’t give the specifications of a Mercedes to the price of a Honda, as it the same doesn't give the price of a Honda to someone seeking the quality of a Mercedes.    

2- Avoid loss, not Chase gain (Risk)

Human nature is known to flee from a loss than chase the unknown gain. To comfort your buyer, you have to make sure that the MoFu subscriber sees all the gains possible and there will be no risk hidden anywhere.

For example Payment methods, return policy and safe shipping. The rise of Cash On Delivery is a classic example that transformed e-commerce in India.

Many customers (especially where credit cards are not commonly used) prefer to Pay On Delivery. According to Business Insider article about India’s culture about the COD, 83% of customers of India used COD as they are worried about frauds and spams.

Emotional (Right Brain)

1- Ego:

Every buyer has the ego that unconsciously affects their buying decision. By stroking the ego of your buyers you will make them comfortable and happy.

You can do this by showing them the value added to them to purchase especially from your website. Ask yourself, why is having an apple product an ego stroke.

Let me tell you that this is due to the marketing techniques apple uses and how they position themselves in your mind as an easy and efficient tool you can use for all your tasks. They build a beautiful product makes it unique and explains how expensive it is.

2- Suspicion:

A buyer is always suspicious and this might be one of the major cases of your middle of
the funnel subscriber. Wipeout this point; is to build trust, credibility, and transparency with your subscriber.

According to Econsultancy reviews increase sales by an 18% as 63% of customers are more likely to purchase from a website that has more unbiased reviews.

So bad reviews are effective too: a buyer will be more likely to buy if they put an unbiased review.

3- Scarcity:

In some cases, a buyer might buy something they don’t even need, due to the scarcity issue.
This can be motivated by the fear of not getting this offer. We can hit this point by always showing urgency on certain products using different offers/discounts.

5- Herd Mentality:

Within this globalization age many decisions are affected by what they may call ‘trends’, but in fact, it is the herd mentality which affects our subconscious purchasing power without even noticing it.

Knowing more about how does the Herd Mentality affect your sales is going to help you.

People tend to follow what everyone is following and use what everyone is using.  

“The idea that ‘everyone else is doing it’ is a powerful principle of persuasion. It’s used often in advertising when a particular brand of chocolate is described as the “world’s favorite chocolate” Jennifer Fleming.

Buyer’s Journey:

I am sorry! But I will have to tell you that your buyer doesn’t move from the ‘awareness’ to the ‘decision’ as fast or as easy as you expect. Rather they are moving on a journey full of stops and confusions.

This shows that you have to stop thinking about campaigns and start thinking more about engaging with your customers and building a more trusted, personalized relationship.

Here comes another question how will I engage my visitor?

Be aware that in this part of the funnel (Middle of the funnel) you will face a huge drop off from your website, due to different reasons, maybe because your users are busy, or they are not interested with your product. They probably need a 1:1 interaction which impossible to happen and will only be easy through marketing automation.

Engaging your visitor will need more personalization and more awareness of what can be
their needs. Thanks to technology which made it easy to have everything automated. Marketing automation will help you to track your customers specifically MoFu subscribers’ age, preferences, what attracts them the most and what are their next steps to buy your product. Having all of these data will help you with more conversions.

In the next session, we will show you ways to target your MoFu subscribers.

But let’s try to put some scenarios to see how an online journey goes and how to adjust to these changing practices:

1- Search:

As technology is invading our world nowadays, the number one step is going to research, especially if you will have to pay money.

This is obviously what an online buyer does (81% of the online buyers search before buying).

They accurately search for the product they need, ask friends and ask for recommendations for different websites. Make sure you are strongly and correctly present on the Search Engines, with your proper landing page, design and friendly to use website.

2- See Reviews:

On buying a product will you look for a review? Of course you will, moreover, you will check out the rating of the product as well. This is a flashlight that you have to be more attentive to your service and the quality of your product as it will backfire in the long term. I am sure you don’t want bad reviews/recommendations on your product or service.

3- Find Deals and Discounts:

An online buyer will not settle for one deal or for one website. He will try to find another offer somewhere else and guess what? He will. Take the initiative to break sales and offers first.

4- Credibility and Trust:

They will search for easier and faster payment ways, return policies and initially they
will have to feel the trust. We can say show them a future warm purchase, by showing how supportive is your customer care, how easy are your payment ways and conditions and make sure that they know how safe it is buying from you by adding shipping and return policies.

Here is a simulation according to Forrester for how complicated a buyer’s journey may be, including stops and confusions.