12 Ways To Make Money Using Marketing Funnels

Consumer behavior is shifting. Transforming. Evolving. All thanks to this thing we call the Internet. As the Web grows and expands, marketing channels are changing. Ad costs are ballooning. And more importantly, attention spans are waning. It’s no longer simple and easy to make money marketing your online business. It’s far harder to compete when countless businesses are all vying for attention. Companies have deep pockets and limitless budgets. You can’t compete with that. That’s why it’s not a speed game. It’s a long haul. And you must be in it to win it.

Businesses must adapt to not only survive today but to thrive. Fierce competition will do that. But it’s more than that. Much more. It’s about understanding and tapping into consumer behavior. Many think it’s still a one-off game of running ads hoping and praying for conversions. Those businesses experience a slow and steady death. Instead, the ones that win leverage the inherent power of marketing funnels to make money.

Marketing funnels allow you to win the long game. They enable you to leverage human psychology in novel and innovative ways. They tap into the core levers that drive us as human beings. And they enable you to make money by harnessing the underlying consumer behavior that makes us all tick. The truth is this. We don’t want to buy random products from companies or people we don’t know. Nope. We want to buy from those we know, like and trust. We want to connect and feel that we’re understood. That’s the real secret to making money in business today.

How To Make Money Using Marketing Funnels

So what are marketing funnels? If it’s your first time hearing about marketing funnels, here’s the scoop. Marketing funnels take the customer on a predefined journey that turns browsers into buyers fast. Some call them marketing funnels while others call them sales funnels. But they’re also called purchasing funnels. Consumer funnels. And customer funnels. It doesn’t matter what you call them, it’s all the same thing. But that doesn’t make them any less relevant. In fact, marketing funnels are the most important tool you can use to make money in your business today.

It doesn’t matter if you have a simple side hustle, you own a brick-and-mortar “boring” business, you own a big business, or no business at all. If you want to make any money online, you must understand how marketing funnels work. And you must learn how to use them to attract and convert customers like clockwork. But if you think that marketing funnels are like websites, you’re mistaken. They’re not like websites. Websites are a dying breed. They have too many choices that overwhelm us. Nope. Marketing funnels are not like websites all all.

Marketing funnels are laser-focused. They offer a finite approach. A direct journey from Point A to Point B. That’s the foundation of their magic. But marketing funnels do much more than that. They allow you to tap into the heart of humans by connecting on a deeper level. That’s because they drive people to join your list, allowing you to communicate and share stories. This allows prospects to get to know you. It forms trust and builds rapport. And eventually, it helps seal the sale. Not always quickly or instantly. But over time. That’s the real magic of marketing funnels.

1—Make Money Using Affiliate Marketing Funnels

Affiliate marketing is the art of making money by selling the products or services of other companies. Each sale tied back to you results in a commission. That means you don’t have to create the products or services yourself. All you need to do is understand how to market them and get others to buy those products or services. It’s not simple. It takes a deeper understanding of the mechanics of marketing.

Sure, making money as an affiliate is hard. We all know that, right? That’s because most people try to do affiliate marketing the wrong way. They blast links left and right. They hound family and friends. And instead of attracting people, they repel them away. That’s not how you do it. Instead, you need an affiliate marketing funnel. It needs to deliver value and collect contact details before sending them to the affiliate offer.

Affiliate marketing funnels are also known as Bridge Funnels. Bridge funnels allow you to collect contact details and add a person to your email list before forwarding them to the affiliate offer. These are specifically designed to help you form a bond and develop a relationship with the prospect. This way, you can connect with them on a deeper level and sell them more products and services down the road. You’re not just limited to a single offer.

2—Lead Generation Business

Leads are a vital part of any business. Leads are valuable contacts who will potentially buy down the road. And every business needs more leads. That’s where lead-generation businesses come into play. You can build an entire business and start making money from marketing funnels through lead generation. All you need to do is to create lead-generation funnels to generate leads. You can use those leads in your business or sell them to other businesses.

To create a lead-generation business using marketing funnels you’ll need a high-converting landing page with a problem-solving lead magnet. Your lead magnet must address a problem that the prospect is currently struggling with. And it must deliver an enormous amount of value to the prospect. It should help them solve all or part of the problem. When you do that, it increases your authority and the level of trust a prospect has in you. And that sets them up to pay for the implementation of the solution.

Most people think that giving away the farm is not the right move. If you solve a prospect’s problem, why would they pay you any money after that? That’s where most are wrong. Delivering value upfront builds reciprocity. Reciprocity is goodwill. A prospect now has respect for you. That’s because you delivered an organized solution to their problem. That doesn’t mean they want to implement that solution themselves. Sure, maybe some of them will. But a large majority of those people will want to pay for the implementation of the solution. That’s just how it works.

3—High-Ticket Application Funnels

Another way to make money with marketing funnels is to use an application funnel. Application funnels allow you to sell high-ticket services and premium products. It invites the prospect to apply to purchase or join whatever it is that you’re offering. This could be a coaching program, consulting, mastermind, premium product installation, and so on. This applies to many areas of business. Application funnels work great because they force prospects to pre-qualify themselves. It allows you to weed out most of the prospects that will waste your time.

The best way to approach an application funnel (especially for high ticket) is to create a reverse squeeze page instead of a squeeze page. The two are a little different. A squeeze page asks for contact details upfront. Afterward, it delivers the value. Reverse squeeze pages deliver the value first. And then it asks for contact details. This typically results in a higher quality lead but a lower number of conversions. This is far more useful for high-ticket products and services.

4—Two-Step Tripwire Funnels

Two-step tripwire funnels are powerful money-making machines. They leverage buyer psychology and consumer behavior in a few unique ways. The first way is by substantially lowering the risk threshold by offering a low-ticket product. Most people are willing to pay a small amount of money for a product from someone they don’t know rather than a high-ticket product. This allows you to blow the prospect away with value to ensure securing a high-ticket sale down the road.

Another way two-step tripwire funnels leverage buyer psychology is through the Law of Consistency. If someone is willing to pay you a small amount of money now, they’re far more likely to pay you a higher amount. And, since this is broken up into two steps, they must click a button as a micro-commitment to move from step one to step two. Micro-commitments are important in sales. It gets the prospect performing the action you intend them to perform.

Another important benefit of a two-step tripwire marketing funnel is that if they don’t complete the sale but move to the second step you still walk away with their details. Once you have their contact details you can invite them back to complete their purchase by using automation. The contact details allow you to deliver value through email communication. And it helps you build rapport with that prospect. Remember that people want to buy from others they know, like and trust. This reinforces that concept heavily.

5—Online Surveys Funnels

Online surveys also allow you to leverage important human behavior cues. You can make money with survey funnels because filling out a simple survey is a low-friction method for lead generation. People will gladly answer multiple-choice questions on a survey funnel if it means providing some insight into a problem they’re struggling with. It also reinforces micro-commitments because they’re constantly clicking buttons to get to the next step.

Online surveys allow you to train prospects to engage in behavior that compels a sale down the road. Clicking buttons and filling out forms is an important part of human behavior linked to purchasing. That’s what makes online surveys so powerful. Use the online surveys to deliver real value and then begin sharing stories with the prospect. That allows you to sell them something down the road. This is a powerful marketing approach and goes well beyond the one-click interaction most companies implement to solicit purchases with paid ads.

6—Sales Letter Funnels

Sales letters are expertly written to help induce a sale. The best sales letters can explode a business overnight. They’re powerful, thought-provoking, emotion-inducing letters that identify the pain and agitate it before presenting a solution. The solution is right there for the taking on the page. Great sales letters require great copywriting. But if you can put together a sales letter, you can make a lot of money with this type of marketing funnel.

Frameworks exist for creating great sales letters. You must know and understand your prospect implicitly. You need to know all about them and what makes them tick. And what keeps them up at night? This way, you can get into the prospect’s mind to determine how you can approach the sales letter the best way so that it speaks directly to the prospect. This is really the key. Know the prospect first and the problem they’re experiencing. Then, design a sales letter that harnesses those details and presents a solution.

Effective sales letters do much more than that. They help to minimize risk by presenting risk-reversal methods such as money-back guarantees. Great sales letters also help to bake in social proof by providing testimonials, endorsements, and so on. And the best sales letters that are the most effective are at the heart of an irresistible offer.

7—Book Marketing Funnels

Most book marketing funnels are two-step tripwire funnels with a twist. Most of them offer the book for free. The twist is that you have to cover shipping. The word “free” is powerful in marketing because it gets prospects to take action. When combined with some form of urgency, it propels prospects toward a sale. Why? Because people often need a reason to take action. They won’t always take action on their own accord. But when you combine a free-plus-shipping offer with some impending deadline, it’s a powerful combination.

For example, this book uses a free-plus-shipping offer to drive sales. The book is offered for free. And it’s one of the best-selling marketing books of all time. The only caveat is that you have to pay for shipping. And people will gladly pay for shipping when they’re receiving something of value like that. The book has a retail price because it’s being sold on Amazon and typically retails for around $18 for the paperback.

8—Webinar Funnels

Webinars are presentations. They’re used to sell products and services at a higher price. Companies use them to sell online courses, membership site access, coaching, masterminds, and more. Webinars are used to help shift a prospect’s beliefs to induce a sale. Beliefs often stand in the way of a sale. That’s because everyone has beliefs based on prior experiences. Our real-world experiences help shape the very beliefs that hold us back from buying something.

Beliefs can revolve around the vehicle (the product), internal beliefs (lack of capability), and external beliefs (i.e. lack of time and money). The goal of a webinar is to reshape those beliefs by using the power of stories. Stories help to replace beliefs by hijacking the mind. Combined with social proof and a great offer, webinars can help you make a lot of money in any type of business.

9—Product Launch Funnel

The Product Launch Formula was created by Jeff Walker. It helps to illuminate the path for launching a new product to an existing audience. If you have an existing audience, this marketing funnel might be a great way for you to roll out a new product or service to that audience. It works over the course of multiple days. The first few days are designed to deliver valuable content and information. This sets the stage for the sale later on.

On the last day, the product is launched. The audience is told that the launch will only be for a limited time or for a limited number of people. This creates urgency and scarcity. During that time the cart is opened. And the audience is informed that the cart will only remain open for a limited period or until some other metric is met. This creates a fear of missing out, which propels sales even further.

10—Summit Funnels

Summit funnels allow you to bring a bunch of experts in an industry together to deliver value to an audience. The summit is typically given away for free to anyone who joins it live. They can watch the entire event live and all you need to do is interview the experts and ask them questions. This helps create authority and reciprocity amongst your audience. At the end of the summit, you can invite participants to purchase a product or service you offer.

Summits can also become the product itself. For people who cannot attend live, you can sell the recordings of the summit. Those recordings can be sold in any marketing funnel, along with upsells within the funnel. Upsells could include things like coaching, consulting, masterminds, and more. The best part? These can be done virtually. Meaning that you don’t need to rent out a venue or deal with event production whatsoever. That makes a virtual summit very affordable to launch.

11—Funnel Marketplace

You can generate passive income in the funnel marketing place by selling your funnel designs to others inside of the funnel marketplace. That means that you only have to do the work one time and you get paid repeatedly for it. And if your funnel designs are good then you can certainly make money with marketing funnels using this approach. You can research some of the existing templates for sale here. Look at the templates that have solid reviews and reverse engineer those. Make your designs better.

Millions of businesses have marketing funnels. That opens you up to a huge target audience of those who might be willing to purchase your funnel designs. You’ll need to do some form of promotion to get the word out. And you’ll need to collect some reviews before your funnel designs take off. But it’s well worth it since you mostly have to do the work once and get paid repeatedly for it.

12—Freelancing

Companies everywhere need marketing funnels. After all, marketing funnels offer the best way for a business to make money. That’s because they’re laser-focused. They drive prospects down a predefined path that helps increase leads, sales and revenue. They also help boost the average amount of money that customers spend with a business. Marketing funnels are great overall. And if you know how to build a marketing funnel you can make money as a freelancer helping others.

You can use any of the freelancing websites. Sites like Upwork, Freelancer, and Fiverr. You can use these sites to bid on projects and offer your services to others. You can use predesigned templates and a drag-and-drop editor to design these marketing funnels. Meaning that you don’t need to be a web developer to make money doing this. There’s no complex code to write or any servers to set up. It’s simple and easy when you use marketing funnel software to build these funnels.