Welcome to Part 1 of my new series about designing a simple and devastatingly effective video-powered funnel. Every week, starting today and until the end of June, I’m going to teach you about one aspect of funnel creation — so you can attract, nurture, and convert your ideal customers on autopilot.

Read on, and don’t forget to check out Part 2 afterwards! 

I want to start this series strong… so here’s the #1 lesson you must know about funnels: 

Any marketing funnel is only as good as the offer behind it. 

Your landing pages, your ads, your emails — all those elements also matter. Of course they do! 

But the only thing that truly separates a dud funnel from a funnel that converts like gangbusters… 

…is a compelling WHY. 

As in: why should your prospects opt into yet another marketing funnel? Why would they give you their contact details and agree to hear from you? 

What’s in it for them?

And if your answer is, “Because they’ll get a chance to buy my amazing product or service that will totally change their life!” …no. That’s not enough.

No offense — I’m sure that your product or service is amazing.

But before you can convince your prospects of that, they will need a different incentive. A powerful, free offer that will attract them into your funnel… and add meaningful value to their lives even before they buy anything!

Because the #2 lesson about funnels is:

You have to give before you get, and help before you sell.

So how can you create such a compelling offer for your funnel? That’s exactly what I’m going to show you today.

Heads-up: this article is not about slapping a random lead magnet on your funnel and calling it a day! Instead, I’m going to teach you a simple 4-question process for crafting a deeply aligned offer that perfectly matches what your ideal prospects want and need…

…and packaging it into an actionable, tangible solution they will LOVE.

Does that sound good? Then let’s get started with the first question you need to answer when creating your offer — which also happens to be THE question…

Cartoon Godfather is holding up a shining multi-colored funnel

 

1. Who is your ideal audience?

Your audience informs and shapes every single element of your marketing funnel: from the microcopy on your landing page to the content and positioning of your lead magnet.

The more you obsess over your ideal customers — their identity, problems, goals, and needs — the more effective your funnel is going to be at attracting, nurturing, and converting them.

Aligning your offer with your target audience is going to have a massive impact on conversions.  People won’t hand over their personal information for just any cookie-cutter freebie — it ain’t the mid-2000s internet anymore! No, they need to believe that your offer is relevant and valuable to them specifically. They have to feel genuinely excited to get it.

You can’t create something like that unless you get to know your audience first.

And I mean, really know them.

Here are three of my preferred strategies for defining your ideal buyer personas

  1. Study your favorite customers or clients — past and present. Use them as a blueprint to craft the kind of ideal buyer persona that you would always want more of in your business.
  2. Drill down into the psychographics. Go beyond age, gender, location, income level etc. as your markers of an ideal customer. Try to imagine their goals, values, lifestyle choices, even barriers and limiting beliefs. These will give you a much more specific, “3D” model of your dream-fit buyer.
  3. Think about who you DON’T want. That’s right: you can discover who you want to work with… by first deciding who you don’t want under any circumstances! If you know your deal-breakers and disqualifiers, it will also help you define your ideal customers.

OK, now that you have a detailed, vivid image of your dream audience in mind, what do you do next?

Great question! Next, you learn what makes them tick…

 

2. What is their immediate capital-P Problem?

There are only two kinds of offers:

  1. “Vitamins” that provide a nice to have, but not essential, benefit, and…
  2. “Painkillers” that address an immediate, burning pain point.

Out of these two, which do you think is going to work best for converting anonymous traffic into red hot leads and prospects?

…Exactly. The offer that focuses on alleviating pain / solving a problem will attract more people and convert better, always. That’s just how human psychology works — we prioritize getting rid of pain far more than pursuing some additional benefit!

That’s why your next order of business is:

Determine the one agonizing problem your audience is struggling with right now.

What keeps them up at night? What poisons their every waking moment? What are they googling at 2am on a Sunday?

You want to zero in on an immediate, specific issue that’s like a thorn in the side of your ideal customers… and that you can help solve with your funnel offer.

E.g. let’s say that your ideal customers are freelance virtual assistants. What’s their most pressing problem? Well, it could be finding high-quality clients that pay more than $5/hr — and don’t demand 80-hour workweeks while they’re at it!

Now, here’s how you can discover your audience’s big, hairy Problem before you start creating your funnel:

  1. Ask your existing leads and prospects. Try this one-question email survey: “What’s the #1 problem you’re struggling with in [your niche] right now? Please be specific.” You can even ask paying customers or clients about their struggles before they bought from you.
  2. Conduct some customer development interviews. Book a handful of 30-minute calls or coffee chats with people who match your ideal customer profile. These are a goldmine of useful insights for sales and marketing.
  3. Eavesdrop on your ideal customers in the online spaces they hang out. People often tell each other things they won’t reveal to companies — so this kind of stealthy information gathering can be really valuable!

Knowing the problem, you can move on to…

 

3. What is your irresistible promise?

Okay, now that you know your audience, and you have a solid idea of what their capital-P Problem could be — is it finally time to design your funnel offer?

Nope! Not yet. And I will tell you why:

Your prospects care deeply about the outcome of fixing the problem, and the impact it will have on their lives… but not so much about how exactly you’ll get them there.

So, if you want to craft a marketing funnel so alluring that leads will pour into it 24/7? Then you must first define that outcome, and its impact on your audience’s lives, in a way that resonates with them. And that’s going to be your irresistible promise!

Now, I’m going to workshop an example to show you what it can look like in practice.

Let’s stick with my earlier scenario about freelance virtual assistants whose #1 Problem is finding high-paying clients that are a joy to work with.

What kind of promise would this crowd resonate with, in your opinion?

I can imagine a few — but the most compelling one I can think of is: landing a steady, well-paying client within 30 days, without needing a website or lots of experience.

You can see how a freelance VA fed up with low-paying, low-quality, one-off “opportunities” would find this irresistible, can’t you?

Based on that core promise, a business can then develop any number of offers for its marketing funnel. And each of those offers will likely resonate… because the promise already does!

Now, how can you develop an irresistible promise for YOUR business and audience? Follow this simple process:

  1. Just like you’d ask your target market about their #1 Problem (see Question Two), ask them what their ideal solution to that problem would look like! Once again, your audience is going to be your best source of insight about this.
  2. Now, brainstorm the outcomes and results your company could feasibly deliver to your prospects. Chances are, they won’t quite match that ideal picture that your audience has in mind… but that’s OK. Just try to approach it as closely as you can.

Your irresistible promise will reveal itself at the crossroads between what your prospects want vs. what your business can comfortably deliver as part of your marketing funnel.

And now, let’s talk about the specific solutions you could create to fulfill that promise…

 

4. What’s your actionable, valuable solution?

This is the final, and the most fun, part!

Now you get to brainstorm and design a specific “vehicle” for making good on your promise to your audience — in the form of your funnel offer, a.k.a. your lead magnet / opt-in incentive.

Before we dive in with examples, let’s look at the 3 essential qualities of an effective, too-good-to-resist funnel offer.

It must be:

  • Actionable. Your audience must be able to implement your free solution in their lives, ideally — instantly or very quickly.
  • Specific. Your funnel offer should ONLY focus on solving the #1 Problem and realizing the irresistible promise.
  • Valuable. Your solution needs to deliver a substantial positive impact on your audience’s lives.

Practical. Focused. Valuable. …Sounds like a tall order, doesn’t it?

Don’t worry: if you stay true to the #1 Problem you’re solving, and the big promise you’re communicating to your prospects, it’s actually surprisingly simple to craft a funnel offer that ticks all those boxes!

Here, let me show you.

Let’s return to my previous example involving freelance virtual assistants. The irresistible promise we discussed was: “landing a steady, well-paying client within 30 days, without needing a website or lots of experience.”

Now, what are some potential solutions that would make that promise a reality? Brainstorming time!

  • A 5-day email course on how to land their first $30+ per hour VA client.
  • A PDF listing 10 little-known places to find premium prospects online.
  • An interactive 5-minute quiz helping them to choose a specific lucrative niche for their VA services.
  • A package of 10 cold email scripts to make prospecting faster and easier.
  • An ultimate guide-style post covering everything they need to know about getting their 1st (or next) client.
  • A rolodex of well-paying agencies who can hire them as VA subcontractors.
  • A free 30-minute coaching session to help them create a “game plan” for getting their first high-paying VA client.

See? Even the weakest of these ideas (and I freely admit they aren’t all bangers) is still light years better than a random, generic lead magnet would be!

It’s just like I said — the exact format of your offer can vary, but you must make it problem-obsessed and promise-driven. If you can manage that, your audience will eagerly snatch it up, implement it, and come back hungry for more.

 

Implementation time! Craft your own irresistible offer

Next week, I’m going to show you how to create the ultimate marketing video for your funnel. Until then, though, here’s your “homework,” should you choose to accept it…

Use the framework I’ve shown you in this article to design your own irresistible offer. Pay extra attention to the #1 Problem and the big promise outlined in questions #2 and #3 — they will make all the difference.

That’s it for this week, and I will catch ya here on the blog for Part 2!

 

Want us to build you a profitable funnel? Let’s talk

Hey, I hope I’m not coming on too strong, but…

My team and I want to build a high-performing video-powered funnel for your business, from start to finish. You won’t have to lift a finger, or even show up in front of a camera — we’ll do all the work!

Check out all the assets you will get as part of your brand-new, shiny, revenue-generating funnel:

  • 2 prospect-pulling video ads to drive targeted traffic to your site
  • Powerful explainer video that captures the life-altering value of your solution
  • Video-optimized landing page that converts, personalized to your brand
  • Custom 5-part nurturing email sequence to convert prospects into buyers

Plus, you’ll get:

  • 1-on-1 marketing audit where we’ll deep-dive into your business and strategize how to create a funnel that supports your goals.
  • And hands-on tech support and implementation — so you can deploy your new funnel and start generating revenue as quickly as possible!

Interested? Then book a free, no-strings-attached appointment below:

Click here to book your 30-minute marketing funnel consultation, and let’s talk shop!