The new sales funnel has a kink in it.
I used to love watching cartoons as a kid when the hosepipe would get blocked or kinked but the water kept coming, creating a giant bulge in the middle, which then exploded and water flooded everywhere.
Now that’s how the new sales funnel looks. It’s a normal funnel but in the thin section there now exists a giant bulge because there’s a blockage.
Where has this blockage come from? The major change to the old funnel is that prospects or potential customers (much better word) no longer turn up in droves at the open end and slowly make their way down the spout and end up as business.
Now people come into your funnel in dribs and drabs, usually following the inbound marketing efforts, your content marketing strategies and internet noise, one at a time and then hang around because they’re not ready to go ahead with you yet. They need keeping warm, incubate them until they are ready to move out and into your welcoming arms.
Salespeople that don’t have this incubator, have a leaky funnel because the new customers, whilst hanging around, fall through the leaks and are lost forever. The incubator plugs any leaks.
How does the incubator work? Now that’s for another day, I have a classic cartoon to watch on YouTube
