The New Funnel For Turning Followers Into Buyers Without Being Pushy

Social media can help take your brand to the next level. From increasing brand awareness to targeted advertising and answering customer queries, there is a lot you can achieve with social media marketing. However, you must go beyond simply gaining likes and followers to grow your business. After all, followers don’t pay bills. Instead, you need to turn your followers into buyers.

In fact, one of the key challenges businesses face is converting their followers into paying customers. This is despite social media taking up a significant portion of their time, including engaging with Facebook groups, finding the right hashtags, creating content, sourcing unique images, and responding to users' comments. Fortunately, in this article, we will guide you on how to turn social media followers into buying customers without being pushy. 

Understanding the Difference Between a Buyer and a Customer

While you can have a large social media following, not all your followers are usually ready to buy. This is understandable, considering that people go through a sales journey before purchasing a product. This journey consists of several stages, such as: 

• Awareness. During this stage, the audience has already found your content and is starting to follow you. You are using content marketing to make them aware of your brand.
• Trust. During this stage, customers learn about your brand and start to view you as an expert. They watch, engage with, and learn from your content. 
• Conversion. This stage involves your audience taking action, such as signing up, booking a product, or purchasing.

Therefore, you need to nurture your followers through these stages before you can turn them into buyers. When doing that, you should consistently and clearly show the value you are offering. 

How to Nurture Social Media Followers Into Buyers

As a brand, your role is to nurture your social media followers into buyers through the following steps:

Creating a Clear and Compelling Profile

If you don't have a social media profile to tell your story, it can be hard to gain followers. Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and TikTok will enable you to connect with your customers. Remember that your social media profile will give followers their first impression of your brand. Therefore, you will need to put your best foot forward.

If you already have existing social media profiles, you can look at them to determine what draws customers to them and what pushes them away. Consider also who you are trying to connect with. Here are a few tips on creating an outstanding social media profile:

• Make a good first impression. A well-crafted social media profile should effectively showcase your values, credentials, and target audience. You can check other profiles for inspiration and guidance. Have a photo that shows your brand values.
• Have the key essentials. Select a username that resonates with your target audience. Have a short bio that explains who you are and what you do for your followers. You can include your website link with key contact details. 
• Adjust the tone. If you are on LinkedIn, use a professional tone. On the other hand, don’t use a tone that is too serious on Facebook. Ensure that each profile reflects your brand values, but is tailored to the audience on that. 
• Ask for testimonials and endorsements. These will help you improve your standing. If you have any professional achievements, mention them as they can help increase your credibility. You can also note your goals to enable people to understand what your business aims to achieve.

Consider your social media profile like a landing page where new followers can visit and immediately understand your brand and what it stands for.

Use Value-Based Content Marketing

Social media users only follow a page because they realize it is adding some kind of value to them. Value-based marketing is a content strategy that makes customers the centre of your content strategy. Instead of creating only promotional content, focus on providing relevant, helpful, and educational content that adds value to the reader.

With the stiff competition from brands on social media, users are often overwhelmed with the decision to make. That is why you need to look for a way to stand out from the crowd. One way to achieve this is by creating content that adds value and addresses some of the pressing customer issues. The key pillars of value-based marketing are:

Understanding Your Target Audience

Unless you know your target audience, creating content that meets their needs can be hard. There are different ways in which you can understand your audience, such as:

• Understanding the sales funnel.
• Creating a detailed persona.
• Identifying the goals and challenges of your audience.
• Creating valuable and relevant content.

Creating Valuable and Relevant Content

After you have a clear picture of who your target audience is, you can now focus on creating:

• Content that responds to their concerns and needs. You can read our guide on creating an effective Instagram content strategy.
• Provide great insights and exclusive deals.
• Create actionable and practical advice.
• Share industry best practices and trends.

Content Diversification

A good social media strategy should encompass a variety of content types to cater to the diverse needs of different audiences. This may include:

• In-depth blog articles such as tips, how-to, and answers to FAQS.
• Educational articles and webinars.
• E-books and white papers.
• Behind-the-scenes videos.
• Detailed infographics.
• Podcasts.
• Tutorials and guides.
• Case studies.

Market Your Brand

If people don't hear about your brand or you don’t market to them, there is no way they will buy. Even as you create valuable content on social media, you need to leave space for promotional content. However, you must be strategic about what you share, as posting too much promotional content may make you sound repetitive. Instead, you can:

• Explain how your product helps your audience to solve a particular problem.
• Post clients’ results or testimonials.
• Provide a peek at a product to be launched.
• Explain why you created the product.
• Answer your customer's questions.

Share your offers in your captions, live videos, and stories. Keep rotating your messaging, but ensure it remains consistent. 

Use Strong Calls-to-Action

Calls-to-action motivates social media followers to take a specific action, as it clearly defines what they need to do next. By using enticing language and strategic placement, a CTA can make the audience take a particular action, such as sharing content, downloading ebooks, or purchasing an item.

According to various studies, text-based CTAS can boost your conversion by 120%. Therefore, effectively utilizing them can help you positively impact your customers on social media and take your business to the next level. You can have a CTA that makes your followers to take an action, such as:

• Clicking a link in your bio to the product.
• Sending a DM for more details.
• Tapping for a free guide.
• Commenting, “Yes,” if they need more information. 

Place your CTA strategically to guide your audience and encourage them to take action. Some places where you can place the CTA are:

• Bio and profile. You can include a CTA in your bio, encouraging visitors to take different actions, such as contacting your business, visiting your site, or browsing your shop. This won't introduce your brand but tell customers how to interact with it. 
• Post captions. You can also add a caption to your posts asking users to engage with them by liking, commenting, and sharing the content. These CTAs will help increase interaction and engagement. 
• Stories and reels. When added to the stories and reels, a CTA can help increase engagement. This is because it encourages the audience to swipe or tap to explore more of the content. For instance, you can ask them to participate in a poll, quiz, or even visit your site. To make the CTA less visible to your audience, add a link sticker.
• Social media ads. CTA buttons on social media ads can help users take specific actions, such as downloading an app, signing up for a service, or purchasing a product.

If you don't have a CTA, your audience will simply scroll away even when interested in your product. Therefore, add a specific and direct next step in each of your sales posts.

Email List Building

While your audience finds out about you on social media, the real conversion happens on your email list. When someone signs up for your email list, it means they are interested in your brand. Social media platforms are constantly changing, which can impact your marketing strategies. But an email list is something you own and have control over.

An email is usually more direct, personal, and focused. When a social media user signs up for your email list, they are already showing a deep interest and are likely to convert. To create a mailing list, consider offering free resources such as a guide, mini-course, or checklist. Ensure you promote it regularly to your target audience. You can then use the email list to nurture and sell to your audience.

Show Social Proof

When people discover that others are buying a product or service, they are also likely to buy it. For instance, if your friends recommend a new restaurant, you are also expected to try it out. By showcasing your social proof, you can enhance credibility, improve your brand reputation, and encourage customers to choose your brand. Here are several types of social proof you can use: 

• Customer reviews and testimonials. These show the value offered by your brand. Adding customer reviews and testimonials can make customers trust your brand and choose it over the competition. Therefore, add customer testimonials on your social media page and website. Such reviews can be especially important for new users as they can make them more confident in their decision-making. 
• Influencer endorsements. Influencers today play a significant role in shaping public opinion. That means when you work with influencers, they can give your brand a stamp of approval from their followers. However, when working with an influencer, choose one whose values align with your brand's. With the right influencer, you can increase your post engagement and conversion. 
• Success stories and case studies. Case studies and success stories can be excellent tools for social proof, providing a glimpse of the benefits of your products. Therefore, you can have a section of your site to showcase case studies of your product's effectiveness. 
• Awards and certification. Showing the company's awards and achievements can help increase its trustworthiness and credibility. Your brand will appear more credible and be seen as committed to quality and excellence. You will assure your customers that your products are high quality and that your brand aligns with their values and desires.

Ensure that you are genuine and honest, regardless of the social proof you use. Don't post fake reviews or even exaggerated ones. This can damage your brand when customers find out.

Have an Easy Buying Process

A Salesforce report indicates that 88% of customers suggest they find their buying process to be as important as the product or service they are buying. A seamless and personalized shopping experience will help you increase sales, bring you word of mouth referrals, and result in higher customer loyalty. On the other hand, if you have a complicated buying process, you will have people who would have converted but abandoned their carts. Here are ways to make the buying process easier:

Have a Fast-Loading Site

One of the most frustrating experiences is visiting a site that loads slowly. Such a site will cause customers to abandon their carts and buy elsewhere. A Portnet study reveals that if a site loads in one second, it can increase conversion three times more than another one that takes five seconds to load, and five times higher conversion than another one that loads in ten seconds. 

Therefore, businesses need to optimize their performance and speed. To do that, start by using the Google Page Speed to analyze your site’s speed. Then, you can use the following tips to improve the loading time of the site:

• Compress images using a compression tool. When you make your images smaller, they load faster, which reduces the site's load time.
• Use the right image formats, such as JPEG and PNG, for graphics. Use SVG for icons and logos. Ensure you have a good balance between file size and quality.
• Use a good hosting provider with robust performance and fast servers.
• Leverage lazy loading for videos and images so these elements only load when necessary, thereby reducing the initial load time.

Make Your Site Navigation Easy

Making your site navigable can help reduce customers’ frustration, reduce cart abandonment, and increase sales. When you have a clear and more intuitive design, it becomes easier for your prospects to find what they are searching for. Therefore, ensure that your producers are organized in a logical order. Your site should also have categories that are easy to access and navigate. 

 Other tips you can use for a straightforward site navigation are:

• Mobile-friendly site. You can expect your prospective customers to visit your site using various devices, which is why you need to ensure that your site can adapt to different screen sizes, providing a seamless shopping experience across all screens, including smartphones and tablets.
• Use navigation icons and images. This enables users to browse various categories and products on the site. It also fosters a more interactive engagement, especially for visual learners.
• Place the navigation at the top of the bar. Ensure the navigation bar is positioned at the top of the screen, allowing users to easily access the different navigation links without needing to press the back button.

Outstanding Product Images

Product images can enhance the customer buying process, as customers often lack a clear view of the product and cannot physically touch it, unlike in a brick-and-mortar store. When taking images, ensure there is perfect lighting, preferably natural lighting. You can also use the following tips to ensure great-looking product images:

• Different image angles. This will give your customers a better idea of the product's appearance.
• Be consistent in our branding. Ensure that the color, styling, and branding reflect the image you want to portray.
• Show the product in real use. For instance, if you sell sofas, you can add images of the sofas in a real room to help your fans understand how they will look in real life.
• Add a descriptive alt text. Text descriptions can enhance accessibility for individuals with visual impairments.

Add Different Payment Options

Ensure your customers can pay in different ways, including cash, credit cards, and mobile wallets. This increases the convenience and flexibility of payment and helps in: 

• Increasing customer satisfaction. This offers customers more flexibility as they can pay in their preferred method. 
• Higher conversion rate. Since you have no payment barriers, you can serve a larger number of customers, thereby increasing your conversion rate. 
• Low cart abandonment. You can reduce issues with payment methods that cause cart abandonment, as buyers can choose the best method.

Community Engagement

Engaging with your community can lead to loyal customers who become brand advocates. In community engagement, it is essential to establish and strengthen your relationship with your followers, which, in turn, increases their enthusiasm for your brand.

To build your community engagement, you need to understand what your community needs and then interact with them in a relevant and meaningful way. With proper engagement, you can increase connections, leading to a higher level of trust. Therefore, make sure you:

• Reply to DMs and comments.
• Acknowledge it when people share your content or tag you in it.
• Ask questions that spur conversations. 
• Use quizzes, polls, and live to engage your audience.

When you make your followers be seen and heard, they are more likely to support your brand.

Create a Sense of Urgency

One of the reasons people convert is when you touch their emotions. One way to do that is by creating a sense of urgency. 

Urgency is a psychological trigger that affects human emotions. If people see a time-sensitive opportunity, they put a higher value on it. They are bound to take action when they feel like they will miss that opportunity. 

You can use terms such as limited-time offer, enrollment deadline, seasonal themes, limited stock, or spots to make people feel this is the time to buy. However, you need to avoid being pushy when doing that.

Stay Visible Consistently

We noted earlier that customers go through various stages before making a purchase. That means if they only see you once and then disappear, you are unlikely to convert them. Therefore, if you want to turn your social media followers into customers, you need to be consistently visible. 

Ensure that you regularly show up and provide value. Remind your followers who you are and what opportunities you have to work with you. Don't give up if they don't buy immediately, as people will sometimes follow you for months before making a purchase. If you stay consistent, you are likely to build trust. 

In Conclusion

When you see people following you, you should know this is just the beginning. You must create a community of people who understand, like, and trust your brand. After that, you can now focus on turning the followers into buyers. 

By following the steps outlined in this guide, it's possible to increase your conversion rate. Your followers will also become brand advocates, helping to create a sustainable business.