Dear Paul,
I get that I should be marketing, but I don’t know how. I hear about funnels, and I have no idea what that means. I find the whole thing complicated, and I have no clue where to start.
Yours truly,
A Totally Made-Up Voice Actor Based on Years of Working with Hundreds of Voice Actors
–
When it comes to marketing, the vast majority of voice actors are exactly there. They may be posting on socials like crazy but not generating any leads. Maybe they get lots of likes and comments on their content, but no one is sending auditions or reaching out about work. Maybe they’re even driving a lot of traffic to their website and lots of demo listens and downloads, but no one is converting. Maybe they just feel lost and directionless.
Maybe that’s you. Or somewhat you.
Today, we’re going to talk about a simple marketing funnel, what it is, the four stages of a simple funnel, some common mistakes newer talent make when executing a funnel, and a quick real-world example.
What the Heck Is a Funnel?
A funnel is simply a customer journey.
Think about a journey you might take. At the start, you need to know the route and have enough gas to get there. When you’re on the road, you may need to stop for snacks and to hit the head. Later on, you might need to stop for more gas and a short walk. And at the end, you might need to know how long it took you to get there, your average speed, and your miles per gallon.
You have different needs at different points in the journey. A marketing funnel is no different. Customers have different needs at different points of their journeys, too.
The most basic marketing funnel – the points on the journey – go like this:
- Awareness
- Interest
- Decision
- Action
It’s called a funnel because each stage of the journey will likely have less people in it (for example, not everyone who is aware of you will be interested in working with you), so it’s wide at the top and narrower at the bottom.
The Four Main Stages of a Funnel
Stage 1: Awareness
Goal: To get visible. This stage is all about getting seen and heard.
In my humble opinion the best way by far to do this is by reaching out directly to decision makers who can hire us. Not chiefly casting directors, but end clients – producers, creative directors, training directors, medical video producers, independent authors, and on and on. Other strategies include social media, LinkedIn, blogging, YouTube, live networking, referrals, and more.
Stage 2: Interest
Goal: To build trust and curiosity by providing relevance and value.
You can be a vendor begging/asking for work, or you can be a consultant to the people who hire voice actors.
For example, you attend a book fair looking to meet independent authors. You can present as a narrator looking to make connections to book work, or you can present as an audiobook production consultant and narrator who can be a future resource for authors considering an audiobook. One is transactional, the other is consultative. One is looking to get; the other is looking to give.
You can build interest and curiosity with your demos, the messaging on your website, in your email outreach, your comments on social media, free guides and checklists for various buyer profiles, how you present yourself as a pro, what you value in a working relationship, how you like to do business, and more.
You provide relevance and value by showing you understand your buyer’s challenges and pain points and demonstrating how you solve them.
Stage 3: Decision
Goal: To persuade a prospect to confidently choose you.
Social proof shows a prospect that people like them have made a similar decision in the past, with positive outcomes. For example, showing creative directors that other CDs have hired you in the past and had great results. We can provide social proof in a lot of different forms: client testimonials, case studies, and prior work examples to name a few.
We can also build trust with a clean and easy to navigate website, a smooth discovery call, a quick and easy onboarding process, clear proposals, and so on.
Not everyone who trusts you will hire you, but everyone who hires you will do so because they trust you.
Stage 4: Action
Goal: To get the conversion.
That doesn’t always mean to get hired. A conversion might be a demo download, a contact form filled out, or a discovery call scheduled. The best way to increase any single conversion is to eliminate friction.
For example, if your demos are hard to find, they’ll be harder to listen to and download. If your contact form is buried, it will be harder to get people to fill it out.
Be obsessed about eliminating friction and making things as easy as possible for your customer.
Common Beginner Funnel Mistakes
Trying to Sell Too Early
Sell too early, at the top of the funnel, and you’re proposing marriage on the first date. Don’t be that person. People need to trust you before they buy from you. Before they trust you, they need to know who you are. In other words, relationships, like cars, need warming up. They are built over time.
Lack of Follow Up
No one will buy from you the first time. Does it happen? Yes. In reaching out to almost 150,000 people over the years, I’ve had a handful of (literally four or five) people hire me straight away. It takes between 8-20 touches to engage a prospect, guide them through the funnel, and get them to engage. If you thinking you’re going to reach out to 10,000 people one time and get work, you’re sadly mistaken. Reach out 100 people 10 times and your odds skyrocket.
Talking About You
Prospects don’t care about you. They care if you can solve their problem. Show that you understand it and can solve it, and you win. Make your messaging about them and their problem, not you and your gear and your training and blah blah blah.
Overthinking Everything
Especially when you’re new, you don’t need a complex social media strategy, 17 different target buyers, 11 demos, and a $10,000 website.
Newer talent need to get started marketing. If you don’t start, you can’t grow.
A Simple Funnel Example
- Awareness: You reach out to a new prospect with an introductory email, demonstrating you get their problem and can solve it.
- Interest: Your first follow up drives them to your website to check out your demo. Now they start to understand how you fit into their world.
- Decision: When they have an appropriate project they return to your website because they think you may fit,= and they decide to move forward (either with an audition or a job).
- Action: They fill out a contact form, email, or call about said audition or job.
A funnel is simply a framework for building a relationship with and guiding your prospects through a customer journey toward an intended action. Funnels give you a structure to help people more confidently make the choice to hire you.
They take time, patience, a little work, and forethought.
Start simple and improve over time – but start. Now.
P.S. If you haven’t yet taken our introductory voice-over class, where we go over everything one needs to know about getting started in the voice-over industry, sign up here!
P.P.S If you want to learn more from VO experts and grow the knowledge you already have, join our VO Pro group!
