What Is A Value Ladder? (And Do You Need One For Your Business!)
In my previous post, I discussed what a sales funnel is. I will continue the story with an explanation of what a value ladder is and why you need one for your business.
The goal of the sales funnel is to take people through a sales process so you can grow your business. Hopefully, if you have done things correctly you break even on the front end and make your profit on the back end. The sales funnel is a super powerful tool. If you are not using one you are leaving a lot of money on the table.
So…what is a value ladder?
The value ladder is your product line. As the value of your product goes up so does the price. So you gain a customer by offering something for free. Then they may purchase the entry-level product. As they remain your customer then they move up to upgrading or purchasing the next item in your product line which is more expensive.
Take Apple for example. You may start out with an iPod. You enjoy using it and getting all your music together in iTunes. The next thing you purchase may be an iPhone. Hey, all your music and pictures all sync and it’s easy to use…you love it! Hmmm…Maybe I need an iPad or a computer next. Then and Apple TV and before you know it you are integrated fully into the Apple product line and you have moved up the “value Ladder”. This system works very well with the sales funnel and email list.
I will give you another example of using the value ladder as an affiliate marketer.
First I will define what affiliate marketing is. In a nutshell, affiliate marketing is when you promote a product or service and then you are paid a commission when a product/service is sold. This does not increase the price to the end consumer but basically you are rewarded for connecting the customer with the product.
Many affiliate marketers make the following mistake when they first start out.
They will send people directly to their affiliate links. One big problem with this is that they are not able to collect the email address so they are not able to follow up with the people that showed interest. If you remember in my previous post I said that most people need to be contacted 5–10 times before they are ready to buy. Also if you don’t get an email address down the road you are not able to promote any other offers to this person. They go directly to the product owners list and they get all the benefits.
The value ladder is a very effective way to promote.
A more effective way to promote is to start with a lead capture page that includes an ethical bribe to get the prospects email address. You give something of value away. The purpose of the lead capture page is to collect the email address and send people to the next page. Now, this is where things get interesting.
The next page is a “bridge page” This is where you introduce yourself and start building a connection with your customers. You confirm that they are in the right place, and maybe why you love the product and why they need it now. Then this page sends them on to the sales page.
At this point, if you are the product owner then you may take the person to an upsell page. So your first product (low barrier to entry maybe $7) The upsell may then be $17. Then the customer goes to the thank you page where they are told how to access their purchase and their freebies. This is where a lot of marketers make the mistake of stopping. But remember..all of this is just to cover your advertising cost so you can get a customer for “free”. The profit is in the follow-up and for that, you need an autoresponder.
What is an autoresponder?
An autoresponder is basically a database of the email addresses of the people that showed interest in your freebie. The advantage of an autoresponder is that you are able to email everyone at the same time or schedule emails as needed. This way you are not emailing each person individually. With your emails, you are able to follow up and move people up the value ladder. This boosts your profit margin on your campaigns.
In order for this system to work well, you need both a sales funnel software and an autoresponder. The two software programs that I recommend are ClickFunnels and Aweber, Especially if you are just starting out and need something easy to learn and use.
ClickFunnels (sales funnel software) has a 14-day free trial which you can access here: https://dldonaldson.com/clickfunnels
Aweber (autoresponder) has a 30-day free trial: https://dldonaldson.com/aweber1
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If you purchase anything through a link in this article, you should assume that I have an affiliate relationship with the company providing the product or service that you purchase, and that I’ll be compensated in some small way at no extra cost to you.