Becoming The Fastest Funnel Builder in the World

Becoming The Fastest Funnel Builder in the World

by John Parkes   |   Jul 3, 2017   |   6 min read

When time is money, learning how to be fast at something that MAKES money? … Well…that’s like inventing the 48-hour day.

Funnel building is hard work. Anyone who’s done it knows the sweat equity to get even a simple funnel up and running! Copy, design, tech hookups, email sequences, ads, graphics…phew. *wipes brow

So I’m going to give you my best Funnel building hacks – the ones that will exponentially speed up every part of the process, so you can churn out more funnels … money.

But before I do, let’s break down the traditional sales funnel into all its parts and pieces. We’ll use a simple self-liquidating offer (SLO) funnel.

  • Landing Page (holding the free offer)
  • Thank You Page with a low-cost tripwire offer
  • Order Form
  • OTO Page with the special upsell
  • Order Confirmation Page
  • Email Sequence that fires when someone opts in

We’ll avoid some the crazy email segmentation and abandon cart emails for this example for now. You can add them in later.

 Hack #1 – Act Like a Manufacturing Plant

We all know the brain works better when you batch tasks, and the funnel is no different. Most people do this…

  1. Write the landing page. Design the landing page. Design the lead magnet.
  2. Write the thank you page. Design the thank you page.
  3. Write the OTO page. Design the OTO page. Write the OTO script. Record the video.

WRONG WRONG WRONG.

What I want you to do is batch your tasks like this:

  1. Funnel Copy – Write all the copy (and by golly, use FunnelScripts)
    1. Landing Page
    2. Thank You Tripwire
    3. OTO Script (then pull from the script and add to bottom of the page)
    4. Email Sequence
  2. Funnel Wireframing – During this phase, you’re simply setting up the funnel and adding in the copy (no design). Just get the pages and copy all in. Bonus points if you lay down placeholders for graphics so you know what size to make!
    1. Landing Page
    2. Thank You Tripwire
    3. Order Page
    4. OTO Page
    5. Order Confirm
  3. Funnel Design – Now you go back and add colors, fonts, graphics, logos, etc.
    1. Landing Page
    2. Thank You Tripwire
    3. Order Page
    4. OTO Page
    5. Order Confirm
  4. Funnel Tech – Finally (and this is important), do the tech in this order. Set up the domain for the funnel, go through each page and adjust the meta settings and permalinks, set up any integrations with your email service provider, and finally, set up the products and delivery on the order form.
    1. Domains + Links
    2. Meta + Settings
    3. Integrations
    4. Products + Orders

When you batch it by the type of task, you’ll work far faster because your mind and brain are already in the zone.

Hack #2 – Fall in Love with Video

Copy is the longest and hardest part of a funnel. But with video, you can shorten that time significantly. The hardest page to get a conversion is usually that FIRST thank you page – the tripwire. Because it’s often coming off of an ad and the traffic is cold, you have to spend more time than you might think to sell them on a measly $7 or $10 offer. USE video.

This means, get your house set up with some video equipment and a tripod. Every time you need a new sales page, your studio is ready to go so you can shoot yourself talking and save yourself a TON of words on the page.

Hack #3 – Get in the Habit of Testimonial Hacking

I don’t care if it’s from a nice email, a Facebook post, a private message, or something else. Screenshot everything! Use Skitch by Evernote so you can quickly blur out last names when you screenshot and make a quick folder on your computer. When you have testimonials all set and ready to go, it saves you a ton of time looking around and emailing people for feedback!

Some ways to get great testimonials quickly?

  1. Ask for feedback in your group.
  2. Send out a 1 question survey.
  3. Do a Facebook Live and encourage people to comment.
  4. Make a habit of offboarding customers and clients with a quick zoom call, and record it!

Then go through and screenshot everything!

Hack #4 – Make Copy Templates

This means you need to become a master at saving things that EVERY sales page uses.

  1. Bullet points
  2. Headlines
  3. Taglines
  4. Guarantees
  5. Welcome Emails

A lot of sales pages use similar keywords and so it helps to have these in a spot where you can grab and go. Bonus points if you pre-design them in CF as saved sections too (see hack #5).

One of my favorite things to do is to take a bullet point from a health funnel, and then just take out a few words and reconstruct it for a totally different niche! If you make templates and amass hundreds of bullets and taglines and headings, try swapping out a headline for one industry and use it on another. You’ll find that it may cause a nice pattern interrupt!

For example….this is for a financial planning infoproduct.

Unwanted Debt is Not the Boss

Take Back Your Finances, Save Without Stress, and Trust The Process. You Can Get Out of Debt! I know this because my story is your story.

Now turn it around and use it for a diet product!

UNWANTED FAT IS NOT THE BOSS

Take Back Your Belly, Eat Without Stress, And Trust In The Process. You CAN Lose The Weight!

I know this because my story is your story.

Hack #5 – Save Your Sections for Repeatable Funnels

With the new Power Editor in Clickfunnels, you can save SECTIONS, not just pages. This is super handy when you have to use the same design for multiple page template types (like sales page and order form for example).

So when you’re starting a funnel, make a heading section, a bio section, a testimonial section, a footer section. Do this on the SALES page FIRST. Design those sections and save them.

Then, when it’s time to do all the order forms and landing pages and whatnot, those sections are all saved and ready to go!

Hack #6 – Batch Your Graphics and Mass Upload

When I’m getting started with a funnel, I go into Photoshop and work on graphics including things like…

  1. Logos (multiple versions)
  2. Backgrounds (2000×1050) – I make several
  3. Icons (the guarantee icon, video icon, download, etc. etc.)
  4. Dividers
  5. Module Boxes
  6. Headers

Then, I upload them ALL in one shot in the Clickfunnels Media Library so they are all there and ready to go, no matter what page I’m on!

Hack #7 – Learn How to SET Design

In a sales page, setting design can help speed up the process immensely. A sales page is long. And it’s common for sections to repeat themselves (the design elements I mean). So…you want to make sure you’ve introduced all the colors and type of sections you’re going to use in the first 6-10 sections of the sales page.

So build those first six types of sections. Start with backgrounds. Maybe it’s a…

  1. Photo background
  2. White background with colored borders
  3. Faded out logo background
  4. Black textured background

Get those sections set with the background, the borders, the drop shadows, and the fonts. Speaking of fonts, use the GENERAL typography font settings and ONLY customize the elements that deviate from it, but I digress.

Once they’re set, you can duplicate and repeat them again and again, only having to adjust the one-off graphics and copy inside the section.

Hack #8 – Make a Spreadsheet of Things You Always Need

So, how bout that favicon image per funnel? SAVE THAT LINK! You could even use a clipboard saver like Alfred for Mac so you can paste it with a simple command.

The same goes for any custom code you might be using in your funnels (like promo codes, check boxes, or custom CSS). Facebook Pixels in the settings. Here are the things I have saved…

  • Favicon media URL
  • Facebook Pixel
  • CF Pro Tools Custom Scripts
  • Onboarding fulfillment emails
  • Color codes

Hack #9 – Optimize for Mobile LAST

Once the whole funnel is built, go through page by page and view on mobile. Adjust font sizes and if you have a section that REALLY can’t work on mobile, duplicate the section – turn it to desktop only, and then modify the duplicate and set it to mobile only. It does mean in the editor you’ll see two sections right next to each other, but the viewer won’t!

Hack #10 – Spend Time Planning So Building is Fast

I know that’s obvious, but it really works.

  1. Do ALL your copy in a Google doc and make sure it’s edited and perfect before going in.
  2. Create a quick funnel brand board with the color codes and theming you’ll need.
  3. Evaluate if your funnel is falling into the “nerdy” cool zone. What I mean is, are you making it harder than it needs to be because you love to tinker? For example, does that OTO REALLY​ need its own page, or can it be a quick order bump?
  4. Find a funnel you’re inspired by so everyone is clear what look and feel you’re going for.
  5. Make sure Stripe and your email service provider or SMTP is all set up before you begin.
  6. Hire a VA who JUST creates funnels and places the copy inside templates you determine, or just works on setting domains, filling out meta areas, and placing the pixels. Save your brain for the design and copy!

So there you have it. In the time it took you to read this blog post, I built 10 funnels…kidding. Only 2. 😉

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77 thoughts on “Becoming The Fastest Funnel Builder in the World”

  1. Julie’s expertise shows beautifully in this blog. She has detailed out each and every step of a funnel.

    Reply

  2. Nice! I love the thought and the process that went into breaking this down!

    I do similar in Basecamp and create standard “to-do lists” so I know I have certain parts to do before others.

    I also have my to-do’s in order, top to bottom, in order of what needs to be completed.

    It helps take the time out of “what do I need to do next”.

    Great post!

    Reply

  3. Thank you for sharing Julie! This is really helpful – I hadn’t thought about batching tasks before, but it makes so much sense!

    Reply

  8. This is incredibly helpful! I intend to print this and laminate it so I can follow it and check items off as I build my funnels 😍 Thanks so much, Julie!

    Reply

  11. I love streamlined systems and you have completely laid out a streamlined system to build funnels! Ready to lay the groundwork on setting up my system! As always – great teaching!

    Reply

  14. In a word – Holy-Flippin-WOWSA (the hyphens do NOT count!!).
    Excellent post – an absolute boatload of useful, (read ‘born of experience’), applicable and ultimately actionable directions. Now for the hard part . . . .
    Implementation!
    Thank You for your time and work Julie Stoian – you are genuinely appreciated.

    Reply

  15. Step by step…breaks it down thoroughly for the pro yet simple for the beginner. Brilliant! Thanks Julie!!

    Reply

  17. Awesome article! It’s full of SO MUCH “get to the nitty gritty info”. I can already see where this is going to save me SOOOO much time. Thanks so much for a great post!

    Reply

  19. Clean, informative and to the point … and you might have just come up with the blueprints for a 48 hour day packed into 24 hours! Thank you Julie~

    Reply

  20. This is awesome! As someone who is new to funnel building it is so helpful to see the task broken down with tips on how to help speed up the process. It doesn’t seem as intimidating when you see it all spelled out.

    Reply

  21. Julie, Thank you for breaking it down like this! It’s very helpful! Thanks to you, I will have my funnel up and running in no time!!!
    Cynthia Merryman

    Reply

  24. Perfect! Right to the point and always informative. Love reading your stuff, Julie!

    Reply

  25. Fabulous article! Alfred? Never heard of him before 🤣 … I was frustrated with the whole copy paste… this is a game changer… and I am totally guilty of going page by page… this will really speed things up 💖 Thanx Julie! 😘

    Reply

  28. I feel like you just handed me a roadmap with turn by turn directions. You are better than Google <3

    Reply

  31. Julie, thank you for the fantastic tips, I will be bookmarking your page. Appreciate all that you do for our community and congrats on representing all of us “funnel chicks” in the top 10.

    Reply

  32. Loved it! Thanks so much Julie, not only for your wisdom but also for your inspiration! I’m new to the Online Marketing world and you’ll definitely be one lady I follow! Keep rocking it! 🙂 XO

    Reply

  34. Sometimes it takes a gal to be this damn organised! Only joking – but printing this and it’s going to the front page of my folder. Thanks so much. Awesome timing coming across this!

    Reply

  40. Thank you so much Julie, i love the way you explain everything!
    There are sooooo many golden nuggets in your videos, love it!

    Reply

  43. Wow! I’m printing this out and going through it step by step. Was sooo Doing this the way I shouldn’t and funnel has been sitting there for 5 days! Thank you for sharing!

    Reply