12 Content Tips That Will Fill The Top of Your Sales Funnel

They're aware of your product or service, or at the very least they've come to the realization that they have a need that has to be fulfilled.

Who are we talking about? That's for you to find out.

Not to be confused with the little square cubes in your miso soup, TOFU opportunities represent the demographic of people who reside at the top of your sales funnel.

They're out there nameless with needs, and it's up to you to put a name to the need and give them a little push in the right direction. 

So how do you get started?

Well, all it takes is the right content at the right time through the right channel, no pressure or anything.

If you're scratching your head, just keep reading. We've mapped out 4 different pieces of content that top-of-the-funnel opportunities crave to help you start moving more leads down the sales funnel. 

Ebooks

Creating an Ebook for top-of-the-funnel opportunities will help to attract those who are searching for information and clarification. An informative Ebook should seek to educate a reader about a particular topic through the use of text and visuals (charts, graphs, photos) that a single blog article simply can't cover.

The best way to catch the attention of TOFU opportunities is to select a topic that addresses a common question or problem that relates to your industry and more specifically the pain points of your personas. 

Quick Tips:

• While you may have a lot to say, do your best to keep it simple. After all, the way we consume information has changed drastically and while wordy Ebooks once had their time and place, modern consumers are looking for much simpler resources. 

• Format is everything. The use of relevant visual content will help to break up any wordy blocks of text, while bulleted lists are also encouraged as a way to ease readability.

• If you're having trouble cementing a topic, ask your sales team to make a list of the question that they are most commonly asked during interactions with prospects. These are the types of questions that will begin to engage top-of-the-funnel opportunities so that you can move them down the funnel.

Informative Blog Posts

The opportunities that you're dealing with at this stage of the sales funnel are full of curiosity, and it's likely that they're currently employing Google to run searches on a regular basis as they search for answers. 

If you've got a business blog, you're already equipped with the means necessary to start hammering out the answers to their questions so that the next time they search for something, there you are.

Quick Tips:

• One of the fastest ways to attract and satisfy top-of-the-funnel opportunities is to start optimizing your blog posts so that they're easier for opportunities to find. Before you approach your next post, do a little keyword research and try to identify industry keywords and optimize your blog posts around those terms. Don't know where to go for keyword insight? Here's some resources that might help. 

• The use of numbered lists in blog titles is appealing to top-of-the-funnel opportunities because they're both attractive and upfront. In fact, according to research from the Content Marketing Institute, titles that begin with a number perform 45% better than the average. Additionally, "how-to" posts lend themselves well to top-of-the-funnel opportunities because they serve as quick and easy explainers. 

• Don't forget to include a relevant CTA at the bottom of each blog post. A CTA will provide you with another opportunity to influence these opportunities and hopefully convince them to convert on a landing page. 

Webinars

Webinars provide marketers with an easy, affordable way to attract top-of-the-funnel opportunities that doesn't rely on a ton of written content. Webinars particularly appeal to top-of-the-funnel because they're often times looking to consume information and uncover answers to their questions without having to do a lot of work. 

Like a book on tape, webinars provide just that, and what sets them apart from other forms of content is that they call for registration before the event. With attendees contact information in hand prior to the webinar, you can do a little research to be sure that you're mapping the content to their exact needs.

Quick Tips:

• If you're hosting a webinar, make sure that you that you define a hashtag to accompany the discussion. This will make it easy for attendees to submit their comments and questions and open up the floor for you to provide them with insight and additional resources. 

• Be sure to create an engaging slide deck that follows the sequence of the webinar. At the end of the slide deck, include a relevant offer that speaks to the needs of you audience in order to invite more conversions. 

• Recording your webinar is a great way to capitalize on it. Once recorded you can then incorporate it into some sort of offer that requires a form fill in order to obtain contact information from those who may have missed it, or add it to your library for a more "evergreen" approach.

Videos

Top of funnel content should be designed to engage opportunities, and pull them deeper into the sales funnel. Video content works particularly well to do so because it is not only visual, but it requires little effort from their end.

Much like a webinar, video content provides inquiring opportunities with quick insight that is easy to digest. The human element of a video also makes the information more attractive, as we all know humans like to know they're are actual human minds on the other side of things they consume. 

Quick Tips:

• Consider A/B testing different thumbnail images. Believe it or not, the image someone sees before the click the video could be enough to persuade them to click, or drive them away.

• Include a CTA at the end of your video to guide viewers down the funnel more effectively. According to Vidyard, a video marketing platform provider, the CTA at the end of their homepage video drives an 18% click through rate into deeper content. (Source: Eloqua)

• Utilize "props" such as a chalkboard or whiteboard to spell things out for viewers as you explain them. Remember, TOFU opportunities are at the beginning of the buying process which means they need more clarification than leads who are further down the funnel. 

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