Picture it

Recently, I've taken a closer look at the sales funnels of successful online course providers.

Following the "model" principle, I just need to see what works and align myself with the principles that work.

Among others, I have looked into Caitlinbacher.com, Adamenfroy.com, and Authorityhackers.com.

Why? - Because they came into my sights.

And ... even more importantly ... because each of them makes millions per year with their courses.

Basic principle in modeling: Orient yourself to successful examples.

And successful they are; Caitlin, Adam and the Authority Hacker guys!

So, how did I examine each of their funnels?

Well, I proceeded very thoroughly....

I documented and examined each landing page.

I completed the email registration and examined every email.

I dissected the offer and its components.

I studied every sales video and tried to understand it piece by piece.

In short, I went extremely deep.

But one single thing that I did gave me the groundbreaking realization.

What thing?

I pictured each of the three funnels on a simple diagram!

Here's an example of Adam Enfroy's funnel:

What was the groundbreaking realization?

I SAW how SIMPLE the funnels are structured.

Only the visualization gave me the insight into it.

AND I saw that all three funnels are structured in the same way.

A clear hint at a recipe for success.

The funnels themselves and their success are not the topic here today.

Because the overarching insight is even more important.

It is:

Picture it!

What does that mean?

It means that you and I would do well to represent larger contexts in a picture.

The big contexts are always either

A structure,

A process,

Or the combination of both.

We've just seen an example: A sales funnel is a structure (pages, emails, forms) and a process (the steps I go through the funnel).

An organization chart of my company would be an example of a structure.

I'll provide more examples when I have the time and inclination ...

Now let's continue with my story:

I want to make clear to you and me the abundant advantages it has for us when we create a picture of these things.

What does it do for you?

In sum, picturing it helps me to be more successful AND to reduce my effort at the same time.

Let me explain this here:

Differentiation: Hand on heart, I have WAY too seldom represented the large and important contexts as a picture. The good thing about it? - I can assume that others are as lazy as I am. This gives me a wonderful differentiation, if I get off my butt and start picturing important systems and workflows.

Recognizing connections: Differentiation itself doesn't bring me anything. It has to be advantageous. The crucial advantage of picturing large contexts is ... that I SEE them and thus RECOGNIZE the connections! - Recognition works through seeing. I had to have the pictures of the three sales funnels in front of me to realize how simple they are and how they work exactly.

Better prioritization: If I see the big contexts, I can orient myself to them when prioritizing! - I don't get lost in the minutiae, but stay with the big levers. If I pull on the big levers, it helps me to be more successful faster.

Clarity and simplicity: The big pictures remain nicely simple. This creates clarity and helps me to keep my business and my life nice and simple. Exactly what I want.

Brilliant effort/benefit ratio: the nice thing? - I only have to visualize the big contexts once. They either never change, or only rarely and to a small extent. This means that the activity is very manageable in terms of time. But it has immense benefits.

How do you do that?

The big question:

If making pictures is so incredibly advantageous, why do we do it so seldom?

From my own experience, for two reasons:

Firstly, because I lacked the awareness of HOW valuable it actually is.

Secondly, because I lacked a simple way to make the pictures. The implementation was too hard.

Following the Invert Principle, we just need to remove the obstacles to reach the goal.

Step 1: Create awareness

Chances are good that you also have to experience it yourself.

Perhaps this article plants a small seed in your brain (that would be my goal).

But the full awareness can probably only come when you have visualized a context yourself and FEEL how it helps to suddenly have the big contexts in front of your eyes.

How do you get there? - Just start.

Step 2: Use a simple tool

I use Whimsical to create my images and diagrams.

Even though there are numerous other possibilities (Google Docs Drawings for example).

Whimsical is the only tool so far that has made it so easy for me to build these diagrams that I actually enjoy it.

This is the crucial step to overcome the hurdle.

I'm not going to get into a Whimsical tutorial here.

Nor into a detailed process of HOW you visualize WHICH contexts.

I'm happy to do that in future, separate articles.

The decisive point of this article is different:

The realization THAT you visualize the important contexts!

Start, try it out and see if you also ask yourself soon:

"Why didn't I start doing this much earlier?"

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