Free Plus Shipping Funnels: What it is and Why You Should Create One

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“Free” is a powerful selling word. It really gets people hooked.

That’s why businesses around the world have been making use of a lucrative eCommerce method known as “free plus shipping” funnels.

Free plus shipping funnels have helped small businesses around the globe to grow their customer base while successfully upselling their products in the process.

These funnels have proved to be an effective way to generate leads and increase traffic.

Not sure how offering a free product can help you build your customer base and add value to your company?

Keep reading to find out more!

1. What is a Free Plus Shipping Funnel?

The free plus shipping funnel is a funnel that offers a free product in exchange for an email address, shipping address, and shipping payment.

If someone sees an ad regarding your free plus shipping offer, this is what would ideally happen next:

After ending up on the landing page of your funnel, the customer fills out a form. They provide you with an email address that you can use to market to them in the future.
The customer is redirected to the checkout page where they will provide their details for the shipping payment.
Then the customer is redirected to an upsell page, where they are presented with offers that are related to the free product.
They are then redirected to the “Thank You” page that confirms their order and provides them with links relating to your business.

The ultimate goal here is to get as many visitors as possible into the funnel.

See what I mean?

It’s a win-win situation.

Even if the customers are not interested in your upsell, you’ll still be building your email list.

1.1. Why You Should Start a Free Plus Shipping Funnel

If you correctly market your free shipping funnel you will have an influx of new leads.

Another benefit of the free shipping funnel is that it lures customers into purchasing upsells.

This is all because of the word “Free”.

And who doesn’t want a free product?

You should aim to barely break even with this venture. You’ll be charging customers a shipping fee that amounts to how much you paid for a product plus the actual shipping.

The only real cost to you is the cost of getting someone to click on your ad to get them into your funnel.

The real return of investment (ROI) here is the number of new leads you’ll be gaining.

Of course, there is also an opportunity to make some revenue with your upsells.

So what does a successful funnel look like? Here are a few examples of free plus shipping funnels that ticked all the boxes:

1.2. Free Plus Shipping Examples

1.2.1. Digital Products

Dan Lok’s free plus shipping funnel’s landing page succeeds because it immediately tells the visitor what they’ll be getting and why they need it.

As you can see, no other offers are included on the landing page.

Customers have to insert all their contact information before they can gain access to more information about the free offer.

However, the real beauty of this funnel comes in the form of its checkout page.

Dan has structured an attractive additional offer that, along with the free product, seems almost irresistible.

By lowering the price of his course if purchased with the free ebook, he presents customers with an offer that they will want to take advantage of.

This is a typical tripwire offer. Dan presents his customers with a low-ticket offer and immediately introduces them to a limited more expensive offer.

And if his method didn’t lead to a sale, he’s still building up his email list.

See how effective this funnel can be?

1.2.2. Physical Products

The Family Protection Association’s free shipping funnel works because it offers a desirable product with a high perceived value.

This method can turn even the coldest traffic into buyers.

Once again the offer is perceived by the visitor to be so good that they just can’t miss out.

Now let’s take a look at their checkout page.

This free shipping funnel is designed to grow the company’s email listrather than upselling.

However, they do offer an order bump by giving the customer the option to add more units to their order and charge additionally for it.

Here the company gains by getting more lifetime value out of their customers.

In other words, it’s a lot easier to sell products to customers who already purchased from you before.

So all they have to do is set up an email marketing campaign to try and get these customers to purchase more products later on.

As you can see, free plus shipping funnels can come in handy if you want to set up your brand for the long-term with repeat customers.

Scroll down to find out how you can create a killer free shipping sales funnel to get an inrush of new customers and boost your revenue.

2. How To Set Up Your Free Plus Shipping Funnel

2.1. Choose the Right Product

The first thing you’ll have to accept is that not all products will be effective in a free plus shipping funnel.

So you have to make sure that you do some market research before you pick the product you’re going to be giving away for free.

Here are a few key points that you should keep in mind when selecting a product:

It’s easy and cheap to acquire. Remember, you’ll be giving it away for free and you’ll have to buy it in bulk.
It is desirable and valuable to your audience. It shouldn’t be something that looks cheap.
It has to be something small. You don’t want to be paying too much for the shipping.
The product shouldn’t cost less when bought in retail stores.

If customers choose to get your free product, you can choose to redirect them to an upsell page.

This is where the potential to make extra revenue takes place.

2.2. Decide on Your Upsell

Don’t be mistaken, free plus shipping offers can work great on their own.

But the opportunity to boost your profits becomes more powerful with upsells.

Mike Filsaime, one of the pioneers of the one-click upsell, explains this in his Butterfly Marketing Manual.

He states that the conversion rate from lead to customer is a lot higher after someone has already bought from you.

In other words, if you present customers with a second offer immediately after their purchase (in this case, the free product), you can substantially increase sales.

So if you add another offer that relates to your product after the initial offer, customers will be more likely to purchase it.

You can effectively implement this method by making use of one-click upsells.

As we saw with Dan Lok’s funnel, when a customer is presented with the free offer, they can click a button that will immediately add the second offer to their cart.

With one-click upsells, you immediately take advantage of the supposed higher conversion rate.

2.2.1. Present an Attractive Offer

If you’re making use of upsells, you can present the customers with an attractive offer that they will want to take advantage of.

This could be something that relates to your free product which is offered at a discount.

This is a good time to consider a one-time-offer upsell.

By presenting customers with an extra one-time-offer, you present them with an attractive deal that they might find irresistible.

Take a look at Grant Cardon’s one-time-offer upsell to get a better idea of the concept.

2.3. Create a 2-Step Order Form

After you’ve decided what offers you’re going to present to your customers, it’s time to start creating your funnel.

Your order page should set up to have a high conversion rate.

If the payment process is complex and drawn out, visitors might reassess their decision to make the purchase and leave your funnel outright.

Ideally, you should set up a 2-step order form to ensure that your free shipping funnel has a high-converting design.

2.4. The Landing Page

The first step of your order form is usually found on your free plus shipping funnel’s landing page.

Your landing page should present the offer to the visitor, telling what they’ll be getting from the offer and why they need it.

Here you collect the necessary details (personal information, email address, and location) without mentioning any details regarding the actual purchase.

This is a very important stage in your free shipping funnel, as the visitor is posed with the decision to provide their information in exchange for a free product.

Be sure to make the page look appealing and present an attractive offer, here’s an example of a well-designed free plus shipping funnel landing page:

2.4.1. The Checkout Page

Step 2 of your order form displays what the customer will be paying for.

Here, they’ll fill in their shipping details and their payment details.

This is where you present your upsells. One-click upsells work great here, as visitors will add to their purchase simply by clicking a box and adding the upsell to their cart.

This specific checkout page is an awesome example. It offers a great low-cost deal that’s related to the original free offer.

Your upsells don’t always have to be on your checkout page, they can also be added as an intermediary step between your checkout page and landing page.

Grant Cardon’s funnel is a great example:

A great feature of this upsell is that it has an added countdown to create a sense of urgency in the customer.

Plus, it presents customers with a massive discount that they wouldn’t want to miss out on.

2.5. The Thank You Page

After the customer has made the purchase and decided whether or not to add the upsell, they’ll be redirected to the “Thank You Page”.

Avoid disregarding your “Thank You Page” just because the sale is already made.

Again, customers are more likely to buy a product if they’ve bought from you before.

You still want to make your “Thank You Page” look functional in order to avoid buyer’s remorse and refunds on the upsells they might’ve bought.

So make sure to tell the customer what the next steps are and how they’ll get access to the product.

2.6. Marketing Your Free Plus Shipping Funnel

Crafting the perfect free plus shipping funnel is one thing, now it’s time to figure out how you’re going to advertise it to your audience.

It’s unlikely that you’ll generate a large volume of traffic to your funnel just because you’re offering something for free.

To ensure that your free plus shipping funnel is a success, you’ll need to set up some marketing campaigns to draw potential leads to your funnel.

A great way to market your free plus shipping funnel is through social media promotion and advertisement.

Facebook and Instagram Ads can help you market your free plus shipping ads to the relevant audience.

Just take a look at this free plus shipping Facebook ad:

This ad is clearly aimed towards hardcore Star Wars fans.

The copy is simple and straightforward and will definitely pique the interest of anyone interested in the franchise.

Another way to market your free plus shipping is through Google Adwords.

The great thing about Google Adwords is that it has a quick feedback loop.

In other words, you’ll be able to quickly review the success of your marketing campaign.

This will help you understand what parts of your marketing campaign you need to improve, and which marketing channels you should focus on.

Keep in mind that it’s important to be aware of how successful the different marketing channels that you’re using are.

You’re already offering a free product, so make sure that you’re maximizing the amount of traffic you generate while staying within your marketing budget.

2.7. The Cons of Running a Free Plus Shipping Funnel

Although free plus shipping funnels are a great tool for growing your customer base and generating revenue, there are a two things you should keep in mind:

They’re not really a long term strategy. When you’re selling physical products, free plus shipping models are better in the short run. This is due to their limited profit margins that can’t really be relied on in the long term.
Free plus shipping funnels only work for inexpensive items. Product selection is very important here, you have to find a cheap product that can be of value to your audience, which can be a difficult endeavor.

4. Start Creating Your Free Plus Shipping Funnel with Systeme.io

With the systeme.io funnel builder, you can design a high-converting free plus shipping funnel in a matter of minutes!

Our software has tons of templates that you can use to start building your funnel.

Creating Your Free Plus Shipping Funnel with Systeme.io

After choosing your desired template, you can customize the look of the funnel according to exactly how you want your brand to be presented!

With our 2-step order form feature, you’ll be able to easily set up free plus shipping funnels for any product.

Our all-in-one marketing platform can help you take care of all the aspects of your free plus shipping funnel.

It contains payment and email marketing features that can easily be integrated into any stage of your sales funnel.

Don’t worry about spending too much time creating your funnel, our user-friendly software will save you loads of time.

That means that you can focus on other aspects of your business while we do all the heavy lifting.

Our Freemium Plan allows you to test and use our software without providing any credit card details!

Start building the perfect free plus shipping funnel with systeme.io today!

5. Conclusion

The free plus shipping funnel is a great way to generate loads of leads and upsell more expensive products.

If you market your free plus shipping well and design a high converting funnel using the right software, you’re guaranteed to reap all the benefits!

Now that you know everything about creating an eye-catching free plus shipping funnel with systeme.io, go ahead, set up your funnel and start growing your business!