Selling is stage 3 of Write to Sell. In this stage, you build 2 funnels in order:
- Gift funnel, to give away a free gift and collect email addresses.
- Sales funnel, so customers pay and get their product on their own.
The stage ends when both funnels run on your website and lead into each other. From then on, you have one link to give gifts away and a sales funnel that closes orders when you are not there.
Why do you need 2 funnels?
The content system brings customers to your website, but it does not take payment. Stage 3 adds the missing part, which is turning readers into buyers.
The two funnels follow the way people normally buy. A customer gets a gift, tries it, finds it useful, and only then wants to buy. The gift attracts customers, and the sales funnel is where they buy.
Each funnel always comes with automation. Customers see only the funnel. The automation sits inside and leads customers from the moment they get the gift to the moment they buy, so you do not close orders by hand.
Stage 3 follows stage 2
Stage 3 starts when you have what stage 2 made:
- One 3-post content funnel frame: a Know, a Trust and a Love post.
- One Truth vault for your core product, about 5 posts.
That is not a lot of content, and you do not need more to start selling. From stage 3 on, the content part counts as done. When you have spare time, you repeat the process of stage 2 to grow your content funnel. The main work of stage 3 is to make the product clear and build the gift.
The content system you already have raises the conversion rate of both funnels. Customers get the gift and then meet your posts, so they move toward buying much more easily than if your website had nothing on it.
What does stage 3 include?
| Group | Pages | Used for |
|---|---|---|
| Get it right | Gift funnel, sales funnel | Telling the 2 funnels apart and knowing what each one is made of |
| Put into practice | Create a gift, create a gift funnel, build a sales funnel, test a funnel | Make the gift, build 2 funnels, then test before you open to customers |
| Resources | Google Analytics, AI prompts and MCP | Measuring the path into the funnel and speeding up the hands-on work |
You work in order. The core product is the root, the gift is split off from the core product, and then come the funnels. The order matters because the gift can lead customers to the sales funnel only when it is a part of the product you sell.
The hands-on parts, such as creating the product, automatic emails, payment setup and website management, are in the Put into practice and Resources. You do not need to remember all of them at the start. What you need to grasp is how to get a gift funnel that gives gifts, and a sales funnel that sells by itself when you are away.
What you have after stage 3
By the end of stage 3, you do not need more content or more pages. What you have is 2 funnels on your website, linked to each other and running on their own:
- A gift funnel with a link you use to give gifts, promote and share useful content outside your website. Because it is a gift and you sell nothing, nobody minds when you share it.
- A sales funnel behind it, linked to the gift funnel, that sells for you without closing orders by hand.
Behind the 2 funnels are the automation and the templates that come with them. Customers see only the gift link and the sales page, while the emails, delivery and payment reminders run inside.
The most common mistake
New builders most often go wrong at the step of creating the gift product. This is the deciding step of stage 3, and there are 2 ways to get it wrong:
- The gift is not split from the core product. The gift has nothing to do with the product you sell, so it is very hard to move people who got the gift to buy. The effort you put into the gift is wasted.
- The gift is not useful enough. The gift is free, so it is easy to put in little effort and make something generic.
After the gift, the next hard part is setting up the 2 funnels and understanding how they run.