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Last week I walked you through the Meta ads audit. Today I want to zoom out on where your funnel could be leaking.

Because an ad can be perfect and still waste money if the funnel it is feeding is broken. And most of the funnels I audit in client accounts have leaks the owner did not know were there. The harsh reality is that many have an organic marketing problem that does not feed into their paid marketing efforts.

So today I want to show you where your funnel can leak, how to find the specific leak in your business, and what to prioritize fixing in the time you have left before Black Friday.

I built you a PDF to walk through it with me.

Every ecommerce funnel has four stages. You are probably used to the top, middle, and bottom. I have been working with an expanded four stage structure for ecommerce brands, and it changes how you spot the leaks. Here we go.

Stage 1: Awareness.

New people meeting your brand for the first time. Ads. Organic social. Word of mouth. SEO.

Where it leaks: ad spend reaching people who already follow you, organic posts never leaving your current audience, pixel misfiring so you cannot retarget.

Stage 2: Interest.

Someone clicked, visited, and started looking around.

Where it leaks: slow mobile site, no social proof on product pages, descriptions that do not answer the real questions customers are asking.

Stage 3: Decision.

Someone added to cart or started checkout.

Where it leaks: no abandoned cart flow, checkout friction, shipping costs revealed too late, no trust signals before “Place Order.”

Stage 4: Retention.

Someone already bought from you.

Where it leaks: no post purchase email flow, no VIP segment, no review request, no reactivation sequence for past buyers.

Here is the honest part:

Most ecommerce owners pour attention and budget into Stage 1. Ads, posts, more ads. This is also where they think they can start collecting daily purchases, it is not. A high converting funnel is a well oiled machine with all stages working cohesively. 

Meanwhile Stages 2, 3, and 4 are leaking revenue that would compound if the leaks were plugged. Also, stage 1 is where the organic presence comes into place, organic work is simply not optional. I’ve said this before, ads cannot do all the work. 

The question for Q4 is not “how do I bring more people in.” The question is “of the people I am already paying to bring in, how many are making it all the way through?”

That is what the audit is for.