The Funnel Fallacy

We all know potential customers don’t consciously move through the marketing funnel, gleefully hopping from ‘awareness’ all the way through to ‘advocacy’. This is because customers are nuanced; some are ready to buy a product now and with little information, others will spend months mulling over the purchase, even if it is a relatively inexpensive one.

So, why don’t we admit that campaigns often don’t need to factor in all phases of the funnel? There are three core reasons and they all tie back to being as relevant as possible by focusing on ‘cohorts’ instead of broad customer demographics.

Theory vs. Reality

Originally created as the ‘purchase funnel’ way back in 1898, it is now integral to 99% of marketing plans. But it was - and still is - a theoretical model; it gives us language to talk about different elements of the sales process. Believing that it’s linear is like believing all millennials like experiences over things and all Gen Z’s want to go full-time as a TikTok creator. We are all part of multiple cohorts and we respond best to information that is hyper-relevant to whichever mindset we are in at any given time.

Marketing Never Sleeps

As this article says, “Modern marketing is not constricted to a single set of fixed tools” and neither is it restricted to balancing effort and spend on different phases of the funnel. If awareness and consideration is high and there is a strong offer or limited edition product, maybe we go straight to consideration conversion, for example. But this needs to be monitored because brand perceptions change constantly (almost entirely subconsciously). By trying to identify what content is performing above benchmark and summarising the human insight that is driving that performance, that information can create larger, more relevant and more effective ideas.

Social Reveals the Truth

The final nail in the traditional marketing funnel coffin is that a growing percentage of people under 30 use TikTok, Instagram and other social platforms as the primary means to filter online information (and now, of course, tools like ChatGPT). Monitoring where customer attention is and how they interact will reveal what part(s) of the funnel you need to focus on. Once you find an idea that is really resonating with potential customers, you can put more resources behind it with much greater confidence.

At VaynerMedia, we call this ‘brandformance’.

When the answer is out there, why waste your money on a funnel fallacy?