A modern evolution of the marketing funnel to marketing hourglass

The evolution of marketing has taken it from being conversion-driven to experience-driven. The marketing funnel has since been extended to take the shape of a marketing hourglass that encompasses a broader understanding of the consumer journey.

Obviously, you want to build trust and increase awareness of your brand or offering. A marketing funnel helps you create targeted approaches for your customers and prospects. It guides them through different stages of the conversion process.

The “funnel” is one of the most recognizable terms associated with sales and marketing. It is an established model for visualizing the journey. Especially, for a customer, from a sales and marketing standpoint. By using the marketing funnel, you’ll be able to learn about specific consumer behavior. It tracks different stages of your conversion journey. So you can adapt your marketing efforts to increase awareness, maximize conversion and boost customer retention.

This article from Medium accurately describes the funnel as a “get to know you” process. It is ideal for customers to build trust, purchase, or continue using your offering. 

Let’s clarify with a simple example:

You are selling sunglasses from your online store. Summer is approaching. And it’s obviously a good time to ramp up your marketing efforts. How does using a marketing funnel here give you an advantage?

AWARENESS

You want to get the word out as early as March. So you launch a social media campaign with the latest styles. This prospects to your website to browse your product range. You have created AWARENESS within a group of people about your business/offerings.

INTEREST / CONSIDERATION

The website has links to all your social channels and a reviews page. You are providing the customer with the avenues to research your brand and offerings. This establishes trust. It also generates actual INTEREST. This is where your prospective customer undergoes CONSIDERATION of your brand. It will help them decide whether they feel comfortable purchasing your products, as a result.

LEAD GENERATION

It might still be too early for customers to make the purchase. But you want them to show intent so you drop in a quick offer for 20% OFF any purchase before May. All they have to do is sign-up! You make it easy so they just have to use their email. At this point, you’re GENERATING LEADS!

DECISION

Two months go by. Now you’re just entering a bright sun-filled summer with clear skies. It’s the perfect time to send an email. You can remind your mailing list/subscribers about their offer which is about to expire. It’s DECISION time!

CONVERSION

Your lead bites! He clicks through to the offer, gets redirected to your page, and browses through the options. He finds the one he had his heart set on from the very beginning and clicks the all beloved “Add to Cart” button. You’re on your way to a sales CONVERSION!

ENGAGEMENT

Your customer just got his new aviators by delivery and excitedly opens the packaging. He starts by trying them on. He then takes a few pictures of himself from every angle possible. Now just looking to post the best photo to show it off. But you incentivized him to add a hashtag of your campaign #readyforsummer. Why would he do that? Cause he stands to gain! For his chance to win a trip to Ibiza with 3 of his friends! You’ve set the stage for digital ENGAGEMENT with the contest!

LOYALTY

The customer’s journey doesn’t just end there! You need to make sure you deliver a quality of service that builds LOYALTY and fosters trust. You can do this by offering the customer exceptional warranty and support services or ensuring each purchase earns him loyalty rewards/points.

ADVOCACY

You value this customer and want to further cement his loyalty to the brand, so you e-mail him a discount code that any of his friends can use, and if they use his code he gets 10$  of credit for his next purchase! Your customer is being introduced to brand ADVOCACY. He could quite possibly get another pair of shades the same summer by just telling his friends about a product he already loves!

The capitalized terms may or not represent funnel stages that you may use. This would depend on what your goals are, how you choose to accomplish them, and your overall marketing and even sales strategy. Some combination of Awareness, Interest, Consideration, Lead Generation, Decision, Conversion, Engagement, Loyalty, and Advocacy will definitely make it into your marketing funnel.

Setting the right goal

If your goal was to just sign up as many people for a Summer offer, your conversion stage would have been the very moment a lead signs up on your website. Your goal provides context for your funnel. If your objective was to increase engagement on a campaign, then your marketing funnel would start from creating awareness on your channels with an image/video post, which has engagement buttons to like, share and comment. Since your engagement is multiplied with a higher reach, your post caption could highlight a chance to win a 500$ voucher at your store if they tagged 3 friends with whom they were #readyforsummer 

Your conversion point depends on YOUR GOAL!

There is a range of objectives you can tailor your marketing funnel for. If you can apply a combination of stages to create your own, then your goal qualifies! But here is a shortlist of the top goals relevant to marketing funnels:

• Create awareness, increase traffic, views, email opens or reach
  
• Increase engagement, clicks, reactions, etc.
  
• Generate leads or mailing lists
  
• Sign-up for newsletters, offers, promotions
  
• Meet sales targets and objectives
  
• Increase customer lifetime value
  
• Develop brand loyalty or elevate customer satisfaction
  
• Boost reviews/ratings, feedback 
  
• Increase referrals or NPS score
  

Regardless of your goal, you should always set SMART(ER) objectives. It increases your chances of attaining them. You can find more information on SMARTER goal-setting here.

As briefly discussed in the example above, the number of stages for your marketing funnel depends on your goals. Broadly speaking, you can categorize the funnel as Pre – conversion | Conversion | Post – Conversion or more popularly as TOFU | MOFU | BOFU stands for top/middle/bottom of the funnel. But to truly understand which model can help you attain your goals best, let’s understand its evolution.

The original marketing funnel: AIDA Model

One of the oldest funnel frameworks used was the AIDA(R) model. Despite the changing landscape of marketing, with the onset of digital channels and new avenues and possibilities, the AIDA model is still widely accepted, since this model relies on cognitive and behavioral decision making of consumers. The AIDA(R) model stands for:

A: Awareness | The goal here is to get the consumer’s attention

I: Interest | Now it’s time to establish yourself as trustworthy to pique their interest

D: Desire | You have to make them really want your offering, by showing its value

A: Action | You’ve turned them into a customer. Moreover, they want what you’re selling

The AIDA model dates back at least a century. It was developed in 1898 by E. St. Elmo Lewis for direct sales. Its continued usage is a testament to its effectiveness. However, the model has evolved with its application:

AIDAR (Action, Interest, Desire, Action, Retention)

This is a simple extension of the AIDA model to add “retention” of existing customers by getting them to re-order. Also, it could be to subscribe to regular service or even get feedback. You can find out more about AIDAR as a customer relationship management tool here.

AIDCAS (Action, Interest, Desire, Conviction, Action, Satisfaction) model

The “conviction” in this model is an extension of driving desire further to instill more confidence for the consumer in your offering. This model is geared better towards products with after-sales service. Additionally, the “satisfaction” stage focuses on the delivery of exceptional service as a method of retention. Markitects have a great model that describes AIDCAS, which we highly recommend checking out.

ACID (Awareness, Consideration, Intent, Decision)

This model is just AIDA catered for online purchases. It simply swaps “intent” for “desire” and “action” for “decision”. Also, it includes the many actions consumers use to signal commercial interest like “Subscribe/Register”, “Add to cart” or “Add to Wishlist”.

RACE (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage)

This is a digital marketing planning framework based on buyer stages of: Exploration (Reach), Decision-making (Act), Purchase (Convert), Advocacy (Engage). This was developed by Dave Chaffey and is described in detail on Smart Insights right here.

The Marketing Hourglass

The evolution of the marketing funnel doesn’t just stop with the above adaptations. While new models and combinations of stages are constantly being normalized, it is based on evolving goals, offerings, and consumer behavior. The most revolutionary of the funnel changes was breaking the requirement for customers to move downwards from the top of the funnel. Understanding that, in reality, customers can enter and exit the funnel at any stage meant catering strategies to each funnel stage instead of applying a trickle-down strategy that depended on the success of previous stages. Expansion of the funnel into an encompassing hourglass was the next major progression of the overall customer journey where an inverted funnel follows the buyer journey for after-sales stages. 

The buyer’s journey was always the focus in the AIDA and other sales/marketing funnels. Conversion and sales were primary objectives. However, the hourglass approach places a larger, if not equal, emphasis on the customer journey after purchase is made. We see a rise in the use of customer personas to better understand consumer experiences. This includes, but isn’t limited to, customer service,  retention, relationship management, advocacy, and loyalty. Just as in the funnel, there are several variations of the hourglass model, but the underlying methodology can be simplified as follows:

Top half – The buyer’s journey: KNOW, LIKE, TRUST

KNOW: This is the same as the awareness phase of the AIDA model. You’re trying to get the word out about who you are and what you do. But you should make yourself easy to find. So that you can meet your customers on the channel(s) they are comfortable with.

LIKE: Here, you aim to attract customers by generating interest. Or even just letting them get to know your brand more. You want them to align with your brand, and start to see value in your offering too.

TRUST: Any relationship is based on trust, even a brand-customer one. You can start with transparency and then fortify it with reviews, ratings, and comments. You have to follow ethical marketing principles to gain credibility.

Bottom half – The customer journey: TRY, BUY, REPEAT, REFER

TRY: This stage is about giving the customer a snippet in the form of free content. You could also offer a free trial to your service, or even a product demonstration. You want to really show them how you can solve their problems, and add value here as a result.

BUY: Besides being equivalent to the purchase stage in old marketing funnels, this stage is all about the actual acquiring experience. In reality, it could range from the simplicity of the process to any surprise WOW factors you have in store for their purchase.

REPEAT: Retaining a customer is all about successfully satisfying their needs. Your offering must deliver on the value promised and then you capitalize on their satisfaction with cross-selling, up-selling, or additional services.

REFER: Ideally, you want all your customers to become advocates and promote your brand from you. In reality, you can’t expect every happy customer to refer to you, and even if they do, you have to ensure the right program and processes are in place so that customers see added value in referrals and promoting your product. 

Your touchpoints will be vital in determining the successful implementation of the marketing hourglass model. You also have to select the right channels to engage your customers, and actually map your customer journey to maximize the benefits of the model.

Some great resources to dig deeper into the marketing hourglass models can be found on Campaign Monitor or the Contentools blog. Do check them out for a more detailed study on the hourglass and its various applications.

Conclusion

You can use the tried and tested AIDA model, or a modern marketing hourglass. Funnels were created as frameworks to better understand your prospective and existing customers too. If you approach your marketing strategy and planning with customer centricity, any marketing funnel will help you organize and segment your approach for turning prospects into customers and then keep those customers coming back to you. The value you add with your offerings and the service you provide to keep customers satisfied is central to your brand’s success.