Joseph Jaffe argues that it is time to “flip the funnel”. When you flip the funnel you take what traditional marketers argue and flip it on its head. When you flip it over you get ADIA. A is acknowledgement, D is dialogue, I is incentivization, and A is activation.
The Traditional Funnel
The traditional marketing funnel is AIDA. Attention, interest, desire, and finally, action. The problem is that this mindset, that marketing’s role is to generate leads at all costs. The problem with this thinking is that it doesn’t really matter how many people see your advertisement. What you want and what you need are profitable, long-term relationships with customers. The traditional line of thinking is oversimplified and out of date.
A New Way Forward
Acknowledge. The first thing we do on the other side of the funnel is acknowledge. This is what makes people feel important and like they made the right choice. Acknowledgement can come in many forms, one such form can be saying thank you. The right way to acknowledge is in the delivery, so make sure you’re genuine.
Dialogue. Now that you’ve established a little bit of trust, it’s time to take the next step and engage in dialogue with your customers. One thing to keep in mind is that we are engaging with our customers on their own terms. To do this, you can establish a customer group or club. The goal in this group should be to create conversations between customers themselves.
Incentivization. It's time to start rewarding your customers so that they continue to buy from you. You’ll want to reward people not just for buying from you, but also for helping to spread the word. Remember that many of your sales come from repeat sales and you’ll do great.
Activation. If you really want to make the most of this new funnel, you’ll want to start harnessing the power of the crowd. Take Nike for example. They sell millions of shoes every single year. To go together with this they’ve created communities and apps to build their network. So next time you go to buy shoes, you’re not just buying shoes, you’re buying into a world-wide network of people who share your passion for running.
Tying it all Together with Customer Experience
Everything we’ve talked about so far can be summed up in the word “customer experience”. Above all that is the one thing your customer cares about. Something you need to do in order to make this happen is to ensure that your entire team is working on it It’s not enough that you merely say you have a commitment “excellence in customer service”, you have to live and breathe it so that your customers experience it too.