It’s fair to say the “Awareness Consideration Conversion” funnel is a fundamental marketing mainstay. That’s because it’s a shorthand for mapping the consumer journey from initial brand awareness to the point of purchase. This journey is marked by 3 core stages:
- Awareness: where potential customers first “meet” a brand.
- Consideration: where potential customers evaluate whether the brand or product meets their needs.
- Conversion: where the potential customer makes a purchase or completes the desired action.
The “Awareness Consideration Conversion” formula is a framework for media campaigns and strategies. Each stage of the funnel requires a unique approach. For instance, awareness campaigns aim to reach a broad audience and introduce them to the brand. Consideration strategies focus on engaging interested prospects. Conversion campaigns are designed to nudge the people that are ready to purchase to take action. This three-category funnel helps marketers allocate budgets, define KPIs, and optimize ad spend to generate positive results across each phase.
Today, the “Awareness, Consideration, Conversion” funnel has become the go-to playbook in digital marketing, widely adopted and reinforced by platforms like Google and Facebook. The straight-forward structure of the funnel makes it easy to apply, but relying on a perfect step-by-step consumer journey process leaves it outdated in today’s multi–channel world where consumers move unpredictably…
Why did Awareness Consideration Conversion Become the Norm?
The simplicity of the “Awareness Consideration Conversion” formula made it extremely attractive to marketers from the get go. It proved to be a great way for them to structure their media buying and planning processes into neatly defined stages, making it easier to allocate budgets, create targeted ads, and measure performance. Reinforcing the standardization of the ACC model, highly influential platforms like Google and Facebook built campaign tools around the framework, offering ad types specifically tailored to each stage (awareness, consideration, and conversion). This has, over time, contributed to the widespread adoption of the ACC funnel as THE method for navigating the consumer journey.
Why Awareness Consideration Conversion Doesn’t ALWAYS Work
In a linear media world, the formula did make sense… Traditional outlets like TV and print have historically followed predictable customer journeys. This is because consumers were typically exposed to brand messaging through ads (awareness), they would then evaluate their options (consideration), and finally, make a purchase (conversion). The stages were clear and distinct, making the “Awareness, Consideration, Conversion” formula a natural fit for media planning. This is likely why the industry relies heavily on the ACC model, assuming a perfect-world scenario where marketing outcomes could be easily predicted and data remained uncomplicated.
HOWEVER, the flaw in this model truly lies in its linear structure. The ACC funnel treats conversion as the ultimate end-goal of the journey. The reality of it is that consumers are converting both offline and online millions of times a day – whether through micro-conversions such as subscribing to a newsletter or through in-store purchases – creating a continuous, rather finite, relationship with brands.