There are very few cases where people hear about a brand (or product) and immediately decide to buy it. Usually, there are several stages a customer goes through starting from the first exposure to a brand until buying it. An incredibly useful tool to map out (and measure!) this customer journey, is the brand funnel.
The main idea behind such a funnel is to organize your customer’s brand journey into different stages. It’s important to note that there is not one single version of the funnel; the stages may differ per business/industry. This article will cover the most common stages: Awareness, Consideration, preference, and usage.
Brand Awareness
The first stage of the brand funnel. It refers to the number of people that have heard of your brand and can remember it in some capacity. It’s the largest data group in the whole funnel because it contains people who will become your customers, as well as people that you will lose in the later stages of the funnel. There are three different levels of brand awareness that you can measure, read more about that here.
Brand Consideration
The second stage of the brand funnel. It represents the number of people that are aware of the brand and consider using it when evaluating their options. Notice the hierarchical structure of the brand funnel here: you cannot consider buying a brand if you’re not aware of it.
Brand Preference
The third stage of the brand funnel. Here you can find the number of people that prefer to use your brand over the competition. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the people in this group use your brand. This could be people that don’t buy from the category at all. And even if they do, customers tend to have a preferred set of brands between which they choose occasionally. Nevertheless, this stage is often viewed as the most important one (for a brand manager). The more consumers prefer your brand, the bigger the chance they will use it.
Brand Usage
The fourth stage of the brand funnel. It represents the number of people that use your brand. Usage can be calculated differently, depending on the industry you operate in. In FMCG brand managers often look at “P4W usage”; meaning that this part of the brand funnel represents the number of people that have used your brand in the past 4 weeks.
Moving through the brand funnel
Understanding how customers go through these stages will help you identify specific areas of opportunity in their journey. As described, these stages are consecutive; meaning a customer must go through every stage of the funnel, before moving to the next one. Identifying where customers are failing to transition from one stage to the next, is crucial information for your decision-making. Let’s have a closer look at how to move customers along the brand funnel:
From brand awareness to brand consideration
If you want to fuel long-term growth, you start with increasing brand awareness. If you see impressive results in brand awareness and consumers don’t move to consideration, probably you’re targeting the wrong people. Defining your target audience is key to making the movement from awareness to consideration happen.
From brand consideration to brand preference
This shift is where emotion plays a big role. People are considering your brand, but what makes you stand out vs your competitors? You need to make sure that you fulfill the consumer’s needs and appeal to their values. Your campaigns should focus on benefits that others can’t provide.
From brand preference to brand usage
To move from preference to usage, consumers must make the purchase. To support this step, you must make sure that everything is in place for the purchase to be as smooth as possible. A positive buying experience can lead to referrals that will fuel the top of your funnel again.
As a brand manager, you continuously work on optimizing your marketing strategy. Visualizing the customer journey helps you prioritize your campaigns and efforts. The insights provided by the brand funnel should help you with making the right decisions that will benefit your business.