The conversion funnel is to move consumers from consideration to awareness to purchase.

A classic marketing funnel measures how successful a brand is at moving consumers through their purchase journey including stages such as awareness, familiar, consider, purchase, repeat and loyal. From a strategic view, the brand funnel tells you where your brand is now, and when analyzed with intelligence, it provides hints as to where you can go next. The marketing funnel is also referred to as a sales funnel or brand funnel.

Importantly, we use the brand funnel analysis to help determine where your brand sits on the brand love curve, which outlines how consumers build a bond with a brand, as they move through five stages: unknown, indifferent, like it, love it, and onto the beloved brand status. 

Our brand love curve sets up the brand strategy of where to go next. First, indifferent brands have very skinny brand funnels with low awareness, low purchase and negligible repeat and loyalty. Second, brands that are liked but not loved, have high awareness and sales, without an emotional connection, they almost have no loyalty. Then, brands at the loved or beloved stage have the most robust brand funnels, with strong awareness, purchase, repeat and loyalty scores. Above all, this analysis should be part of our deep-dive business review and can be used to set up your marketing plan decisions. 

To illustrate, click on the marketing funnel diagram to zoom in. 

Marketing funnel

Every brand should understand the details of its brand funnel. It’s one of the best tool for measuring your brand’s underlying health. It explains your consumer’s purchase journey. It is the equivalent to knowing your blood pressure or cholesterol scores. A classic sales funnel should measure awareness, familiarity, consideration, purchase, repeat, and loyalty. At the very least, you should measure awareness, purchase, and repeat. It is not just about understanding the absolute scores on the funnel. You need to understand the ratios that explain how good of a job you are doing in moving consumers from one stage of the funnel to the next. 

I will show you how the robustness of your brand’s sales funnel explains where your brand sits on our brand love curve. As a rule, the broader the funnel, the better connected your brand is with consumers.

Marketing funnel analysis

Marketing funnel analysis using absolute scores

• A: On the chart below, the first thing to do is look at the absolute marketing funnel scores. There are many types of comparisons you can do, whether you compare to last year, competitors, or category norms. Then look at the marketing funnel ratios, which is the percentage score for how well your brand can convert consumers from one stage of their purchase journey to the next. To create ratios, divide the absolute score by the score above it on the funnel. In the example above, take the familiar score of 87% and divide it by the awareness score of 93% to determine a conversion ratio of 94%. This means 94% of aware consumers are familiar

Absolute funnel scores

A traditional marketing funnel (also called a sales funnel) looks at awareness, familiar, consideration, purchase, repeat, and loyalty. There are two key numbers, the absolute score and the ratio scores that shows how strongly you convert to the next stage of the funnel. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

• B: Then, on the next chart below, lay out the absolute scores and the ratios in a horizontal way to allow a comparison. You will notice these are the same scores as “A” and “B” in the previous chart. The crucial numbers for Gray’s Cookies are the ratios of 94%, 94%, 77%, 25%, and 12% at the top of the chart. Then bring in a close competitor (Devon’s) with their absolute and ratios scores to allow a direct comparison.

Marketing funnel ratios

To illustrate, click to expand the diagram to see marketing funnel / sales funnel details.

Next, we take the ratio scores and compare them to your nearest competitor. You can now compare the performance for your brand at each stage of the marketing funnel. This process creates identifiable gaps you will need to explain. For Gray's Cookies, you will notice significant gaps at the lower part of the marketing funnel. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

Marketing funnel analysis using ratios

• C: Above, find the ratio gaps by subtracting the competitor’s ratio scores from your brand’s ratio scores. In the example, the first ratio gap is -4% ratio gap (94% – 98%). Clearly, this means Devon’s does a 7% better job in converting consumers from awareness to familiar than Gray’s Cookies. 
• D:Next, as you create ratio gaps along the bottom, you can see where your ratio is either stronger or weaker than the comparison brand. Essentially, these ratios show how well you can move your consumers along their purchase journey. 
• E: Finally, start analyzing the significant gaps between the two brands and tell a strategic story to explain each gap. Looking at the example, you can see Gray’s and Devon’s have similar scores at the top part of the funnel, but Gray’s starts to show real weakness (-23% and -51% gap) as consumers move along their purchase journey from repeat to loyalty. You need to address and fix these gaps with your brand plan.

Use this type of chart to visualize the comparisons at each stage of the marketing funnel. It can be used to highlight the gaps. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

Beloved Brands playbook

Our Beloved Brands playbook goes in depth on everything you need to build a brand consumers will love. Learn to about strategic thinking, brand positioning, writing brand plans, advertising decisions, media planning, marketing analytics, and financials.

Stages of the marketing funnel

It takes a strategic mind to figure out brand love

First, for new brands, they are completely “unknown” to consumers. Unless there were genuinely compelling messages, consumers would walk past without even looking. To achieve some success, the priority for these brands is to get noticed within the clutter of the market. 

Then, at the “indifferent” stage, consumers feel O.K. about the brand, similar to how they usually feel about commodities, like fruit and vegetables. These brands satisfy the consumer’s basic needs. Consumers will only buy the brand when it is on sale, but switch back to their other brand choice when it is not. Make your brand more than just a commodity. Brands need to be better, different, or cheaper. Otherwise, they will not be around for long, and you waste your investment. 

Next, brands that reach the “like it” stage experience the first sign of business success. Their consumers see the brand as a logical, functional, and smart choice. However, the lack of any emotional connection leaves the purchase up to chance. Consumers will still switch brands randomly. Brands at the like it stage stress the product performance so much they forget to trigger any emotions. 

We created the Brand Love Curve to highlight the different stages for how a brand evolves with consumers. The five stages are unknown, indifferent, like it, love it, and beloved. The consumers' view changes at each stage and sets up strategic direction for the brand. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

As consumers start to love your brand

Importantly, brands at the “love it” stage start to see more emotionally engaged consumers. The rule of love you must follow: Consumers must love the brand before you can tell consumers you love them. Consumers see the brand as a favorite choice, usually connected to a favorite part of their day. They are loyal and build the brand into a routine. These brands must also find a way to demonstrate their love toward consumers and continue to tighten the bond with their most loyal brand lovers. 
Finally, brands at the “beloved” stage is where the brand becomes iconic, with a core base of brand lovers who cherish and defend the brand. These consumers see the brand as a personal choice, a badge they proudly hold in their hand or wear on their feet. At the beloved stage, the brands must create magical experiences that inspire brand lovers to share with their friends.

Our brand love curve explains how consumers feel at each stage of their purchase journey 

Marketing funnel metrics

Matching marketing funnel analysis to the brand love curve

Our Brand Love Curve guides where the brand is now. How tight is the bond with our consumer? Look at the voice of the consumer in how they describe the brand. And, look at the market indicators. The brand love curve goes from indifferent to like it, to love it, and onto a beloved brand. To illustrate, click to zoom in and learn where your brand might stand.

You can begin using your consumer tracking, sales funnel, market share, and the voice of the consumer to help explain where your brand sits on the brand love curve.

First, indifferent brands have skinny sales funnels, starting with inferior awareness scores. Consumers have little to no opinion. Concerning performance, you will see low sales and poor margins. Your brand plan for indifferent brands should increase awareness and consideration to kickstart the consumer’s purchase journey. 
Next, the like it brands have sales funnels that are solid at the top but quickly narrow at the purchase stage. Consumers see these brands as ordinary and purchase only on a deal. When they are not advertised or on sale, sales fall off dramatically. These brands need to close potential leaks to build a loyal following behind happy experiences.
Then, the love it brands have a reasonably robust sales funnel but may have a smaller leak at loyal. They have stronger growth and margins. Look for ways to feed the love at various stages of the consumer’s purchase journey turn repeat purchases into a ritual or routine. 
Finally, beloved brands have the most robust brand funnels and positive consumer views. These brands should continuously track their funnel and attack any weaknesses before competitors exploit them. Also, it is time to leverage that brand love to influence others.

How consumer brand strategies should match up to the brand love curve

Five major brand strategies help move your brand from one stage of the brand love curve to the next.

At each stage of the Brand Love Curve, your consumer strategy should change. For the unknown stage, a brand should focus on getting noticed. At the indifferent stage, focus on establishing the brand in the consumers mind. Then, at the like it stage, create reliable experiences. At the love it stage, focus on the connection with consumers. Finally, at the Beloved Stage, try to get your most loyal consumers to speak out or show the brand to others. To illustrate, click to zoom in.

Leading a business review

For unknown brands, the strategic focus should be to stand out so consumers will notice the brand within a crowded brand world, where they see an estimated 5,000 brand messages per day. 
For indifferent brands, the strategy must establish the brand in the consumer’s mind so they can see a clear point of difference over their current brand choice. 
At the like it stage, the strategy is to separate the brand from the pack, creating happy experiences that build a trusted following over time. Only after they trust the brand, they begin to open up.
At the love it stage, the focus shifts tightening the bond with the most loyal brand fans. 
At the beloved stage, the strategic challenge is to create outspoken, loyal fans who are willing to whisper to their friends on the brand’s behalf.

Learn how to use marketing analytics to lead a deep-dive business review. Dig in on the marketplace, consumers, channels, competitors and the brand to uncover the issues facing the brand. To illustrate, click on the diagram to zoom in on the process.

Business review templates

Brand Templates

To view, click to zoom in the brand template slides.

Our brand templates will make your job easier!

Our brand templates are used by many of the best brand companies around the world. They reflect the work we do as a brand consultant and the tools from our Beloved Brands playbook. With each template, we include fully completed examples and blank slides for you to enter your own strategies.

Brand templates options

Each option is available for Consumer, B2B or Healthcare brands.

Brand Plan Presentation

• Vision, Purpose
• Key Issues
• Strategy Pages
• Execution Plans

Brand Positioning

• Target Profile
• Positioning
• Brand Idea
• Brand Concept

Business Review

• Consumers
• Competitors
• Brand Audit
• Channels

Brand Toolkit

• Brand Plan
• Business Review
• Brand Positioning
• Creative Briefs

Marketing Excellence

We empower the ambitious to achieve the extraordinary.

Without a doubt, our role at Beloved Brands is to help the ambitious marketers who are trying to improve their marketing skills. Most importantly, we will prepare you so you can reach your full potential in your career. You will learn about strategic thinking, brand positioning, brand plans, marketing execution, and marketing analytics. As well, we provide a suite of marketing tools, templates that will make it easier to do your job, processes that you can follow, and provocative thoughts to trigger your thinking. 

Have you gone through an assessment of the marketing skills of your team? Take a look below:

The fundamentals of marketing matter.

Our Beloved Brands marketing training programs cover different streams to suit the type of marketer you are. For instance, our marketing training covers consumer marketing, B2B marketing, and Healthcare marketing. 

The marketing fundamentals that we show in this article are part of what we use in our marketing training programs. Ambitious marketers will learn about strategic thinking, brand positioning, brand plans, marketing execution, writing creative briefs, advertising decision-making, marketing analytics, and marketing finance. 

Importantly, when you invest in our marketing training program, you will help your team gain the marketing skills they need to succeed. Without a doubt, you will see your people make smarter decisions and produce exceptional work that drives business growth. 

Finally, I wrote our Beloved Brands playbook to help you build a brand that your consumers will love. If you are a B2B marketer, try our B2B Brands playbook. And, if you are a Healthcare Marketer, try our Healthcare Brands playbook.

Beloved Brands video

Everything a Marketing must know about.

Importantly, Brand leaders need to know how to think, define, plan, execute and analyze with the best of them. Moreover, while the brand leaders don’t really know how to do anything, they are looked upon to make every decision. Have a look at our five minute video on everything a marketer must know. To read more, click on this link: Everything.

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If you are looking to make your marketing team smarter, we can help. To get started, email Graham Robertson at

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