Don't Forget the Top of the Funnel: Why You Need a Funnel Marketing Plan

I talk to a lot of founders and leaders who feel like their teams are working nonstop to cultivate new partnerships and customers, but the results don’t match the effort.

In some cases, they’re pouring budget into “doing marketing” – usually industry events, conferences, and wire press releases. In others, marketing has quietly fallen to the back burner while the company focuses on technology milestones, scientific advances, or financing.

Either way, they end up in the same spot:

• A lot of activity.
• Not enough qualified conversations.
• A growing sense that “this should be working better than it is.”

So how do you create focus and a go‑forward strategy that actually proves market readiness and drives customer acceptance?

A simple place to start is with the marketing funnel.

Why the Funnel Still Matters (If You Use It Correctly)

The funnel is a familiar framework, but I see it misapplied all the time.

There are a few versions; in this article I’ll use the five‑tier model:

1. 1. 1. Awareness
      2. Interest
      3. Consideration
      4. Conversion
      5. Loyalty / Advocacy

What I see most often, especially in B2B and technical markets, is an almost obsessive focus on the middle and bottom of the funnel:

• • • “Do we have enough qualified leads?”
    • “What’s our conversion rate?”
    • “Can we get more demos on the calendar?”

Once someone looks even vaguely qualified, teams go straight into Consideration and Conversion mode.

Typical Consideration tactics:

• • • Customer testimonials
    • Explainer videos
    • Case studies

Typical Conversion tactics:

• • • Product demos and trials
    • Limited‑time offers (discounts, incentives)

All of those are important. The problem isn’t that you’re doing them. The problem is when you’re doing them in isolation.

If you neglect the top of the funnel – Awareness and Interest – your business development team has to do significantly more heavy lifting in every conversation, because prospects are coming in cold, unprimed, and often confused.

A Simple Analogy: Buying a House

Think about how you’d buy a house.

At the top of the funnel, your internal dialogue probably sounds something like this:

• • • Awareness: “Do I want or need to buy a new house at all?”
    • Interest: “If I do, what kind of house would make sense? How big? What neighborhood? What features matter most?”
    • Consideration: “Given my price range and target area, which specific houses could actually work for my needs?”
    • Conversion: “I’ve found the one. How much should I bid? What’s my ceiling? What terms am I comfortable with?”

Now imagine an agent you’ve never met cold‑calls you and immediately asks:

• • • “What do you need or want?”
    • “What kind of house are you buying?”
    • “What’s your budget?”

You might give a few vague answers. More likely, you’ll get off the call as quickly as possible.

Why? Because you’re not there yet. No one has helped you think clearly about whether you even want to move, what problems you’re solving, or what a “good” option looks like.

Yet this is exactly how many companies treat their outbound and early‑stage conversations.

What Top‑of‑Funnel Looks Like in Real Life

Now flip the script.

Imagine someone who looks a lot like your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is quietly asking themselves a different question:

“Do I want or need to find a new solution for this problem?”

At that moment, they:

• • • See a search ad from your firm that clearly names the problem they’re wrestling with.
    • Hear your CEO on a podcast or read a quote in a news article that frames the issue in language that finally makes sense.
    • Notice a LinkedIn post that offers a short, practical resource like a white paper that helps them organize what they should even be looking for.

If you’ve invested in the top of the funnel:

• • • Your Awareness activities show up when and where they’re asking the “Do I need to change?” question.
    • Your Interest‑stage content helps them define the shape of a good solution: what features and benefits matter, what trade‑offs to consider, what risks to avoid.

By the time they ever fill out a form or reply to your outreach, they’ve already:

• • • Seen your company name a few times.
    • Started to view you as an expert in solving their specific kind of problem.
    • Built a mental shortlist in which you’re not a stranger; you’re a serious option.

That’s what a healthy top of funnel does. It pre‑disposes leads to see your platform or product as credible before your team ever sends the first email.

Why Founders and Technical Teams Skip the Top

For founders and technical teams, especially in FoodTech, AgTech, and B2B platforms, skipping the top of the funnel is rarely intentional. It usually happens because:

• • • The work of technology, science, or product development consumes all available attention.
    • “Marketing” gets equated with a handful of events, a website launch, or press releases.
    • It feels more efficient to push for demos and pilots than to invest in Awareness and Interest that are harder to attribute in the short term.

The result is that your middle and bottom of the funnel efforts are trying to compensate for a missing foundation.

You can fix that. But you have to see it clearly first.

You Don’t Just Need More Tactics. You Need a Funnel Marketing Plan.

If you want your business development, sales, and partnership teams to stop doing all the heavy lifting alone, you need a funnel‑based marketing plan that:

• • • Tells a differentiated, credible story in the right channels at the top of the funnel.
    • Uses compelling narratives and your unique proof points that speak directly to your ideal customers’ or partners’ pain points.
    • Anchors those stories to specific activities and assets at each tier of the funnel – from Awareness to Interest to Consideration and Conversion.

When you do this well, your leads arrive:

• • • Already aware of the problem and the category of solution.
    • Already educated on what “good” looks like.
    • Already inclined to see your firm as a strong, trustworthy option.

That doesn’t guarantee a closed deal. But it dramatically increases the odds that your hard‑won conversations are productive, not uphill battles.

A Simple Next Step: Funnel Assessment

If you’re unsure where your funnel is working and where it’s quietly leaking opportunity, that’s exactly what we help leaders diagnose.

At Ladder 17, we work with purpose‑driven, tech‑enabled brands in food, agriculture, wellness, and B2B platforms to:

• • • Assess how well their current activities support each stage of the funnel.
    • Identify gaps between how they’re marketing and how their real buyers make decisions.
    • Build focused, executable plans that demonstrate market readiness and drive adoption.

If you’re ready to see where your funnel stands – and what to do about it – reach out to schedule a Funnel Assessment for your firm, brand, or product.