Who, chapter one

Intent rises as people move

Tactics still to place

Place a tactic to see whether it fits.

Tactics in a stage where they do their job 0 of 8

Where each tactic does its job
Tactic	Stage	Its job there
A billboard by the station	Awareness	Be noticed
A podcast sponsorship	Awareness	Be noticed
A grind-size guide	Interest	Answer the questions people have
A retargeting ad	Interest or decision	Pick up where a visitor left off
A review site	Decision	Remove the doubt
A demo request	Decision	Remove the doubt
A free trial, no card needed	Decision or action	Make starting easy
A “your cart is waiting” email	Action	Make finishing easy
A setup call in week one	Onboarding (bow tie)	A first win, fast
A quarterly check-in on their numbers	Expansion (bow tie)	Show the next thing they need
More seats when they add crews	Expansion (bow tie)	Show the next thing they need
A referral credit	Referral (bow tie)	Make it easy to tell someone

The intent river. People come in at the top as light; fewer of them go further down, but the ones who do want what you sell more, so the light gets brighter. Drag each tactic into the stage where it does its job, or focus it, press Enter, choose a stage with the arrow keys and press Enter again. A tactic in the right stage glows as brightly as the intent it serves, and one in the wrong stage says why. Switch on the bow tie to keep going after the sale. The tactics belong to Kiln, an invented coffee roaster, and Ledgerline, invented accounts software for contractors. The brightness is an ordering, not a measurement.

Hope and heat is not an effective distribution tactic.

From my essay draft, 7 June 2026.

The idea

A funnel is the plan that replaces hope. I think of it as a map of how much a person wants what you sell, not a list of channels. At the top someone barely knows you exist. At the bottom they're ready to pay. Each step down gives you a different job: awareness has to be noticed, interest has to answer the questions people actually have, decision has to remove the doubt, and action has to be easy.

The commonest mistake, I think, is a tactic doing the wrong job. A billboard gets asked to close a sale, or a hard offer lands on someone who has never heard of you. In B2B the shape doesn't stop at the sale either. The customer still has to get set up, grow into the product and tell someone else about it, which is why some teams draw it as a bow tie instead of a funnel.

Where I used it

A spec launch for Lululemon. Members got early access by email before the public launch, so the people who already wanted the brand most went first. Spec work. Not commissioned by Lululemon.
The UVA Food Assist web redesign. I treated the volunteer-to-leader ladder as a funnel for people, from noticing the group to leading a shift, and the site laid it out as a five-step pathway with one main call to action. Group work, my section.
Second State Records, the studio and label I co-founded. I set up one pipeline from the first enquiry and booking, through the paperwork and production, to release. It's a funnel for artists: each step asks a little more commitment than the one before. Solo

What I'd do now

Rebuild the Food Assist funnel as a worked example, with Northfield Food Bank standing in, since the real site carries students' personal details. Northfield is an invented student-run food rescue. Its funnel isn't for buyers. It's for volunteers, and the jobs are the same ones: get noticed, answer the questions, take away the doubt, make the first step easy, then keep people once they're in.

Northfield’s volunteer funnel: hears about it, tries one shift, comes back, leads a shift, brings someone. Fewer people reach each step, and each one who does is worth more to the food bank. Northfield and its steps are invented.