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The Funnel is Fiction: Building Real Buyer Journeys That Work

the funnel is fiction building real buyer journeys that work

Let’s get one thing straight: the traditional marketing funnel is a relic. A charming, dusty artifact from a time when buyers waited patiently for your next email. Today’s buyers? They ghost your gated content, binge your competitors’ YouTube channels, and show up 70% through their decision process—if you’re lucky. The funnel assumes a linear, obedient buyer. Reality laughs in PowerPoint. It’s time to stop force-fitting modern behavior into a 19th-century sales model and start building buyer journeys that actually reflect how people buy today. This article is your blueprint for doing just that—no fluff, no funnel fantasies, just sharp strategy and a few well-placed truth bombs.

Why the Funnel is Fiction (And Always Was)

The funnel was never a map—it was a mirage. A neat, top-to-bottom fantasy that made CMOs feel in control. But here’s the inconvenient truth: buyers don’t move in straight lines. They zigzag, loop, ghost, reappear, and make decisions based on a cocktail of logic, emotion, peer influence, and late-night Reddit threads.

Let’s break down why the funnel fails:

It’s linear. Buyers aren’t. They jump stages, revisit old ones, and often skip your “awareness” phase entirely.
It’s brand-centric. The funnel assumes you’re the center of the universe. Spoiler: you’re not. The buyer is.
It’s static. Real buyer journeys are dynamic, multi-threaded, and influenced by dozens of touchpoints you don’t control.

Still clinging to your funnel? That’s like using a paper map in a GPS world. Nostalgic, maybe. Useful? Not so much.

What Real Buyer Journeys Look Like

Real buyer journeys are messy. They’re more like a subway map than a funnel—interconnected, non-linear, and full of detours. And they’re driven by one thing: the buyer’s context, not your campaign calendar.

Key Characteristics of Modern Buyer Journeys

Self-directed: Buyers do their own research. They don’t want to be “nurtured”—they want answers.
Multi-threaded: Especially in B2B, buying decisions involve multiple stakeholders with different agendas.
Channel-agnostic: Buyers don’t care if it’s a podcast, a peer review, or a Slack message—they follow value, not format.
Emotionally driven: Logic gets you shortlisted. Emotion gets you chosen.

So if your strategy still revolves around pushing leads down a funnel, you’re not just behind—you’re invisible.

Framework: Building Buyer Journeys That Actually Work

Forget the funnel. Here’s a smarter, buyer-centric framework that reflects how decisions are made today:

1. Map the Decision Ecosystem

Start by identifying all the players involved in the buying decision—not just the economic buyer, but influencers, blockers, and silent veto-holders. Then map their motivations, fears, and success metrics.

What does success look like for each stakeholder?
What internal politics are at play?
What content or conversations do they trust?

2. Design for Discovery, Not Conversion

Stop obsessing over MQLs. Instead, create content ecosystems that help buyers discover you organically—through peers, communities, and search—not just ads and email drips.

Invest in ungated, high-value content that solves real problems.
Amplify through trusted voices—partners, customers, and creators.
Make your brand findable, not forceful.

3. Orchestrate, Don’t Automate

Automation is great for reminders. It’s terrible for relationships. Instead of automating every touchpoint, orchestrate meaningful interactions across channels and teams.

Align sales, marketing, and customer success around shared buyer insights.
Use intent data to time outreach, not to spam inboxes.
Build sequences that feel like conversations, not campaigns.

4. Measure What Matters

Vanity metrics are the opium of underperforming teams. Ditch the dashboards that make you feel good and focus on metrics that reflect real buyer progress.

Track buying signals, not just clicks.
Measure influence across the journey, not just attribution at the end.
Use qualitative feedback to validate quantitative data.

Case in Point: How One SaaS Brand Ditched the Funnel and Won

A mid-market SaaS company we worked with was stuck in funnel hell—tons of leads, zero pipeline. We helped them flip the script:

They stopped gating content and started publishing deep-dive guides that ranked organically.
They built a customer advisory board that doubled as a referral engine.
They replaced their lead scoring model with a buyer intent model based on behavior and firmographics.

The result? 3x increase in qualified pipeline in six months. No funnel required.

Truth Bomb

The funnel isn’t broken—it was never real. Stop fixing fiction and start mapping reality.

Conclusion: Burn the Funnel, Build the Journey

If you’re still building strategies around a funnel, you’re not just behind—you’re irrelevant. Today’s buyers don’t want to be “converted.” They want to be understood. They want value before volume. And they want brands that respect their intelligence, not insult it with outdated models.

So here’s your challenge: audit your current buyer journey. Where are you forcing linearity where there should be flexibility? Where are you prioritizing process over people? And most importantly—are you building for your buyer’s reality, or your boardroom’s fantasy?

The funnel is fiction. The future belongs to marketers who build for the way people actually buy.

Mark Gabrielli
Founder, MarkCMO
[email protected]
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“The Funnel is Fiction: Building Real Buyer Journeys That Work”

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