When it comes to marketing, there are hundreds, if not thousands of theories you can use. Some of them have been around a long time, some have been discredited, and others use modern tools to create sales techniques that only work in certain spaces. But there is one tool that every business needs to have a basic understanding of, and that’s the AIDA model. This model is essential if you want to create marketing campaigns that perform well and deliver consistent, high conversion rates. Let’s be honest, who doesn’t want that for their business? So today, we’re going down the rabbit hole of the AIDA model, what it means, and how you can use it.
What Is The AIDA Model?
The AIDA model is a marketing model that’s considered one of the classics, and perhaps one of the best-known. The reason for that is simple – it’s something that all of us do on a daily basis, whether we realise it or not. Harnessing a natural thought process for a marketing model is no new thing, but the AIDA model takes us through the customer journey while forcing us to examine it from the other side. And since we go through it every day in our own buying decisions, it’s something we can relate to and use to create strong and relatable marketing campaigns.
To start at the beginning, AIDA stands for:
Attention
Interest
Desire
Action
This is the route that forms part of a purchasing funnel, and customers may move around in it for a while, going back and forth, until they are ready to make a decision and move onto the last phase. It’s a critical part of understanding the customer decision-making process, and it can be the difference between a campaign succeeding or failing. It was first created in 1898 by E. St. Elmo Lewis as a way to optimise sales calls and improve conversion rates. Which it did, and it’s been tweaked over the years to match current marketing trends and emerging technologies.
Now, businesses can use the AIDA model as a way of designing targeted marketing campaigns and increasing their conversion rates. You can also use it to plan and analyse your PR campaigns, your sales force effectiveness, and even your social media responses. That’s why it’s such a valued tool among digital marketing experts!
How Do You Use the Aida Model?
Using the AIDA model in your own business is remarkably easy, and it can really make a huge difference to your conversion rates if you’re willing to put in the time to do it. It’s simplest to work through the steps and ask yourself some questions – the answers to which will help you understand your customer purchase journey and design marketing campaigns to target each stage.
To walk you through it, here are the steps you might go through when applying the AIDA model to one of your products or services:
Attention
Work out how to attract the attention of customers in the first place. What ‘eye-catcher’ could you use to draw them in? This is usually done via advertising strategies.
Interest
Now the customer knows you and your product/service exist, it’s time to ramp up their interest level. This would usually involve talking about and demonstrating your product or service, showcasing it in its best light in as many ways as you can – for example product descriptions, demo videos, brochures sent out, and so on.
Desire
Now they’re interested in the product/service, you need to light the flames of desire. It’s time to make them want to buy. For this you need trust, and you need content. Make sure you’re providing a steady stream of information on your blog, get them following you on social media, provide special offers and write themed newsletters. The more prospects interact with your brand, the more they’ll trust you, and the more they will want to buy from you.
Action
This is the ultimate goal – making the prospect hit the buy button and turning them into a customer. For this, you need a high-incentive call to action that doesn’t require a lot of work from them. This is where your calls to action are important, whether it’s a button, a banner, or an email, make sure it makes the process of buying as easy and friction-free as possible.
But What Does That Look Like?
All of that might sound simple enough, but it can be difficult to imagine what that actually looks like in practice. So let’s go through an example with an imaginary company. This company is called Simulacra Beauty, and they specialise in hairdressing and beauty treatments. They have 2 salons at the moment and are looking to launch another in a new area. They want to generate business for the new salon as quickly as possible, and so they use the AIDA model. Their steps would look something like this:
Attention
To generate awareness they run a focused PR campaign for 5 months ahead of the launch. This campaign promotes their award winning services, their stylists, the qualifications they hold, and their status in the local community. They also sent specific newsletters to their current customers and a pre-qualified list of customer groups provided by a marketing agency.
Interest
With a mailing list built up through the PR campaign, they send out a direct mail and newsletter campaign 2 months before the salon launch. These mailers contained special offers for new customers, including a free consultation, a free cut and finish, or money off selected products. They also promoted their loyalty card scheme, which would allow customers to get every 5th haircut free.
Desire
Close to the launch of the new salon they start reaching out to the local press. They want to create a ‘buzz’ around the new salon, and so they put on a pre-launch event, offering exclusive tickets to come and see the new salon, meet the stylists, drink some champagne and get free goodies. This was advertised through the press and on social media.
Action
A few weeks before launch they positioned clear CTAs across their website and social media. Buttons like ‘book your appointment now’ and ‘call to book’, along with publishing discount codes for people to use when they came into the new salon.
Using this method, Simulacra could create enough interest around their new salon to ensure their appointment book was full before they even opened the doors – leaving them free to focus on retention strategies from there. This is just one example of how the method can be applied, and in reality, it can be used in all sorts of different ways!
At Lion Spirit Media the AIDA model is just one of the marketing frameworks and theories that we use when creating tailored digital marketing strategies for our customers. By understanding the process behind the customer journey and their decision-making, we are able to create marketing campaigns that hit the right notes at the right time and shepherd customers down that funnel and into action. Using a unique blend of strategy,content marketing, SEO and paid advertising, our strategies align with your customer journey at every step and create the ideal climate for them to buy from you. If you would like to know more, just get in touch with the team today.
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