The evolution of content in the Customer Journey: From a linear funnel to a digital path

The evolution of content in the Customer Journey: From a linear funnel to a digital path

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The Customer Journey has undergone a radical transformation in recent years. As emerging technologies redefine how businesses interact with their customers, the buying process has shifted from a linear path to a dynamic, digital, and multichannel experience.

In the past, decision-makers followed a predictable journey: they identified a need, researched options, and contacted sales. Today, the process is far more complex. CEOs, CTOs, and marketing teams gather information from multiple platforms before even considering a purchase. They engage with content on LinkedIn, attend webinars, explore short-form videos, and prioritize personalized experiences at every stage of their decision-making process.

In this article, we’ll explore how the customer journey has evolved, why these changes are critical for success, and what strategies businesses can implement to create high-impact content and convert high-value clients.

From a linear approach to a dynamic and personalized journey

Traditionally, the customer journey followed a structured sales funnel with three stages: Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. This model assumed that customers moved through each phase in an orderly manner. However, today’s consumers engage with multiple touchpoints before making a decision, requiring a more strategic content approach to attract and convert potential clients.

In the past, many businesses relied on mass content production, primarily through blogs, as their main lead generation channel. The belief was that publishing more content would increase the chances of capturing potential customers.

However, this approach had several flaws:

  • Market saturation: With countless businesses creating similar content, standing out became increasingly difficult.

  • Inconsistent quality: Prioritizing quantity over quality led to repetitive, superficial content.

  • Lack of personalization: Generic content failed to address the specific needs of customers at different stages of their journey.

  • Single-channel strategy: Blogs dominated content marketing, limiting outreach to more effective formats.

By relying solely on blogs and SEO, many companies struggled to capture the attention of decision-makers who preferred other content formats and platforms.

The Old Linear Model: High-Volume content and a single channel

Today: High-Quality content in a multichannel strategy

Now, the focus has shifted toward creating strategic and relevant content, prioritizing quality over quantity. The goal is no longer just to generate traffic but to educate, provide value, and guide customers throughout their buying process.

Successful companies follow three key principles:

  • Relevance and value: Content must align with customer needs at every stage of the Customer Journey.

  • Personalization: By leveraging analytics and Artificial Intelligence, businesses can create highly tailored experiences.

  • Multichannel strategy: Companies distribute content across multiple formats and platforms to reach customers at the right time.

According to a Gartner study, 74% of B2B buyers conduct independent research before speaking with a supplier. This means businesses must ensure their content is available across multiple formats and channels to capture attention at every stage of the buying process.

By integrating social media, video, email marketing, and interactive content, companies can drive higher engagement, build trust, and improve conversion rates.

Key factors driving change in the B2B Customer Journey

1. Digitalization and access to information

B2B buyers no longer rely solely on sales teams to learn about solutions; instead, they seek answers through online communities, social media, and digital platforms. The explosion of content has made customers more discerning, pushing businesses to create high-quality, relevant, and differentiated content to stand out.

2. Generational shift in decision-makers

A new wave of business leaders, particularly in startups and tech companies, consists of digital natives. They prefer consuming content in interactive formats, look for agile experiences, and value authenticity over traditional marketing tactics.

Studies show that 50% of B2B buyers are under 40 years old, meaning outdated strategies like mass email marketing and traditional SEO are no longer enough to capture their interest. Instead, businesses must focus on engaging, data-driven content strategies to appeal to this demographic.

3. Personalization and tailored experiences

Modern B2B buyers expect personalized experiences based on their industry, preferences, and specific needs. In fact, 80% of B2B buyers demand tailored interactions, making personalization a key driver of engagement and conversions.

Companies leveraging Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data analytics to deliver custom content and recommendations see significantly higher engagement rates and improved conversion metrics. By embracing personalization, businesses can foster deeper relationships, build trust, and enhance the overall buying experience.

Effective strategies for the new Customer Journey

Blog - March 2025-ES_05 - Estrategias efectivas para el nuevo Customer Journey

1.  Implementing artificial intelligence and machine learning

Artificial Intelligence (AI) allows businesses to personalize content in real time, streamline sales processes, and predict buying behaviors. Key applications include:
Smart chatbots that provide instant answers and improve customer interactions.

  • Recommendation algorithms that suggest relevant content based on user behavior.

Predictive analytics tools that identify high-potential leads and optimize marketing efforts.

2. Extreme personalization: A data-driven approach

Generic strategies no longer work in B2B marketing. To stay competitive, businesses must:

 

  • Segment audiences based on industry, company size, and decision-maker roles.
  • Create tailored content specifically for CEOs, CTOs, and technical teams.

Adapt messaging according to where the customer is in the sales funnel.

EXTRA TIP:

If you want to dive deeper into advanced Inbound Marketing strategies for the tech industry, check out our Complete Guide to Inbound Marketing.

3. Diversifying content formats

Instead of relying solely on blogs and ebooks, businesses should embrace a multiformat content strategy to reach decision-makers where they are most active. Key formats include:

  • Short-form videos and reels on LinkedIn and YouTube.
  • Podcasts featuring industry experts for in-depth discussions.
  • Infographics and interactive reports that present insights visually.
  • LinkedIn posts with key industry takeaways to boost engagement.

By offering content in multiple formats, companies expand their reach and increase audience engagement across various digital platforms.

4. Optimizing for voice search and AI-Powered search engines

With the rise of AI-driven search engines and voice assistants, businesses must ensure their content is optimized for:

  • Conversational queries on Google, aligning with how users naturally ask questions.
  • Voice searches on devices like Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant.
  • Concise, structured responses that AI can easily interpret and rank in search results.

As search behavior evolves, adapting content for AI and voice-driven interactions will be crucial for maintaining visibility and attracting the right audience.

Blog - March 2025-ES_06 - En Resumen

In Summary

The Customer Journey has changed irreversibly. It is no longer a linear sales funnel, but rather a dynamic, digital, and multichannel experience, where decision-makers actively research, compare, and validate options before making a purchase.

By creating relevant, personalized content and leveraging multiple platforms to engage with customers, businesses can optimize the customer journey, increase interest, and improve marketing performance.

Is Your Business Ready to Adapt to the New Customer Journey?

At Isource, we stay ahead of market trends and leverage multiple platforms to design a content strategy tailored to your audience, helping you enhance your B2B marketing strategy.

Contact us today and let’s unlock your brand’s full potential!

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Learn how you can create a marketing campaign using AI

Learn how you can create a marketing campaign using AI

Artificial intelligence has great potential to revolutionize many areas and marketing is one of the most promising. Along with other trends such as omnichannel, AI-driven marketing is one of the most effective bets for companies to ensure that they remain relevant for years to come. The application of artificial intelligence is being particularly intense, allowing disciplines such as loyalty marketing and relationship marketing to be taken to new levels.

Today, marketing professionals are already taking advantage of Artificial Intelligence technology for their business strategies. According to a recent report by Hubspot, more than 80% of industry experts use some form of AI in their online activities, in addition to mentioning advertising as one of the main application examples. The market for AI in Marketing is estimated at US$15.84 billion, with a projection to reach more than US$107.5 billion by 2028.

In this scenario, it makes sense that companies find different challenges when implementing AI in the development of a marketing campaign. Here are some of them to take into account:

 

The effective implementation of AI requires experience and specialized knowledge in the field. Companies may not have internal staff with AI expertise, which can make it difficult to understand algorithms.

AI is data-driven, so one of the main challenges is making sure you have access to quality and relevant data.

AI is a constantly evolving field, and keeping up with advances and changes can be challenging.

Although AI can provide powerful analysis and results, correctly interpreting those results can be tricky. AI can generate patterns and correlations, but it is important to understand the context and relevance of these findings. It is necessary to have marketing professionals who are able to analyze and use the results of AI effectively to make informed and strategic decisions.

Artificial Intelligence will have an impact in the marketing area since it will be able to segment audiences, manage advertising campaigns and efficiently build strategies. Under this paradigm, marketing professionals play a key role in the effective implementation of AI-based solutions, especially in information analysis, brand identity recognition, data interpretation, monitoring results for continuous improvement, among others.

With the optimal development of the campaign you can achieve effective personalization, which thanks to artificial intelligence allows you to analyze large volumes of customer data and generate detailed profiles. Likewise, AI algorithms can identify more precise and relevant customer segments and thus perform real-time monitoring and analysis of the results of marketing campaigns.

In this context let’s see 7 key points to take into account when building an optimal marketing campaign using AI:

Clearly define the goals of your marketing campaign. For example, you need to be able to increase brand awareness, generate leads or increase sales. A useful tool in this context is Acquisio, since it helps to establish clear goals, which will allow you to measure the success of your campaign, since it is a results marketing platform that will optimize search and social display campaigns and obtain maximum performance from local search campaigns.

To get the most out of AI, you will need data analysis tools. These tools will help you identify patterns, trends, and customer segments relevant to your campaign. Some popular options include Google Analytics, Salesforce CRM, and Adobe Analytics.

Using the information collected and analyzed, create detailed profiles of your target customers. These profiles will help you better understand your audience and personalize your marketing messages and strategies. With tools like Twilio Segment you can leverage customer data to fuel personalized communications across all channels.

AI is driven by data, so it’s essential that you collect and organize all the data relevant to your campaign. This may include demographic data, customer behavior data, social media data, past transaction data, etc.

Use AI techniques, such as machine learning and natural language processing (NLP), to analyze your data and obtain useful information. You can use machine learning algorithms to predict customer behavior, identify similar customer segments, or personalize your marketing messages.

AI is a constantly evolving process. As you collect more data and learn more about your audience, you can adjust and optimize your campaigns.

Use marketing automation tools to implement your AI-based strategies. These tools will allow you to send personalized messages, track leads, schedule social media posts, and measure the performance of your campaigns.

Remember that a successful implementation of an AI-based marketing campaign requires time, effort, and adequate resources. It is also important to consider privacy and ethics when using customer data.

At Isource marketing, we believe that AI is a powerful tool to help our clients and prospects achieve their goals. By leveraging the capabilities of AI, we are able to deliver precise targeting and personalization, efficient automation, deep data analysis, and continuous optimization. By strategically embracing AI, we can deliver innovative and effective solutions that drive our clients’ success in the world of marketing.

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