The Evolving Funnel: From Visibility to Invisibility
â–Ľ Summary
GenAI obscures traditional marketing funnels by hiding user journeys within AI models, inferring intent from prompts rather than visible actions.
– New concepts like Prompt Fingers and Intent Vector Bidding redefine targeting, focusing on semantic intent over demographics or keywords.
– AI clusters users dynamically based on real-time prompts, forming situational cohorts tied to immediate needs rather than fixed traits.
– Embedding Fingers represent content semantically, enabling AI to match ads to user prompts through vector alignment.
– Future marketing shifts to AI-native platforms, where brands align messaging with prompt-driven clusters rather than traditional ad placements.
Marketers spent years refining the funnel: a journey from awareness to consideration and finally, conversion. It was a logical path where every click and bounce was visible, but the emergence of Generative AI (GenAI) has obscured this process. The funnel still exists, not in its traditional form, but hidden within the AI’s model. Whenever ChatGPT or Perplexity receives a prompt, it reveals the user’s stage in the decision journey. This shift from visible actions to invisible inferences marks a new era in marketing strategy.
Introducing New Concepts: Prompt Fingers and Intent Vector Bidding
Duane Forrester introduces compelling new concepts in the marketing realm: Prompt Fingers, Embedding Fingers, and Intent Vector Bidding. These terms describe the future of paid media in an AI-driven world. While the ad system discussed here is theoretical, it’s not far off from what Google and other tech giants are exploring. At its core, this new model of marketing is about understanding user intent through the language and structure of prompts, rather than traditional demographics or keyword targets.
From Cohorts to Clusters
Cohort targeting once relied on observable behaviors and identifiable traits like location or demographics. But GenAI systems don’t need to know specific user details; they focus on what users ask and how they ask it. Every prompt is vectorized, capturing the intricacies of meaning, context, and intent. This allows AI to group users into cohorts based on prompt similarities, forming dynamic clusters that don’t rely on long-term traits but are instead driven by real-time context.
Understanding Prompt Finger
A Prompt Finger is an embedding signature derived from a user’s prompt, representing their intent, language, and inferred needs. This becomes the new persona within GenAI systems. It’s how the model determines which responses, and potentially which ads, are relevant to a user. This shift from demographic profiling to prompt-driven personas is fundamental for marketers seeking to align with AI systems.
Embracing Situational Cohorts
Imagine a spontaneous celebration in Toronto or a predicted snowstorm in the Northeast U.S. Thousands of prompts emerge, forming situational cohorts connected by immediate needs rather than personal identifiers. This breaks away from traditional marketing strategies and opens new opportunities for businesses to align their messaging with these momentary clusters. It’s about aligning with the ‘now,’ not predefined audience segments.
Embedding Fingers: The New Targeting Payload
Just as prompts are vectorized, so too is your content. Every piece of digital content forms an Embedding Finger, a vector signature that reflects its semantic meaning. This realignment means that if an advertiser’s content matches a user’s prompt, it is more likely to be retrieved by the AI system. This approach could redefine targeting strategies, emphasizing semantic alignment over traditional optimization methods.
The Concept of Intent Vector Bidding
In a potential future where GenAI systems monetize prompt-driven interactions, Intent Vector Bidding could emerge. This system would allow advertisers to bid on ad placements based on the alignment between a user’s prompt intent vector and an advertiser’s content vector. This is not yet a reality, but given current trends, it’s a conceivable advancement.
A Path Towards AI-Native Ad Platforms
Over the past decades, marketing has seen a gradual shift from manual control to AI-driven automation. The ultimate evolution leads to a system where businesses don’t submit ads but feed data to an AI platform that aligns brand messaging with real-time cohort clusters. This represents a significant transformation in how digital marketing is conducted, emphasizing the importance of semantic understanding and prompt alignment.
What Marketers Can Do Now
Marketers should start thinking like models, anticipating and aligning with emerging prompt patterns. This involves creating content that resonates with multiple cohorts, building prompt libraries as creative guides, and monitoring AI-generated summaries for brand presence. The focus is no longer on page views but on being semantically retrievable by AI systems.
The Rise of Prompt-Native Brands
In the coming years, some brands will design their messaging strategies entirely around prompt behavior. These prompt-native brands will craft content to ride the wave of prompt clusters, ensuring their presence in AI-driven conversations. This could mean a shift away from traditional websites, with a brand’s entire existence embedded within AI interactions.
The marketing funnel hasn’t disappeared; it’s simply become invisible, integrated within AI models. Success in this new era requires aligning content with AI-determined stages and embracing the dynamic, context-driven nature of consumer engagement.
(Source: Search Engine Journal)
