Nobody buys from a brand they’ve never heard of.

Yet…as marketers, we know it’s hard to get budget for those awareness programs, often considered a “nice-to-have”, or sometimes a flat-out waste.

But how are you supposed to get those meetings booked if no one has heard of you?

You don’t get pipeline without awareness.
You don’t get consideration without mindshare.
And you certainly don’t get chosen without showing up, early and often.

👇 Here’s a peek at how I set the awareness foundations inside a modern demand engine. 

Awareness is Good. Consideration is Better.

Impressions mean nothing if they don’t create recognition, trust, or recall.

Your job isn’t just to “get seen.” It’s to earn a spot in your buyer’s brain, so when they’re ready to buy, you’re already on the shortlist.

That means your awareness strategy has to go beyond brand colors and social cadence.
It has to match how buyers buy today.

And modern buyers?

They research on their own. And about once a week I mention that buyers do at least 70% of their research before engaging with sales.

They ask peers, search AI, listen to podcasts, scroll social.

They don’t want to talk to you, until they’ve already formed an opinion about you.

The 3 Types of Awareness Levers

To earn consideration, you need a strategy for presence, not just a lead gen plan. All programs aren’t created equal and don’t work in every situation, in fact some of these have opposing use cases. Consider your strategy and plug in what works.

Here’s how awareness programs break down:

1. Paid Awareness

• Channel examples: Sponsorships, paid social, content syndication, display, podcast ads
  

• Best for: Fast reach, guaranteed impressions, category design
  

• Watchouts: Often lacks engagement or clear signal quality
  

2. Organic Awareness

• Channel examples: LinkedIn, influencer marketing, founder/employee advocacy, events
  

• Best for: Building trust and community, long-term brand pull
  

• Watchouts: Slower, requires consistency and a strong POV
  

3. AI-Driven Awareness

• Channel examples: Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), custom GPTs, Perplexity visibility, schema/structured content
  

• Best for: Becoming discoverable where your buyers actually ask questions

• Watchouts: New territory, requires technical execution and messaging clarity

How You Know It’s Working

You can’t always track awareness linearly. But it shows up in powerful ways:

✅ Branded search volume
✅ Demo requests from “dark” channels
✅ Higher outbound response rates
✅ Inbound DMs and referrals
✅ “We’ve been following your content for a while…”

You don’t need perfect attribution to know it’s working.
You need pipeline momentum and buyer signals.

TL;DR

• Awareness isn’t about being everywhere. It’s about showing up where it matters.

• The demand you can’t trace is often what fuels the deals you can close.

• If you want to grow pipeline, start by earning attention before you see buyer intent signals.

👇 Want help building an awareness strategy that works?
I help startups with:

🎯 A Demand Diagnosis - uncover the leaks in your demand system - Book It Now

🔍 GEO Discovery Project - Make your brand discoverable in AI-powered search