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This all started during a recent strategy call with a client. They asked a familiar question:
"How do we make sure our paid campaigns cover all stages of the marketing funnel?"
Our answer? Brutal but honest:
"The marketing funnel is dead. The faster you let it go, the better."
Naturally, that raised eyebrows. Panic followed:
"Wait… if we can’t rely on the funnel, how do we measure results? How do I prove my value as CMO?"
If your role depends entirely on funnel metrics, yeah, you might want to brace yourself. But don’t worry. We never drop a truth bomb like that without a roadmap. Let’s unpack what comes next, and why Google’s Messy Middle might just be the model you’ve been waiting for.
For a long time, the marketing funnel made everything feel clear-cut. People moved from awareness to consideration to purchase as if they were following a script. It gave marketers a sense of control. Each step was easy to map, measure, and optimize.
But that tidy framework doesn’t reflect reality anymore. Buyers don’t move in straight lines. They jump between channels, revisit options, compare, and often make decisions without ever touching your lead form. Search engines, social proof, and self-education now shape most of the journey.
So no, saying “the funnel is dead” reflects how chaotic modern buying behavior has become. Google captured this shift in what they call the Messy Middle, a phase where people bounce between exploration and evaluation over and over before deciding.
In this post, we’ll cover why the funnel no longer serves B2B SaaS marketers, what the Messy Middle means for your campaigns, and how ideas like the 95-5 rule and Dark Social offer a more realistic way to build trust, visibility, and long-term impact.
The Funnel Was Built for a Buyer That Doesn’t Exist Anymore
The traditional funnel made sense in a world with limited channels and even more limited information. Buyers had fewer options, fewer distractions, and fewer ways to explore on their own. But that world’s gone.
Today, buyers move on their own terms. They jump between channels, gather info at their own pace, and often disappear for weeks, only to return when they’re ready to decide. Some skip steps entirely. Others spend months looping between research and comparison. There’s no neat progression anymore, because the journey isn’t linear, and frankly, it never really was.
And look, we get it. Many B2B SaaS marketers still rely on the funnel for reporting, attribution, and strategy. It’s structured, familiar, and easy to present. But if your metrics and tactics are based on a model that no longer reflects how people actually buy, something’s bound to break.
Let's ask a LLM:
Think about how a typical B2B SaaS buyer moves through their journey. They might first notice a paid ad or sponsored post on LinkedIn that introduces your product. They visit your website to learn more, but don’t convert immediately. Instead, they download a whitepaper, read a blog post, and then disappear for weeks.
Later, they might come back after seeing a competitor’s ad, getting a referral from a colleague, or stumbling across a mention on Reddit. Or maybe they never engage with your brand again.
Buyers skip stages, revisit content multiple times, or abandon their initial interest altogether. While the funnel assumes every lead moves neatly from awareness to decision, in reality many prospects bounce between exploration and evaluation, looping in and out without a clear progression.
A Shift in Consumer Behavior
Research confirms what many marketers already sense: 80% of the B2B buyer’s journey now happens without any salesperson involved. Buyers spend more time on their own - researching, reading reviews, and comparing options - before they ever talk to sales reps.
For SaaS and tech marketers, this shift is a wake-up call. The old funnel model doesn’t capture how complex and unpredictable buying decisions have become. Your prospects are exploring, evaluating, and revisiting options across multiple channels and touchpoints.
If you want to stay ahead, you need to rethink your strategies. Meeting buyers where they actually are means embracing this new journey, not just where you hope they’ll be in your funnel.
The 95-5% Rule: Why Most Leads Will Never Convert
Here’s a hard pill to swallow: most of your leads were never meant to convert. That's not a critique of your marketing efforts but a reflection of the reality in B2B SaaS and tech.
The 95-5% rule is a harsh but necessary truth. In simple terms, it means that 95% of the leads you generate will either be too early in their buying process, completely out of your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile), or simply shopping around. Only 5% of your leads are ever truly “ready” to convert. But those 5%? They don’t stay that way forever. They’ll eventually enter the Messy Middle, and when they do, you need to be there to help them make a decision when the time comes.
This changes everything about how we measure success. Marketers have been stuck counting conversions: MQLs to SQLs, demos booked, deals closed. But those numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. The real question is: how well are you staying connected with the 95% who aren’t ready to buy yet?
You’ve probably heard the saying, “Not every lead is a qualified lead.” That’s exactly what the 95-5% rule is all about. It’s a reminder not to pour all your energy into bottom-of-the-funnel metrics. Instead, focus on engaging the other 95%, whether that means educating them slowly, providing helpful content they can explore on their own time, or simply staying top of mind as a solution they might need down the road.
The Dark Social: The Unseen Path to Conversion
There’s a hidden part of the buyer’s journey that’s tough to track, but often where the most meaningful interactions happen. This is what marketers call Dark Social: private sharing through email, direct messages, or closed communities that traditional tools just can’t see.
Let's say you publish a new blog post or whitepaper and share it on social media. You can track likes, clicks, and shares, but what you don’t see is how that content gets passed around privately. Someone emails it to a colleague, another shares it in a Slack channel, and someone else posts it in a private LinkedIn group.
All these private shares drive more engagement and downloads, but none of it appears in your analytics. That means a big chunk of your influence is invisible, making the classic funnel even less reliable.
Understanding Dark Social means accepting that much of the buyer’s path happens off the grid. As marketers, we need to find ways to account for these hidden interactions if we want to connect and convert effectively.
What Falls into the Dark Social
The Dark Social consists of content shared through private channels — places that can't be tracked by traditional marketing tools. Some examples:
- Private Messaging Apps: WhatsApp, Slack, Facebook Messenger — when a person shares a link with a colleague, it doesn’t show up in your analytics.
- Email Sharing: Someone copies a link to your content and sends it to a group of people via email. You won’t see these shares in your data.
- Word of Mouth: Conversations that happen in person or over the phone, where people recommend your product or content, but never publicly share it.
- Closed Communities: Private Slack groups, niche forums, or groups on LinkedIn, where recommendations are made and content is shared behind closed doors.
What is Google’s Messy Middle Theory
Google’s Messy Middle describes the chaotic, unpredictable space between first hearing about a product and making the final purchase decision. It’s a way to understand how buyers behave today, which is far messier and less linear than traditional funnels suggest.
In this phase, buyers aren’t fully searching or ignoring your product, they’re somewhere in between. They bounce around, exploring options, reading reviews, comparing features, and gathering information. Google breaks this down into two parts: Exploration, where buyers research and consider options, and Evaluation, where they narrow choices and weigh pros and cons.
For B2B SaaS companies, this means the old playbook, top-of-funnel ads pushing for quick conversions, doesn’t cut it anymore. Buyers spend months or even years in this Messy Middle, especially when decisions involve multiple stakeholders and long sales cycles. According to Forrester, 55% of B2B buyers won’t engage with sales until they’ve done significant research on their own.
If you’re still stuck on the traditional funnel, you’re missing key opportunities to connect with prospects as they explore and evaluate. To win today, you need continuous, targeted engagement that adapts to this back-and-forth journey.
Psychological Triggers at Play
Buyers are driven by psychological triggers throughout their decision-making journey. These triggers often push them to evaluate options in ways that aren’t entirely rational, causing them to make emotional decisions as they gather information and weigh their options. Here are some of the most impactful psychological triggers that influence buyers, pushing them through various stages of their journey.
1. Social Proof
People tend to follow the crowd. The opinions, behaviors, and experiences of others can strongly influence one's decision. Positive reviews, user-generated content, testimonials, or high ratings from customers can push buyers toward a purchase. For example, reading positive software reviews on platforms like G2 can convince a potential customer that the product is reliable and trustworthy.
2. Scarcity
The fear of missing out (FOMO) plays a huge role in decision-making. When consumers see that an item is in limited supply or a promotion is time-sensitive, it triggers urgency. For instance, a website might display a message like “Limited time offer,” encouraging customers to act quickly. This mostly happens with low-ticket SaaS.
3. Framing
How information is presented can heavily influence decisions. The same product or service can seem more attractive depending on whether it’s framed as a "premium offering" or a "limited-time deal." For example, a software package priced at $6k/year might be more appealing when framed as "less than $16 a day" rather than $500 per month.
These three triggers can create irrational decision-making, making consumers loop back between exploration and evaluation stages as they get pulled by emotional triggers.
Integrating the Messy Middle, 95-5% Rule, and Dark Social into a New Marketing Framework
The Messy Middle challenges us to ditch the old funnel mindset. Instead of pushing leads through fixed stages, marketers need to meet buyers where they are, at every touchpoint, every step of the way. Buyers don’t move in a straight line, so your job is to offer support, insights, and guidance as they explore and evaluate.
The 95-5% rule is a reminder not to chase every lead equally. Focus your energy on the 5% who are ready to buy now, but don’t ignore the other 95%. With consistent, meaningful engagement, those early-stage prospects can become customers down the line.
Dark Social adds another layer. Your content needs to be valuable, something people want to share privately through emails, chats, or closed groups. Even if you can’t track those shares, you’ll feel their impact when referrals start rolling in. That’s the power of trust and word-of-mouth in private spaces.
For B2B SaaS marketers, it’s time to rethink content sharing. It’s not just about public likes or shares, it’s about creating whitepapers, blog posts, or videos that speak to real problems and inspire private conversations. The more shareable and useful your content, the more your customers become organic evangelists. To get a better handle on Dark Social’s impact, consider exploring hybrid attribution models.
Why You Need to Adjust Your KPIs for This New World
Traditional metrics like MQLs and SQLs just don’t cut it anymore. The Messy Middle isn’t about how fast someone converts, it’s about how much value you’ve provided along the way. How engaged, educated, and trusted your prospects feel matters far more.
So, what should you track instead? Start with engagement. Forget obsessing over conversion rates for a moment. Sure, conversions matter, but engagement is where the story unfolds. Are prospects reading your blogs, watching videos, or coming back after downloading a whitepaper? These actions show they’re investing time and interest in your brand.
There’s no straight line from awareness to purchase. Buyers explore, compare, and evaluate over a long period. Your focus should be on how often prospects engage with your content and interact across channels. These behaviors build trust and relationships that eventually pay off.
Engagement is about relationships. B2B SaaS buyers are deliberate and research-driven. You’re not just nurturing them to buy now; you’re cultivating a long-term connection. That means tracking Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV) and how well you nurture prospects over time.
The real game-changer? Behavioral insights. Titles and company size still matter, but knowing what your prospects do, what pages they visit, questions they ask, if they revisit demos, tells you far more. These signals show where they are in their journey and what they really need from you.
Conclusion
If there’s one key takeaway, it’s this: the marketing funnel is dead. B2B SaaS marketing has evolved, and so must the way we engage with leads.
The real action happens in the Messy Middle, where buyers bounce between stages, revisit content, and rethink their options. Your role is to stay visible, relevant, and supportive throughout this unpredictable journey.
The 95-5% rule reminds us that most leads aren’t ready to buy right now—but they’re still valuable. By focusing on engagement and relationship-building, you prepare those 95% to become customers down the road.
And don’t overlook Dark Social: the private, untracked conversations where trust and influence truly grow. If you’re not tapping into this hidden channel, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity to connect and convert.
