The AIDA Model: How to Capture Attention, Generate Interest, and Drive Action
But is that all we want? Let’s turn your product into a sustainable growth engine for your business
As a product manager, product marketer, founder, or business owner, you know how challenging it can be to guide customers through their journey—grabbing their attention, keeping them engaged, and ultimately leading them to take action.
That’s where AIDA comes in.
Whether you're launching a new product, writing compelling ad copy, or improving your sales funnel, AIDA provides a structured way to move potential customers from awareness to conversion. This marketing framework has been used worldwide to increase engagement, reduce drop-offs, and optimise conversions.
What is AIDA?
AIDA is a classic marketing model that describes the stages a customer goes through before making a purchase. The acronym stands for Attention, Interest, Decision, and Action. Marketers and advertisers use this model to craft compelling messages that guide potential customers from awareness to conversion. Important for product managers and founders to understand.
Where did AIDA come from?
The AIDA model was first introduced in 1898 by Elias St. Elmo Lewis, an American advertising pioneer. Lewis initially proposed this model as a way to design effective advertisements that capture a prospect’s attention, maintain their interest, influence their decision, and encourage action.
This framework has since been widely adopted in marketing, sales, and digital advertising across multiple industries.
AIDA has been refined and adopted across various industries as a psychological framework for understanding consumer behaviour.
When to Use AIDA and Who Uses It?
AIDA is particularly effective for industries that rely on direct customer engagement, persuasive messaging, and conversion-driven marketing strategies. It is widely used in:
Advertising & Digital Marketing: Creating compelling ad campaigns that move audiences toward a purchase.
Sales Teams & Lead Generation: Structuring pitches and follow-ups to increase conversions.
E-commerce & Retail: Designing product pages and calls to action for higher conversion rates.
Content Marketing & Copywriting: Developing blog posts, landing pages, and sales funnels that drive action.
Breaking Down AIDA
1. Attention – Grabbing the Customer’s Focus
The first step is capturing the potential customer’s attention. In a world filled with constant advertisements and distractions, businesses must create eye-catching and engaging content to stand out.
Example:
A clothing brand might use bold visuals and striking headlines in its social media ads.
A tech company could grab attention with a surprising statistic about cybersecurity threats.
A SaaS company might publish a blog post titled “The One Tool Every Marketer Needs in 2024” and optimise it for SEO.
2. Interest – Keeping the Audience Engaged
Once you have the audience’s attention, you must sustain their interest by providing value—whether it’s educational content, engaging visuals, or intriguing storytelling.
Example:
A car company might highlight its new electric vehicle’s longer battery life and eco-friendliness.
A beauty brand could showcase before-and-after results of using its skincare products.
A healthcare company offering a diagnostic service might share expert-backed blog content and interactive quizzes to help customers assess their risk factors.
3. Decision – Convincing the Customer to Choose You
At this stage, the goal is to convince the potential buyer to consider making a purchase. Providing social proof, testimonials, comparisons, and guarantees helps customers feel confident in their decision. Similar to the Second Event that triggers a decision in the Wheel of Progress.
Example:
An online course provider might offer a free trial or money-back guarantee to reduce risk.
A luxury hotel might highlight customer testimonials and high ratings to persuade travellers.
A medical diagnostics provider could showcase success stories and physician endorsements to build trust.
4. Action – Prompting the Final Step
The final step is to prompt the customer to take action—whether it’s making a purchase, signing up for a service, or booking an appointment.
Example:
A streaming platform might use a “Start Your Free Trial” button.
An online store could use a “Buy Now” button with a limited time discount call-to-action.
A fitout business could use a “Book Your Free Consultation” button on its website to drive leads.
But we all know that real business value comes from repeat customers, repeat users. So you may have seen Retention become the fifth element of the AIDA model. More about that here
And if we’re really honest with ourselves, what is better than having your customers bring more customers and turning your product into a growth engine with Referrals and Recommendations and Rewards to motivate this behaviour in your biggest customers. Turning your customers into fans and an unofficial sales team?
Now that would not have been a problem that the advertising pioneer Elias St. Elmo Lewis would have had in 1898.
Retention, Referrals, Recommendations and Rewards is a problem that founders, product leaders, business owners and product managers will be thinking about to grow their business (and do it profitably) in a world where social media, review sites and recommendation engines are everywhere. Want to understand the drivers of this, come to the Product Growth Masterclass in April 2025 and build a growth engine that scales.
Examples of AIDA in Different Industries
Automotive Sales: Car dealerships use AIDA by running eye-catching TV commercials (Attention), showcasing the latest car features on their website (Interest), offering test drive incentives (Decision), and prompting immediate bookings (Action).
Technology & SaaS: A software company might use social media ads to attract users (Attention), highlight how their platform solves pain points (Interest), provide free demos (Decision), and include a compelling CTA like "Start Your Free Trial Today" (Action).
Hospitality Industry: A luxury hotel might use influencer marketing to gain exposure (Attention), share guest experiences and amenities (Interest), display high customer ratings (Decision), and offer limited-time discount codes for direct bookings (Action).
Real-Life AIDA Applications
Furniture & Fitout Business Using AIDA
Scenario: A business specialising in office furniture and interior fitouts wants to attract corporate clients.
Attention: Run a digital ad campaign with an eye-catching before-and-after office transformation video, along with SEO-optimised blog content that ranks for keywords like “best ergonomic office fitouts”.
Interest: Showcase ergonomic benefits, space optimisation, and custom designs through blog posts, case studies, and informative social media content.
Decision: Offer client testimonials, a free space consultation, and a portfolio of past projects to establish credibility.
Action: Use a clear call-to-action like “Book Your Free Consultation Today!” on the website and ads.
Healthcare Business Selling a Diagnostic Service Using AIDA
Scenario: A healthcare company offers a new early-detection screening service for diabetes.
Attention: Use infographics and shocking statistics about undiagnosed diabetes on social media (pinterest), paired with SEO-optimised content such as “How to Detect Diabetes Early” to attract organic search traffic.
Interest: Provide educational content on the benefits of early detection and how the service works through blog posts, expert interviews, and videos.
Decision: Highlight patient success stories, endorsements from medical professionals, and comparisons with traditional methods.
Action: Include a “Schedule Your Test Now” button on the website with a limited-time discount for first-time patients.Think this post is valuable? Feel free to share it.
Alternatives to AIDA
While AIDA is widely used, there are other frameworks that might suit specific business models better:
1. STDC (See, Think, Do, Care)
Developed by Avinash Kaushik at Google (2013), STDC focuses on different stages of a customer’s interaction with a brand:
See: The largest possible audience that may have an interest in your product or service.
Think: The segment of that audience actively considering a solution but not ready to act.
Do: The audience that is ready to make a purchase.
Care: Engaging existing customers for retention and advocacy.
AIDA is more structured for direct-response marketing, while STDC is better suited for broader brand awareness and ongoing customer engagement.
STDC is best for Content marketing and brand-building strategies. Learn more at See, Think, Do, Care Winning Combo: Content + Marketing + Measurement
2. PAS (Problem, Agitate, Solution)
This model is commonly used in copywriting and sales messaging:
Problem: Identify a pain point your audience is experiencing.
Agitate: Intensify the problem by highlighting its emotional or financial impact.
Solution: Present your product or service as the answer.
PAS is highly effective for emotional persuasion but lacks the structured flow of AIDA, which works across all types of marketing campaigns.
PAS is best for: Persuasive advertising, sales emails, and direct-response marketing. Learn more at PAS Copywriting Formula Explained With Examples
3. TOFU-MOFU-BOFU (Top, Middle, Bottom of the Funnel)
This model aligns marketing efforts with different funnel stages:
TOFU (Top of Funnel): Content that attracts new visitors (e.g., blog posts, SEO, social media).
MOFU (Middle of Funnel): Nurturing leads with educational content, webinars, and email marketing.
BOFU (Bottom of Funnel): Encouraging conversions with case studies, demos, and testimonials.
TOFU-MOFU-BOFU is best for content marketing and lead nurturing, whereas AIDA provides a clearer psychological journey for direct sales and advertising.
This is best for: Inbound marketing and lead nurturing. Learn more at Why Inbound Marketing is Necessary at Every Stage of the Sales Funnel
4. AARRR (Acquisition, Activation, Retention, Referral, Revenue)
Also known as the Pirate Metrics Framework, this model was developed by Dave McClure in 2007 to track customer behavior in startups
.
Unlike AIDA, STDC, PAS, TOFU-MOFU-BOFU, the Pirate Metrics Framework, or AARRR, starts to look at retention and referral and metrics good business people always track (and report on) - Revenue! It also starts to think about this from the customers perspective and asks how do we keep customers, how do we get them to bring other customers and how do we ultimately grow our revenue as a business.
Acquisition: Gaining new users.
Activation: Ensuring they experience the product's value.
Retention: Keeping them engaged.
Referral: Encouraging them to bring others.
Revenue: Monetising their engagement.
This is best for business growth, introducing new products, growing products and revenue growth strategies. Learn more at AARRR Pirate Metrics Framework or come along to my ICAgile Certified Product Management course and I’ll show you how to use this in practice.
Still…. we haven’t yet got to a way to think about the whole process from the customers' perspective. That is until you start to think about the real growth engine that drives a business.
First understanding the customer through their Job to be Done, unpacking it with the Wheel of Progress, designing a Customer Journey the user experiences through the product and creating self reinforcing growth loops that support Retention (and engagement), Recommendation, Referral and Revenue growth.
If you want to embed a growth engine into your product, contact me at irene@phronesisadvisory.com
Launching products is not enough.
Getting customers to join and trial your product is good.
Making sure you don’t have a leaky bucket of churning customers. Being able to turn a sale into multiple avenues for product growth and grow your product (and business) profitably.
This is better!
Now AIDA and other frameworks above are powerful and adaptable models for businesses and products looking to increase engagement and conversions. However, if you want to grow sustainably and profitably, designing a growth engine that utilises the best at each stage of the customer journey is crucial for solid growth.
I’m Irene Liakos. A product management and growth expert with over 2 decades of experience growing product profitably across Telco, Banking, Fintech, AI, Data, Travel, Ecommerce and more. I teach, coach and advise product managers and business leaders. Reach out to me if your products aren’t delivering the value you need for your business to grow. You can contact me at irene@phronesisadvisory.com
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