As a advertising and marketing strategist for over a decade, I’ve at all times been fascinated by what makes folks click on, interact, and finally purchase. One framework I preserve coming again to is the AIDA mannequin.
I noticed it work brilliantly whereas scrolling via Instagram — a Duolingo advert stopped my thumb mid-scroll:
The enormous inexperienced owl mascot doing a trending dance grabbed my consideration.
The caption about “studying a language in 5 minutes a day” piqued my curiosity.
The feedback part stuffed with profitable learners sparked my want.
The “Obtain Now” button prompted rapid motion.
That is AIDA in motion. I‘ve used this similar framework to assist numerous manufacturers craft compelling messages that convert. Let’s discover the way it works and the way you should use it in your subsequent advertising and marketing marketing campaign.
Desk of Contents
What does “AIDA” stand for?
Let me break down this acronym in a manner that I’ve discovered resonates with each new entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
Consideration: Seize your viewers’s focus.
Curiosity: Maintain them engaged.
Want: Make them need what you provide.
Motion: Information them to take the following step.
I like to think about AIDA as a narrative that unfolds in your buyer‘s thoughts. It’s based mostly on the hierarchy of results idea, which means that clients transfer via every emotional stage earlier than taking motion.
In my expertise, AIDA works equally to a advertising and marketing funnel, with fewer folks at every subsequent stage. Nonetheless, I’ve observed two key variations:
AIDA is extra linear.
It focuses on psychological development relatively than simply buyer journey touchpoints.
Historical past of the AIDA Mannequin
As somebody who’s studied advertising and marketing frameworks extensively, I discover it fascinating that one in all our strongest advertising and marketing methods comes from the nineteenth century.
The AIDA promoting system was developed by eventual Promoting Corridor of Fame inductee Elias St. Elmo Lewis in 1898. To place this in perspective, this was when:
Advertising and marketing meant newspaper advertisements.
The quickest automobile reached simply 39 mph.
The phone was nonetheless a luxurious merchandise.
Why It Nonetheless Issues At present
In my expertise, these 4 parts — consideration, curiosity, want, and motion — stay elementary to profitable advertising and marketing. I’ve seen them work throughout each channel I take advantage of:
TikTok and Instagram Reels
AI-powered e mail sequences
Interactive touchdown pages
Immersive video content material
The AIDA mannequin constantly helps me create content material that draws and engages clients, generates leads, and closes offers.
What I discover notably outstanding is how this “old style” mannequin has tailored to fashionable advertising and marketing channels. Even in 2025, with generative synthetic intelligence and digital actuality changing into mainstream advertising and marketing instruments, these core psychological ideas proceed to drive shopper conduct.
How you can Apply the AIDA Mannequin to Your Advertising and marketing
I‘ve observed that the AIDA mannequin shares parts with nice storytelling. Even in the event you haven’t heard of the AIDA mannequin earlier than, there‘s likelihood you’ve naturally used it in your advertising and marketing supplies.
By bringing a little bit little bit of construction to your instincts, you possibly can create content material and design your web site with extra management over your prospects’ paths to a buying choice.
Right here’s a information to understanding and implementing every stage of the AIDA advertising and marketing mannequin.
1. Appeal to consideration.
In my AIDA promoting and advertising and marketing campaigns, I’ve discovered that selecting the best phrases sparks viewers curiosity. At this primary stage, your shopper is just asking, “What’s it?”
Notice that this step normally follows or overlaps along with your efforts to extend model consciousness.
Professional tip: I’m an enormous fan of beginning small by making lists of attention-grabbing phrases. Whereas AI instruments like ChatGPT may help generate concepts, I like to recommend avoiding phrases that aren‘t already in your vocabulary or don’t naturally suit your advertising and marketing copy.
For instance, when writing this text, I used HubSpot’s AI device to generate an inventory of 20 phrases that spark curiosity in advertising and marketing copy.
It returned phrases like “uncover” and “unique,” that are extensively relevant, but it surely additionally prompt “thriller” and “enigmatic” — neither of which I’d seemingly use until the service in query concerned a magician (and possibly not even then, however you understand your viewers greatest!).
2. Generate curiosity.
You’ve captured their consideration — now you must maintain it.
By way of my expertise, I’ve discovered that audiences wish to study extra about your model, the advantages of your resolution(s), and your potential match with them. At this stage of the AIDA mannequin, I deal with creating persuasive, thrilling content material that makes folks assume, “I prefer it.”
Professional tip: I‘ve realized that one of the simplest ways to generate curiosity is with a compelling hook. What makes your services or products distinct? In my AIDA promoting campaigns, I keep away from business jargon and clichés by being particular. I’ve discovered that audiences bear in mind tales higher than information and figures, so I lean closely on storytelling to create resonance.
To generate curiosity for my new small enterprise, a magician-staffed house-cleaning service that declutters your house with the flick of a wand (if solely!), I started with my record of curiosity-sparking phrases.
“Uncover the magic of a clear home” grabs the eye of individuals with messy homes, and “magic” suggests one thing distinct concerning the service.
3. Evoke want.
The purpose of this stage is to show that “I prefer it” into an “I would like it.”
You may accomplish this the identical manner social media influencers do: by constructing belief along with your viewers. You’re more likely to desire a product in the event you belief that the influencer really makes use of and loves it.
I‘ve realized to construct belief very similar to profitable social media influencers do. When an viewers trusts that somebody genuinely makes use of and values a product, they’re extra prone to need it themselves.
For my magical house-cleaning service, I can construct belief via empathetic content material that doesn’t alienate my messy potential clients. Listed here are some content material examples I’ve discovered efficient for constructing belief on this manner:
Earlier than-and-after images that commemorate progress, not perfection.
Fast organizing ideas that present rapid outcomes.
Buyer tales highlighting frequent challenges.
Weekly cleansing checklists for various dwelling sizes.
Time-saving cleansing hacks for busy households.
These kinds of content material assist construct want by displaying achievable outcomes whereas sustaining empathy with potential clients.
Adapt that to your individual model in your web site, publication, downloadable gives, and social media, and preserve serving content material that’s attention-grabbing, correct, and builds a rapport along with your viewers.
Obtain Now: Free AIDA Mannequin Template
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The prospects you’re most certainly to shut are the customers who envision a future with you — they already take pleasure in consuming your content material and assume your services or products might be even higher.
For that reason, you should show a niche between the place they’re now and the place they might be along with your resolution. On the similar time, you should set up social proof with case research and testimonials.
For instance, when advertising and marketing a mission administration device, I’d share how a advertising and marketing workforce went from lacking 40% of their deadlines to hitting 95% inside three months. Then, I would observe up with testimonials from the workforce lead about improved morale and consumer satisfaction.
Professional tip: I‘ve discovered that “earlier than and after”-style content material constantly performs properly within the want stage. Whether or not it’s screenshots of a productiveness dashboard, income development charts, or buyer success metrics, displaying tangible transformation helps prospects envision their very own potential success.
Instance: Calendly
One in every of my favourite examples of desire-building content material is Calendly’s case research about Des Moines Space Group School (DMACC): “How one school saved $170K final 12 months with Calendly.”
The case research follows the before-and-after precept completely: It reveals how DMACC reworked from having college students lined up out the door and coping with frequent double bookings, to a streamlined scheduling system throughout 12 areas.
The outcomes embrace a 4.5x ROI with $170,000 in price financial savings and a 100% lower in double bookings. Plus, it options sturdy social proof via quotes from an instructional advisor, making success really feel achievable for comparable establishments.
4. Spur Into Motion
After you generate sufficient want in your services or products, give your prospects the possibility to behave on it. The purpose is to remodel their want into motion and compel them to reply with low-friction however high-incentive calls to motion.
You need their “I would like it” to transform to “I’m getting it.”
Professional tip: I at all times make sure that prospects (regardless of the place they’re of their choice journey) can simply see the worth they‘ll obtain. Whether or not it’s a free trial, demo, or session, make the following step crystal clear and compelling.
For instance, after I create CTAs for software program merchandise, I’d use “Begin your free trial — see leads to 24 hours” or “Guide your demo to find time-saving options.” These CTAs clearly set up each the motion and the worth.
The hot button is making your CTA distinguished, clear, and uncomplicated. I at all times guarantee buttons or banners spell out precisely what motion to take and what worth they will obtain in return.
Instance: Nerdwallet
Supply
I typically level to Nerdwallet as a grasp of friction-free CTAs. Its bank card comparability device reveals what I search for within the Motion stage of AIDA.
Nerdwallet makes it simple for folks to take motion. Its homepage options two clear CTAs that serve totally different consumer wants:
“Evaluate bank cards” — for folks prepared to select.
“Discover Guides and Ideas” — for individuals who want extra info.
Every button is easy and clear, with a brief description displaying its worth. This method offers customers a selection based mostly on the place they’re of their choice course of.
AIDA Drawbacks
As a content material marketer who loves AIDA, I hate to confess that it comes with limitations. Sure, it is a helpful framework, however not all buying choices observe this neat, linear path.
Trendy patrons typically skip levels or enter the journey at totally different factors — for instance, discovering an answer whereas researching an issue, bypassing the eye and curiosity levels totally. The mannequin additionally would not handle what occurs after the motion stage, like buyer delight and retention.
In my expertise, in the present day‘s customers anticipate ongoing engagement and assist. That’s why I at all times advocate viewing AIDA as half of a bigger development technique. I’ve discovered that combining it with different fashions, just like the flywheel, creates a extra full method to advertising and marketing and buyer relationships.
Utilizing the AIDA Mannequin within the Period of AI
As somebody who works with each conventional frameworks and new expertise, I typically get requested about AIDA’s relevance in 2025. Whereas AI may appear to make linear fashions out of date, current analysis reveals the other is true.
The most recent research reveal AI considerably enhances AIDA’s effectiveness via:
Improved gross sales efficiency by way of AI-driven suggestion engines and personalised advertising and marketing.
Optimized advert spend and automatic buyer interactions that cut back acquisition prices.
Enhanced buyer satisfaction and loyalty via predictive analytics.
More practical useful resource allocation based mostly on detailed marketing campaign efficiency knowledge.
AI-powered content material manufacturing that may be tailor-made for every AIDA stage.
Chatbots and digital assistants that information clients via the acquisition journey.
I’ve seen these insights play out in my very own work with AI and AIDA. Let me present you ways I apply them at every stage.
AI-Enhanced Consideration
I take advantage of AI content material turbines to check a whole bunch of headline variations, whereas sentiment evaluation identifies which emotional triggers seize consideration most successfully. For instance, after I examined social media posts, AI-optimized headlines constantly elevated click-through charges by pinpointing patterns in high-performing content material.
AI-Pushed Curiosity
Giant language fashions now assist create personalised content material paths. When a prospect engages with particular subjects, AI analyzes their conduct and routinely serves related content material that maintains their curiosity. I’ve seen engagement charges double utilizing this method.
Knowledge-Knowledgeable Want
AI analytics instruments observe consumer interactions throughout a number of touchpoints, serving to determine precisely when curiosity transforms into want. This helps me perceive which content material mixtures create the strongest emotional connections. As an illustration, I take advantage of GPT-4 to investigate buyer critiques and determine the precise options and advantages that drive buy intent.
Automated Motion Optimization
Trendy AI instruments constantly check and refine CTAs, routinely adjusting button placement, coloration, and duplicate based mostly on real-time efficiency knowledge. They’ll even personalize the ultimate conversion step based mostly on the shopper’s journey, displaying totally different gives to totally different segments.
What excites me most about combining AI with AIDA is the way it makes this basic framework extra dynamic and responsive whereas sustaining its core psychological ideas.
Utilizing the AIDA Promoting Framework
After spending years making use of the AIDA mannequin to numerous advertising and marketing campaigns, I‘ve come to understand its enduring relevance. Even in 2025, 127 years after Elias St. Elmo Lewis first developed it, I nonetheless discover it remarkably efficient for understanding and enhancing the client’s journey.
What I‘ve realized is that whether or not you’re utilizing subtle AI instruments or crafting conventional advertising and marketing campaigns, AIDA’s elementary ideas of human psychology stay unchanged. It continues to assist me create extra partaking, persuasive, and efficient promoting that converts audiences into clients.
Editor’s word: This publish was initially revealed in October 2018 and has been up to date for comprehensiveness.
