Navigating the Shift from Lower-Funnel Success to Upper-Funnel Investment

Navigating the Shift from Lower-Funnel Success to Upper-Funnel Investment: Why Accurate Measurement is the Key to Growth Beyond Clicks

Many brands have perfected the art of lower-funnel marketing—mastering platforms like Google and Facebook to drive direct sales. However, as brands look to scale, the question becomes: how do we continue to grow beyond the lower funnel while managing rising customer acquisition costs (CAC)? The answer lies in upper-funnel investments, but the transition is often hindered by a critical challenge: measurement.

The topic of expanding into upper-funnel channels like Connected TV (CTV), podcasts, and direct mail take center stage in a number of conversations we have with brands. These discussions often underscore an essential truth for all growth-driven brands—without accurate measurement across the entire marketing funnel, upper-funnel investments can feel like a leap of faith.

Here’s why accurate measurement is the foundation for making strategic media investments and how it can unlock growth beyond clicks.

The Lower-Funnel Trap: Why Success Here Isn’t Enough

Many successful brands see strong results from their lower-funnel activities. Channels like Google Ads are highly measurable, and if a company needs a sale, they know how to get it. But, lower-funnel marketing is becoming increasingly expensive as competition for bottom-funnel conversions increases.

For brands to continue growing, they must look beyond last-click channels. Investing in upper-funnel tactics such as CTV, linear TV, and podcast ads can generate new demand and build brand awareness. However, these channels don't offer the immediate feedback loop that lower-funnel channels do—making it difficult for brands to know whether their investment is truly driving results. This creates hesitation among marketing leaders and skepticism at the board level.

Why Measurement is Critical for Upper-Funnel Investment

Rockerbox specializes in solving this exact problem by providing a comprehensive view of the entire marketing funnel, from upper-funnel awareness activities down to direct-response conversions. While Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and its data-driven attribution (DDA) model are popular tools for tracking performance, they fail to capture the full picture—especially for non-click-based media like CTV or direct mail.

“You want to make sure that the path to conversion you’re basing decisions on is as close to accurate as possible,” CEO Ron Jacobson said in a recent call. “If your data set is incomplete, your decision-making will be flawed.”

Upper-funnel channels don’t often generate clicks, and yet, they play a crucial role in driving long-term growth. Impressions, view-through conversions, and indirect site traffic are all part of the customer journey, but they can be missed by traditional analytics tools that rely heavily on click-based measurement.

Rockerbox’s Approach: Capturing the Full Customer Journey

Rockerbox’s platform stands out by aggregating data across all touchpoints, from clicks to views, ensuring marketers can accurately measure the impact of their upper-funnel campaigns. Rockerbox ingests data from channels like CTV, podcasts, and direct mail, integrating it into a single view alongside click-based data to provide a holistic understanding of performance.

This capability allows brands to:

• See which channels drive users to their site, even if no direct click occurred.
• Measure the true impact of upper-funnel tactics by incorporating view-through data from platforms like Facebook, Criteo, and Hulu.
• Attribute conversions more accurately by using multi-touch attribution (MTA), which assigns value to each touchpoint in the customer journey—not just the last click.

Rockerbox’s approach ensures that marketers are not flying blind when investing in upper-funnel channels. Without a solution like Rockerbox, brands risk investing in channels that may appear to deliver no ROI, simply because the full picture of their impact isn’t being captured.

The Role of Multi-Touch Attribution and MMM

One of the key decisions for brands expanding beyond lower-funnel marketing is whether to adopt multi-touch attribution (MTA), media mix modeling (MMM), or both. A common concern we see mentioned in sales calls: Is MTA a natural “walk before you run” approach, or should brands jump straight to MMM?

Rockerbox offers both solutions, but we generally emphasize that MTA provides a more granular, daily view of marketing performance, making it an ideal tool for brands navigating the transition to upper-funnel investments. MMM, on the other hand, is a longer-term approach that considers external factors like seasonality, competitors, and promotional periods. The two methodologies work best together.

“We recommend running your media mix model and using it to calibrate your daily decision-making framework,” Ron said. “It’s not a day-to-day measurement tool, but it gives you a valuable historical perspective that can guide your daily optimizations.”

For brands, MTA can provide immediate feedback on upper-funnel campaigns, while MMM can offer strategic guidance based on long-term trends and broader market conditions.

Bridging the Gap: How to Prove Upper-Funnel Success to Your Board

One of the biggest hurdles in expanding into upper-funnel channels is convincing the board or leadership team to approve the investment. Upper-funnel marketing often requires a significant budget, and without the right measurement tools, it can be difficult to prove its value.

Our recommendation? The earlier you start to get data, the earlier you can start to make informed decisions.

Conclusion: Accurate Measurement is the Key to Unlocking Upper-Funnel Growth

For brands, moving beyond lower-funnel marketing is the next logical step to sustain growth. But to invest confidently in upper-funnel channels, accurate, comprehensive measurement is critical. Rockerbox’s ability to capture the entire customer journey, from upper-funnel impressions to lower-funnel conversions, ensures that brands have the data they need to make smart, informed decisions.

If you’re ready to move beyond the lower-funnel trap and start investing in long-term brand growth, Rockerbox can help you get there by providing the measurement tools you need to make every marketing dollar count.