I had the privilege of hosting an extraordinary LeadsCon 2025 session last month, featuring Katherine Harvill, Vice President, Offline Marketing and Marketing Operations, Pennymac, and Kent Mora, Chief Marketing Officer, West Coast Dental. We tackled one of marketing’s most persistent challenges: building high-performing funnels that convert leads into loyal customers. In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, we explored how marketers must shift from tactical thinking to strategic funnel development, embracing multi-channel measurement while remaining medium-agnostic.

Our discussion emphasized the critical importance of developing comprehensive funnel playbooks, balancing top, and bottom funnel priorities, and continually testing assumptions while revisiting performance marketing fundamentals. What became abundantly clear throughout our session was that success requires both strategic vision and practical implementation – from conducting thorough funnel audits to establishing cross-functional workstreams that align marketing with broader business objectives. The insights we gathered were too valuable to keep within the conference halls, so I’m excited to share our collective wisdom including key takeaways and practical action steps for marketers to implement for funnel optimization for 2025 and beyond.

Key Takeaways from “Unlocking Growth: Building Out Your High-Performing Funnel Strategy” LeadsCon Las Vegas Session:

1. True Full Funnel Playbooks are Required for Optimal Success
2. Top vs. Bottom – Balance Priority and Validity
3. Start With Your Consumer Profiles & Personas (Primary, Secondary, Tertiary)
4. Critical to be Medium Agnostic, Not Biased by Past
5. Always be Testing
6. Shift Mindset from Tactical to Strategic
7. Measurement of Multi-Channel & Multi-Device Consumer Journey Must – No Perfect Model with All Answers
8. Revisit the Performance Marketing Principles & Fundamentals – Much Invaluable Today

Practical Action Steps for marketers to implement from “Unlocking Growth: Building Out Your High-Performing Funnel Strategy” LeadsCon Las Vegas Session:

1. Conduct a Funnel Audit – Map your current customer journey from awareness to conversion, identifying drop-off points, bottlenecks, and areas with insufficient measurement.
2. Evaluate Your Attribution Model – Assess whether your current attribution approach accurately reflects your business reality; consider running a pilot test of a multi-touch model if you’re currently using single-touch.
3. Create a Cross-Channel Testing Calendar – Develop a structured 90-day plan to systematically test messaging variations and channel optimizations with clear success metrics.
4. Establish Cross-Functional Workstreams – Schedule regular meetings between marketing, sales, and product teams to ensure alignment on funnel optimization priorities.
5. Build a Brand Impact Measurement Framework – Design a methodology to track how brand initiatives influence performance metrics like CAC, conversion rates, and retention.
6. Perform a Channel Efficiency Analysis – Calculate true cost-per-acquisition across all channels, accounting for both direct and indirect contributions to conversion.
7. Review Data Collection Practices – Ensure you’re capturing the right signals at each funnel stage to inform decision-making, especially for mid-funnel activities.
8. Develop Stage-Specific Content Strategy – Create targeted content that addresses customer needs at each funnel stage rather than one-size-fits-all messaging.
9. Implement Cohort Analysis – Start tracking how customer behavior differs based on acquisition source, campaign, and time period to identify successful patterns.
10. Create a Resource Reallocation Plan – Based on funnel analysis, determine which stages need additional investment and which may be over-resourced relative to impact.
11. Schedule Regular Funnel Reviews – Establish a cadence (monthly or quarterly) to assess funnel performance holistically and adjust strategy accordingly.
12. Document Learnings Repository – Create a centralized place to catalog insights from tests and optimizations to prevent repeating unsuccessful approaches.

Unlocking Growth: Building Out Your High-Performing Funnel Strategy. LeadsCon 2025 Key Takeaways and Practical Action Steps.

Karla Crawford Kerr, Vice President of Marketing, Hawthorne Advertising
Katherine Harvill, Vice President, Offline Marketing and Marketing Operations, Pennymac
Kent Mora, Chief Marketing Officer, West Coast Dental