The Marketing Pinball Analogy: Why Multiple Touch points Matter
Have you ever played a pinball machine?
If you grew up before the 1990’s you would remember these. You pull back the spring, launch the silvery ball and hope for the best. Sometimes it bounces exactly where you want it to. Other times it ricochets off bumpers you weren't aiming for, disappears down tunnels you didn't even notice and somehow ends up somewhere completely unexpected. The funny thing is, after years of working in marketing, I've realised customers behave exactly the same way.
One of the biggest misconceptions I see business owners make is believing that people buy in a straight line. We love the idea of a neat marketing funnel because it makes everything feel predictable. Someone sees an ad, visits your website, downloads an e-book, books a meeting and becomes a client. It's clean, measurable and looks fantastic on a whiteboard. Unfortunately, that's almost never how people actually make buying decisions.
I realised this years ago when I started asking every new client the same question.
"How did you hear about us?"
At first, the answers seemed straightforward. Most people would say they found us through the website, a Google search or LinkedIn. If I'd stopped asking questions, I would've accepted those answers and assumed I knew exactly where my marketing was working. Instead, I'd ask one more question.
"How did you find the website?"
That's when the real story would emerge.
I remember one client telling me they'd found me through my website. After chatting a little more, they suddenly remembered they'd actually seen me present at an RMIT MBA lecture almost five years earlier. Nothing happened after that presentation. Years passed. Then one day they saw one of my LinkedIn posts, remembered my name, searched for my website and got in touch.
According to the CRM, the lead came from the website.
In reality, it came from a presentation, a social media post, a Google search and years of familiarity slowly building into trust. If I'd only looked at the last click, I would've completely misunderstood how that client actually found me.
That's the pinball machine.
People don't move through your marketing in the order you expect. One person might hear you speak at an event before reading your blogs. Another might discover your business through Google, disappear for six months and then come back after seeing a client testimonial on LinkedIn.
Someone else might ask a friend for a recommendation, visit your website, watch a few videos and quietly follow your content for months before ever introducing themselves. Every customer takes a different path because every customer builds trust differently.
I think that's where many business owners get stuck. We spend so much time trying to optimise funnels that we forget we're dealing with human beings. Humans don't all think the same way, so why would they all buy the same way?
Some people trust credentials. They want to know your experience, qualifications and track record before they engage you. Others trust personality. They want to watch your videos, hear you speak or get a feel for whether you're someone they could genuinely work with. Some people are convinced by case studies and testimonials, while others simply trust a recommendation from a friend. None of those approaches are right or wrong. They're simply different ways of reducing uncertainty before making a decision.
Over the years, that's changed the way I think about marketing. Instead of trying to force people through a perfectly designed funnel, I focus on giving them more opportunities to get to know us. Every blog becomes another touchpoint. Every podcast interview, webinar, LinkedIn post, client story, video and speaking engagement gives someone another chance to build confidence in what we do. I don't know which piece of content they'll discover first, and honestly, I don't need to.
One mistake I see regularly is businesses creating one destination and expecting that to do all the heavy lifting. They build a website, publish a few social media posts and then wonder why enquiries aren't coming in. The problem isn't usually the website. It's that there aren't enough touch points around it. If someone isn't ready to buy the first time they find you, where do they go next? Is there a blog that answers their questions? A podcast they can listen to on the drive home? A webinar that gives them a deeper understanding of your expertise? The more ways people can explore your business, the more opportunities they have to develop trust in their own time.
That's why I encourage business owners to keep creating, even when it feels like the results aren't immediate. Marketing often feels invisible because trust builds quietly. Someone might read an article today, watch one of your videos next month and hear your name mentioned by a colleague six months later. None of those moments seem particularly significant on their own, but together they create the confidence someone needs to finally reach out. By the time they contact you, they're often not discovering your business for the first time. They're simply acting on trust that has been building for much longer than you realise.
The beauty of the pinball analogy is that it reminds us we don't control the customer's journey. We can't decide which piece of content they'll consume first, how long they'll spend researching us or what finally convinces them to make contact. What we can control is the machine itself. We can keep creating valuable content, keep showing up consistently and keep giving people reasons to trust us. The more touch points we create, the more opportunities we give someone to bounce around, learn about our business and eventually decide we're the right fit.
So if you're wondering why your marketing isn't generating more enquiries, don't just ask how many people are visiting your website. Ask yourself how many opportunities you're giving people to build trust before they get there.
Because customers rarely buy after one interaction. They buy after enough interactions to believe you're the right person to help them.
