The funnel has disintegrated: How can customers discover you organically today?

Search and Organic Media is changing. Evolving. Progressing. I’ve said as much at any conference over the past few years, and so has any other Organic Media expert worth their salt. Because it’s true. It always has been. And it’s important to keep on reminding our clients and the wider Marketing world about it. After all, non-brand commercial terms sent 27% less traffic to websites last year than they did in 2020 (Advanced Web Ranking Google Organic CTR Study, All Devices, 2025 vs 2020). It’s clear that the funnel has disintegrated. It’s no longer fit for purpose. And that’s been the case for a while now, but the emergence of AI has shone a bright light on the broken pieces scattered around. At Journey Further, our approach is not just to theorise, but to apply solutions rooted in data, so you have the best chance of steering customers down the winding path of discovery to choose your brand. Again and again. With that in mind, here are a selection of proactive actions you can apply to appeal to the people you want to be customers through your Organic Media strategy, and the machines that mediate that relationship. So that your brand can be found, understood, and chosen.  

Demonstrate earned proof: deprioritise owned claims

Earned media was always important. But it’s so much more important in this world where your audience is taking a scenic route from TikTok to Reddit to YouTube to Google, and back again. And in AI Search, your brand’s reputation precedes you. LLMs will surface and synthesise general consensus from trusted sources. 89% of AI citations come from earned media. So you need to think – “where can my brand earn the chance to be present?” – not just for the audience of a reputable publication, but so you can show up when your audience is searching in LLMs. And it isn’t just major news publications – consider your efforts to be present within the “trust archetypes” that LLMs favour: forums and review sites can be vital.  

Tap into your audience’s sources of influence

As much as that earned proof is immensely valuable, you also have to look at what organic platforms your audience spends their time on. Use tools like SparkToro to discover whether they’re seeking out inspiration from lo-fi TikToks, crafting boards on Pinterest or delving into long-form video on YouTube. And dig out the granular, anecdotal golden nuggets from Reddit that will help you prioritise the topics you should be talking to your audience about. The rewards are twofold:

• You can identify the touchpoints where you need to be present in order to guide your target demographic towards your brand real estate.
• If you’re present in a meaningful way across these, then you will also often be surfaced when your audience searches through traditional SEO or AI Search.

Proprietary tools such as our Salient Content Ideation Agent mean that we can discover insights from TikTok, Reddit, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook communities to fuel creative content strategies with bespoke prompts. Ensuring Discovery at speed.  

Consider what social content you’re serving up

Most social content is simply fast food for feeds. You hit that peak for a second. And then it will float into the Content ether. That is not to say it’s not worthwhile, but consider a balanced approach. Search optimised social content – be that on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram etc – is discoverable and evergreen. Specifically, longform and evergreen YouTube content may be slow, but it’s also immortal. Findable within that platform, but living beyond a moment when your target audience searches on traditional Google Search or LLMs.  

Map your customer’s journey down the winding road to Discovery

Ditch siloed channel activity. Think like an Organic Media Planner. That means:

• Auditing to understand where and why people search in a category
• Developing a robust content strategy that can be prioritised by platform-specific search demand, trending keywords and topical velocity
• Create video content for brands and influencers on the most opportune social platforms
• Report. Tweak. Repeat. Remember that journeys aren’t linear and influence isn’t equal

 

Automate to elevate

And finally, think about who should be doing the heavy lifting. In a world where it feels like a lot of your Organic success may be dictated by AI, take advantage of it. Look at what assisted workflows could help to automate the resource-heavy, time-sapping tasks. And that means your experts can actually focus on strategy to be more creative – augmenting and amplifying their skills. Giving them the time to plot the many different routes your audience will take to find your brand, and ultimately choose it.