Brand equity is what makes bottom-funnel marketing work harder
- samkarow
- Jan 20
- 2 min read
Most paid media teams are being asked to do two things at once:
✅ improve performance
✅ control spend for growth
But there is one lever that consistently makes performance marketing more efficient over time:
BRAND EQUITY.
Brand equity is not a “soft” metric. It is what reduces friction at the bottom of the funnel.
Two principles explain why:
1️⃣ Brand equity drives revenue and profit, not just awareness
Brand equity is directly measurable in commercial outcomes. In Kantar’s LIFT return on investment database, 28% of sales are attributed to brand equity generated by media spend.
And the upside goes beyond volume. Kantar’s Blueprint for Brand Growth, based on 6.5 billion consumer data points, shows that brands with stronger predisposition achieve 9 times higher volume share, 4 times higher likelihood to grow value share, and 2 times higher price paid, demonstrating how brand equity supports both revenue growth and margin.
2️⃣ Brand equity boosts conversion efficiency across the funnel
Brand-building is not limited to traditional channels. Evidence from Kantar’s Global LIFT+ database shows brand contributions from digital channels like YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, and online display have increased in recent years, reinforcing that digital can build equity, not only capture demand.
High-attention placements strengthen this effect. Kantar found Out of Home delivers a 13.3% increase in Ad Awareness compared to digital media, television, and connected television, highlighting how impactful environments create stronger memory structures that support downstream efficiency.
This efficiency lift is measurable. Avalaunch Media and Tracksuit (2025) found high-awareness brands achieve 2.86 times higher conversion rates from performance media than low-awareness brands, showing that upper-funnel brand building directly improves bottom-funnel outcomes.
-> Brand equity is what makes bottom-funnel marketing work harder.
When trust and meaning are already built, paid media is no longer trying to convince from zero. It converts latent demand.
This is the lens we use at Effective when translating research into media buying strategy: building brand equity deliberately, so performance outcomes become more efficient and scalable.
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