Most marketing is designed to move people through a system. Attract them at the top. Capture their email. Nurture them through a sequence. Convert them at the bottom.
It works. The metrics prove it. But it also feels exactly like what it is—a machine designed to extract value from attention.
Here’s a different approach: Build something people actually want to return to.
The idea isn’t to optimize the journey or gamify the experience. What a generous business wants to accomplish with marketing is creating a place that is worth being, worth visiting. A newsletter they open without dread. A blog they bookmark and come back to. A presence they trust enough to forward to their team.
That’s not a funnel. That’s a front porch.
Funnels Extract. Front Porches Attract.
A funnel is transactional by design. You map the stages. You measure drop-off rates. You A/B test the CTAs. The goal is to move someone from stranger to customer as efficiently as possible. Nothing wrong with that—it’s just inherently built around extraction.
A front porch is different. It’s a place where people stop by because they want to, not because you engineered the path. Some stay for five minutes. Some stay for an hour. Some come back every week. You’re not pushing them through stages. You’re just making it worth their time to be there.
The distinction matters because funnels optimize for conversion, and front porches optimize for return. One measures success by how many people move through. The other by how many people come back.
What This Looks Like in Practice
A front porch is a posture.
It’s a weekly newsletter that teaches something useful without a sales pitch at the end. It’s a blog where the writing is clear and the ideas are honest, not dressed up in SEO keywords and empty promises. It’s a LinkedIn presence where you share what you’re learning, not what you’re selling.
The format doesn’t matter. The feeling does.
When someone lands on your content, do they feel like they’re being moved through a system? Or do they feel like they found something worth their time?
If it’s the latter, you’ve built a front porch.
Why This Matters Now
People have gotten very good at detecting when they’re being funneled. They see the pop-up. They skip the gated white paper. They ignore the “limited-time offer” that shows up every week. They’ve been conditioned to recognize extraction disguised as value.
But a front porch is different. A front porch doesn’t demand anything. It just offers a seat. And if that seat is comfortable—if the conversation is good and the people who gather there are worth knowing—they’ll keep coming back.
How to Build One
The shift is simpler than you think.
Stop asking “How do I convert them?” and start asking “How do I serve them?” What does your audience actually need? What would make their day easier or their thinking clearer? Start there, not with the sale.
Show up consistently, not urgently. Funnels thrive on urgency—limited spots, act now, don’t miss out. Front porches thrive on rhythm. Same time. Same place. Same quality. People return to what they can count on.
Make it easy to leave. Unsubscribe link at the top. No guilt trips. No “Are you sure?” If someone doesn’t want to be there, let them go. The ones who stay will be the right ones.
Be useful without an agenda. Not every piece of content needs a CTA. Some just need to be worth the reader’s time. Trust that value compounds.
The Long Game
Funnels are built for speed. Front porches are built for longevity.
Funnels optimize for this quarter. Front porches build relationships that last years. And here’s the part most people miss: front porches convert better than funnels. This isn’t because they’re designed to, but because trust compounds faster than urgency ever could.
When someone has been reading your work for six months—nodding along, forwarding your posts, quoting you in meetings—they don’t need a seven-email nurture sequence when they’re ready to buy. They already know you. They already trust you. The sale isn’t a conversion. It’s a continuation.
That’s the front porch advantage.
The Question Worth Asking
Is your content a place people want to be? Or a place they’re being moved through?
Are you building trust, or engineering urgency?
Are you serving your audience, or extracting from them?
The funnel works. But the front porch lasts.
Build something people want to come back to. Not because you’ve optimized the path, but because the conversation is worth having.
That’s the shift.
That’s the porch.