As I was walking down one of the aisles in Wal-Mart the other day, I noticed a wide range of cornflakes – some new brands placed alongside the older ones. This led me to think about the Marketing Management course that I had studied in my MBA, especially the AIDA concept espoused by Philip Kotler.

AIDA is an abbreviation for

A – Awareness (for eg., that a iPhone exists)

I – Interest (that iPhone has n features and its good to have)

D – Desire (I totally want to own a iPhone)

A – Action (I buy a iPhone)

AIDA framework is generally used in the field of products, services and advertising. I extended the concept here to relationships in my overdrive.

That translates to -

A – Awareness that you exist

I – Interested in you. I gotta check compatibility and stuff, but in general conversations etc, I like you and am interested.

D – The entire set of checks and balances, due diligence, compatibility etc. done from my side. I totally desire you and want to be with you.

A – Action, essentially, Proposing.

So, how does this framework work out? Let me explain with an example.

Awareness is the easiest part. I know her. She knows me. For simplistic purposes, let’s assume we meet once in a while and have each other’s phone numbers through which we converse regularly.

Interest is where I try to determine whether she is a good fit or not – in terms of emotional and compatibility issues, interests, general view of life etc. A relationship can only go forward if both parties (that is, me and her) are atleast in this phase. If I determine that the girl is not interested in me, nor do I have a chance in hell in the future, I can cut my losses by not investing any more of my time and effort in further pursuing this girl. At any rate, even if she says ‘I don’t know’, I will atleast know that I have a chance if I can invest time and effort to convert the ‘I don’t know’. People usually jump from Interest to Action, a critical mistake and in which case success rate might not be that high.

Desire – For a relationship to be successful, atleast one of the parties should quickly move to this phase. This is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the relationship to go forward. In this phase, one party would have invested pretty heavily and hopefully he would have had the girl in the ‘I’ phase. Pursuing her through the right means will lead her into ‘D’ phase. Subsequently, move in to the ‘A’ phase.

Action – As much as you think she is in ‘D’ phase, proposing would take guts. Apart from the minute fear of rejection (rarely, unless you have misread her to be in ‘D’), there is also a factor of how, when and where to propose. Easier said than done, but not as ambiguous as the ‘I’ and ‘D’ stage. This along with Awareness stages are very clear in terms of expectations and results.

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