Sarah Levinger's Trigger → Exploration → Evaluation → Purchase framework for choosing ad formats by psychological state (with Ridge ring examples), how to weight the mix by business goal, and Dara Denney's awareness-level expansion (unaware → product-aware).

Matching formats to the buyer’s state (T-E-E-P)

TL;DR

Ads are served to brains in mindless-scroll mode that resist clicking away; choose the creative stack for the psychological state of the viewer, not trends or the founder’s taste.¹²
T-E-E-P (from a Google digital-purchase study): Trigger, Exploration, Evaluation, Purchase; most brands only run creative for two of the four.³
Weight the mix by goal: top-of-funnel → trigger formats (consider link-click/traffic optimisation); sales growth → evaluation + purchase; cost reduction → formats the team makes at top quality.⁴⁵
Tag every inspiration ad with its T-E-E-P phase so the swipe library is browsable by state.⁶

Details

The four phases and their formats:⁷⁸⁹

Phase	Viewer state	Job	Formats
Trigger	pre-aware, hasn’t searched	name the moment; “feel seen, not sold to”	relatable micro-moment ads, surprising stats
Exploration	knows the problem, curious, low commitment	earn the right to say more; talk about the industry	short video, visual hooks, memes, ASMR, generation-matched authority (e.g. dermatologist)
Evaluation	comparing, skeptical	evidence about us	testimonials, before/after, education, case studies, comparison tables
Purchase	card in hand	remove friction, let them buy	offers (50% off, free gift), long-form, founder ads

Ridge rings example: trigger — “3 out of 4 men misplace their wedding band”; exploration — “he finally wears his ring after seven years of marriage”; evaluation — a comparison table (Sarah has run table ads for ~6 years and “never seen them not work”); purchase — the offer.⁹¹⁰

Weighting by goal. Top of funnel needs a wide net: short-form, pattern-interrupt, novelty; spread the rest evenly. Growth needs depth, proof, specificity, trust — not short hooks. For cost reduction, quality is a cost reducer: the best possible story, relatable content that attracts identity-aligned (cheaper) customers.⁴⁵

Inspiration sources by state: Motion inspiration library, Meta Ad Library (30+ days running is a signal, but some brands keep decoy ads alive to mislead competitors), TikTok Creative Center, GA content paths and heatmaps, YouTube analytics drop-offs, and 30–60 min/week of organic scrolling every Monday. CTR “lies sometimes” — check which creative actually drove purchases (post-purchase surveys).¹¹¹²¹³

Awareness levels (Dara Denney). Level 2 of Creative diversity after Meta Andromeda — the five levels: unaware → problem-aware → solution-aware → product-aware need different messaging. Iteration idea: take a winner and move it further up-funnel (more educational, humorous, curiosity) — it almost always extends its life.¹⁴¹⁵

Disagreements / caveats

Sarah would put top-of-funnel on organic (cheaper, feeds ads) — her strongly held view, outside most strategists’ control.¹⁶
Dara counters that up-funnel isn’t always right: in a crowded category go solution-aware (see Diagnosing an ad account's creative gaps before producing new ads).

Matching ad formats to the buyer's state — the T-E-E-P framework and awareness levels

Matching formats to the buyer’s state (T-E-E-P)

TL;DR

Details

Disagreements / caveats

See also

Matching ad formats to the buyer's state — the T-E-E-P framework and awareness levels

Matching formats to the buyer’s state (T-E-E-P)

TL;DR

Details

Disagreements / caveats

See also

Footnotes