funnel

plural funnels

1. A utensil in the shape of an inverted hollow cone terminating in a narrow pipe, for channeling liquids or granular material; typically used when transferring said substances from any container into ones with a significantly smaller opening.
2. A passage or avenue for a fluid or flowing substance; specifically, a smoke flue or pipe; the chimney of a steamship or the like.
3. abbreviationellipsisfigurativelybusinessEllipsis of purchase funnel (“the process of customer acquisition conceptualized as a series of stages, from initial awareness (top) to sale or conversion (bottom)”).

   top of (the) funnel marketing

   awareness stage marketing

   1 more example

   Then there's the funnel. Marketing usually spends most of their time at the top of the funnel with a quantity strategy. On the other hand, Sales spends their time trying to convert, accelerate, or close accounts that are in the middle or bottom of the funnel.

   2019, Chris Golec, Peter Isaacson, Jessica Fewless, Account-Based Marketing: How to Target and Engage the Companies That Will Grow Your Revenue, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 41

4. abbreviationellipsisclimatologyEllipsis of funnel cloud.

present singular third person funnels · US participle present funneling · UK participle present funnelling · US participle past funneled · US past funneled · UK participle past funnelled · UK past funnelled

1. transitiveTo use a funnel.
2. intransitiveTo proceed through a narrow gap or passageway akin to a funnel; to condense or narrow.

   Expect delays where the traffic funnels down to one lane.

   1 more example

   2014, Paul Salopek, Blessed. Cursed. Claimed., National Geographic (December 2014)https://web.archive.org/web/20150212214621/http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2014/12/pilgrim-roads/salopek-text A line of clocks in our cheap hotel displays the time in Lagos, Bucharest, Kiev: the capitals of pilgrims who come to kneel at the birthplace of Christ. In reality the entire world funnels through the Church of the Nativity.

3. transitiveTo channel, direct, or focus (emotions, money, resources, etc.).

   Our taxes are being funnelled into pointless government initiatives.

   3 more examples

   Like so many others, I was awestruck by the first season, which captured a moment in time and successfully funnelled its rage outwards at a world in which women are indeed silenced, controlled and killed by men.

   2018 June 16, Fiona Sturges, “Cattleprods! Severed tongues! Torture porn! Why I’ve stopped watching the Handmaid’s Tale”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 05 Feb 2020

   The Soviet Union had a substantially larger land army, considerably larger than NATO and the U.S.,” Sharpless said. […]So, one strategy was to block various access routes and perhaps funnel them into an area where you could use larger weapons against them.

   2019 January 7, Paul Srubas, “His job was to place atomic bombs. Place them, not drop them. Set the timer. Run like hell.”, in Green Bay Press-Gazette

   He was alive to every creak and dunt, the thinness of the walls, as if the tenement block was a kind of aural panopticon that funnelled every sound to the other residents, let everyone eavesdrop on their business.

   2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 274

4. transitiveTo consume (beer, etc.) rapidly through a funnel, typically as a stunt at a party.

   The first time he did it was to this freshman Kevin Ryers and we all just burst out laughing, watching Kevin try to funnel a beer.

   2013, Jonathan Caren, The Recommendation, page 31

plural funnels

1. alternativeAlternative form of fummel (“hybrid animal”).