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DTC NEWSLETTER
DTC

Saturday, June 26, 2021

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Google announced that theyโ€™re delaying Chromeโ€™s blocking of tracking cookies until 2023.

Marketers everywhere:

And weโ€™ve got more good news. In this newsletter, youโ€™ll find:

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๐Ÿ‘€ An update on iOS 14.5 and what our team is seeing.

๐Ÿค“ How to get the right data at the right time to make the right decisions.

๐ŸŒฑ Sustainable initiatives that will increase cart conversions, AOV and customer loyalty.

๐Ÿ‘ฉโ€๐ŸŽจ How to negotiate creative fatigue on TikTok.

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Read till the end to access exclusive DTC swag. ๐Ÿ˜Ž

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๐Ÿ‘‰ If a pal forwarded this to you, subscribe so you never miss out. And be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram.

Facebook

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iOS 14.5 makes roller coasters look like a walk in the park.

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With all the twists, turns, and drops weโ€™re all feeling a little queasy. Take a deep breath, the Pilothouse team has you covered.

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A little backgroundโ€ฆ

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Facebook uses a pixel system (now with their Conversions API) to track sales that happen on a site.

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Itโ€™s dynamic and powerful in tracking user journeys with the brand and through the consideration period / funnel.

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Historically, the pixel (say a year ago) would track roughly 85โ€“99% of total sales in Shopify, if set up correctly.

The latest update: ๐Ÿ‘‡

Over the past couple of weeks, we've seen the pixel continue to receive events from Shopify. However, we've seen a reduction in the number of events processed, with the remainder being discarded.

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Review your purchase Event Overview for a breakdown of your pixel events.

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Some brands are reporting < 60% of total Shopify sales being processed on the pixel, even when the CAPI integration is set up.

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The Challenges:

Facebook only models 1-day click sales, so brands with greater consideration on, say, 7-day click are likely running into greater processing issues when Facebook attempts to process events or use them for measurement and optimization.

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With a sharp decline in processing of events, a significant portion of sales likely aren't being attributed to ads.

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Where that user piece comes in is how the opt-out portion affects it directly, since some users also arenโ€™t having sales attributed within this.

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๐ŸšจThis can negatively impact your businessโ€™s bottom line if you pull back your spend where you shouldnโ€™t, lean into what you know as a marketer and donโ€™t rely heavily on the algorithm โ€“ which could be heavily affected as well.

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Knowing your overall store numbers and looking closely at sources like Google Analytics are more important than ever.

Sponsor

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Attest can provide you with the right data at the right time to make the right decisions.

Use Attest to connect with your target audience and:

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Goodbye doubt, hello growth!

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Facebook

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Your iOS 14.5 Check-List

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โœ… Run gap analyses for your brands to understand how channels are being affected by ad spend and where the drop actually is โ€“ performance VS. attribution.

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If you're looking for a cool hack to see how Facebook and Shopify are working together for your brand specifically, follow these steps:

  1. In events manager, toggle to your pixel, and review the number of sales you see listed for the purchase event - This represents the total events processed.
  2. Click on the purchase event, click the button that says "view details."
  3. On the pop-up that appears, click "event overview." Now, compare the "events received" on Conversions API with your total sales in Shopify over the same time period. This will show how many sales the pixel is registering in total.
  4. Compare the total events processed you gathered in step 1 with your total sales in Shopify. This will show you approximately how many sales are being processed or eligible to be attributed to ads.

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โœ… Double check your CAPI set up.

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โœ… Run post purchase surveys to understand how users learned about your brand. Weโ€™re seeing cases where the survey results are exactly the same even while FB ROAS looks down.

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โœ… Identify your best place for a source of truth

  • Analytics runs last click attribution in many of the UTM reports available, so itโ€™s not perfect.
  • You can review how those numbers compare between Facebook and GA over time, and see if you notice big gaps in attributed revenue month over month or week over week as a factor of your traffic cost to understand your "required conversion rate" for your target ROAS or CPA.
  • Comparing your spend efficiency VS. total revenue in your CRM / Shopify will give you an understanding of whether efficiency has decreased to get similar results โ€“ there is a performance factor here.

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NOTE: Facebook is adding modeling to 7-day click towards the end of the month in a CAPI 2.0 update. Weโ€™ll keep you updated on that! ย 

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Understanding the iOS 14.5 changes is the most important thing you need to know this month to forecast where your DTC business is going.

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Still have questions? Weโ€™ve got you.

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Pilothouse has the data and the direction. Come find us.

Google

By typing {keyword:default text} into your ad copy/headlines, you can tailor your ads to the exact search terms people are looking for.

For example, if someone is searching for "quality womens watches," and you own a watch company, the headline would read:

Shop (insert company name) ย {KeyWord:Watches}

The capitalization of keywords directly affects which parts of your headline are capitalized.

The resulting ad would read: (insert company name) Quality Womenโ€™s Watches.

Sponsor

Grow Big by Growing Green

Establishing your brand as a champion of sustainability is table stakes, especially for eCommerce brands. ๐ŸŒฑ

As consumers become more aware of their personal carbon impact, online shopping is fast-becoming a clear contributor to climate change for these eco-conscious buyers. A whopping 92% of consumers are more likely to trust companies with ethical and sustainable practices.

Enter EcoCart, the free eCommerce plugin that captures and converts consumers who are seeking more sustainable options.

EcoCart shares tried and true strategies on eco-friendly growth in their Guide for Using Sustainability to Unlock eCommerce Growth.

Itโ€™s jam-packed with case studies and best practices on how to implement sustainable initiatives that will boost cart conversions, AOV and customer loyalty.

Look for: ๐Ÿ‘€๐Ÿ‘‡

  • A breakdown of Millennial and Gen Zโ€™s commitment to sustainability.
  • Why eCommerce needs to take note of eco-conscious consumer sentiment.
  • How to turn the eCommerce landscape green.
  • Case Studies on how it pays to be a more sustainable brand.

Read EcoCartโ€™s guide to join the sustainability movement, improve customer loyalty, and increase conversions.

Podcast

We're back with Spencer, Pilothouse's lead TikTok buyer, to learn more about the killer ad platform.

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The highlights from the pod:

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๐ŸคณTop-notch content is the number one driver of performance on TikTok.

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High-quality creative thatโ€™s native to the app can run for months.

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"Quality creative" means something different to every brand. Our team noticed that high production videos with a lot of graphics donโ€™t perform as well.

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Like other platforms, users flag it as an ad and scroll past.

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Scrappy content or content that appears scrappy is the most successful.

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Videos that are fast-paced, cleverly edited, in sync with the music, have a storyline and are emotional perform best.

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๐Ÿง Attribution model changes on TikTok

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To improve tracking, TikTok recently changed from a single session attribution model to 7-day click 1-day view (the same as Facebook).

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Our team is still unpacking the new system, but so far they feel really positive about the update! If youโ€™ve noticed anything or have any questions, give our team a shout!

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๐ŸŽจ Negotiating Creative Fatigue

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This is the main difference between Facebook and TikTok.

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On Facebook you can put out ten campaigns, consolidate it down to one, and work on your messaging. You can compound on top of each other.

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On TikTok, you arenโ€™t able to consolidate your campaigns because creative fatigue will set in and your campaign will diminish as youโ€™re trying to scale up.

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As your creative begins to under-deliver, itโ€™s important to have a bank of content ready to go.

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From each test campaign, create multiple slight variations of your winner and put that in another scale campaign so things are overlapping.

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When your content does diminish and drop off, take that same creative and throw a new headline on it, put it in your open campaign with a bunch of ad sets and it can have a second life (if the content is good).

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๐ŸŽง Listen to the entire pod!

Brand Spotlight

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Meet Omsom! ๐Ÿœ๐Ÿ˜

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This DTC brand was founded by first-generation Vietnamese American sisters, Vanessa and Kim Pham.

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They started Omsom to bring proud, loud Asian flavors to your fingertips any day of the week.

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How it works: Cook restaurant-quality Asian dishes at home in under 30 minutes with their starters. ๐Ÿ”ฅ

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An Omsom starter is a pantry shortcut for a specific Asian dish, combining all the sauces, aromatics, and seasonings you need.

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Omsom provides the recipes โ€“ just bring your own protein + veggies to the party!

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Their collection of delicious starters include flavors like Lemongrass BBQ, Spicy Bulgogi, and Japanese Yuzu Misoyaki. ๐Ÿคค

Take a look๐Ÿ‘‡:

M & A

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๐ŸŽง Amazon is acquiring a podcast hosting and monetization platform.

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๐Ÿ’ฅ BuzzFeed agrees to go public via a SPAC.

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๐Ÿค“ Eyeglass brand Warby Parker confidentially files for IPO.

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๐Ÿฉบ Intrinsic gathers $113M for health and wellness acquisitions.

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๐Ÿคณ Creator tools startup Spore raises $1M to build closer bonds between influencers and their fans.

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๐Ÿฅ— Salad chain Sweetgreen files IPO.

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๐ŸŽถ Music licensing marketplace Songtradr raises $50M.

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๐Ÿ—ƒ Sanity raises $39M for its "use-anywhere" approach to content repositories.

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๐Ÿ”Š Have you heard our latest podcasts?

๐Ÿšฝ Goodwipes Co-Founder Sam Nebel Chats Influencer Strategies.

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๐Ÿ˜… How iOS 14.5 Will Affect Google and Facebook Ads.

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๐Ÿ›’ Olipop's Eli Weiss Goes Deep on Customer Experience.

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DTC Newsletter is written by Thomas Schreiber, Eric Dyck, and Sadie Evans.

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