DTC930: Big Q4 Win With Results, Social Proof, and Refresh BFCM Ads

Good morning,

Here’s what you’ll find in today’s DTC:

🤨 Dealing With Skeptics
How social proof helps with brand building.

🏆 Achieve Massive Q4 Growth
Four proven ways to grow (plus real results).  

🚀 Drive Growth with CTV Advertising
Vibe unlocks growth for THC brand Cantrip.

🧠 Don’t Start From Scratch…
You need to refresh your ads instead.

You’re reading this newsletter along with new subscribers from: Cosatto, Essential No.9, and KickIt Pajamas. 👋

🤔 Not Sure If Your BFCM Strategy Is Missing Something? Don’t Find Out The Hard Way.

Join an upcoming strategy session with Klaviyo to make sure your business is really ready for the Q4 rush. 💯

🎯 They’re sharing expert recommendations and last-minute moves to help you drive more revenue, build more loyalty, and fill in any gaps you’ve missed in your peak-season plan.

Save your spot today to get in on:

• ✅ Best practices and checklists for deliverability, acquisition, flows, and sending strategy
• ☝️ Timely tips to make the most of peak-season prep
• ⚡ Conversation and inspiration from marketing pros and industry peers

It’s now or never. Make sure you’re set up for the success you deserve.

Are you in?

🎧 No One Trusts You (Yet): Why Social Proof Matters More Than Ever

We all know that social proof builds trust, but few brands know how to actually use it to drive performance.

Aves from Pilothouse shares how social proof isn’t just about collecting nice reviews. It’s about engineering trust across every touchpoint of the funnel.

She shares how social proof helps with your brand rep and how every comment is potential ad copy.

Here are five reasons why your next winning campaign might start with your customers, not your creative team: 👇

1️⃣ Social proof makes your first impression feel safe

First-time buyers don’t know you. The quickest way to close that trust gap?
Show them other people already made the leap.

A review or UGC testimonial is proof that you deliver on what your ads promise.

“Reputation is more important for brands than ever. Social proof makes a first-time customer comfortable clicking buy.”

2️⃣ It converts better than “new creative”

Marketers love fresh ad creative, but the truth is, reviews outperform headlines more often than you think. Social proof gives your message context, not just color.

Instead of saying “Our deodorant lasts 72 hours,” show a real quote:

“I didn’t have to reapply after a full weekend at Coachella.”

That’s conversion copy you didn’t have to write.

3️⃣ It belongs throughout your funnel, not just your PDP

Social proof isn’t a bottom-of-funnel tool. It’s a multi-touch asset.

• Top of funnel? Use reviews to introduce your product benefits with credibility.
• Middle? Use testimonials to overcome objections.
• Bottom? Let UGC show what ownership looks like.

The best DTC brands layer social proof the way they layer retargeting, intentionally.

4️⃣ Comments are content gold

Stop deleting comments and start categorizing them. Whether they are hilarious, skeptical, or just supportive, they all serve a purpose.  

• Skeptical comments make space for your community to respond.
• Supportive comments boost credibility.
• Funny comments give your ads a human edge.

5️⃣ It’s your reputation insurance

When you consistently showcase real customer voices, social proof compounds.

Each positive review strengthens the next.

👉 Listen to the full episode with Aves here.

‍⏰ Agentic AI Is Completely Transforming Commerce. Here’s What That Actually Means For You

🚀 The rise of agentic AI is transforming how people discover, decide, and buy, and most brands aren’t ready for what’s next. 💥

👀 Swap’s latest report, 10 Reasons Agentic AI Is the Future of Commerce, breaks down how AI agents will reshape product visibility, payments, and consumer trust across the entire shopping journey. 🛍️

Inside, you’ll learn:

• 🤖 What agentic AI actually means for commerce
• 🔍 How to optimize for GEO (Generative Engine Optimization)
• 💳 Why payments are going agent-native
• 📈 10 reasons to act now

Don’t let the future leave you behind.

‍💰 Q4 Meta Win: Scaling Smart, Not Just Spending More  

Last Q4, the Pilothouse Meta team helped a DTC alcohol brand achieve massive growth on paid social, scaling spend by over 40% while increasing revenue by over 90% year-over-year.

How?

A strategy wasn’t just about spending more. It was about smart structure, creative testing, and audience alignment that turned performance into profit.

Here were the results 👇

Q4 YOY Meta Platform Data:

How Pilothouse Drove Growth

1. Campaign Structure

The team leaned heavily into Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns (ASC) for new customer acquisition.

• ASC campaigns delivered a 4.48 7DC ROAS on $208.6K spend, well above account average.
• These campaigns accounted for over half of total spend, efficiently scaling reach and return.

2. Targeting Strategy

• Broad targeting outperformed narrower interest segments.
• By letting Meta’s algorithm find high-value shoppers, Pilothouse maximized efficiency without over-segmentation.

3. Creative Testing

• The team tested a range from scrappy UGC-style content to polished brand visuals.
• Surprisingly, warehouse-style static images outperformed video, showing that authenticity still wins attention.

💡 For Q4 2025, Pilothouse recommends testing “contrast ads” (mixing raw and refined creative) to reach new audiences effectively.

4. Product and Offer Testing

• Having a product and offer that resonates with your audience is key. The team implemented structured product testing, and leveraged bundling and in cart upsells to boost AOV on top SKUs.

The takeaway?

Scaling during Q4 isn’t about cranking budgets. It’s about finding the creative, targeting, and product mix that compounds results.

By building data-backed campaign structures and staying nimble with creative testing, Pilothouse helped this DTC brand dominate the most competitive ad season of the year.

Want These Results for Your Brand? Space is filling up quickly at Pilothouse, but we have a couple of spots left for Meta clients.

‍🎧 CTV for DTC: How Cantrip Drives Measurable Growth with Vibe’s Audience‑First Strategy

In this DTC Podcast episode, Arthur Querou, CEO of Vibe, and Adam Terry, founder of Cantrip, join the show to discuss how performance-driven CTV advertising is helping DTC brands (even ones in regulated industries) to unlock scalable and measurable growth.

Adam shares how Cantrip, a THC beverage brand, achieved 3–4x ROAS within weeks of testing CTV, while Arthur breaks down how Vibe’s identity-first model is changing how brands approach TV advertising.

In this episode, we dive into:

• CTV as a Performance Channel: Vibe is redefining connected TV by focusing on identity-first targeting rather than inventory-first buying.
• Winning in Regulated Categories: Cantrip communicates openly about its product on CTV in ways that Meta and Google restrict, driving higher conversion efficiency.

“On Vibe, I can just run an ad that says, ‘Hey, I sell weed. Come to my website.’ ”

• Attribution and Incrementality: How brands can track not just direct conversions but also the halo effect across other channels.
• The Future of CTV Advertising: Arthur predicts that 95% of TV ads will soon be AI-generated, enabling hyper-personalized messaging at scale.

👉 Listen to the full episode with Arthur and Adam here.

Instead of making more BFCM ads, try refreshing proven ones.

Here’s how: Take your top-performer, keep the core body, and swap in a new urgency-driven hook.

Olly Hudson shares that visual variety is key when it comes to succeeding on Meta.

If your ad looks too similar to others in your account, it won’t scale.

Refresh to drive incremental reach without wasting spend.

‍🔥 NexGrill, an outdoor cooking and heating brand, joined Walmart Marketplace in 2022. With access to millions of customers, zero monthly fees, and powerful ecommerce tools, they grew from a small startup to a global brand in just two years. Join now. *

‍📥 Got a B2B Biz?

Join dozens of B2B companies finding demand-gen success through our niche community of 150k brand leaders and founders this year. Talk to our team to learn more.

Have you heard our latest podcasts?

• 💸 TWBERP 56: The Four Stages of The Website Purchase Funnel
• 🧢 How Dad Gang Scaled to 700K Hats Sold With Same Playbook
• 📈 AKNF 552: Use Amazon As Part of A Unified Growth Strategy
• ✅ Ad-venturous 24: Q4 Sale Ad Best Practices
• 🦃 TWBERP 55: Talk Turkey; The Q4 Email Gut Check
• 🌿 WYNX Engineered Explosive Growth In a Regulated Environment

Don’t forget to rate the DTC Podcast on Apple (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

DTC Newsletter is written by Rebecca Knight and Frances Du. Edited by Eric Dyck.

Please note that items in this newsletter marked with * contain sponsored content.