DTC961: Holiday Social Media, BFCM Meta Recap, and Boxing Day Strategy

Good morning,

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

• 🧑‍🎄 Make Your Holiday Social Media Strategy A Value Add
• ⚡ Smart Pivots That Crushed During BFCM
• ❗ Add This Line To Your PDPs to Build Trust

‍🎁 Holiday Momentum Is Taking Off On Roku. Harness Shoppable Ads And Capture More Sales

The shopping season doesn’t dip after Black Friday… it takes off. 🚀

🎄 Early December is a high-intent discovery and conversion window, especially for last-minute shoppers. It’s a vital time to meet your buyers where they already are.

📈 Roku reaches 90M streaming households, and consistently sees record hours of viewing during the post-Thanksgiving period and weeks leading into Christmas. These holiday viewers are tuning in with a hybrid entertainment + shopping mindset.

👀 They’re browsing, researching gifts, and making purchases while streaming, and Roku’s shoppable Action ads and seamless Shopify integration lets them make purchase decisions directly from their TV screen. 📺

Want even better results? Run exclusive offers inside Action Ads to capture peak streaming attention and drive higher engagement and conversions. 💥

🛍️ Don’t drop the ball. Keep the holiday sales soaring.

‍🧑‍🎄 Consumers Are Looking For Holiday Inspo…

Customers aren’t just scrolling right now. They’re actively looking for gifting ideas and holiday inspiration.

With 86% of consumers planning to shop online this season, the opportunity isn’t to simply post more.

It’s to make your brand feel like part of the holiday experience.

When your organic presence reflects the energy, rituals, and emotions of the season, you build affinity that directly impacts Q4 sales.

Pilothouse shares ways to show up organically this holiday season:

1️⃣ Refresh your visual identity: Update your Instagram and Facebook cover images with festive, brand-aligned creative.

Brands like Sephora, Starbucks, Lululemon, and Jo Malone have all done this to break creative fatigue and give both organic and paid traffic a fresh visual touchpoint.

2️⃣ Join holiday conversations: Ask seasonal questions in IG Stories. Share employee traditions or spotlight customer holiday moments.

On X, post holiday-themed visuals and join broader hashtag conversations.

On Pinterest, build seasonal boards that showcase your products in real holiday contexts.

Focus on building community, not just holiday selling.

3️⃣ Show behind-the-scenes moments! Lean into the highly visual, personal nature of the holidays.

Share snapshots from your brand’s celebrations, limited-edition products, or seasonal production moments.

💡 Encourage customers to share their own photos using your products in holiday settings.

The takeaway?

Customers aren’t just discovering brands through ads.

They’re scrolling, searching, and engaging across Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and X all day long.

When your social content reflects seasonal moments, rituals, and emotions, you increase touchpoints, strengthen brand recall, and prime shoppers for conversion throughout December and into Q5.

‍

‍🚀 Kick Off Your Holiday Campaign With a Win. Roku’s Gifting You $5K To Double Your Impact

This holiday season, it’s time for your sales to heat up. 🔥

📺 Roku gets your brand into 90M streaming households, right as viewers are starting their holiday shopping in full force. Roku users are watching an average of 3.5 hours per day, creating sustained reach for holiday campaigns, right when it counts. 🛍️

💵 Even better, your gift from Roku this year? Get $5K in ad credit when you spend your first $5K with Roku Ads Manager with code GET5K. Terms apply.

👀 Get your brand in front of viewers during peak streaming season on America’s #1 TV streaming platform with advanced targeting, shoppable ad formats, and real-time insights all in one convenient dashboard.

👉 Don’t miss this limited-time offer.

‍🎧 BFCM + Meta in 2025: Shorter Promo Windows and Scrappy Pivots That Crushed

Jacob and Jocelyn from the Pilothouse Meta team break down what actually moved the needle for Meta advertisers this Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

The biggest unlock? Being scrappy.

The brands that crushed it weren’t over-optimized; they were just fast.

Quick to tweak offers. Quick to drop weird creatives. Quick to kill what wasn’t working.

What you’ll learn:

• Why classic percentage-off offers still worked best
• What BOGO and free shipping offers actually drove performance
• How scrappy creative (like stick figure drawings) outperformed polished ads
• Why lighter audience exclusions won this year
• Which account structures flopped and what replaced them

▶️ Watch the full episode on YouTube here.

🎧 Or click here to listen on Spotify.

Customers are shopping now but also feeling nervous about the growing number of online scams.

Ease their worries with just one line.

Add this messaging to your PDP pages. It instantly makes your brand look legitimate and justifies pricing even if shoppers find cheaper options elsewhere.

‍📺 Streaming time on Roku continues to spike post-BFCM weekend. Will your brand be there? It's not too late to set up your CTV ads ahead of the holidays with Roku Ads Manager. Sign up here. *

‍📥 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.

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.