DTC986: Meta’s Creative Testing Feature, Tech Stack, and Painful Lessons

Good morning,

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

• 🔥 How This Streetwear Brand Grew 80% With These Shopify Apps
• 👀 Seeing This New Testing Feature in Your Meta Account?
• 🥲 A Painful But Necessary Lesson for Founders

You’re reading this newsletter along with new subscribers from: Pip & Nut, Richer Sounds, and HydraPak. 👋

‍💯 Your Ecommerce Confidence Score

There’s a gap between what you think is working and what’s quietly costing you money.

Most operators don’t see it until it shows up in their numbers.

This 2-minute Ecommerce Confidence Assessment shows you exactly where those gaps are.

Built on insights from 50,000+ ecommerce brands and tailored to how you actually work: media buyer, retention, CRO, creative, or ops.

After you finish, you'll see:

Your Confidence Profile
Where you’re moving decisively vs. where hesitation is slowing growth

Your blind spots
The specific gaps in your current workflow

Your next moves
AI-powered playbooks used by 8-figure brands, matched to what you’re missing

Some problems stay invisible until you put a number on them.

‍🎧 Balance Spend Between Test and Scale Ads

Ever get caught with a campaign that’s spending 90% of its budget on 1 ad, while the other ads aren’t seeing the light of day?

Meta feels your pain, and they’ve been rolling out a newer testing feature in some ad accounts.

It’s called “creative testing” and is available at the ad level for some advertisers.

The Pilothouse Meta team has started testing it with a few brands, and the team is passing along setup info:

1️⃣ ​Create a new ad and scroll down to Creative Testing.

2️⃣ Then click Set up test. You’ll be prompted with the following options to build out 2-5 more ads for the test and decide how much of the daily budget should be allocated to the new test ads that you’re including in the test, along with duration and a KPI.

Once you click confirm, the algorithm will start dedicating a portion of your daily budget to these ads while continuing to deliver your top performers.

​Overall, this helps with balancing spend between test and scale ads all within 1 campaign – a pretty powerful tool as we get deeper into testing with Andromeda at the forefront.

If this is in your account, give it a test and find new creative winners this month.

‍💥 The AI Workflows Behind 8-Figure Growth

There’s a big gap between playing with AI and running it inside your business.

This playbook shows you what 8-figure ecommerce teams are using right now.

It includes the exact AI agents, prompts, and workflows behind brands like LSKD, Dixxon, Origin, and Pressed Juicery.

Inside, you'll see:

• How Dixxon cut creative analysis from 5 hours to 10 minutes (169% ROAS lift)
• The workflow that caught $100K+ in affiliate fraud at LSKD
• How Origin drove $450K in incremental Klaviyo revenue with one hour of setup

Confidence comes from using strategies you don’t have to guess at.

‍🔥 Inside Stadium Goods’ Explosive Growth  

Stadium Goods has grown from a Soho sneaker boutique into one of the world’s most respected online marketplaces for rare and authentic sneakers and streetwear.

Acquired by Farfetch in 2019, the brand site draws loyal collectors worldwide and generates nearly $5 million per month through its Shopify storefront.

Shopify reports conversions for this brand grew 80% in 2025.

Here’s some tools they use to fuel the scale:

1️⃣ Shopify Inbox: Shopify Inbox powers real-time customer communication directly on site and via mobile.

By centralizing live chat and automated responses, Stadium Goods can resolve purchase questions instantly, reducing friction and supporting higher checkout completion.

This capability strengthens customer confidence in big-ticket buys where authentication and rarity are top concerns.

2️⃣ GSC Countdown Timer: Scarcity fuels sneaker culture, and the GSC Countdown Timer visually amplifies time-sensitive offers and restocks.

Strategically placed countdowns create urgency around limited and rare releases and sale events, driving FOMO and faster decision-making.

3️⃣ Criteo Sales Growth Ads: This tool extends Stadium Goods’ reach beyond organic traffic with personalized retargeting and high-intent audience acquisition.

By reminding past visitors of items left in cart or highlighting relevant products, it significantly boosts return visits and purchases, complementing the brand’s strong organic pull.

Want another brand broken down? Reply with a name 👀

Most first-time founders waste months building the wrong thing.

It’s a painful but necessary lesson.

Buyer psychologist Katelyn Bourgoin says talking to customers matters more than building in isolation.

The goal isn’t to ask customers what to build but to deeply understand their frustrations.

Once you anchor your product around meaningful, high-stakes problems, you dramatically increase the chances people will actually pay for the solution.

‍🤔 You know about your brand performance but do you know what you're missing? This 2-minute quiz finds your ecommerce confidence score. Take the quiz. *

‍📥 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.