DTC1007: Meta Bug Alert, Value Outside Product, and Know Your Audience

Good morning,

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

• 🚨 Meta Bug Alert: Stop Bot Traffic and ROAS Drops
• 🪙 Highlighting The Value Outside of Your Product Itself
• ❌ Don’t Make This Common Mistake When Creating New Ads

You’re reading this newsletter along with new subscribers from: Zoum Zoum Party, Pogo Energy, and Macomb Powersports. 👋

‍⏳ Only Days Left: Will AI Recommend Your Brand—Or Someone Else’s?

When consumers ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or other LLMs what to buy, they aren’t browsing.

They’re choosing from the brands AI recommends. Want your brand in the running?

Triple Whale’s telling all in their AI Visibility for Ecommerce webinar on February 18th at 1pm EST.

Search has evolved.
SEO gets you ranked.
AEO (AI Engine Optimization) determines whether AI names your brand at all.

Join Triple Whale experts and agency partner Elk to learn:

• Where AI discovery is already impacting DTC revenue
• How to influence AI outputs, and correct brand misinformation
• The frameworks Elk uses with leading brands
• 6 practical actions you can implement immediately

AI discovery is already here. The brands that optimize now will compound their visibility. The rest will play catch-up.

👉 Only a few days left before registration closes.

‍🚨 Seeing A Sudden ROAS Drop? Read This.

If your ROAS has taken a sharp dive this week, you’re not alone.

Meta is currently displaying a pop-up notification acknowledging that an attribution setting change in February has caused reporting discrepancies.

While there hasn’t been formal communication from Meta beyond that notice, the issue appears to be real.

Pilothouse has observed impression count errors and potential overdelivery of low-quality or bot traffic, particularly from the Audience Network placement, across multiple accounts.

How to Mitigate the Issue

If you’re using third-party tracking tools:

• Apply traffic rules to filter suspected bot traffic.
• Monitor burst spending and hold back budgets if you notice unusual impression spikes tied to low engagement or low-quality sessions.
• Platforms like Triple Whale rely on their own pixel data and post-purchase surveys, which may reduce the impact of Meta-side reporting inconsistencies.

Important to note: Traffic rules alone won’t solve overdelivery to weaker placements.

If spend is disproportionately flowing to Audience Network and driving low-quality traffic, you’ll need to:

• Review placement-level breakdowns inside Meta
• Compare platform-reported performance against Shopify or backend revenue
• Adjust targeting or placement controls accordingly

Triangulation is key.

The takeaway?

Diagnose first. Optimize second.

If you’re seeing unstable performance, it’s worth digging deeper before making major budget cuts.

‍🎧 The Value Beyond What You Sell

Most brands obsess over product features.

But the smart ones obsess over brand identity.

In this quick Ad-venturous episode, Aves breaks down what actually drives modern brand growth: the value you bring outside of the product itself.

She unpacks how brands like Liquid Death and Rhode make identity the star rather than the product.

What we cover:

• Why “omnipresent brands” win in today’s market
• The two primary value plays: social status vs. entertainment
• How Liquid Death sells identity, not canned water
• How Rhode manufactures demand through exclusivity and scarcity
• Why humor often outperforms polished “aspirational” branding in paid ads
• How identity-driven brands make Q4 easier (and more profitable)

▶️ Watch the full episode on YouTube.

🎧 Or listen here on Spotify.

Most brands choose ad formats based on what’s trending.

But what’s trending might not necessarily be the type of content your customer base is watching.

That disconnect? It kills performance.

Fraser Cottrell shares that alignment matters more than what’s trending.

Does your audience live on TikTok? Do they watch with sound off?

Know what your customer consumes.

Know how they consume it.

Then build creative that fits their behavior.

‍📥 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 72: How To Attribute Your Post-Click Ecosystem Part 1
• 🚀 Inspect Bushbalm’s 70% YoY Growth via Retail and Pro Channel
• 📧 AKNF 583: Counter Intuitive Ways To Max Net Present Value
• 💡 Ad-venturous 40: How To Write Creator Briefs That Perform
• 🔮 TWBERP 71: Predict Your 2026 Email Revenue
• 🪥 How Suri Sold 5,000 Toothbrushes With In a Week

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.