Monday, Sept 16

B2B Advertisment Opportunity

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Drivepoint

🎯 Your Q4 forecast doesn’t have to be a guessing game.

Chances are you’re still dialing in the numbers for Q4. If you’re like most DTC brands, that means trying to compile data from 25 different sources, nail down your marketing agency, line up your offers, and then…somehow…duct tape that all together in your forecasting model.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

Brands like Oats Overnight, Simple Modern, Curology, Ibex, Graza, and immi are using Drivepoint to manage their forecasting and scenario planning. With Drivepoint, they are:

⬇️ Automatically importing data from Shopify, Amazon, QuickBooks Online, and NetSuite.

✨ Using AI to predict returning customer orders with 98% accuracy

🔀 Building and comparing multiple scenarios to understand the impact of potential offers

📦 Forecasting with confidence all the way through to inventory and cash

Sound good? That can be you, too.

Book a demo today and we’ll stand up a complete Q4 forecast using your real data in 48 hours, 100% free of charge.

4 Meta Ad Mistakes That Could Be Draining Your Budget—Here’s How to Avoid Them

Meta Ads can skyrocket your DTC Brand, but only if you use them effectively.

Many brands we audit run into common pitfalls that drain their budget without seeing a strong return on ad spend (ROAS). 🚀

Here are top 5 biggest mistakes & How you can avoid them to ensure your Meta Ads deliver the results you're looking for.

1. Not Isolating Variables in Testing 🧪

Testing is crucial to get your next set of winner ads,

However, many brands make the mistake of testing too many things simultaneously.

When you change the headline, creative, and targeting all in the same test, it’s impossible to know what lead to the result.

You need to isolate one variable at a time to get clear answers.

For example,

Start by testing different headlines while keeping the creative and audience the same.

Once you find a winning headline, move on to testing new creatives.

This method gives you clear insights into what works and allows you to scale your ads more effectively.

2. Not Testing Enough Creatives 🎨

Running the same ad repeatedly can lead to ad fatigue, where performance drops because your audience has seen it too many times.

Meta Ads thrive on fresh content, and brands that fail to test enough creatives often miss out on better-performing ads.

Aim to test at least 5 to 10 different creatives each week to keep your ads fresh and effective.

These variations can be as simple as changing the image, testing new videos, or switching up the copy.

By constantly rotating new creatives, you give Meta’s algorithm more opportunities to find winning combinations that resonate with your audience.

3. Ignoring Audience Segmentation 🎯

One size does not fit all when targeting your audience on Meta.

Sending ads to a broad audience without proper segmentation can result in wasted spend and low conversions.

Instead, create custom audiences based on people who have already shown interest in your brand—such as past purchasers, website visitors, or email subscribers.

You can also create lookalike audiences to find new potential customers who share characteristics with your current buyers.

By segmenting your audience, you ensure that your ads reach people who are more likely to engage and purchase.

4. Choosing the Wrong Campaign Objective 🎯

Meta Ads offer several campaign objectives; Choosing the wrong one can lead to poor results.

Some brands focus on objectives like ""traffic"" or ""engagement,"" thinking more clicks will translate into more sales.

But that’s not always the case.

If your primary goal is to generate sales, you should use the conversion objective and optimise for purchases.

This ensures Meta shows your ads to people most likely to buy, not just browse.

You'll see better results from your campaigns by aligning your objective with your end goal

Struggling to take Meta Ads to the next level? 😕

Check out my 5-phase Ad Testing and Scaling System, designed to help you systematically test, optimise, and scale your ads for maximum profitability.

This system ensures you’re testing the right elements, scaling the winners, and getting the best ROAS possible.

Let’s profitably grow your brand together!

IBRAHIM’S NUGGETS

Happy Monday!

Hope you had a great weekend and ready to crush the Monday!

This morning, I wanted to do some research and give everyone a recap on how things went during Black Friday/Cyber Monday last year.

Here’s what I found:

According to Adobe, it was another record setting 5 day event for commerce worldwide. Cyber Week (i.e., the five days from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday) saw $38 billion in sales overall, up 7.8% YoY.

We also saw record spending online during,

• Thanksgiving day ($5.6 billion, up 5.5% YoY)

• Black Friday ($9.8 billion, up 7.5% YoY)

• Cyber Monday ($12.4 billion, up 9.6% from 2022)

Additionally, from (Nov. 1 to Nov. 27), consumers spent $109.3 billion online, up 7.3% YoY. Over half (60%) of this spend was driven by five categories, which were:

• Electronics ($21.7 billion)

• Apparel ($19.2 billion)

• Furniture ($14.7 billion)

• Grocery ($6.8 billion)

• and toys ($3.1 billion)

Also, for the first time ever:

• Mobile shopping overtook desktop for total BFCM spend: Smartphones drove 51.8% of all online sales (up from 49.9% in 2022).

• Discounts hit record highs: On Cyber Monday, the biggest deals happened in electronics, where discounts peaked at 31% off the original listed price (vs. 25% in 2022). This was followed by computers at 24% (vs. 20%), televisions at 19% (vs. 17%), apparel at 23% (vs. 18%), sporting goods at 15% (vs. 10%), furniture at 21% (vs. 8%), and appliances at 18% (vs. 16%). Discounts for toys came in below 2022’s levels at 27% (vs. 34%).

• Average Order Values also increased: Consumer carts grew by 2.7% from Nov. 1 to Nov. 27, when compared to the same period in 2022 (From about $100 shopping carts to around $102) and for Cyber Weekend (Nov. 25 and Nov. 26), AOVs grew by about 3.2%. These numbers are the average and Shopify merchants did a little better than this.

• Buy Now Pay Later Surged: Buy Now, Pay Later purchases hit an all-time high, up 43% from 2022’s BFCM. So the obvious thing to do here is, enable BNPL on your store if you haven’t already! I think it’s going to be another strong year for BNPL.

And as far as data for Shopify merchants, here’s how it looked:

• Peak sales per minute: $4.2 million at 12:01 PM EST on Nov. 24.

• 61 million consumers globally purchased from Shopify-powered brands.

• The top selling product categories were apparel and accessories, health and beauty, and home and garden.

• Average cart price: $108.12 ($107.53 on a constant currency basis).

• Top selling countries: U.S., U.K., Australia, Canada, and Germany.

• Top selling cities: Los Angeles, New York, and London.

• Cross-border orders represented 15% of all global orders.

• 56,000+ tonnes of carbon removal funded by Shopify to counteract shipping emissions.

• 60% year-over-year increase in sales made via Shop Pay.

• 17,500+ entrepreneurs made their first sale on Shopify.

• More than 55,000 merchants had their highest-selling day ever on Shopify!

Amazon also had a record breaking year. They don’t release exact sales data, but they said customers around the world purchased more than one billion items on Amazon, with shoppers saving nearly 70% more on Amazon during their “11 days of deals” compared to the same period last year," ending on Cyber Monday.

You have the data, now use it work on things that require your attention.

Alright folks, that’s it for today!

Zaymo

📭 Let your customers shop from their inbox. They buy more. How? Zaymo lets customers check out inside the email. And leave reviews. And answer quizzes.

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Have any questions that you need help with?

Ask here - and look out for Fridays Issue where Ibrahim will answer them.