Today’s all about revelations …

🏆 Connor MacDonald reveals Ridge’s top ad that helped generate +$4M.

🎁 Cody Plofker reveals Jones Road’s top-to-bottom, step-by-step Q4 plans.

🤔 Jason Panzer reveals the distinctions between “kindness vs gentleness.”

📅 Connor Rolain reveals where he’ll be (with 20 other DTC leaders) this week.

As well as a roundup of the top-five trending news stories with links + summaries.

Connor MacDonald CMO, Ridge

An Executive’s Guide to Creative Analytics

As much as I’d love to spend my days pouring over AIDA metrics in a creative analytics dashboard, the team gets to do that.

My days are split between web, tech, ops, retention, partnerships, brand, merchandising …

And hitting the ceiling this guy (my CEO) keeps raising.

So when I need a debrief on top performers across our growing number of categories and campaigns, Motion is my go-to.

• Timeframe
• Group by Ad Name
• Set a spend level: >$100k
• Filter by Ad Name for Category

BOOM! I get a quick and meaningful glimpse of top content contributing to recent performance.

Last month?

MKBHD Sweepstakes cruised. NASA continued to succeed. Ridge Lite content earned 3x our average CTR.

Yes, our Cybertruck giveaway generated more than $4M in “extra revenue.” Even more important for my role …

Its top ad spent more than 2X the next biggest spender ($106k vs $49k) at our 1DC target.

Not only do I rely on this report, but these high-level takeaways get shared across the company.

Retention, eComm, and Partnership teams can easily understand what messages resonate to better inform their channel strategy.

These asynchronous, content-rich communication forms have become key for us as a remote organization.

Motion plays a critical role in that, especially as an executive.

That’s why I recommend it.

Plus, tell them Connor Mac sent you to get …

Jason Panzer President, HexClad

From E071 (linked below): Special Shoutout to Sean Frank for Leading the Distinction Between “Kindness & Gentleness”

Being kind is about ensuring that those who work for you are treated fairly and with respect.

It involves listening to concerns, acknowledging contributions, and even providing severance for someone who doesn’t fit.

Kindness is about maintaining an ethical and considerate approach to managing people — ensuring that no one feels wronged or undervalued in the long term.

However, kindness should not be confused with gentleness.

Gentleness often implies a soft approach to communication, which can be misinterpreted as indecisive or lacking urgency.

In a business environment, particularly in high-pressure situations, there isn’t always time to cushion feedback or deliver decisions with gentleness.

Leaders may need to be direct and firm to keep the organization moving forward efficiently.

This might involve cutting off unproductive discussions or making decisions that, while potentially harsh in the moment, are necessary for the company’s success.

Another layer to this is emphasizing that while kindness is important, a business leader’s primary responsibility is to ensure the organization wins.

Employees want to believe that their leader is doing everything possible to lead them to success.

They would prefer a leader who is occasionally prickly but effective over one who is overly gentle but leads them astray.

But there are dozens of people at HexClad and at prior companies I’ve worked with who would take a bullet for me.

Knowing this helps when I’m required to drop the hammer occasionally.

Ultimately, being a successful leader involves balancing kindness with the necessary firmness to achieve results.

This balance ensures that — while employees feel respected — they also understand that the organization’s success is always the top priority.

THE FEED

​

Catching up With Austin, CEO of Northbeam

• ​YouTube​
• ​Apple​
• ​Spotify​

Q4 Planning: How We’re Strategizing for Black Friday, Cyber Monday & the Holidays

• ​YouTube​
• ​Apple​
• ​Spotify​

Cody Plofker CMO, Jones Road Beauty

Black Friday isn’t made during Black Friday.

You will either succeed or fail based on everything you’ve done leading up to it.

Why? Because Black Friday is the realization of whatever demand and value you’ve created before Black Friday.

Unfortunately, operating within that truth is hard. It’s more than just creating a strategy around how you’ll approach …

• Spend & Channels
• Offers & Timing

It’s emotionally exhausting.

To help, I want to pull back the curtain on exactly how we’re approaching Q4 at Jones Road Beauty.

 Spend & Channels: Top to Bottom 

The most valuable media dollars you’ll spend all year are in Sept through early Nov. At least, that’s true for us.

When we look at the delayed value effect (delayed multiplier) through Northbeam, that’s when we see the largest increase between 1D-click ROAS versus 30D-click.

The longer your consideration window and the higher your price point, the wider that difference becomes.

During Black Friday & Cyber Monday, it’s the opposite. Delayed value immediately drops off. Your 1D returns are the same as your 30D. There’s no incremental impact after that.

What you really have to think about is …

• When to spike spend?
• Where to fill your funnels?
• How to set and hold targets?

From now until the end of Oct, we’ll be pushing as hard as possible on our upper funnel media mix. More TV, more YouTube, more out-of-home (OOH), more non-conversion objectives — reach, views, and quiz completions.

But this isn’t allocation without accountability.

We’re already conducting a holdout test on YouTube reach until the end of Sept. We’ll do the same on Meta with reach versus video views throughout Oct.

Another advantage is that we run the same core offer during Memorial Day as Black Friday (Mini Miracle Balms). The build-up is very similar, including a lead-gen funnel.

To realize value during the holidays, you have to create value before them:

1. New impressions
2. New site visits
3. New emails

In mid-Nov, we turn our attention to bottom-funnel channels.

We might reduce upper-funnel spend — depending on what we learn — but as our total budget increases, both Meta and Google’s allocations will go up significantly.

Last year, we spent $773k on Black Friday. This year, we’re going for our first $1M-spend day.

What about targets? It takes guts to run so inefficient.

That’s where having historicals and a playbook with daily expectations comes in.

Let’s say your MER goal for Nov is a 4. For every dollar you spend on advertising, you want a 4X return in total revenue blended between new and returning customers.

To spike spend + fill your funnel, you’ll need to lower your target MER of 4 … to 3 or sub-3 in Oct through early Nov.

If your AOV consideration or revenue concentration is higher than ours, then early Nov might be set even lower. HexClad, for example, ran its Oct MER a third lower than year-end MER — 38% lower than Nov.

In the moment, it’s scary. It really is.

The only way you can do it — hold and not pull back — is by knowing your monthly, weekly, and daily targets.

 Offers & Timing: Step-By-Step 

We don’t do discounting at Jones Road. Instead, all of our offers are driven by product launches and collections (kits) — exclusivity, limited-time, or gifts with purchase.

Our Labor Day promotion (above) is a great example.

Technically, our anniversary is Oct 26. This year, we’re moving it right to the beginning of the month with the Bobbi Kit 4.0 — a high-AOV bundle of core SKUs plus a few new releases.

Here’s what last year’s looked like.

We’re also moving our holiday collections an entire month from mid-Nov to mid-Oct.

Two big kits and a few smaller kits.

The big kits will include our twice-a-year Mini Miracle Balms, core SKUs, and a new fragrance rollerball. Smaller kits will be product bundles like our lip and cheek palettes.

All very giftable at different price points.

Last year, we had 25k of each — which sold out in record time.

To keep them in stock for peak gifting, we’ve purchased 85k–100k of each.

That’s when we’ll launch Mini Miracle Balm standalone kits.

In 2023, Harley Finkelstein (Shopify’s president) shouted us out on TV for being one of the top SKUs during Black Friday.

We sold 375k. The goal is to sell double that this year, with the inventory to sell a million units.

For Black Friday, we’ll do some new creative. But mainly we’ll duplicate the Trojan Horse landing page and creative from our Memorial Day promotion.

New customers in Oct — acquired through the Bobbi Kit or holiday collections — should become returning customers through Black Friday’s Mini Miracle Balms.

On Cyber Monday, we’ll refocus on the holiday collections. Those should carry us to shipping cutoffs around Dec 15th. Christmas Day is typically soft.

Then, we see strong performance in “Q5” — Dec 26th to New Year’s. Do not forget to include that period in your strategy.

Believe me, I get it. Every year, I set the plan:

• Upper-funnel channels
• Low-expectation efficiency

Then, I get nervous. And every year afterward, I’m like …

This year, I’m holding my foot down on the gas. I’m staying aggressive. The value always comes.

You don’t have to win the race on the first mile. You just have to know what your pacing should be for each and every one.

Connor Rolain Head of Growth, HexClad

My friend Aaron Orendorff is hosting a two-day online event Sept 4th and 5th. I’ll be there. So will Connor Mac and Cody. Along with something like 20 other speakers. It’s an hour each day. And we only get 5 minutes to share our best tactic!

THE TRENDS

​

This week’s top-five trending news stories, curated by the editor of CPG Wire

1. Applied Nutrition Preps for London IPO: Bloomberg​

UK-based supplements firm Applied Nutrition plans to IPO in London later this year. The company, which was founded in 2014 by Tom Ryder, reported £86M in sales last year, a YoY increase of 42%. Adjusted EBITDA also jumped 41% YoY to £26M.

2. Beverage Hardware Startup Aerflo Raises $10M: Medium​

Aerflo, a Brooklyn startup that makes a portable water bottle that doubles as an on-the-go carbonation device, secured $10M in funding. Lerer Hippeau and Torch Capital co-led the round. Other investors include Bluestein Ventures, Palm Tree Crew, and Closed Loop Ventures Group.

The US sparkling water market is worth $5.6B, and Aerflo aims to make it more sustainable.

3. How Red Antler Quietly Built a Formidable Venture Arm: Modern Retail​

Red Antler — the branding agency behind Cann, Casper, and Levain Bakery — has quietly been building a venture arm called Habitat Partners. Its investments include PopUp Bagels, Happy Wolf, Zero Acre, and many others. Anna Hensel from Modern Retail sat down with the founders to learn more.

4. Our Home Buys Iconic Snack Brand: Food Dive​

Our Home — a diversified, better-for-you snack company — acquired popcorn brand Pop Secret from the Campbell Soup Company. Pop Secret debuted in 1986 and generated net sales of $120M last year. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

5. Spirit Halloween Juices Up Retail Footprint: Retail TouchPoints​

Spirit Halloween is more bullish than usual this year. The seasonal retailer will add 400 new stores to its retail footprint by the end of Sept, bringing its total store count to 1,525. Spirit Halloween is also looking to hire a whopping 50,000 store associates to staff its stores.

To our US readers, Happy Labor Day. To the Canadians, Happy Labour Day. And to everyone else across the world …

Hit reply and let us know.

• Forecasting tools?
• Ad creative inspiration?
• Merchandising strategies?

Until next time,
The Operators

PS: Special thanks to Motion for backing us as a sponsor even before day one.

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