💰 Matt Bertulli offers you his 2026 planning playbook (free)

🎁 Derek Lauermann inspires with holiday gifts + campaigns

🖨️ Connor MacDonald shows how he prints incremental profit

🎯 Tyson Drake reveals a framework to dominate market share

🤑 Cody Plofker shares four positions he’s hiring for right now

And, the top five headlines from this week in consumer (DTC) news — including Shopify’s latest release.

Matthew Bertulli CEO, Lomi & Pela Case

Are You Prepared for 2026?

Last week, I spent two days planning with my executive team. We pored over the coming year. Every detail. Every assumption.

This lays the foundation. Here’s the high-level overview we used.

Why am I telling you this? Because …

Also, tons of other smart people will show you how they’re setting up to win 2026. Something like 25 ecommerce executives from the biggest brands are coming together.

This is your last call. Do not miss it.

Derek Lauermann Grüns, Dir. of Paid Media

Ad Snacks 🍬 Four Brands I’m Holiday Shopping

Everyone’s surf scaling on Meta this season, riding efficiency waves like we’re in Waikiki.


Meanwhile, here are the brands creating pipeline-level waves that have me stoked.

 Personal Charms Are an LTV Gift 

Who I’m shopping for? My mom, the mama bear who loves gifts with meaning.

What I’m buying? Pandora, personal charms.

Why they’re winning? Emotional gifting lane, charm-driven repeatability, and great seasonal holiday offers.

Snack 🍬 Modular gifting naturally compounds LTV.

 Influencers Are a Woman’s Best Friend 

Who I’m shopping for? My wife, the budget-conscious queen who loves a quality staple.

What I’m buying? Mejuri, jewelry.

Why they’re winning? Premium creator content, tasteful holiday promos, and drops that move on TikTok + Reels.

Snack 🍬 When creators match your aesthetic, your product becomes a highly sought-after purchase.

 Creator Personas Bring Shoppers 

Who I’m shopping for? Myself, the self-proclaimed techie who loves ecomm.

What I’m buying? Ridge, wallet.

Why they’re winning? Perfect creator persona fit (MKBHD), tech-forward design, and collab energy that makes everyday carry feel “upgrade-worthy.” But how can I ditch my Italian leather!?

Snack 🍬 The right collab generates new interest and demand.

 Seasonal Greens You’ll Actually Love 

Who I’m shopping for? My dad, the holiday lover who’s been worried about gut health.

What I’m buying? Grüns Grinch Punch, seasonal greens.

Why we’re winning? Tasty new flavors, biggest deal ever, and seasonal creatives have never made adding to cart easier!

Snack 🍬 Giftable + great offer = holiday cart velocity.

Surf scaling is a fun holiday tactic, just make sure to double-check where you’re surfing. Validate using click-only comparisons to Meta’s 7DC (day-click) 1DV (day-view) default setting to gain critical insight.

The brands I’m shopping create thoughtful persona waves that build and convert when it matters.

I hope you’re crushing Q4. Want to get ready for 2026 with 25 ecommerce heavyweights?

Sign up for the live @ Operators event! I’ll be presenting, too.

Connor MacDonald CMO, Ridge

The Checkout Monetization Layer You’ll Actually Turn On

​​Every operator has the same reflex. Don’t touch checkout.

I get it. We all worry about:

• Checkout friction
• Brand identity
• Anything “external"

But Rokt Pay+ by Aftersell isn’t that.

It’s wallet banners from providers your customers already trust, dropped into checkout in a way that feels native.

We tested it cautiously, with traffic allocation. Fully expected the conversion graph to twitch. It didn’t.

And it quietly started printing incremental revenue every day.

If you’re serious about modernizing your stack, Pay+ is one of the lowest-risk, highest-upside switches you can flip.

THE FEED

​Q4 Sales Are Wild!​

​Black Friday Cyber Monday Recap & The Forecasting Process Behind Ecom Profit With Richie Mashiko​

Tyson Drake Fractional CMO

How to Dominate Mental Market Share & Produce Creative Diversity: The CEP Framework

Something breaks. Becomes uncomfortable.

Can no longer be ignored.

These are everyday moments that trigger needs. That’s when people enter a “category,” and when buying begins.

What Are Category Entry Points?

Developed by Professor Jenni Romaniuk at the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science, CEPs are the cues, situations, needs, or contexts that make people think of a category and bring brands to mind as options or solutions.

For example, you might think of a specific brand of earplugs in these situations:

• “I can’t focus in a noisy office”
• “My hotel neighbours are too loud”
• “I’ll be front row at Metallica soon”

That last one is how I entered the category and got a pair of Loop Earplugs. For someone else, perhaps the category entry point would be snoring adults and crying babies on a flight.

Why does that matter?

If you understand when your market thinks about your category, you can build your creative to align with those moments, so your brand comes to mind when it counts the most.

CEPs & Market Share: The Research

The relationship between the number of CEPs a brand is associated with and its market share is one of the most well-supported findings in modern marketing.

Brands with more CEP links capture larger market share.

Maybe it seems obvious.

The more situations where people think of your brand, the more opportunities your brand has to be purchased.

And there’s a 94% correlation between mental market share, which is how many people think of your brand in buying situations, with actual sales market share.

How do you put them into action? You start with questions; namely, the “7Ws” of CEPs.

7 Ws of Category Entry Points

1️⃣ Why are people buying
2️⃣ When do they buy or use
3️⃣ Where are they (contexts)
4️⃣ With whom are they (social)
5️⃣ With what are they doing it
6️⃣ While wearing or using what
7️⃣ While feeling what (emotions)

One brand that nails this is Loop Earplugs.

Let’s apply the framework. We’ll start by mapping out the 7 Ws, and then group them into clusters.

Step 1. Collect Real Buyer Language

The first step is research. You need to gather real language from actual buyers about when, why, and how they enter your category. Use a combination of …

• Post-purchase surveys
• Email surveys
• Subreddit research
• Review mining

The goal here is breadth. Capture a wide range of possible CEPs that lead someone to think “I need this product.”

The 7 Ws for Loop Earplugs

1️⃣ Why are people buying?

• Protect ears in loud environments
• Reduce sensory overstimulation
• Sleep better in noisy spaces
• Manage anxiety and feel at ease
• Improve concentration at work
• Enjoy concerts + events comfortably
• Look stylish while still protected

2️⃣ When do they buy or use?

• At concerts or music festivals
• At night, when trying to sleep
• During flights or long travel days
• Working in noisy shared spaces
• During their daily commute
• While socializing in loud bars
• When riding their motorcycle

3️⃣ Where are they?

• At home trying to sleep, focus, or relax
• At work in open-plan offices or studios
• In transit on planes, trains, or buses
• At indoor events, concerts, or clubs
• Outdoor sporting events or festivals

4️⃣ With whom are they?

• Alone when focusing or sleeping
• With friends in social settings
• With colleagues at work
• With strangers while in public

5️⃣ With what are they doing it?

• Music
• Sleeping
• Meditating
• Studying
• Reading
• Writing
• Working
• Flying
• Partying
• Performing

6️⃣ While wearing or using what?

• Headphones
• Eye mask (sleep)
• Sunglasses
• Work uniform
• Casual wear
• Helmet (motorbike)

7️⃣ While feeling what?

• Overstimulated or anxious
• Tired or needing rest
• Excited but want comfort
• Focused and productive
• Self-conscious (appearance)
• Empowered or in control

Step 2. Group Into CEP Themes

Next, find the patterns. You’re looking for clusters of similar situations. Themes become mental categories that your brand can own through different stories.

In the case of Loop …

• Sleep and restoration
• Focus and productivity
• Social and nightlife
• Travel and transit
• Wellbeing and sensory

Each CEP provides new associative links in your market’s memory, anchoring your product to their needs.

Step 3. Prioritize CEPs

Not all CEPs are created equal.

Some situations happen daily, others are rare. Some are crowded with competition, others are wide open.

Prioritize CEPs that are both frequently encountered and ownable, where you can build strong, distinctive associations.

More niche CEPs can also be valuable for creative freshness or smaller audiences. Some considerations.

• Frequency: How often do buyers encounter this situation?
• Fit: Can you credibly and realistically own this space?
• Assets: Can you build distinctive brand elements for it?
• Opportunity: Is this underdeveloped with room to grow?

Once you have a core list, you can track them with post-purchase surveys to benchmark which CEPs are working, and use that to guide your creative strategy.

Step 4. Turn CEPs Into Creative

The next step is turning CEPs into creative.

• Creative briefs (i.e., how does the product show up when people want to enjoy a specific cluster or find relief?)
• Media buying expansion (i.e,. contextual placements, concerts, sleep apps, travel and lifestyle creators)

The words customers use to describe why and when they bought tell you exactly how people enter the category.

Each phrase becomes a pathway back to a broader CEP. 7Ws research might surface real buyer statements like:

“The room is quiet until my partner starts snoring like a chainsaw, and suddenly falling asleep feels impossible.”

“I’m lying in this hotel bed listening to doors slam and voices echo down the hallway, wondering how anyone is supposed to sleep in this place.”

“The number of crying babies and snoring adults on this flight is driving me crazy.”

These are real buyer experiences.

By reflecting this real-world language in your creative, you make it natural for people to recall your brand. And each variation adds a new retrieval path to the same CEP.

That means more mental pathways leading to your brand.

Loop takes this even further. Along with ads, it makes dedicated landing pages for each CEP.

How to Measure CEPs

The simplest way is through post-purchase surveys. Ask which situation or need led them to choose your brand.

You can also collect insights as a pre-purchase quiz.

Watch how different CEPs change over time as you adjust creative, scale spend, and move through different seasons.

Add CEPs directly into your ad naming conventions. This makes it easy to aggregate data and spot which are underused or over-represented, and where to increase output.

The result? A clear map of your creative diversity gaps.

Here’s What You Need To Do

Map your category’s 7Ws using surveys, social listening, and review mining. Group similar situations into themes. Align your creative briefs and media buys to specific CEPs. Track which resonates through post-purchase surveys.

Then reallocate budget to the best-performing CEPs.

This isn’t complicated.

It just requires being intentional about which situations you’re building associations with. Most brands approach creative diversity as “make more ads.”

But volume is not a strategy. The CEP framework gives you a way to understand which situations your brand should own in buyers’ minds. It helps your brand:

• Be remembered in buying situations
• Make creative reflect real triggers
• Invest in the cues that grow demand

In the end, you’ll make better creative, reach more buyers, and stop wasting time on ads that don’t move the needle.

Tyson Drake is a Fractional CMO; he’s led marketing at DTC brands like The Oodie and appeared as a guest on the Marketing Operators Podcast. Connect on Twitter (X) or LinkedIn.

Cody Plofker CEO, Jones Road Beauty

I’m Hiring Four Roles + Making Big Bets

The biggest bet I’m making next year is merging paid and organic social content teams into one.

We will 10x organic content resources; mostly around creators. And we will post on 10+ different handles. That will be our “creative testing.”

Whatever pops off will get analyzed, iterated, and pushed into our ad account. We will have zero “UGC agencies” writing scripted video. Want to help me build it?

1. Chief Creator Officer

Externally facing creator with millions of monthly views that can be fractional. You’d post about Jones Road Beauty, create content, teach us how to create content, and work with creators on all channels. Basically, our creator sherpa.

We’re in the creator economy, but brands are not inherently good at creating. We want to go all in and are putting our money where our mouth is.

We’re looking for a legit creator who gets content strategy, beauty + fashion, and can navigate us through this world.

Part-time role, with expectations to spend 10-20 hours a week working with us — either creating content, building out our creator program, or advising.

2. Internal Director (or VP) of Creative Strategy

We’re also looking for someone to own internal creative strategy across organic and paid social. This role will sit parallel to our Creative Director, it’s senior-level.

You will own anything touching creator-led content, be tasked with building out flywheels, and an internal creator studio.

3. Creators in Residence

We’ll bring on dozens of creators to work with us in various capacities. If you are a creator who gets platforms, algorithms, and culture … we want to meet you.

Options for part-time, freelance, and full-time roles. Across all platforms. Flat fee or retainers plus performance incentives for those who want it.

We want to have 10-20 different handles being posted on. We want to hire creators to run each handle.

4. Creator Studio Buildout

We have a blank studio space right now that we want to turn into a creation engine with 5-6 creators in our studio per day, churning out content. We’re looking for one person or team to build out the studio with a few turnkey sets.

If you know someone who’d be a good fit for any of these roles, please share it with them. If any of this interests you …

Please fill out this form, and we will be in touch.

THE TRENDS

Curated by the editor of CPG Wire, this week’s five biggest consumer-news headlines in DTC.

1. Shopify Unveils Its Winter ‘26 Edition: Shopify​

Shopify just announced a slew of updates and over 150 new features as part of its Winter ‘26 Edition.

The biggest changes relate to Sidekick, Shopify’s AI-enabled commerce assistant, which has gone from being a reactive assistant to a proactive collaborator. With Sidekick Pulse, for example, users can receive actionable feedback that leads to meaningful improvements instantly. Users can even prompt Sidekick to create custom apps from scratch.

Shopify also introduced Agentic Storefronts, which let you place your products directly into AI conversations on ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot.

2. DropOut Hires The Co-Founder of Poppi: LinkedIn​

DropOut Companies, a Nashville-based consumer brand incubator, just added Poppi co-founder Stephen Ellsworth as an Operating Partner.

DropOut is best known for creating Jams, a high-protein competitor to Uncrustables that now retails at Target and Walmart. Early next year DropOut will launch its second incubated brand, Bronco. Ellsworth co-founded Poppi with his wife, Allison Ellsworth, in 2018 before selling the company to PepsiCo for nearly $2 billion.

3. GroundForce Capital & Righteous Felon: Business Wire​

GroundForce Capital just invested in Righteous Felon Craft Jerky, a fast-growing purveyor of better-for-you meat snacks. Brendan Cawley launched the brand in West Chester, PA in 2013.

Righteous Felon has carved out a niche in a crowded category by focusing on clean ingredients, memorable branding, and unapologetic flavor. Prior to investing in Righteous Felon, GroundForce Capital backed Bobbie, Liquid Death, Vive Organic, OWYN, and a number of other brands.

4. Biologica Launches with $7M in Funding: Inc. Magazine​

The co-founder of Allbirds, Joey Zwillinger, just launched Biologica alongside his wife, Liz Zwillinger. Biologica is a science-backed hormonal supplement brand that supports women during three very different life stages: reproductive years, perimenopause, and post-menopause.

Biologica launched with $7 million funding from Addition, Greycroft, True Beauty Ventures, Hawktail, Good Friends, and a handful of strategic angels.

5. Feastables Co-Founder Reveals Next Venture: LinkedIn​

Jim Murray, a co-founder of Feastables and the former President of RXBAR, just revealed his next venture, Anomaly Health. Anomaly Health solves a problem that every family deals with on a regular basis: when one family member catches an illness, suddenly the whole household goes down.

So Murray created Anamoly, a science-backed and expert-formulated daily immunity drink mix. The product is formulated with colostrum, probiotics, vitamin C, zinc, copper, and other active ingredients.

That’s it for today. I’m off to prepare for Operators Assemble. Really excited for this one. If you’re joining us, see you tomorrow!

With thanks and anticipation,
Aaron Orendorff 🤓 Executive Editor

PS (Disclaimer): Special thanks to Aftersell for sponsoring today’s newsletter.

​Read or share online | Unsubscribe​