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The DTC ecommerce agency for profitable growth
Direct-to-consumer looked simple when CAC was cheap: launch on Shopify, run Facebook ads, scale. Now acquisition costs more, attribution is murkier, and the brands still winning are the ones that know their unit economics cold.
We’re a DTC ecommerce agency for B2C brands that want profitable growth, not growth at any cost. We connect acquisition, conversion and retention into one system managed to customer acquisition cost, lifetime value and contribution margin.
DTC growth starts with unit economics
Before we touch a campaign, we build your growth model:
Contribution margin per order after COGS, shipping, payment fees, returns and discounts
Blended and new-customer CAC, by channel where data allows
LTV by cohort: 90-day, 180-day and 12-month repeat revenue
Payback period: how long until a new customer covers their acquisition cost
MER targets that keep growth profitable at your current margins
That model tells us how much you can afford to pay for a customer, which then shapes every decision about channels, creative, offers and retention.
Why DTC growth gets harder as you scale
The first million often comes from a few winning ads and a loyal early audience. Beyond that, the economics shift: your best audiences saturate, creative fatigues faster, CAC rises with spend, and platform attribution grows less reliable. Brands that keep growing profitably usually make the same moves. They diversify acquisition beyond one platform, invest in creative volume and testing, raise AOV with bundles and offers, and treat retention as a growth channel rather than an afterthought. They also measure on blended, business-level numbers instead of platform dashboards.
Acquisition
Meta and TikTok: the core DTC demand engine, run through our social media marketing program with a structured creative testing pipeline
Google: Shopping, Performance Max and search capture the demand social creates; see Google Ads for ecommerce
Creators and UGC: authentic content at the volume paid social demands
SEO: compounding, owned traffic that lowers paid dependence over time
Conversion and AOV
Every point of conversion rate and every dollar of AOV lowers your effective CAC. Our CRO program covers product pages, bundles and offer architecture, free-shipping thresholds, express checkout (Shop Pay, Apple Pay) and post-purchase upsells.
Retention and subscriptions
DTC profitability is usually won on the second order. We build email and SMS retention programs (welcome, post-purchase, replenishment, win-back), loyalty and referral programs, and subscription offers (for example with Recharge or Skio) where your product suits repeat delivery.
Offer architecture and pricing
Many DTC brands leave margin on the table with blanket discounts. We help design offers that raise AOV and protect profit: bundles and kits, tiered free-shipping thresholds, gift-with-purchase, subscription incentives, and launch offers for new customers that don’t train existing customers to wait for sales. Offers are tested like any other change, measured on contribution margin, not just conversion rate.
Beyond your own store
As DTC brands scale, many add Amazon, TikTok Shop or retail partners. Each can grow reach, and each can undercut your own site if pricing, promotions and advertising aren’t coordinated. We help plan how these channels fit together so they add customers rather than cannibalize your most profitable one.
The DTC Shopify stack
Most DTC brands run on Shopify, and the stack matters: theme speed, app bloat, checkout extensions, reviews, subscriptions, Klaviyo, attribution tools and analytics. Our Shopify design and development team keeps the stack lean and integrated, so marketing has clean data and fast pages to work with.
Measurement for DTC brands
Platform dashboards overstate their own contribution, and that problem grows as you add channels. We set up a measurement stack that holds up:
Server-side tracking (Meta Conversions API, TikTok Events API, Google enhanced conversions) for more complete signal
Post-purchase surveys (“How did you hear about us?”) to capture channels that tracking misses, such as podcasts, creators and word of mouth
Blended reporting: MER, new-customer CAC and contribution margin from store data
Cohort LTV by first product, first channel and first offer, so you know which customers are actually valuable
Incrementality tests when spend justifies them
Playbooks by stage
Around $1M–$5M: nail product-market fit signals, a winning creative angle, Google Shopping basics and core Klaviyo flows. Keep the stack simple.
Around $5M–$20M: scale creative volume, add channels (TikTok, YouTube, creators), build a structured CRO program, and segment retention by cohort.
$20M+: incrementality testing, sophisticated budget allocation across channels, retail and marketplace coordination, and LTV-driven acquisition targets.
These are typical patterns, not rules. Your plan comes from your numbers. It all comes together in our multi-channel ecommerce marketing approach.
Common DTC growth mistakes
Scaling spend before creative
More budget on tired creative just buys more expensive customers.
Discounting as the default lever
It trains customers to wait for sales and erodes margin permanently.
Treating retention as “email.”
Post-purchase experience, product quality, packaging and service drive repeat purchase as much as flows do.
Optimizing to platform ROAS
Blended, new-customer economics tell the real story.
Adding channels too early
Spreading a small budget across five platforms rarely beats doing two very well.
Ignoring cash flow
Profitable LTV on paper doesn’t help if payback takes longer than your cash runway allows.
Results
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[Client name]
[Industry, platform]. [Challenge, work done, verified result with timeframe]
[Client name]
[Industry, platform]. [Challenge, work done, verified result with timeframe]
DTC FAQs
Something else? Ask us directly.