DTC growth playbook

DTC growth revolves around paid acquisition economics, retention via email/SMS, and LTV expansion.

Flywheel

• Paid acquisition (Meta, Google, TikTok)
• First purchase activation
• Email/SMS retention
• Subscription or repeat purchase
• Referral + UGC

Unit economics

• CAC < 1/3 LTV
• Payback under 12 months
• MER > 3x

Creative is king

Creative volume drives paid performance more than any other lever.

What to do with this

• Make creative production the center of DTC operations, most DTC CAC problems are actually creative-volume problems
• Ship 20-50 creative variants per week at scale, the DTC brands winning in 2026 have creative as their largest line item
• Invest in email + SMS lifecycle flows, retention and AOV expansion are how unit economics survive rising paid CAC
• Test UGC and creator content alongside produced, the category has shifted and authentic creator content consistently outperforms on Meta + TikTok
• Track blended MER weekly, individual platform attribution is unreliable post-iOS 14, MER keeps the team honest