The 8-step Scaling Flywheel

Audience → Brand → Communication (the ABC flywheel)

This is an ongoing flywheel that will constantly evolve and iterate. From a high-level, creative strategy is about understanding the competitive landscape, analyzing opportunities and threats, developing testing strategies, executing, and iterating on what worked and what didn’t work to drive your business towards your goals. A key component of the creative strategy is about defining who your core audience is, who your conquesting audiences are, and how you need to talk to them.

You need to nail your positioning.

Study the brand catalog and select the hero products to prioritize. Do not attempt to sell the entire catalog as this introduces too many variables to test.

🦩 Hook → Body → CTA

Write out your primary problem:solution hooks/angles.

Copywriting is a crucial component of cracking a brand's customer acquisition funnel.

If you're not great at copywriting, study vintage ads. You can take almost any vintage ad and turn it into a DTC brand's hook/angle.

Make sure ads are native to the platform. They must look authentic and feel like they belong in your audience’s organic feed.

When we are presented with messaging, we pursue the easiest way of understanding new information. In our Meta ads, we need to first focus our energy on 4 specific elements,

- Images or video

Our eyes will naturally scan the image or video first. As most consumers are all averse to advertising, when we are marketing on social platforms we want our assets to feel native to the platform. “Ugly” ads - assets that are not overly produced but still high-quality - will improve thumb stop and hold rates, and drive stronger engagement with less aware audiences. You should also maximize the format. If you are using a static image, make sure you test text overlays that highlight what you want your viewer to know.

- Headline

The ad headline offers limited text so you need to get to the point fast. Create a clear and attention-grabbing headline that summarizes the main benefit of the product or service being advertised.

- Description

The ad description has more space than the headline but is still limited in how much it can communicate. The description should amplify the image or video and headline, and should be focused on the direct response tactics outlined in number 8.

- Call-to-action

People need to be told what to do next. Your creative should include a clear and specific call-to-action, such as "Shop Now" or "Sign Up," that tells the viewer what to do. Your call to action should also be unambiguous, and tied to where the person is in your funnel.Perfect your ad elements

When you start developing your assets you need to focus on 5 core socio-psychological tenets to drive action closer to the click.

- Urgency

Urgency: Performance marketing is all about getting a viewer to respond and to take action. Create a sense of urgency by highlighting new releases, limited time offers, or exclusivity to encourage viewers to take action immediately.

- Scarcity

Scarcity: Creating a feeling of scarcity by highlighting low inventory or limited availability of a product or service to encourage users to take action before it's too late. Scarcity can also feel like the fear of missing out on something. This can be complemented by social proof.

- Social proof

Social proof: Use customer testimonials or reviews to build trust and credibility, and to show that other people have found value in the product or service being advertised.

- Benefit-driven messaging

Benefits-driven messaging: Highlight the benefits and advantages of your product or service, not just its features, to show users how it can improve their life. People need to understand why they should care, not just what something does, to take action fast.

- Relevancy

They should showcase the product in use + have large text overlays.

Static ads are single-handedly the easiest way to test what hooks/angles resonate with consumers.

You will see your CTRs skyrocket when you crack a great hook/angle.

Most top-performing video ads started with a script. These can be broken down into the: hook/body/close. Test combinations of all 3.

The hook captures attention, the body is your unique pitch, and the close is the call to action.

The goal of these pages is to educate vs sell people on why they need the product (I prefer not to show the price).

I prefer to go Ad → Lander → PDP

We've found the biggest lift in lander performance comes from testing headlines vs designing new sections.

My favorite type is listicles, aka "5 reasons why" pages.

I love these pages for two reasons:

- Dumbing down your copywriting helps people clearly understand what you're selling and why they need it

- Simplifying your design reduces confusion

When the assets start adding up, put them together in funnels. Build funnels, not websites.

When nothing is working (ads/landers/hooks) it usually has to do with the offer.

Until you've cracked $10M/year you need to be nimble with offer testing.

Primarily test offers on landing pages then carry offers over to ad copy/creatives.

Expand the ABC, add more products, build a bigger flywheel (ads/landers/messages), and continue the scaling journey.

To know if you are moving in the right direction you need to know how to read and understand performance and growth metrics.

**General Metrics**

1. CPM - Cost per 1,000 impressions

2. CPC - Cost per Click

3. CTR - Click Through Rate

4. CVR - Conversion Rate

5. CAC/CPA - Customer Acquisition Cost

6. ROAS - Return on Ad Spend

7. MER - Marketing Efficiency Ratio

**Video Specific Metrics**

1. Thumb Stop (Hook) Rate - The percentage of people who watch 3 seconds of your video ad.

2. Hold Rate - The percentage of people who watch 15 seconds of your video ad.

3. Completion Rate - The percentage of people who watch your entire video ad.