Ecommerce / DTC · Anonymised
ROAS lifted from 3.5× to 6.6× on the same ad spend
A DTC brand inherited at under 2× ROAS. Spend held flat, system rebuilt: +26% revenue and peak season up 283% YoY - without discounting.
Industry
DTC Ecommerce - Performance Sports & Wearables
Engagement
Ongoing growth partnership (current)
Timeframe
12-month window, year-on-year comparison
Hero stat
+88%
ROAS uplift on the same ad spend
DTC ecommerce · 12-month window · zero incremental media budget
Services provided
- Paid social & search strategy
- Creative testing & production direction
- Conversion & landing page optimisation
- Full-funnel measurement rebuild
- B2B paid lead generation
Channels
- Meta Ads
- Google Ads
- TikTok
Tools & platforms
- Shopify
- GA4
- GTM
- Post-purchase attribution
Context
The brand had moved through multiple agencies. Performance had eroded to a sub-2× ROAS and margin was being propped up by BFCM discounting. Leadership needed a partner who would treat spend like their own - and rebuild the commercial picture, not just the campaigns.
The problem
What we walked into
- -Previous-agency ROAS under 2× across paid social and search.
- -Audience and campaign overlap inflating CPMs against the brand itself.
- -BFCM revenue dependent on aggressive discounting, eroding contribution margin.
- -Reporting that didn't match the bank account - finance and marketing arguing about reality.
Approach
What we did, in order
01
Consolidated the account
Removed overlapping audiences and redundant campaign structures so the brand stopped bidding against itself. CPMs dropped, efficient frequency returned.
02
Built a disciplined creative testing system
Weekly creative testing tied to a defined hypothesis, with clear winners promoted into scale campaigns. Killed the 'spray and pray' that wastes most ecommerce budgets.
03
Rebuilt full-funnel measurement
Server-side tracking and post-purchase attribution survey - a single source of truth that reconciled to Shopify revenue so spend decisions matched commercial reality.
04
Reframed BFCM around margin
Replaced blanket discounting with offer architecture that protected contribution margin. Peak season grew 283% YoY without sitewide markdowns.
05
Added a B2B paid lead motion
Layered a B2B paid lead-gen system alongside the DTC engine to capture wholesale and partner demand the brand was leaving on the table.
Metric breakdown
The numbers, with context
ROAS uplift
From 3.5× to 6.6× · same ad spend · 12 months
Revenue YoY
Same ad spend, no incremental media budget
BFCM revenue YoY
November / peak season · without sitewide discounting
Paid leads YoY (B2B motion)
2,599 paid leads FYTD vs prior year
Outcome
ROAS climbed from 3.5× to 6.6× - +88% - while revenue grew 26% year-on-year on the same ad spend. BFCM grew 283% YoY without discounting, and the layered B2B motion delivered 2,599 paid leads (+187% YoY). The work is ongoing.
“Same spend. Different system. The difference shows up in the bank, not the dashboard.”
Talk to Sam
Running ads but feeling stuck under 3× ROAS?
That's almost always a structural problem - not a budget one. Book a strategy call and we'll walk through what the rebuild looks like for your account.
Advisory Notice
A quick note
Every business is different. The examples on this site are real outcomes from past work, but they are illustrative only and not guarantees of future performance. Results depend on factors including market conditions, competition, customer behaviour, pricing, internal execution, and broader business decisions.
SE Digital helps identify opportunities, improve systems, and support stronger digital performance, but commercial outcomes always vary by context.