Reading time: 4 minutes

Paid Acquisition Playbook that generated +200 Mio EUR revenue 🧠🚀

Ready? Let’s go!

This is the paid acquisition playbook I developed over 9 years in eCommerce performance marketing for 40+ brands, and that I used to build 2 brands from 0 to 50 Mio EUR revenue. 📈

 

It consists of 10 key elements.

Let’s learn them… 🤓

 

#1 – Choose your hero product(s) 🦸‍♀️

 

I always start by studying a brand’s and competitor’s product catalog and choosing 1-5 hero products to focus on.

Your customer acquisition strategy should never start by trying to sell an entire catalog of products. This adds too many variables when testing.

You will end up shooting blindly without any key learnings.

It all starts with the product.

 

#2 – Define your problem-solution angles and hooks 🔎

 

When you have the product selection, it is time to move to messaging.

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

Suppose you’re not great at copywriting, studying competitors’ ads, being a part of the community, and reading reviews from real customers will be a huge help. 

👉 Create a list of scaling competitors, study them, and turn them into a brand’s hook/angle.

Here, focus on understanding the pain points of the customers regarding the solution that your products provide, what bothers them about the alternatives, what their objections are before buying, and group + prioritize them into a specific angle.

I like to start with 3-5 angles per product.

Remember, people buy solutions and improvements in their lifestyle, not product features.

 

#3 – Start by designing static image ads 🎣

 

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.

Your CTRs will skyrocket when you crack a great hook/angle and checkout metrics on your online shop.

Start with statics first before you produce extra videos for your ads.

 

#4 Create video ads using your top hooks/angles 🎯

 

Most top-performing video ads start with a script. 

These can be broken down into the following: 

(1) Hook = Attention grabber

(2) Body = Pitch that sparks the desire to get it 

(3) Close = Action-oriented

 

💡 Test combinations of all 3.

#5 Build High-converting Landing pages 🛒

 

These pages aim to educate people vs. sell them on why they need the product.

I prefer to go with Meta Ad → Lander → PDP → Checkout.

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

Double down on your social proof here and connect the copy to your winning angles.

My favorite style is listicles, also known as “7 reasons why” pages.

Use landing pages to convert users with a full-funnel marketing approach.

 

#6 Add Whitelisting to your Meta strategy 🔥

 

Make sure to leverage Influencers and creators for dark posting + whitelisting.

In 2024, this still works like crazy, but it’s important to find the right creators to combine:

  1. a) their audience
  2. b) content creation skills

You can run ads for prospecting, re-engagement of your and their audiences, retargeting, and retention.

Keep in mind that performance per creator will vary based on the stage of the funnel.

The best success I have lately seen is by creating dedicated landers for the best-performing collaborations.

 

#7 Develop multiple sources of content 🦄

 

We all know the term user-generated content; it still works, so continue to use it. 

In addition, adding employee-generated content (EGC) to the mix, especially the founder story, always seems to work well.

Next to this, form a partnership with creators to deliver content to you on a monthly basis and based on your briefs and performance feedback.

Creatives can make or break a successful ECOM brand.

 

*WHAT I think when someone says ECOM is EASY 🛑

#8 Offer testing 🤔

 

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

Until you’ve cracked 10Mio €/year, you need to be agile with offer testing. 

That’s the world we are living in.

✅ So many times, I have seen the scenario of finding an excellent problem-solution product with strong angles, using a high-converting landing page and irresistible offer that still produced profitability and scaled like crazy.

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

Prioritize product and category offers before the sitewide discounts.

 

#9 CRO an AB testing 👨‍🔬

 

Improving your shop, checkout, and landers will increase your profitability and give you more margin to scale to new heights.

Investment in CRO and AB testing is never a bad investment when you are scaling.

Maximize the revenue per visitor to unleash scaling.

 

#10 Introduce new products 🛍️

 

Launch new products in the existing category and open up new categories to bring down your CAC.

Upgrade your section of hero products to boost acquisition.

Keep in mind that with different products and angles, you might open up a new audience of your potential customers.

💡 There are:

  1. a) evergreen product you can promote the whole year
  2. b) season products connected to a particular part of the year
  3. c) exclusive limited-edition products

From my experience, the broader audience you can target with your products, the more scalable your business will be.

 

Those are 10, but I love to overdeliver, so I will give you one more as a BONUS that will truly unlock the growth.

 

#11 Open new markets 🌍

Expand your winning offers with your hero product’s landing pages and a localized approach to new markets and set up retention strategies right from the start.

Think about:

  • Market(s)?
  • Research
  • Logistics
  • Localization
  • Go-to-market strategy
  • Budget & expectations

Knowing the market and go-to-market strategy is crucial.

Now rinse and repeat.

I’ve been preaching and using this same playbook for the last few years, and it continues to work great for my clients and the brands I’m working directly on.

 

P.S. In my future newsletters, you can expect an even further breakdown of this process – especially the topic of going internationally, as this one sparked the most interest based on your feedback.

 

Everything above in a short summary 👀

And that’s a wrap for today’s ECOM growth community blog! 

 

Remember

Following the proven playbooks will increase your chances of success and save you a lot of time, money, and concerns. 🤝

 

I am looking forward to reading your feedback on this – you can always send me a message on LinkedIn.

 

P.S. If you are looking to get some help on growing your ECOM brand and developing your growth marketing team, let’s chat.

 

Talk soon and as always …

Happy scaling! 🚀

 

BESTS,

Jure (JK) Knehtl

Founder @ JK GROWTH

crossmenu