Tactical & Practical

Did you know you can start running gifting messaging on your site & in your ad account BEFORE you launch a sale, like Father's Day or BFCM? Early in the month of May, I tested Father's Day Gifting Messaging across websites of 4 different brands that all sell products that make good father's day gifts. Even before the sale or the offer is launched, this messaging outperformed evergreen site content...

Proof Wallets is spending as many ad dollars on Linear TV as they are on Meta, and performance is better on TV... If I was consulting for @DanaPeters0321 at the time they launched TV campaigns, I probably would've told him not to do it. I would've argued that it's a distraction this early in the business, and that there was still a lot of room for them to grow & optimize Meta. Good thing Dana and...

When should you iterate? And when should you test net new creative concepts? The simple answer for me, is when you hit a point of diminishing returns with iterations, shake the etch a sketch, and start over with net new concepts The first round of headline testing increased CVR by 27% The next round, we iterated on the winners, and increased CVR by 11% The next round, we iterated again and only in...

Great conversation with @heyitsalexP around perceived value, marketing in the world of fashion, upsells, bundles, and more. Tactical & Practical is sponsored by Intelligems.io - my go to testing tool to help find new ways to increase the percieved value of our products. Check them out! Follow Alex on twitter and subscribe to her newsletter here: https://x.com/heyitsalexP https://t.co/kIyKSdSSQ1

The most valuable copywriting inspiration I've ever gotten is from songwriters. They're the best at writing in a way that makes people feel something. They're excellent at making the aspirational feel within reach. They're better than any marketer at making people feel at home, and comfortable in their lyrics. Great advertising should aspire to do those things too. So, in this episode, I share 3 s...

Since I'm taking some time off from full time employment, my entire steak & whiskey budget is now dependent on freelance work... So, I'm going to market my freelance services the way I wish freelancers & agencies marketed to me while I was on the brand side. Which means... 1. I won't make you hop on a call if you don't want to, I'll explain everything in this podcast. 2. I won't gatekeep my proces...

CMO of Ridge & the Most Valuable Guest of Tactical & Practical, Couuor Mac joins the pod to talk media buying, on-site messaging testing, and hammock-maxxing.

Some of you have spent a year split testing on your website and don't have anything to show for it... and I think I know why. I ran a headline test on a landing page. The control variant was a very evidence-based, authority / credibility kinda headline. The variant that won the split test, and increased CVR by 48%, was on the other end of the spectrum, it was very emotional & benefit driven. THAT...

Brands need to act differently at different stages of growth. What works for a $50 million/year brand might drown a $10 million/year brand. Understand where you're at, and act accordingly.

How I build marketing teams When you should hire in-house vs agencies/freelancers How to keep employees accountable & productive without endless meetings & micro-managing & more don't miss this episode.

AI is great at some things It's bad at others And sometimes, it straight up makes mistakes or lies to me... I think it's all important that we take a step back, understand its strengths, weaknesses, how it can help us today, and how we should be building it into our brands for the future. This episode is all about The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly side of Artificial Intelligence:

Don't hire a performance marketers to do a brand builder's job.

BEFORE you launch that new advertising channel, try these 5 things to try to spark new growth in a product or brand that's hit a plateau: 1. Test new prices & offers on your hero SKU. Price-Market-Fit is not something you can set and forget, just look at gas prices the last couple weeks. The price consumers are willing to pay for your product changes with inflation, election cycles, and category m...

Did you know that you don't have to just ask "How did you hear about us?" in your post purchase survey? I think it's way less valuable to use it as a form as attribution, and way MORE valuable to ask them questions that'll shape your marketing strategy in the future. At Adapt, I'm asking "When did you first hear about us?" "Who supports you on your health journey?" "How do supplements fit into you...

On this episode: - I started an influencer program with $8k that grew into a multi 7-figure channel - A new form of ad iteration made me sell out of my hero SKU way too fast - Ad fatigue is self inflicted? - Headline tests continue to move the needle - Marketers need to understand WHY performance is bad, then they can work on how to improve it

Most of the time I buy whiskey, I'm happy, celebrating, I'm buying to have a good night with friends or to mark a milestone. But on rare occasions... I buy whiskey when I'm sad, angry, frustrated, stress, I buy it as a coping mechanism... Now that's not good, and it's been a long time since I've done it so don't worry about me, lol... but it exposes a flaw in the way that most of the industry is t...

I've been at a brand where an average SMS campaign would do $8k in revenue. Then we sent one that did $40k in 30 minutes. I've ran an email account that made $6k on a normal daily email campaign. Then we sent one that did $75k in 24 hours. And no, those campaigns weren't sent on black friday, they weren't even sent in Q4. In this episode, I show you how you can take a moment that your customers ca...

In this episode I break down how we just: - Doubled ad spend while increasing aMER - How doing less allows you to do more - Testing CTA button text - Resending emails to non openers (the easiest, lowest hanging revenue in all of ecom) - & what to do what your top selling product starts to plateau

President of GrooveLife.com joins the show to talk about building lean & efficient marketing teams.

Learn how I've helped 7 figure brands break through the 8 fig/yr mark, here some anonymous questions from marketers early in their careers, and check out a recent DISCOUNT test I ran with suprising results, my Tweet of the Week, and a JUICY Tactical Tip for SuperBowl Sunday.

Dive into how I started a new brand, and how I think about creative strategy & split testing when nobody has ever heard of you.

We need to throw out the word "brand" I think our simple, performance-marketer brains completely crumble when we try to think about building a "brand." It's abstract, it sounds antithetical to performance & growth, and it leads marketers into a lot of bad behavior Instead, you should be trying to build PERSONALITY into your company. A personality that is capable of showing up in the right context,...

Yes, the majority of Americans aren't rolling in cash right now... But, the top 10% of earners are still seeing your ads, visiting your website, and spending their money. Why aren't you giving them the opportunity to give you MORE?

Discounts are like binge drinking - Lots of fun in the short term (big revenue boost) - Leads to bad behavior (hacky marketing) - Creates shallow, meaningless relationships (low LTV customers) - Terrible Hangovers (awful performance after the sale) - It's more acceptable to do around major holidays (if you're doing it august I assume your life & business are not going well) ...But a great offer is...

The CMO of The Ridge is back on the pod to break down how he's thinking about 2026, including 103 ideas to improve performance next year, an increased focused on retention, on-site merchandising strategy, and organic social.