Paul Gedman has been in DTC longer than almost anyone we've had on the podcast - from joining The Hut Group in 2009 with 40 employees, and over nine years scaling it to £1 billion in revenue via ten acquisitions (including Look Fantastic), to now running eComplete, where he's building a model that competes directly with private equity for e-commerce acquisitions.

Paul breaks down why every DTC era is defined by a different arbitrage opportunity, what actually happens once a founder takes on investment (his "5-a-side to 11-a-side" analogy is a good one), and the brutal real odds of a successful DTC exit - he puts it at 1 in 1,600 founders who get out with more than 50% of the value.

We also get into why 80% of exit processes fail, the prep work founders skip that kills deals months later, and how eComplete is trying to build a hybrid model that gives founders a better shot.


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This podcast is proudly sponsored by Sathi.

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D2C Diaries listeners get 20% off, free migration from their current setup, and onboarding support from their team.

Book a demo: https://mysathi.io/demo?utm_source=soarwithus&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=d2c_diaries

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This podcast is proudly sponsored by Incard.

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Meta performance has been rough since March and if you're feeling it, you're not alone. Olly and Loukas are back for a solo episode breaking down exactly what's gone wrong on the platform and, more importantly, what's actually working across the 40+ audits they ran in Q2.

They cover the five most common account errors they're seeing right now (most of which are quick fixes), why creative diversity has become the single biggest unlock for scaling spend, and how to run a proper gap analysis across persona, messaging, valence zones, emotional drivers, and vehicle type before you produce another asset.

Krishna Rao, CFO of Anthropic, on Invest Like the Best https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEEZPpx8qow

Brian Chesky on Invest Like the Best - AI Founder mode https://youtu.be/eURcW5_uS60

Creative Forecasting resource: https://eu1.hubs.ly/H0wjPt20

00:00 Intro: news and what we've been watching

17:32 State of Meta: why Q2 has been tough across the board

20:18 5 common account errors (attribution, audiences, funnel coverage, concentration, landing pages)

28:09 What's working: The Hudson Method and creator flywheels

36:36 Creative volume, gap analysis and diversifying across personas, valence & vehicle

48:42 Hit rate case study: micro personas and psychological messaging in action

50:58 Iterations, borrowing frameworks from non-competing brands

55:24 Landing pages, quiz funnels and AOV engineering

🚨🚀 If you're a brand spending £100K/month, we'll run your ads. Apply for your growth roadmap: https://eu1.hubs.ly/H0wjzrY0

Follow Olly: https://linktr.ee/ollyhudson

Follow Joe: https://linktr.ee/joe_marston

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---

12 months ago AI animation wasn't really a thing. Now it's a fourth creative format sitting alongside static, UGC and high production and the brands that figure it out first are going to have a significant edge.

We got Alex Cooper back on D2C Diaries this week. And a lot has changed since he was last on. We got into everything.

How we've built an AI videographer role into our production process and why you need a specialist not a generalist.
Why winning ads right now are either hyper native or elite direct response and why everything in the middle is dying.
How the pendulum has swung too far toward AI research and why the best strategists are going back to manual.
Why iterations aren't dead post-Andromeda, they just need to mean something.
And the brand that scaled from $1M to $45M off the back of one concept.

Check out Parker AI here: https://heyparker.ai/

🚨🚀 If you're a brand spending £100K/month, we'll run your ads. Apply for your growth roadmap: https://eu1.hubs.ly/H0wjzrY0

Follow Alex
https://x.com/alexgoughcooper
https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexgoughcooper/
https://heyparker.ai/

00:00 Alex Cooper returns
02:24 Our sponsor Incard
04:01 The biggest shifts in creative strategy in the last 12 months
05:54 How we built the AI videographer role
13:25 AI animations are here to stay
16:02 Meta's persona level delivery
20:04 Gap analysis, learnings and data
26:55 Manual research vs AI automated research
30:07 Our sponsor Incard
31:45 Manual research vs AI automated research
33:39 Iterations post-Andromeda
38:26 Ugly vs high prod
48:37 Positive framing
51:22 Complexity bias in ads
55:20 How Alex is using AI
1:02:17 Parker AI

Follow Olly: https://linktr.ee/ollyhudson
Follow Joe: https://linktr.ee/joe_marston
Follow Loukas: https://shorturl.at/TRI8B / https://x.com/LoukasHambi
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