Stop Killing Ads That Are Actually Working

Waddup y'all! Hope everyone had a great week.

Quick update before we get into it. I just finished one of the more eye-opening analyses I've done for a client and it confirmed something I've believed for a long time but now have the data to prove.

Most founders are killing content that's actually doing its job.

Let me show you exactly what I mean.

Here's what happens with almost every DTC brand I talk to.

They launch a bunch of video ads. A few perform well. A few don't. The ones that don't get turned off. Simple, right?

Except here's the problem. When most founders say an ad "didn't perform," what they actually mean is "it didn't drive enough purchases." They look at CPA, it's too high, they kill it, they move on.

But they never ask WHERE in the funnel the breakdown is actually happening.

Is the ad not getting clicks? Is it not getting people to the product page? Is it not getting people to add to cart? Or is it doing ALL of that and the drop-off is happening at checkout?

Those are four very different problems with four very different solutions. And if you don't know which one you're dealing with, you're flying blind.

I recently did a deep dive on a client's top 15 video ads over a 30-day period. This is a VC-backed DTC brand spending real money on Meta.

And here's what the data showed.

The content was working. Like, really working.

Multiple videos were generating click-through rates that were 2x higher than their proven best performer. We're talking CTRs of 3.8%, 4.4%, 4.9% when the winner was sitting at 2.1%. The ads were grabbing attention and getting people to click.

But it didn't stop there. The add-to-cart rates were strong too. One video had a 60% Click-to-Add-to-Cart rate. 60%! Meaning more than half the people who clicked on the ad added the product to their cart. Another hit 30%. Several were in the 25% range, right in line with the proven winner.

So people were watching the ads. Clicking. Landing on the product page. And adding to cart.

Then they weren't buying.

The proven best performer in the account had a 14.9% ATC-to-Purchase rate. Meaning about 15 out of every 100 people who added to cart completed the purchase.

But most of the other high-performing creatives were converting at 7-10% ATC-to-Purchase. Some even lower.

The video with the 60% add-to-cart rate? Only 7.7% of those people actually purchased.

Let me say that again. 60% of people who clicked were interested enough to add to cart. But only 7.7% of THOSE people bought.

That is not a content problem. That is a checkout problem. A landing page problem. A post-click experience problem.

And here's what's wild. When I ran the numbers on what would happen if we closed that gap, if we brought the ATC-to-Purchase rate across all 15 videos closer to the winner's 14.9%, the potential revenue upside was nearly $200K. Without spending a single additional dollar on ads. Same budget. Same content. Just fixing what happens after someone clicks.

Think about that. $200K sitting on the table because of a checkout flow issue, not a content issue. And the instinct for most founders would've been to kill the ads and start over.

If you're running paid content and you're making decisions based purely on CPA, you might be killing your best content without knowing it.

An ad with a high CPA and a high add-to-cart rate is not a bad ad. It's a good ad with a broken funnel behind it.

An ad with strong engagement and strong CTR but low conversions isn't failing. It's doing its job. Something ELSE is failing.

The creative's job is to grab attention, communicate value, and get someone interested enough to take action. If people are clicking and adding to cart, the creative did its job.

My high school basketball coach, David Boyd (Hall of Fame coach, by the way), used to tell us "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." That's exactly what's happening here. Your content led the horse to water. If it's not drinking, that's not the content's fault.

What happens after that is a landing page problem. A checkout flow problem. A pricing friction problem. Shipping costs showing up too late. Not enough payment options. Missing trust signals. Slow page load times. A product page that doesn't match the promise of the ad.

These are all fixable. But you can't fix them if you think the problem is the content.

Here's something I want to be real about.

Some of the best performing content in this analysis? I'm on camera in it. Me and the founder doing podcast-style ads. Those videos are generating some of the highest CTRs and add-to-cart rates in the entire account.

The thing that initially caught my eye was seeing high CTRs on some of our ads paired with low conversions and high CPAs. That combination didn't make sense to me. If people are clicking at 4-5% CTR, the content is clearly resonating. So why aren't they buying?

That gut instinct told me something else was wrong in the funnel. But I knew a gut feeling wasn't going to be enough to change how we operate. I needed to prove it with data. So I dug into every metric at every stage of the funnel. CTR alone only tells you one piece of the story. I needed to see Click-to-ATC, ATC-to-Purchase, and Click-to-Purchase across every single creative and benchmark all of it against our proven winner.

Once I built the full analysis and laid it out, the picture was undeniable. The content was doing its job. The funnel wasn't.

I brought it to the founder and said "your content is working. Here's the proof. The problem is somewhere else."

His reaction? "Oh shit. This is great."

We immediately started testing new landing pages tailored to specific audiences. And surprise surprise, the first LP test is already crushing it.

That's the difference between a content strategist who just makes stuff and one who actually understands the full picture. The content was never the problem. But someone had to trust their instincts, prove it with data, and then push for the fix.

If you're running content and aren't sure where your funnel is breaking, here's how to diagnose it.

Look at your content in stages, not just the end result.

Stage 1: Is the content grabbing attention? Metric: CTR (Click-Through Rate). If your CTR is strong (above 2-3% on Meta), the creative is doing its job of stopping the scroll and getting interest.

Stage 2: Is the content communicating value? Metric: Click-to-ATC (Add to Cart) rate. If people are clicking and then adding to cart, the ad successfully communicated what the product is and why they should want it.

Stage 3: Is the purchase experience closing the deal? Metric: ATC-to-Purchase rate. If people are adding to cart but not buying, the problem is almost never the ad. It's what happens next. Checkout friction, landing page mismatch, pricing surprises, lack of trust signals.

Stage 4: What does your best performer look like at each stage? Benchmark everything against your proven winner. If a new ad matches or exceeds the winner on CTR and ATC but falls short on ATC-to-Purchase, the creative isn't the issue. The post-click experience is.

Most founders only look at Stage 1 and the final CPA. They skip Stage 2 and 3 entirely. That's where the answers are hiding.

If you run this analysis and find out your content IS working but purchases aren't happening, here's where to start:

Audit your checkout flow. Where are cart abandoners dropping off? Look at shipping costs, payment options, and any unexpected fees that show up late.

Check your landing page alignment. If an ad has a high CTR but low add-to-cart, the landing page might not match the ad's promise. The person clicked expecting one thing and landed on something different.

Add trust signals at checkout. Reviews, guarantees, secure checkout badges, clear return policies. These sound basic but they close the gap between "I'm interested" and "take my money."

Set up abandoned cart recovery. If a lot of people are adding to cart and not purchasing, an email or SMS sequence targeting those people could recover significant revenue immediately.

And most importantly, keep investing in the creative. If your content is driving clicks and add-to-carts, it's working. The ROI on that creative investment will multiply once the post-click experience is optimized.

This analysis took me a few hours. It could've saved this client hundreds of thousands of dollars in wasted ad spend and killed content that was actually performing.

If you're spending money on content and ads and you're not sure if the problem is your creative or your funnel, I can help you figure that out. No pitch deck. No sales call. Just reply to this email and tell me what you're working on. I'll let you know if it's something I can dig into.

Talk soon,

Chase