Death By Landing Page
⚠️ How Your Top Pages Are Killing Conversion Velocity, CAC, ROAS, and CPC Just Flipped this week, and more!
Howdy readers 🥰
In this newsletter, you’ll find:
⚠️ Death by Landing Page: How Your Top Pages Are Killing Conversion Velocity
📊 CAC, ROAS, and CPC Just Flipped this week — Here’s What’s Working Now
🏆 Ad of the Day
If you’re new to ScaleUP, then a hearty welcome! You and 50k+ CEOs, CMOS, and marketers have reached the right place. Let’s get into it, shall we? Oh! Before you forget, if someone forwarded this newsletter to you, don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter so you never miss out!
Together with Portless
📦 60-Day Delays and 30% Tariffs? They’re Costing You More Than You Think
While your inventory sits on a cargo ship, your customers scroll past, your ads waste spend, and your best-sellers go out of stock.
For the next 90 days, tariffs are down but inventory delays still eat into your margin and momentum.
Here’s how Portless changes the game:
- Restock fast-moving products in 3–5 days
- Start selling right after manufacturing wraps
- Only pay tariffs after each customer purchase
- Free up cash and avoid overbuying inventory
Turn 6-week delays into 6-day deliveries directly from China, and protect your margins while everyone else plays catch-up.
Contact Portless and take back control of your inventory!
⚠️ Death by Landing Page: How Your Top Pages Are Killing Conversion Velocity
Every DTC team celebrates “top pages.”
Highest traffic. Most SEO wins. Maybe even backlinks and shares. But here’s the trap: what looks like your best asset may actually be your deepest leak. Because the #1 source of conversion drag isn’t poor-performing pages. It’s high-traffic pages that give you the illusion of success while quietly eroding intent.
They look like they’re working, but they’re just burning attention at scale.
💣 The High-Traffic Failure Audit
Use this framework to audit any “winning” page. If it triggers 2 or more of these failure traits, it’s not helping you, it’s bleeding your funnel.
These aren’t design flaws. They’re strategic misfires caused by treating traffic as the goal instead of momentum.
⚔️ Teardown: The Page That Looked Like It Worked
Brand: Mid-size skincare DTCTop Page: “Best Vitamin C Serums Under $30” ranked #3 for 3 major termsTraffic: ~48,000 monthly visitsIssue: 0.6% conversion rate, 86% bounce from paid search
Rebuild:
- Changed angle: “Compare the Top 3 Vitamin C Serums (We Sell One)”
- Added sticky product CTA at 20% scroll
- Replaced generic FAQs with use-case decision tree
- Segmented traffic flow based on source (search vs email vs paid social)
New Result:
- CVR rose to 3.4%
- Time on page doubled
- Organic + branded search increased as users returned with intent
Lesson: It was never about more traffic—it was about the right message, tuned to the right source.
🧠 Where SEMrush Enters Like a Sledgehammer
Open the Top Pages + Channel Breakdown dashboard. You’ll see not just which pages are pulling traffic, but how that traffic is distributed, how users behave by channel, and where momentum stalls. It’s not just analytics, it’s a profit velocity map for your site.
And when you overlay your competitor’s top-performing pages by source, you’ll realize exactly where they’re converting the visitors you’re just entertaining.
You can start your free 7-day trial here and use the Traffic Toolkit to pinpoint where velocity dies, and where margin lives.
🧨 Final Flip: Stop Worshipping “Top Pages”
Your dashboard is lying to you. “Top” should mean top converters, not top clickbait.
Because in DTC, the question isn’t how many people landed—it’s how many people kept moving. Pages that earn attention are easy. Pages that convert attention into progress are your real growth levers.
📊 CAC, ROAS, and CPC Just Flipped the Playbook — Here’s What’s Working Now
The July 5 Northbeam Index shows clear winners and losers across core metrics. CAC is falling fastest where most brands aren’t looking, while ROAS is spiking on channels that still get minimal budget.
The Breakdown:
1. CAC: TikTok and Snap are quietly crushing acquisition costs - Snap’s CAC dropped -7.65%, while TikTok cut CAC by -5.54%, far better than Meta (-4.72%) and leagues ahead of Google (+1.11%). These are still underfunded channels with strong creative leverage. For brands chasing low-cost scale, this is where your next customer is hiding.
2. ROAS: YouTube and Snapchat dominate returns this week - YouTube posted a +14.74% ROAS gain and Snapchat topped the chart at +15.86%. Both outperformed Meta (+8.17%) and crushed Google (+4.07%), despite lower budget shares. If you’re optimizing for returns, these channels deserve a closer look.
3. CPC: Snap and Pinterest deliver the cheapest clicks by far - Snap’s CPC fell -16.32%, with Pinterest close behind at -9.51%, even as Google’s rose by +2.61%. Cost-per-clicks are plunging fastest on non-core channels. Smart buyers are using that drop to test new audiences and stretch creative further.
Meta and Google still control 90%+ of media budgets, but they’re no longer the best on performance. Budget share hasn’t caught up to the metric shift—Snap gets just 0.74% and YouTube 2.15%. Reallocating 5–10% now could double returns before Q4 ramps up.
🎥 Ad of the Day
What Works:
Parenting Products Sell Through Empowerment, Not Utility - This ad doesn’t say “it’s easier to carry.” It says “you’ll be the parent who knows how to move smartly through chaos.” Emotional relief > ergonomic specs.
Testimonial-as-Content Strategy - The quoted user review isn’t just decoration, it’s a conversion wedge. It speaks in natural, specific language and removes common objections
Pro-Level Design = “You Deserve Better” Signal - The design awards serve as decision reinforcement for premium shoppers. Parents often feel guilt spending more — this creative says, “You’re not overpaying. You’re upgrading.”
Broader Insights:
This ad perfectly blends identity affirmation, credibility signals, product clarity, and user storytelling. Instead of pushing features, it pulls desire through lifestyle utility. Parents don’t just see a stroller; they see themselves breezing through the airport, organized, confident, and admired.
Advertise with Us
Wanna put out your message in front of over 50,000 best marketers and decision makers?
We are concerned about everything DTC and its winning strategies. If you liked what you read, why not join the 50k+ marketers from 13k+ DTC brands who have already subscribed? Just follow this.
At ScaleUP, we care about our readers and want to provide the best possible experience. That's why we always look for ways to improve our content and connect with our audience. If you'd like to stay in touch, be sure to follow us EVERYWHERE🥰
Thanks for your support :) We'll be back again with more such content 🥳