Why It Matters
Black Friday and Cyber Monday carry the highest stakes of the year, and last year’s results showed that some long-held rules no longer apply. Andrew Foxwell and Brad Ploch point out that BFCM-specific creative finally beat evergreens, and that one-hour flash sales with a free gift tripled Hollow’s hourly revenue and lifted AOV 30%. Pacing matters as much as tactics: Black Friday mornings and Cyber Monday evenings are where the revenue happens, and the weekend slump is normal, not a reason to pull budget. The playbook also covers what to keep running (evergreens, a separate retention campaign for lapsed customers) and when to lower the offer threshold. Hollow’s move from “buy three, get three free” to “buy two, get two free” cut CAC faster than it cut AOV, so margin per customer went up.
Who This Is For
Built for Founders members running Meta ads for DTC brands heading into BFCM, especially media buyers and brand-side marketers who are still locking in offers, creative, and campaign structure. Most useful if you’re deciding whether to build BFCM-specific assets, planning flash sales or gift-with-purchase offers, or worried about how to pace budget through a slow weekend.
Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the most important events of the year for DTC brands. You want six-figure hours? You want results that leave your competitors in the dust? Good.
Based on my chat with Brad Ploch on the Scalability School Podcast, I’m sharing the Meta ad strategies that are truly working for DTC brands right now.
1. Flash Sales & Free Gifts: Why Urgency Wins
Let’s talk about the big winner last year: flash sales and gift-with-purchase offers.
Hollow ran a one-hour flash sale offering a free beanie with orders over $100 and repeated the promotion a couple of times with plain text emails and SMS. No fancy automations, just hit send and watch the revenue pace triple. Yes, 3x your normal hourly revenue.
Giving away a gift is a margin hit, but you’re pulling future revenue forward and stacking cash to keep your ad budget cranking. AOV went up 30%. Your accountant might think you’ve lost your mind, but your bank account will thank you.
How to do it Foxwell-style:
Keep it simple. Plain text works
High perceived value, low marginal cost
Mix up the offers if you’re doing it more than once. Socks, anyone?
Be prepared to repeat your efforts because BFCM is a marathon and not a sprint.
2. Revenue Pacing: Don’t Get Faked Out by the Slump
Set your revenue goal for Nov/Dec. Pull daily and hourly data from Shopify and plot it out.
Pro tip: Black Friday mornings and Cyber Monday evenings are where the magic happens. Saturday/Sunday is always trash. Don’t freak out or light your budgets on fire. Consumers are just holding out for Monday deals.
Practical pacing steps:
Export your daily/hourly Shopify data. Spreadsheets are your friend.
Allocate spend to match historical surges.
With more shipping days after BFCM this year, expect sales to stretch out, but remember that having extra days doesn’t mean more money and often just gives people more time to procrastinate.
3. Creative Strategy: BFCM-Specific Assets Finally Matter
For years, we all said “just run your evergreens, Meta likes them.” Not last year. BFCM-specific creative finally started outperforming evergreens. Meta gave them some extra juice, and if you weren’t on it, you left money on the table.
What worked:
Founder or team in the warehouse, talking about deals or favorite products.
Gift guides and bundles (raise AOV, make gift shopping brainless).
Messy and human 'ugly' whiteboard ads.
“Sorry to those who bought last week, deals are better now” (cringy but prints money).
Holiday product pics that AI can do in 30 seconds now.
Don’t overthink it. Make sure your creators (or your iPhone) know the offer and can riff. Mix in comment reply videos too: “Yes, we’re running a BFCM sale!” Engage, don’t just announce.
Want feedback on your Meta ads from people who’ve seen it all? Inside Foxwell Founders, you get live ad account reviews, creative analysis sessions, and a private Slack full of operators ready to help.
4. Campaign Structure: Keep Evergreen, Layer BFCM, Be Ready to Scale
Build BFCM-specific campaigns, but don’t stress if you want to drop promo creative into your existing CBOs. Meta isn’t going to punish you.
Use value optimization and set a higher minimum ROAS, especially if you’ve got a big catalog with different discounts.
Have backup campaigns ready to go. Meta approval is slow when it matters most; don’t wait until you need more volume to build.
Never shut off your evergreen. Let it run. Sometimes the old faithful outperforms the shiny new thing.
5. Retention Campaigns: Reactivate, Don’t Spam
If you want to get fancy, reach out to your lapsed customers, which means people who bought once but have not purchased in the last 90, 120, or 180 days.
Exclude recent buyers.
Run a 1-day click window to hold Meta’s feet to the fire.
Set a higher ROAS target than acquisition because these customers are low-hanging fruit.
Throw your BFCM assets in and let it rip.
For high-SKU brands, use DPAs but keep retention separate from new prospecting.
6. Landing Pages: Consistency or Bust
If you’re starting fresh, using bestsellers or product pages works well as long as you update your announcement bar and offer section for BFCM.
Returning customers? Curated BFCM collections with your best discounts on products they don’t already own.
Make sure every touchpoint matches the offer (email, pop-up, ad, landing page). Don’t let your evergreen pop-up undercut your BFCM deals.
Swap your pop-up copy pre-BFCM to tease the sale and boost opt-ins. During BFCM, make the pop-up match the real offer.
7. AOV: Lower the Barrier, Win More Customers
Stop focusing on raising AOV. Hollow changed their offer from “buy three, get three free” to “buy two, get two free.” AOV dropped, but CAC dropped even faster, and margin per customer increased. Sometimes, making it easier for people to qualify means you scale faster. It’s about finding the right ratio between AOV and CAC.
Foxwell Final Thoughts
This year, success on Meta for BFCM is about urgency, creative variety, the right campaign mix, and matching your offer to your audience. Don’t be dogmatic; run an experiment, watch your pacing, and keep both evergreen and BFCM-specific assets running. And for the love of all things DTC, don’t freak out when Saturday is slow.
Check out the full Scalability School Podcast episode here.
