Fixing attribution first, then scaling to 4.9× ROAS at peak
Ardent's ad platforms claimed 2,400 monthly conversions. Their finance system showed 900. We stopped spending until we knew which number was real.
- Industry
- E-commerce / DTC
- Year
- 2025
- Duration
- 9 months
Client
Ardent Coffee Co.
- Blended ROAS at peak season
- 4.9×Blended ROAS at peak season
- Cost per acquisition
- −38%Cost per acquisition
- Of peak revenue from lifecycle email
- 31%Of peak revenue from lifecycle email
- Blended ROAS, steady state
- 1.6× → 3.8×Blended ROAS, steady state
Where they were starting from.
Ardent had scaled paid social aggressively into a wall: blended ROAS had fallen from 3.1× to 1.6× in two quarters while reported platform performance looked excellent. The conversion event fired on the checkout page load rather than on payment confirmation, so every abandoned cart counted as a sale — and the algorithm had been optimising toward abandonment for months.
Four decisions that shaped the outcome.
- 01
Stop, then measure
We paused 60% of spend for eleven days and rebuilt tracking server-side with order-confirmation webhooks as the source of truth.
- 02
Re-baseline honestly
The real numbers were worse than anyone hoped. We presented them to the board with a rebuild plan rather than a rosier chart.
- 03
Creative as the main variable
Twelve concepts per month in structured batches, judged on incremental revenue rather than click-through rate.
- 04
Own the retention side
Six lifecycle flows — welcome, browse abandonment, replenishment, win-back, post-purchase and VIP — built to earn without incremental media.
Ardent's best trading season on record, achieved with 12% less media spend than the previous year. Lifecycle email now contributes roughly a third of revenue at effectively zero marginal cost.
Built with
- Meta Ads
- Google Ads
- Server-Side GTM
- Klaviyo
- Shopify
- Looker Studio
Peak season was our best on record at 4.9× ROAS. The email flows they built accounted for a third of it without any incremental spend.
Digital Marketing
Paid media, lifecycle and creative run as one system, measured against pipeline instead of platform dashboards.
Tell us where it hurts.
If any of this sounded familiar, the call is free and the advice is honest — even when the honest advice is that you do not need us.
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