The 2026 DTC Field Guide.
Five challenges every DTC brand will face this year, and the reason they're all the same number. A free workbook: five short exercises you run on your own Shopify numbers, in the order they compound.
Five challenges. One number.
The five, in order
Predict it
Acquisition you can't judge until the money's gone. Worksheet: what a new customer is actually worth on day one, versus what you're guessing.
Adjust it
Your best customers by revenue are your most expensive. Worksheet: net your top five down to real contribution after returns and discounts, then re-rank.
Rank by it
Retention spend landing on the wrong people. Worksheet: where your value concentrates, and whether your budget matches the shape.
Act on it
The paid-social treadmill that never compounds. Worksheet: what signal you're sending the ad platform, and why it finds your cheapest customers.
Run on it
Growth that doesn't survive the P&L. Worksheet: was your best month your best month, once the returns land?
Open the guide
Seven pages, five worksheets. You run each challenge on your own Shopify numbers in a few minutes, and by the last page a single idea has assembled itself.
Open the field guideFree, no email required. Yours to keep.
If it’s useful, the rest of the field guide library goes deeper on returns and second-purchase economics.
Read alongside
- Read
Insight · Patterns
Revenue is not a proxy for the health of your business
- Read
Insight · Strategy
You've been making bets without the odds
- Run the calculator
Free tool
The Spend Leak Calculator
The term it turns on: Forward CLV, in the glossary.
Five worksheets on a sample. One number on every customer.
Working the five by hand, on a sample, is the right way to see the shape. The number underneath all five is Forward CLV, and the free Diagnostic puts it on every customer in a one-off read on one read-only Shopify connection.
Read-only access · No deck required · You keep the analysis either way