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Jacob and Jocelyn from the Pilothouse Meta team break down what actually moved the needle for Meta advertisers this Black Friday/Cyber Monday. The biggest unlock? Being scrappy. The brands that crushed it weren’t over-optimized, they were just fast. Fast to tweak offers. Fast to drop weird creative. Fast to kill what wasn’t working.

For DTC marketers managing Meta ads during promo periods.

Why classic percentage-off offers still worked best
What BOGO and free shipping offers actually drove performance
How scrappy creative (think stick figures and UGC) outperformed polished ads
Why lighter audience exclusions won this year
Which account structures flopped and what replaced them

Who this is for: Growth leads, ad buyers, DTC founders gearing up for Q1

What to steal:

Shift back to shorter promo windows and preserve spend for tentpole days
Run weird, low-fi creative without abandoning your personas
Use lighter exclusions to let Meta optimize delivery more freely

Timestamps

00:00 Black Friday performance trends and buying intent

02:00 Why brands with flexible offers won

04:00 Creative pivots and scrappy content outperforming polished ads

06:00 Best offers of the season and what actually moved customers

08:00 Millennial-targeted creative and why variety mattered

10:00 Meta delivery updates and lighter exclusion strategies

12:00 Dayparting, lifetime budgets and what stopped working

14:00 Post-click learnings and which landing pages converted

16:00 Emerging channels like AppLovin and Pinterest

18:00 How top brands are approaching post-BFCM and holiday scaling

Hashtags

#DTC #MetaAds #BFCM2025 #EcommerceMarketing #CreativeStrategy #PerformanceMarketing #PaidSocial #AppLovin #PinterestAds #BlackFridayInsights #CyberMondayMarketing #DigitalAdvertising

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Ep 565: BFCM + Meta in 2025: Shorter Promo Windows and Scrappy Pivots That Crushed

DTC Podcast