Geometry of Growth, Issue #67

Hello my darling DTC valentines! 💖

Hope everyone is having a lovely week. If you missed Geometry of Growth in your inbox last week A) I’m flattered 😊, and B) my apologies! Last week the FERMÀT team was in sunny San Diego for our company offsite.

In addition to cruising on the bay, getting fresh headshots taken, and taking over the Gaslamp District on a combo scavenger-hunt-food-tour, we also hosted our first annual “Fermies” awards, which was an absolute blast. I can confidently say that the entire team behind the FERMÀT magic is equally as magical. 🙂

I can’t believe we’re already halfway through February. It’s been a crazy month so far.

In addition to announcing a new feature release each day via our brand LinkedIn, we’re gearing up for another monster Singularity Series webinar on CRO in just 14 days!

On February 27th, we’re assembling 15+ top DTC leaders to share their single most impactful CRO strategy — all tactics that will actually move the needle for your business. Speakers include folks from some of the biggest brands in DTC like OLLY, Simple Modern, RIDGE, ILIA, Cheeky, and more. As always, we highly recommend RSVP’ing here even if you can’t make it live; that way you’ll get the recording straight to your inbox! 💌

And one last reminder! If you’re heading to eTail West this month, make sure to check out this cool BMW racing event we’re co-hosting with Digioh and SeaMonster studios on 2/24. We have a few spots left for folks to zoom around on the racetrack! 🏎

Kk. Onto the juicy stuff. In this week’s newsletter: Fanatics’ Michael Rubin on customer-first shopping experiences, experimenting with 100% off new customer acquisition offers, SuperBowl ad analysis and more.

Wishing you and your loved ones a wonderful Friday Valentine’s Day this year!

Cheers,
Lex 💚

PS: Make sure to scroll to the end of this week’s edition for some extra-special DTC-themed Valentine’s Day memes. 😜 I handmade them myself.

This week’s featured store is Starface — and we are so optimizing for whimsy with this breakdown! (I thought this would be a fun switch-up in honor of Valentine’s Day week.)

Starface was co-founded in 2019 by Julie Schott — a former senior editor & Beauty Director at ELLE magazine. Unsurprisingly, she has an impeccable nose for beauty branding. The brand’s mission is to normalize and glamorize acne, transforming breakouts into fun moments of self-expression with their unique pimple patches. Their entire e-commerce experience absolutely exudes this mission.

Starface’s target audience ranges from pre-teens to 20-somethings, and they’ve done a great job of making their shopping experience both delightful and accessible for this wide demographic.

Here are some of my favorite things about Starface’s store:

Transparently, I have no clue how conversion-optimized this site is — but it certainly excels at building brand affinity. For a brand that sells relatively pricey pimple patches, especially when major stores have far cheaper alternatives, I think that this is a very smart move. Playful acne care was a great market opportunity. Starface is killing it!

Crush on Starface’s site, just like me, here. ⭐️

Need a last-minute V-Day gift idea? I got you — DTC, direct-response style.

Locked is an ecomm brand that sells permanent, stainless-steel, rhodium-plated bracelets. They’re tarnish-resistant, making them safe for “dirt, oceans, pools, and anything else you may get into”, according to the brand.

Locked bracelets come with 9 inches of chain and the tools necessary to affix your chain permanently to your unique wrist size. They offer silver, gold, black, and rose gold chains — and even better, you can mix and match styles within your set of two so you & your gift recipient can each rock the style that fits you best.

I haven’t purchased one myself, but the permanent bracelet trend is definitely mega-popular right now. I dig that this brand comes with a lifetime warranty, so if you ever need to take it off or see tarnishing, they’ll send you a replacement “no questions asked”. Pretty cool.

Check out Locked permanent bracelets here. 💎

The Super Bowl is one of my favorite events of the year. The food, the friends, and the ads? Immaculate vibes.

But even better than immaculate vibes = data-driven insights, am I right?

Note that I will only encourage you to download something when the content is really good. And I think this report from Extreme Reach fits the bill.

The Super Bowl is the ultimate battleground for brand creativity, and this report deciphers the strategies that made 2025’s ads stand out. With AI-driven analysis, it uncovers key insights on things like inclusivity, creative effectiveness, and storytelling techniques that drive engagement.

For e-commerce brands, this report is a must-read to understand how top-tier advertisers captivate massive audiences. Whether it’s optimizing your brand’s messaging or crafting ads that resonate beyond game day, these insights will help you elevate your creative impact.

Get the full breakdown on how you can help your brand win—during the Super Bowl and beyond — here. 🏈

I’m generally a huge fan of How I Built This, and this episode was an extra-awesome listen because it features Michael Rubin, the Founder of Fanatics.

In the pod, Michael shares his journey from a teenage entrepreneur to leading a $25 billion sports merchandising giant.

I don’t want to spoil the story, but it’s pretty crazy. He started with a closeout sporting goods business at 15, and by the time he hit his 20s, he was CEO of a public company. Nuts.

This is a great listen if you need a little extra oomph or inspiration right now. Rubin’s story is all about resilience, adaptability, and disrupting markets with customer-first shopping experiences.

Listen to Michael’s episode of How I Built This here. 🛠

If you've ever recorded your screen for something like a tutorial, you know the struggle – jerky mouse movements, hard-to-follow cursor jumps, and that unpleasant post-production time trying to make everything look decent before sharing it with viewers. Screen Studio — a Mac app — has definitely changed the game. I’m pretty impressed by how smart this tool is.

Screen Studio automatically transforms your recordings into beautifully polished videos. It smooths out your cursor movements, zooms in on the important stuff you’re highlighting, and even adjusts your webcam overlay so it never blocks what you're trying to show. In just a few minutes, it literally spruces up your videos with you pro-looking animations.

I especially love that it's built for folks who post content across different platforms. The product can automatically adjust the videos you create to fit various post sizes.

Plus, it cleans up your audio recordings and creates auto-generated captions. Preeeeetty sweet.

Level up your screen recordings here. 💻

This week's featured funnel comes from Five. Co-founded by Medterra’s John Larsen, Five is revolutionizing the full-spectrum CBD space with their unique 5:1 ratio of CBD to minor cannabinoids.

When it comes to new customer acquisition, experimenting with your introductory offer can be both time-consuming and challenging. Five has tackled this challenge head-on by leveraging FERMÀT to create a split-tested new customer acquisition funnel for their popular Sleep Gummies, exploring the balance between offer generosity and acquisition efficiency.

The journey begins when shoppers encounter paid social ads featuring Five's Sleep Gummies. Upon clicking, they're dynamically routed to one of two carefully crafted landing experiences - each featuring a different introductory offer. In Variant A, new customers are presented with a compelling 100% off their first order (paying only shipping), while Variant B offers a 50% discount on their initial gummies purchase.

Each landing experience features urgent limited-time offer messaging through prominent header banners, detailed product descriptions highlighting Five's superior formulations, comprehensive FAQs addressing common purchase objections, and authentic customer reviews that build trust and credibility.

Both funnel variants maintain consistent, high-converting elements while isolating the offer as the key testing variable. By duplicating and modifying their historically top-performing offer in FERMÀT, Five was able to launch this split test within minutes.

FERMÀT’s Forever Links feature is particularly valuable here, allowing Five to swiftly redirect ad traffic to the winning variant without throwing back ads into the dreaded “learning phase”. This means they can optimize their acquisition strategy in real-time based on performance data, all while maintaining the efficiency of their paid media spend.

Ready to increase the velocity of your post-click experimentation?

Click here to book a demo, and we’ll show you how. 🌪

👉 PS: Want to secure your spot on the guest list for future FERMÀT events in your city? Add your name to the VIP guest list here.

February 24 // Thermal, CA

This February, we’re stoked to team up with Digioh and SeaMonster Studios for a crazy unique eTail West experience — BMW racing! We’ll kick things off with afternoon fireside chats from industry experts, nibble on some snacks, and then hit the racetrack for some hot laps with pro BMW drivers. This one is going to be an afternoon to remember! Spots are extremely limited; we encourage you to RSVP as soon as you can. Don’t forget to mark FERMÀT as the referring partner, so you get on the list.

February 27 // Virtual

On February 27th, we’re assembling 15+ top DTC leaders to share their single most impactful CRO strategy — tactics that actually move the needle for your business. Speakers include folks from some of the biggest brands in DTC, like OLLY, Simple Modern, RIDGE, ILIA, Cheeky, and more. As always, we highly recommend RSVPing even if you can’t make it live; that way you’ll get the recording straight to your inbox! 💌

Please enjoy & share with friends. 😜