Written by: Mariana Fonseca, Editorial Team, DTCROAS
Key Takeaways
- As social platforms become saturated, DTC brands are seeing acquisition costs climb 25–40% above historical benchmarks, while median Facebook ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) has dropped to 1.93x in 2025, which makes channel diversification essential for profitable growth.
- Over one billion mobile app and game users remain largely untapped for DTC brands, and 71% of ad-driven purchases in this environment happen on the same day, which supports fast testing and rapid feedback.
- Easy performance platforms such as Axon by AppLovin offer under-one-hour setup, AI-based advertising automation, and Shopify integrations that support quick scaling without heavy technical work.
- Axon delivers stronger ROAS through extended watch times and incremental new customers, with case studies showing 53–65% improvements over traditional social channels.
- Test Axon with a small budget and see how high-intent mobile gaming audiences impact your ROAS.
Who This Guide Serves
This guide serves two primary groups. The first group includes DTC founders who are time-strapped and want marketing solutions that work without complex setup or steep learning curves. The second group includes growth marketers who need proven incrementality and rapid ROI (Return on Investment) beyond traditional social channels such as Meta and Google.
Both groups share clear goals. They want to diversify acquisition channels, acquire customers quickly, and scale profitably without adding operational complexity. Whether you manage a bootstrapped business or oversee larger performance marketing budgets, the platforms covered here prioritize speed, simplicity, and measurable business outcomes over technical complexity.
Core Metrics for Easy Performance Marketing
Performance marketing focuses on ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) and CPP (Cost Per Purchase), where every dollar spent connects directly to measurable business outcomes. Easy performance platforms share several traits. They offer under-one-hour setup, AI-based advertising automation, one-click Shopify integrations, and straightforward connections to attribution platforms such as Triple Whale and Northbeam.
Key terminology connects directly to profitable growth. Incrementality refers to net-new sales that would not have occurred without the advertising channel. Prospecting focuses on targeting new customers exclusively, rather than retargeting existing audiences, which makes incrementality easier to measure. The attention dividend describes the measurable benefit of extended user engagement, such as Axon data showing 35 seconds of average watch time compared to 1–2 second social feed interactions.
Top Easy Performance Marketing Platforms Overview
The following platforms were selected based on three criteria. They offer setup times under one hour, automation that reduces manual campaign management, and proven ROAS improvements for DTC and e-Commerce brands. All five qualify as “easy,” yet they differ in audience reach and potential for incremental growth, which affects how quickly each platform can support profitable scaling.
DTC ROAS powered by Axon by AppLovin: an AI-based advertising platform that helps DTC and e-Commerce brands acquire new, high-value customers. It features 15-minute ad creation, AI-based advertising that avoids long ramp-up periods, and dedicated prospecting campaigns focused on new customer acquisition.
Google Ads: Offers Performance Max campaigns with AI-based advertising auto-bidding and simplified setup for e-Commerce brands that want broad search and display reach.
Meta Ads Manager: Provides Advantage+ Shopping campaigns with creative templates and automated audience targeting across social channels such as Facebook and Instagram.
TikTok Ads Manager: Features Spark Ads and automated creative optimization that help brands reach younger demographics through short-form video content.
Microsoft Advertising: Delivers search advertising with lower competition than Google Ads in many verticals, which can improve cost efficiency for specific audiences.
These platforms qualify as “easy” for several reasons. Axon goes live in under one hour and supports day-over-day scaling. Google’s Performance Max simplifies campaign management through automation. Meta’s templates reduce creative complexity. TikTok’s Spark Ads reuse existing content. Microsoft’s interface mirrors the familiar structure of Google Ads, which shortens the learning curve.
Launch your first campaign in under an hour with Axon’s guided setup.
Deep Dive: How Axon Drives DTC ROAS
Among these options, Axon stands out for delivering a fast path from setup to measurable incremental growth, often within 24 hours. The workflow below shows how DTC and e-Commerce brands move from signup to live campaigns in under one hour.
1. Account Creation: The signup process is quick and invite-only, which maintains a high-quality advertiser base. This vetting process places your brand alongside other strong DTC advertisers instead of in a completely open marketplace.
2. Creative Upload: After approval, you can start immediately with existing 9×16 vertical videos from Meta Reels or Stories, so you do not need to produce new assets before testing. The built-in creative studio then provides templates and an AI Interactive Generator that help you build engaging interactives in minutes once you are ready to expand beyond initial tests.
3. Shopify Integration: Before launching campaigns, install the one-click pixel for Shopify stores, or use Google Tag Manager for other platforms. This step ensures accurate conversion tracking from the first impression, which supports reliable ROAS and CPP reporting.
4. Campaign Configuration: With tracking in place, you choose ROAS or CPP optimization, select target countries, and set budgets. ROAS campaigns focus on maximizing return on ad spend, while CPP campaigns focus on maximizing purchase volume. This separation keeps each campaign centered on a single objective.
5. Launch and Scale: After launch, AI-based advertising handles audience targeting, creative testing, and bid management automatically. This automation reduces daily manual adjustments and supports consistent scaling when performance remains strong.
Axon’s ad format combines full-screen video, up to 60 seconds, with interactives and dynamic product catalogs. This structure delivers the attention dividend mentioned earlier, which gives enough time to tell a complete brand story instead of flashing a single product image in a crowded feed.
Proven results include Portland Leather achieving 65% higher ROAS than other social digital ad platforms, HexClad driving over $1 million in incremental revenue with 53% higher ROAS than their largest paid social channel, and MAËLYS scaling to $200,000 daily spend while beating ROAS goals by 10%.
See if Axon can deliver similar ROAS gains for your brand.
Measurement and Proving Value
Clear measurement confirms whether a new channel deserves more budget. Track Day 0 and Day 7 ROAS and CPP through integrated attribution platforms. Axon delivers 90% of purchases within 24 hours, which enables fast performance assessment and quick optimization decisions.
Incrementality measurement shows the true value of a channel. Northbeam data confirmed that 90% of Axon-driven customers were first-time buyers for HexClad. This result demonstrates genuine incremental growth instead of cannibalizing existing social or search campaigns.
Integration with Northbeam, Triple Whale, Google Analytics 4, and other attribution platforms provides unified reporting across your media mix. This unified view makes it easier to compare performance, shift budgets toward higher-ROAS channels, and maintain profitable growth.
Challenges and Pitfalls
New platforms often raise concerns about risk and complexity. Axon addresses these concerns by running on AppLovin’s infrastructure, where advertisers spend over $11 billion annually. The intuitive dashboard, combined with AI-based advertising automation, removes many of the manual steps that make other platforms feel difficult.
Several best practices help brands start safely and scale with confidence. Begin with small test budgets to validate ROAS and CPP before increasing spend. Use existing creative assets first so you can launch quickly and learn what resonates. Focus each campaign on a single objective, such as ROAS or CPP, instead of building complex multi-goal structures. The performance-first model contracts spend automatically when results decline, which protects budgets during testing.
FAQ
How fast is Axon setup compared to other platforms?
Axon setup typically takes less than one hour from signup to live campaigns, and many advertisers complete ad creation in about 15 minutes. Traditional platforms often require days or weeks of setup, creative approvals, and optimization before they deliver consistent results.
What is the difference between ROAS and CPP campaigns for DTC brands?
ROAS campaigns focus on maximizing return on ad spend, which suits brands that prioritize profitability and margin protection. CPP campaigns focus on lowering cost per purchase and increasing purchase volume, which suits brands that emphasize customer acquisition scale. Most DTC brands start with ROAS-focused campaigns because of margin pressures, then test CPP campaigns once they understand baseline performance.
How does Axon’s ROAS compare to social channels such as Meta and Google?
The case studies cited earlier show ROAS improvements ranging from 10% to 65% compared to brands’ largest paid social channels. Results vary by brand, vertical, and creative quality, yet the extended attention format and AI-based advertising optimization consistently deliver strong performance relative to social channels such as Meta and Google.
Can I use existing creative assets from social channels such as Meta?
Yes, Axon accepts 9×16 vertical videos from Meta Reels or Stories, which allows you to launch campaigns quickly. Creating 30–60 second videos specifically for Axon’s format usually increases the attention dividend and improves storytelling, which can further improve ROAS.
What attribution platforms integrate with easy performance marketing platforms?
Leading performance platforms integrate with Triple Whale, Northbeam, Google Analytics 4, and other attribution solutions. These integrations support unified reporting across your media mix and more accurate incrementality measurement.
Conclusion: Next Steps for DTC and e-Commerce Growth
Social saturation and rising CACs (Customer Acquisition Costs) make channel diversification essential for sustainable DTC growth. Easy performance marketing platforms such as DTC ROAS powered by Axon by AppLovin provide under-one-hour setup, AI-based advertising optimization, and access to untapped audiences of more than one billion mobile app and game users.
Explore Axon today and expand your media mix with high-intent mobile app and gaming audiences.
