Jack Link’s DTC Report Card: Why a $1B Brand Is Losing Money Online

1. Executive Summary

Jack Link’s retail footprint is exceptionally strong, but their digital infrastructure is capping revenue, margin, and overall ecommerce growth. The current WordPress setup creates friction across every step of the funnel: navigation, product pages, promotions, checkout, merchandising, and marketing execution. The platform is dictating the experience instead of enabling it.

Fixing the core systemic issues (platform migration, navigation rebuild, PDP improvements, retention optimization, and promo consistency) would meaningfully increase DTC performance.

Based on the number of funnel breakpoints (ad → landing → PDP → checkout), misconfigured shipping logic, and missing PDP fundamentals, a 30–40% lift in DTC revenue is realistic and aligns with benchmarks seen when large CPG brands transition from WordPress to Shopify Plus.

High-Level Issues:

• Conversion leakage due to outdated PDPs, navigation, and checkout experience.
• Margin loss from misconfigured free shipping rules and misaligned promotions.
• Acquisition inefficiency due to broad paid targeting and inconsistent landing pages.
• Retention underperforming due to Amazon-focused CTAs and under-leveraged Klaviyo campaigns.
• Slow iteration cycles caused by WordPress limitations and dev bottlenecks.

2. What’s Working

• Strong social presence with consistent short-form distribution across major platforms. This provides reliable top-of-funnel attention, but the lack of a cohesive DTC funnel prevents this traffic from converting efficiently.
• Solid email design and functional foundational flows. The core infrastructure exists, giving the team a starting point to build a high-performing retention engine once DTC-focused routing and deeper automation are added.
• Strong organic visibility for several high-value search terms. The brand benefits from meaningful non-paid demand, which could translate into higher DTC revenue with improved navigation, PDP relevance, and clearer value props.
• Significant retail brand equity that maintains consumer trust. This brand strength reduces resistance in the purchasing funnel and creates an advantage most DTC brands don’t have. The challenge is converting this trust into efficient owned-channel revenue.

3. High-Impact Failures

A) Conversion Rate Killers

Impact: Low conversion rate reduces ROAS, CAC efficiency, and total DTC revenue.

Evidence:

• Navigation prioritizes apparel equally to snacks.
• Product pages lack nutrition facts, value propositions, and upsells.
• No clear Subscribe & Save benefit messaging (15% off coupon incentives remove the benefit of buying on subscription).
• Category filters show irrelevant filters (clothing filters on snack categories).

Root Cause: WordPress templates + slow dev workflow prevent rapid UX iteration.

Recommendation: Shopify Plus migration, navigation rebuild, PDP enhancements.

B) Profit Margin Leakage

Impact: Direct financial loss and unnecessary margin erosion.

Evidence:

• Free shipping rules are broken; all orders ship free regardless of threshold.
• 15% off coupon + free shipping error + COGS + ad spend removes nearly all gross margin. Many orders are likely operating at a net loss.
• Shipping messaging is inconsistent (says free on header banner but product pages show $50 for free shipping).
• Website routes paid and email traffic to Amazon, forfeiting margin + data.

Root Cause: Misconfigured backend logic + unclear promo architecture + poor DTC prioritization.

Recommendation: Audit shipping rules, fix promo messaging, prioritize owned-channel conversions.

C) Paid Acquisition Inefficiency

Impact: Higher CAC, wasted spend, poor signal quality to ad platforms.

Evidence:

• Google campaigns target extremely broad audiences.
• Google Ads utilizes blog posts for landing pages based on the user search query.
• Meta landing pages do not match messaging.
• Meta ads send traffic to Amazon, breaking funnel continuity.

Root Cause: Lack of funnel strategy + misaligned landing experiences.

Recommendation:

• Rebuild ad funnel: Cold → Warm → DTC.
• Create campaign-specific landing pages.
• Stop sending traffic to Amazon without capturing email first.

D) Retention Underperformance

Impact: Lower repeat purchase rate and LTV.

Evidence:

• Klaviyo emails send traffic to Amazon instead of owned website.
• No clear subscription benefits messaging.
• Welcome + abandoned cart flows exist but lack depth.

Root Cause: Misaligned channel priorities + underutilized email strategy.

Recommendation:

• Reinforce DTC-first retention.
• Expand post-purchase, replenishment, browse abandonment flows.
• Add Subscribe & Save education overlays and product page modules.

E) Platform Limitations

Impact: Slow iteration cycles and inability to execute fast marketing changes. Marketing cannot self-serve merchandising, PDP updates, or promo changes, which slows execution and increases dependency on development resources.

Evidence:

• Navigation structure is rigid.
• PDP updates require development.
• Filtering issues require developer.
• Promotions, bundles, upsells, and merchandising require developer involvement.

Root Cause: WordPress is not built for CPG ecommerce scale or velocity.

Recommendation: Migrate to Shopify Plus.

4. Channel Performance

Social Media – A

Content is being done well and redistributed among major social platforms. Twitter/X will also benefit from short-form content distribution.

Paid Ads – F

Ads are far too broad in targeting. Landing pages do not meet user expectations. Sending traffic to Amazon can be used strategically but an ideal flow would be to send to the website then capture email, this allows retargeting and helps boost pixel performance. The current workflow is an inefficient DTC funnel.

Email – B

Good foundational flows but campaigns are prioritizing Amazon even when the user signed up on the website. Minor issues exist on the footer showing different years and “view in browser” link is broken.

SEO – B

Organic visibility is strong, and most navigation-linked keywords rank on the first page of Google. However, the blog strategy is misaligned with actual search intent. Content appears to be produced for volume and internal linking rather than for demand capture, revenue contribution, or AI-driven answer surfaces. As a result, SEO is generating impressions but not translating into meaningful incremental DTC revenue.

Website UX – F

The website is constrained by the limits of the current WordPress setup. Key UX components—navigation hierarchy, PDP content, merchandising structure, and filtering—are either missing or cannot be executed without development support. As a result, the site lacks the fundamental elements needed to guide users efficiently through the buying journey, which materially suppresses conversion rate.

5. Root Cause Summary

All core problems map back to three underlying failures:

1. Platform constraint: WordPress blocks speed, optimization, and merchandising.
2. Funnel inconsistency: Ads → Landing Pages → Website → Checkout are misaligned.
3. Channel misprioritization: Amazon is prioritized over owned DTC, killing margin and retention.

6. High-Leverage Recommendations

Next 30 Days — Quick Wins

These changes recover lost margin and reduce conversion friction without requiring platform migration.

• Fix free shipping rules + promo messaging
  Impact: Protects 10–20% of margin currently lost to misconfigured shipping and coupon stacking.
• Remove irrelevant blog outbound links
  Impact: Prevents 5–10% traffic leakage from SEO and paid campaigns.
• Route all email traffic to DTC PDPs instead of Amazon
  Impact: Recovers 10–15% of revenue lost to off-site redirection; improves owned-data capture.
• Add nutritional + trust badges to PDPs
  Impact: Expected 5–8% improvement in PDP conversion due to increased trust and clarity.
• Build a best sellers collection
  Impact: Typical 8–12% CR lift by prioritizing top-converting products in navigation.

Next 60 Days — Structural Conversion Improvements

These changes address fundamental UX and funnel consistency issues.

• Rebuild navigation hierarchy
  Impact: 10–20% CR lift from improved product discoverability.
• Standardize ad → landing page matching
  Impact: Reduces CAC by 15–25% by aligning creative intent with landing context.
• Expand Klaviyo flows
  Impact: 5–15% uplift in returning-customer revenue.

Next 90 Days — Platform Upgrade & Revenue Expansion

These changes unlock scalability and allow the marketing team to operate without dev bottlenecks.

• Begin Shopify Plus migration
  Impact: Unlocks 25–40% DTC revenue lift over 6–12 months through faster iteration cycles and modern merchandising.
• Implement upsells, bundles, and Subscribe & Save optimization
  Impact: 10–20% increase in AOV and higher repeat-purchase rate.
• Redesign merchandising to include Amazon-exclusive items with intentional CTA routing
  Impact: Redirects existing Amazon demand into controlled funnel paths while preserving marketplace revenue.

7. Expected Business Outcomes

These projections are conservative and based on typical results from comparable CPG brands correcting similar DTC bottlenecks.

• +10–25% CR lift from navigation + PDP improvements.
• 15–30% margin recovery from fixing shipping + DTC routing.
• 20–40% lower CAC from funnel alignment + proper landing pages.
• 10–20% repeat purchase uplift from retention fixes + subscription clarity.