ATTN Labs

ATTN Labs helps scale E-Commerce and digital products companies by developing and implement their marketing and growth strategies.  

We do this by testing and scaling ad campaigns while tracking their performance down to the dollar.  We also help to demystify attribution so decision makers can understand where to allocate their limited marketing resources. 

Our clients include rapidly growing brands in the DTC/CPG space, consumer teach, software as a service and a limited number of influencer based brands. 

The common thread for each of these brands is existing adspend and a successful product that needs experienced marketers to develop a strategy to utilize all the paid and organic channels to facilitate profitable increases in customer acquisition.

Founder

Create Wellness

Investor

Health Via Modern Nutrition (HVMN)

Advisory Role

OPUS

At-Home Wellness Tech for Emotional Fitness.  Working with the OPUS growth and marketing teams on customer acquisition, pre-order / pre-launch campaigns and GTM strategy.

The University of Chicago Booth School of Business

MS/MBA - computer science & business with a concentration in marketing analytics.  Worked with The Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation's student led startups on customer acquisition and growth.

MS/MBA Candidate

Reforge

Worked with the team that developed the Reforge Growth Series, "The most comprehensive overview available anywhere on how tech companies grow."  As an early hire I was fortunate enough to learn from Brian and his team prior to entering business school.

Growth Marketer

UMZU

Alternative health supplements brand.  Was a part of the initial round of hires for UMZU.  Worked with them on their product marketing , including branding, design, copy and product strategy.

Product Marketing Manager

United States Department of Defense

Studied at U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, the U.S. Army’s school for the professional training of Army special operations leaders, warriors, and operators.
Selected for special operations training through a rigorous assessment and selection process; graduated from Special Operations Forces Captains Career Course.

John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School

Served as the assistant departmental lead for all matters concerning plans and operations. Responsible for preparing and supervising the execution of all training within a 900 person organization. Identified requirements and ensured training was oriented on setting conditions for improving proficiency levels across the formation. Lastly, I conducted reviews of strategic goals for synchronization and completion, while ensuring risk management was integrated across the agency.

Operations Officer (Operations Manager)

Fire Support Officer for a 10 man team charged with advising an Afghan Army infantry battalion (approx 400 soldiers) in the day to day operations and training of their organization.  Located in Panjwai Afghanistan.

Security Forces Assistance Team 48 FSO (Director of Analysis)

• Directed fire support for an infantry company assigned to 4rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division.
• Served as chief advisor for the employment of artillery, mortars, attack helicopters, and close air support to company commander of a 163-soldier infantry company during both pre-deployment training and in a volatile area of Afghanistan.

Company Fire Support Officer (Program Manager)

B.S. Mandarin, Nuclear Engineering

The U.S. Military Academy at West Point is a four-year, co-educational, federal, liberal arts
college located 50 miles north of New York City. It was founded in 1802 as America's first
college of engineering and continues today as one of our nation’s premier leader-development
institutions, consistently ranked among top colleges in the country. Its mission remains
constant—to educate, train, and inspire the Corps of Cadets so that each graduate is a
commissioned leader of character committed to the values of Duty, Honor, Country and prepared
for a career of professional excellence and service to the nation as an officer in the U. S. Army.

• Company Honor Representative at West Point

United States Military Academy at West Point

Co-Founder @ ATTN Labs | Scaling E-Commerce Growth

As the co-founder of ATTN Labs, I help growth stage eCommerce brands (10-100m arr) scale their new customer acquisition.

We do this through relentless problem solving,

focused on driving new customer acquisition.

This means relentlessly testing campaings and tracking results.

Looks like this:
↳clear reporting & communication
↳incrementality focused marketing
↳real-time reporting with your team
↳solving your problems (not the ones we've decided are important)

We've worked with some of the fastest growing brands of 2022-2023 in these categories:
↳ retail
↳food & Bev
↳snacks
↳supplements

We like to work closely with a select group of clients.

This allows us to work with them on:
↳ CRO
↳ creative development
↳ influencer recruiting and whitelisting
↳ thoughtful channel expansion
↳ retention, upsell/crosss-sell programs
↳ product bundling and offer creation

Basically we like to take on the whole DTC growth piece,

but, 

we are open to starting small.

If you are interested in learning more click the link at the top of my profile,

or, click through on my featured section to book a call.,

The biggest opportunity in DTC growth right now:

Building an organic content engine using TikTok creators.

Affiliates drive 80%+ of revenue for brands doing 7-8 figures on the platform.

That's what I'm seeing...

What are you guys seeing as biggest opportunity in DTC growth right now? 👇

Ian Lenny

Talks about #dtc, #marketing, and #eccommerce

Co-Founder @ ATTN Labs | DTC Growth

Just audited a Meta account spending $800k/month.

One mistake is costing them over $150k/month:

They’re killing the wrong ads.

Let me explain:

Being profitable at scale is the goal of most DTC brands.

And since brands understand creative as their biggest lever, 

They crank it all day by producing as many creatives as possible.

Unfortunately, 95% of brands are testing completely wrong. 

For most DTC brands, volume is the goal, so:

→ Creatives are rushed
→ Only front-end data is analyzed
→ Influencer contracts aren't considered 
→ Profitable campaigns are abandoned 

This suboptimal creative testing means winning ads are killed early.

And bad ads are moved to scaling campaigns based off incorrect assumptions.

Which eventually tanks profitability. 

However, this is all be solved with a testing process that ties creatives to profitability. 

Focus on these 3 points. 

1. Initial Performance:

→ CPA compared to offer benchmark
→ CPA compared to account benchmark

2. Total Campaign Cost:

→ Influencer contract costs
→ COGS for advertised offer
→ Discounts / coupon codes

3. Customer Maturation:

→ 60-120 day LTV of customers who previously purchased 
→ Return rates of customers who previously purchased

↳ if you are seeing higher gross margin despite worse front-end performance, keep them running!

But most brands are only executing step 1.

They blindly to the next round of creatives without looking at the data.

You need to take to take the time to understand HOW each ad could affect profitability,

To inform your creative strategy moving forward, ask:

→ What is this ad really promoting?
→ What does the LTV curve for that product look like?
→ What added costs exist (creators, offers, promos)?
→ Can we still hit margin targets after accounting for those?

Come up with a hypothesis as to why each ad won/lost based on the above variables.

Test that hypothesis by watching the customers you are bringing in with those campaigns over time. 

Were your hypothesis correct?

Or do you need to refine your assumptions about which campaigns are driving your bottom line?

I fed 437 viral DTC health & wellness ads into ChatGPT.

What it gave me? 8 proven viral ad frameworks.

Here’s the problem most DTC brands face:

Ads either grab attention 𝘰𝘳 convert. Rarely both.

You test dozens of creatives but results stay all over the place. After dissecting the top ads in health & wellness, I found a pattern:

The highest-converting ads follow specific, repeatable formulas.

By analyzing 400+ top-performing ads with AI, we found 8 viral frameworks that:

• Cut through the noise in saturated feeds
• Speak directly to your ideal customer's pain points
• Build instant credibility in the health space
• Overcome skepticism (without making medical claims)
• Drive conversions while staying compliant
  
Each framework includes:

• Full script template
• Psychology behind why it works
• Real examples from successful brands
• Implementation instructions
  
Want these 8 viral ad frameworks?

1. Like this post
2. Comment "FRAMEWORKS"
3. Send a connection request (if we're not connected)
   
I'll DM it to you right away.

PS - These aren't generic templates. They're specifically designed for health & wellness products and address the unique challenges of marketing in this space.

I’m about to ruffle some feathers: you don’t actually need “A-Players.”

Here’s how to tell if you’re chasing the wrong idea...

At Meta, an “A-Player” might be an L6 engineer making $700k+.

For your brand? Who even fits that mold? Probably not the same person.

What’s wild is the same voices pushing “hire A-Players” also preach building idiot-proof systems.

Spoiler: most so-called “A-Players” hate being treated like idiots.

The smart move is to focus on your talent, your systems, and your incentives.

When those three align, you get top-quality work from the best people you can afford who are guided clearly, trained well, and held to solid expectations.

No extremes needed. Hire smart, build smart, lead smart.

What am I missing here?

The problems 8, 9 & 10-figure brand face are identical

It's always some version of these 3 issues.

You'd think companies at wildly different sizes would have radically different problems...

Turns out they all have some combo of these...

The big three:
• System for testing creative 
• Clear attribution model across teams
• Siloed communications internally that slow project progress

When companies clear up these 3 it solves 90+ % of their problems.

P.S. - These companies don't experience their problems at the same times or for the same reasons.


What are the biggest problems you see?

The 3 barriers to scaling an ad account...
↳ Fix these and you start profitably scaling.

Here’s how to know which one’s holding you back:

After talking to 100s of founders and watching the DTC space evolve, I’ve noticed 3 consistent issues…

You have to fix all three to scale profitably:

→ Acquisition efficiency   
→ Channel-specific conversion efficiency   
→ LTV driver growth

Let’s break these down:

Acquisition Efficiency

This is how effectively you turn cold, unaware audiences into qualified, interested buyers.

The clearest way to measure this: cost per qualified new visitor. You need a process that isolates which parts of your cold traffic campaigns are truly incremental...

Then feeds that insight into future creative, copy, and targeting decisions.

Channel-Specific Conversion Efficiency

Think of this as CRO but more tactical.

It’s not about general site conversion rates. It’s about how well each specific campaign and channel converts its cold traffic.

To track this properly, you’ll need cold-traffic-only landing pages that aren’t accessible via your main nav.

LTV Driver Growth

There are two critical timeframes: 60 days and 12 months post-purchase.

Your goal: 
→ 30%+ lift over first purchase AOV by day 60 
→ 100%+ lift by month 12

To hit those numbers, you need to understand what actually drives repeat behavior.

Is it your emails? Retargeting? Post-purchase flows?

You’ll need product + campaign-linked cohort analytics to find out. Start with Lifetimely by AMP if you’re not using one yet.

If this helped you, repost so more DTC founders can fix their scaling blockers.

P.S: Which of these do you think is the weakest link for most brands?

Incremental revenue is the key to profitable advertising.

But most marketers don't track it.

Here are the 2 easiest ways to track it:

𝟭. 𝙄𝙨𝙤𝙡𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙏𝙚𝙨𝙩

This means using a landing page or series of pages and checkouts that are only being used for one traffic source.

This is the easiest way to see if a specific traffic source is driving sales.

𝟮. 𝘼𝙪𝙙𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚 𝙏𝙚𝙨𝙩

One of the easiest ways to do this is to split up your ads across different geographic areas to see how sales are affected by different campaigns.

The simplest example is to split a campaign across geographic areas that tend to result in similar amounts of sales.

For a limited period of time, shut off ads to a small number of the GEOs you are serving.

Note the difference in sales.

𝙒𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙇𝙞𝙢𝙞𝙩𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨?

You need a significant budget.
You need historical data to work with.

Don't have both of these?

Then track the results of campaigns using an isolation test.

𝙃𝙚𝙧𝙚'𝙨 𝙃𝙤𝙬 𝙩𝙤 𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙧𝙩:

Simplify your test ~ 1 offer
Start with the smallest version possible ~ 1 proven audience
Collect good data slowly and meaningfully ~ QA tracking and allow for statistical significance

You want to do these steps in a short time frame possible without rushing the test ~ So have at least $100/day per audience for as long as you plan to test. 

PS What are metrics advertisers should track?

The fastest growing CPG brands 

All do this 1 thing: 

Cohort analysis by product

Let me explain

There are tons of metrics to look at
• CPA
• AOV
• ROAS
• LTV
• Revenue
• Gross Margin

if you want to really 'growth hack' eCom

Find a way to account for them all

without spreadsheets or a custom database.

Simple tools give you all the insights you need,

and can prevent you from bleeding cash on the wrong offers.

Cohort analysis by product:
• shows you 24 hour ROAS
• LTV for a specific offer
• % change from blended LTV
• Changes in product mix 

Note - you don't always want to scale the product with the lowest CPA.

sometimes you want the best 60-120 day gross margin.

In that case - we have a different strategy that performs.

(we saved 600k in 30 days with it)

Different goals = different strategies.

Free to discuss below.

You can grow a business tracking just 3 things...

But you need cohort specific data.

Got that covered?

𝙁𝙤𝙘𝙪𝙨 𝙤𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙨𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙜𝙧𝙤𝙬𝙩𝙝'𝙨 𝙜𝙪𝙖𝙧𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙚𝙙:

 → How many new customers can I acquire per day, at what cost?
 → What % of purchasers will come back each day?
 → How much do repeat purchasers spend, at what margin?

Simple but not easy.

What are the most important KPIs?

I’ve managed over $150 million in ad spend for health and wellness brands.

The biggest problem I see?

Most brands have no real troubleshooting system.

They just guess when ads underperform.

So I built a clear system that helps you:

• See why your ROAS is dropping 
• Fix the right things fast 
• Know which ads are working and why 
• Find new ways to scale that others miss

No more wasting money on ads that don’t work.

I put this all into my 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗧𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗲𝘀𝗵𝗼𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗚𝘂𝗶𝗱𝗲 — made just for DTC health and wellness brands.

It’s the same guide my clients use to boost ROAS by 30–150% in under 30 days.

Want a copy?

• Like this post 
• Comment “PROFIT” 
• Connect with me if we’re not connected

I’ll send it to you right away.

P.S. These methods are real. They’ve worked on hundreds of wellness campaigns that get results.

Funding isn’t the only way to scale your CPG brand.

Here's my growth strategy for cash strapped CPG founders:

• Build your Dream 100 List (category specific podcasts)
• Go through your Rolodex for potentials connections
• Book yourself on as many PODs as possible
• Build real connection with POD host 
• Ask to use POD content & accounts for whitelisting

This is better then getting funding...

Think of it the same way you would as trying to raise funding.

The real secret is to fly to the cities where the POD host does a sit down talk in a studio...

You'll get the content for ads, the connections and the follow on opportunities. 

Right now this is THE fastest way to grow your brand and get an ROI on your time and money. 

P.S. - You should have a compelling story about why you created the brand that's attractive to the hosts audience.

---

What's working for cash strapped founders?

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