Most brands acquire 60–80% of new customers through just 1–3 products. Those products don't just drive volume they determine the quality of customer you're attracting: bargain hunters, quality obsessives, trend chasers, gifters, etc.
In my experience, most teams never look at which products drive their highest LTV and repeat behavior. They look first purchase sales. So you spend money to acquiring bargain hunters and one-time shoppers inadvertently—then later wonder why retention is so hard.
If your acquisition SKUs are premium, sticky, and beloved, you'll create customers who behave like fans from day one. If they're heavily discounted or low-margin, you're likely creating the behavior you are trying to solve for on the back end.
You need to be looking at LTV by product to know the difference.
Try this simple exercise:
Identify your top 3 acquisition products by new customers.
For each, calculate 12-month LTV, margin, and return rate of customers starting with it.
Re-allocate budget to heroes that bring in high LTV + low returns, and demote the rest from acquisition.
You’ll be shocked how much your customer base changes just by changing what you push at the front door.
👉 Don’t just ask, “What sells best?”
Ask, “Which products create the best customers?” – then put your budget behind those.
If you want a sanity check on your own top 3 acquisition products, reply “TOP3” and I’ll tell you what I’d look at in your data first.
