Why is my CAC rising?

Five structural reasons CAC trends up in DTC. The fix order depends on which one is dominant — most brands misdiagnose and fix the wrong thing.

Creative fatigue first

Most-frequent cause. If you've been running the same creative library for 60+ days without 50%+ new assets, CAC is rising because of fatigue, not market shifts. Ship volume.

Audience saturation

Your warm audiences (site visitors, email list, lookalikes from past purchasers) have a fixed ceiling. Once you've spent on them long enough to cover that ceiling, scaling pushes into colder + more expensive audiences. CAC rises naturally.

Macro CPM inflation

Meta CPMs rose ~22% from 2023 to 2026 (industry-wide). Even with no changes on your end, you're paying more for the same impressions.

The tools worth comparing

• Arcads — Best avatar quality on the market; deepest demographic actor library.
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Related

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