I'm Jim,

I’m a proud husband, a dad to two girls, and a multi-company founder.

After 15 years of building and breaking things, I’ve learned one truth:

Big wins don’t come from working harder. They come from better leverage.

Every Thursday, I’ll share a quick hit or two to help you scale smarter, not sweatier and finally build a business that prints cash and buys back your time.

Jim Huffman, GrowthHit & Neat Apparel CEO
​(Want a friend? Let's connect on Youtube, Twitter or LinkedIn)

​2 Ads Took This Brand From $9k to $114k/month​

We took over an e-commerce brand that was doing $9,000 a month in sales.

Less than a year later, they hit $114,000 a month.

And what’s crazy is we didn't get there by diversifying or trying a hundred different things.

We got there on the back of one platform, one campaign, and literally two ads that drove everything.

Yet most ecom brands are doing Facebook Ads completely the wrong way.

• Launching a bunch of creatives and hoping something sticks
• Spreading budget across fragmented campaigns
• Killing ads that are working because the marketing team "got bored"

Meanwhile, the brands that actually scale have a system for finding winners - and then they ride those winners until the wheels fall off.

So I just recorded a video breaking down exactly how we did it.

In this video, I reveal:

1. The ad that's been our top performer for over a year
2. Why a weird influencer video outperformed everything else we tested
3. The framework we use to find winning creatives every month
4. How to structure your ad account so Meta can actually optimize

👉 Watch it here → Youtube link​

​Q1 is pain-town. Here’s How We’re Surviving at Neat™​

When we acquired Neat™ at the end of 2023, we had no idea how much we’d learn. In 12 months, we’ve grown it from $9K/ mo to $114K/ mo - all while building in public and sharing the highs, lows, and lessons with you in real time.

This week at Neat ....

Q1 is pain-town for most DTC brands. Ours included at Neat™.​

We sell sweat-proof shirts. In January. When it's 20 degrees outside.

Let's be honest about Q1:

• Consumer spending is down (December credit card bills are due)
• We're selling a product people associate with summer
• Revenue typically drops 40% from December

Not exactly a recipe for growth. Here's our Q1 survival playbook:

🏋️ 1. Repositioned for indoor sweat Summer: "Stay dry at outdoor events" Winter: "Gym. Office. Date night." People still sweat indoors.

📧 2. Leaning on email/SMS → Win-back campaigns → "Winter refresh" bundles → Valentine's Day angle

🎁 3. New bundles → "Gym Pack" → "Work from Anywhere Pack"

Keep AOV high when volume dips.

💰 4. Protecting margins → Better 3PL rates → Killing underperforming ads faster → Testing cheaper shipping.

Can't scale volume? Protect profit.

📦 5. Prepping for summer → Forecasting inventory now → Locking in manufacturing before Q2 rush → Using slow season to fix supply chain

FINAL POINT: Testing everything New hooks, new landing pages, new pricing.

Q1 = cheap testing ground for Q2 scale.

The lesson? Q1 stinks for most brands. But if you reposition, lean on retention, and use downtime to test - you can turn pain-town into profit.

👉 What's your Q1 survival strategy?

​ChatGPT To Begin Testing Ads In The US​

OpenAI just announced it will begin testing ads inside ChatGPT for Free and Go users in the U.S. Before you roll your eyes - this isn’t your typical ad rollout.

They’re not injecting ads into answers. They’re not selling your convo data. And they’re not opening the floodgates just yet.

This is a small-scale test, with ads only appearing below relevant responses — like a grocery item ad after a dinner party recipe. All clearly labeled. All skippable.

Why now? ChatGPT Go (a new $8/month tier) just launched in the U.S., and ads are being positioned as a way to support broader access without pushing users to upgrade.

As a founder, I’m watching this closely. This isn’t just about monetization - it’s a test to see if AI interfaces can handle ads without breaking user trust.

It’s early. It’s cautious. But it could reshape how monetization works in AI products.

​Let’s Fix What’s Blocking Your Growth​

• My Agency - GrowthHit​
• Youtube - The Jim Huffman Growth​
• AI Growth Strategies to Sell More On Shopify - GrowthSchool​
• The Sold-Out Shopify Playbook - Get the product​
• Proven AI Prompts for Your Shopify Success - Get the library​
  • My Book: The Growth Marketer's Playbook​

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