- By integrating media buying and creative teams, tracking competitor ads, and analyzing winning patterns, Toby significantly increased winter sales.
- The brand achieved 86% YoY growth and hit their first $1M+ month.
- Toby used Foreplay's Swipe File and Ad Library Scraper to identify effective language, narrative structures, and long-running ads
Does this look familiar?
And does this sound familiar?
"There's nothing we can do"
"Every year we have to [insert sacrifice]"
Today I invited Toby Waller, an ex-Apple marketer, the founder of multiple eCommerce brands and the one of the co-founders of Brick Social to share how he broke seasonality for one of his brands.
Ready? Let's get into it.
"Toby, my brand only sells in Summer, what can I do?"
Breaking seasonality is more than just launching a winter line—it demanded a data-driven creative strategy.
Foreplay was the unlock. It became our central intelligence hub, helping us identify winning ad structures, analyze top competitors, and streamline creative production.
We focused on making winter sales as strong as summer by dialing in our ad creative strategy.
The main obstacles we encountered were:
1. High competition driving up ad costs
2. Creative inefficiencies slowing down production and scaling
And the turning point in our strategy came from a deep integration between our media buying and creative teams, powered by Foreplay.
Previously, our research and creative inspiration system was messy—scattered folders, endless links, and no structured way to analyze top-performing ads. We overhauled this process by implementing Foreplay as our central creative intelligence tool.
Here’s how we use it 👇
We use the Smart Swipe File, instead of losing valuable references, we systematically saved relevant ads from Facebook Ad Library and TikTok using the Foreplay Chrome extension, building a categorized library of high-performing creatives.
Our team are heavy use custom tags to categorize ads by format, narrative style, and visual elements, allowing us to identify repeatable winning patterns faster than ever before.
Casual competitor monitoring wasn’t cutting it. We shifted to process driven competitor ad tracking, and we unlocked valuable insights that reshaped our creative direction:
We used Foreplay’s 24/7 Ad Library Scraper to track the longest-running ads from our competitors, identifying which creatives had the highest longevity (a key performance indicator).
Instead of guessing, we saw exactly when our competitor launched new ads, and which one they kept turned on. We methodically analyze hooks, narrative structures, and sales arguments from the most effective ads in the industry.
With Foreplay, we identified two key creative elements that directly impacted our results:
What language that resonates, Foreplay’s Spyder revealed specific terms and phrases that resonated with winter clothing buyers, which we incorporated into our messaging.
Which narratives win, analyzing Foreplay’s ad database, we pinpointed a “Problem-Solution-CTA” ad structure that consistently outperformed generic formats.
With these insights, we launched and scaled multiple ad creatives from $100/day to ~$1,500/day while maintaining 2.5x+ ROAS.
Now winter is no longer a weakness—it's a profitable season of growth.
This strategy didn’t just drive growth—it transformed the brand’s approach to marketing, merchandising, and creative production
📈 Key Wins:
✅ 86% growth YoY – unlocked revenue potential beyond summer
✅ First $1M+ month milestone – proof of sustainable brand growth
✅ Faster, more informed creative decisions – Foreplay streamlined creative ideation & execution
This success underscores the power of a strategic, data-driven creative approach. By leveraging Foreplay’s advanced features, we refined our ideation process, unlocked winning ad structures and scaled with confidence.
Head of Marketing
