User vs. Buyer: who are you really selling to?

Deep Dive London: Preparing for Peak

16th July | London | 9 AM - 3 PM

If you want to win Q4, the work doesn't start in November. It starts right now.

On July 16th, we are hosting an intimate and interactive Deep Dive workshop in London focused on preparing your brand for Peak.

It’s going to be a small room with 20 brands, and we will sit down together (breakfast and lunch provided) to share actual problems, tear down strategies, and build actionable playbooks for inventory, retention, and acquisition ahead of the busiest time of the year.

Because we want to keep the room highly curated and focused on brands that can actively share and collaborate, seats are strictly limited. It is completely free for brands to attend, so register now.

How to sell when your end-user is not the buyer: Lessons from indu

In our latest DTC Live On Air podcast episode, we sat down with Martyna Lloyd, Head of eCommerce at indu, a skincare brand built exclusively for teens.

When indu first launched, their entire strategy was aimed squarely at their end-user. They built a "Teen Advisory Board," designed the packaging for Gen Z, and ran performance marketing to teenagers.

But by late 2024, they realised something fundamental had to change: their DTC customer wasn't a teenager. It was a parent.

"When we spoke to people... it was really interesting how easy it was to convert parents because for them it was a really simple solution," Martyna shared. "They just heard, 'Oh, it's safe for teens.' They were like, 'No brainer, let's just buy this.'"

Here is how indu successfully navigates the Buyer vs. User divide, and how you can apply it to your own multi-demographic marketing:

1. Sell the hype to the user organically (TikTok)

Teens don't want to be sold to; they want to belong. Indu realised that paying to push ads to teens was highly ineffective (and heavily restricted by platforms).

Instead, they built a massive organic presence on TikTok. They focus purely on entertainment, trends, and education, ensuring the brand stays culturally relevant to the user without ever asking for a sale.

2. Sell the solution to the buyer via paid ads

While teens want hype, parents want safety, simplicity, and trust.

Indu found that converting parents was actually incredibly easy once they positioned the brand as a safe, teen-appropriate solution. They doubled down on Meta and Google Ads, specifically targeting parents with clear, benefit-driven copy that solved their specific anxiety (finding safe products for their kids).

3. Use SEO to bridge the trust gap

When parents see a product their teen wants, the first thing they do is research it.

Indu built a massive blog featuring over 100 articles covering every basic skincare question a parent or teen could have. SEO isn't just for capturing cold traffic; it is a vital tool for validating your brand when the buyer is researching the user's request.

The Takeaway

You don't need a split demographic to steal this playbook. Even if your buyer and user are the same person, they may have different personalities during the shopping journey.

When a customer discovers you on TikTok or Instagram, they are acting like the user, looking for aesthetics, status, or community. But the moment they go to Google to research your brand before buying, they become the buyer, looking for safety, ROI, and logic.

Stop trying to force one channel to do both jobs. Use organic social to build aspiration, but deploy search ads, email, and SEO to handle the logical validation needed to close the sale.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

In Other News…

Ellis Brigham Reduces WISMO Enquiries by 14%: By upgrading their delivery suite to offer dynamic fulfilment windows, live stock visibility, and personalised shipping based on loyalty tiers, the outdoor retailer significantly slashed their customer service burden. What this means for you: Post-purchase anxiety is a massive drain on your customer service resources. Investing in real-time transparency and flexible delivery options doesn't just improve the customer experience; it acts as a direct cost-saving mechanism for your operations team.

Why the UK’s Agentic Commerce Future Will Be Won by Data: AI shopping assistants are changing how consumers buy, but unlike a human shopper who might overlook a missing product tag, an AI agent will simply abandon a site if the backend data isn't perfect. What this means for you:Having the flashiest AI chatbot won't save you if your product catalogue is a mess. Ensuring your inventory levels, sizing charts, and product tags are rigorously clean is no longer just housekeeping; it is a critical acquisition strategy for an AI-first search world.