The Psychology Behind DTC Success: What Really Makes People Buy

I am not here to give you the answer you want to hear… I am here to give you the answer that will help you fast-track your DTC company to success!!

Are you ready?

It is not your product.

Success starts with this one mindset shift:

You don’t sell stuff

The first mindset shift that you will need to adopt, is that you are not an entity that sells stuff… you are a marketing company FIRST.

“What the heck does that mean Curtis??? You sound like you don’t know what you are talking about. Are you saying the product doesn't matter?”

No!! Product matters a ton.

But marketing is the thing that will tell ya what product should exist in the first place.

Talk to people

Portland Leather started as a leather journal company in a one-car garage, Portland, Oregon…. Me making everything… very glamorous.

Before we were playing in the big leagues, we were playing in the little leagues:

Art fairs.

Every weekend, people would come into my booth and we would talk for hours… and yes they would buy the journals but the real value was in our conversations:

- What do you like about this?

- What do you wish was different?

- What would make you use it more?

- What made you stop at my booth in the first place?

And because I am a people pleaser… I actually listened and got to work!!

Then, I would change things and test again the following weekend.

I got so good at this that when people started coming up to me… I almost knew what kind of journal they wanted before they even said it.

That is the first psychology lesson:

People do not want to be sold to.

They want to be understood.

Customers will literally hand you the answers if you shut up long enough to hear em!!

Do you know your customer?

Whenever I ask someone who their product is for and they say, “We are for everyone” it usually means they have no idea who they are selling to.

Now unless you are selling toilet paper, you are not for everyone!!

To become great at selling you have to be great at understanding the market… YOUR market…

- What do they value?

- What do they fear?

- What kind of things annoy them?

- What have they tried?

- Why do they choose you?

When you try to sell to everyone, your marketing becomes weak, your messaging becomes generic, and your product becomes “fine.”

And “fine” does not scale!!

The psychology behind buying is simple:

People buy what feels like it was made for them.

So at some point you have to accept the hard truth… your product is not for everyone.

Get out of your Shopify dashboard and talk to real people! Then…

Make what people want

Once you know the market, the next step is unbelievably simple:

Make what people want.

That’s it.

A lot of “marketing geniuses” think success comes from convincing people to buy something. Wrong game!!

The brands that win don’t start with product and then try to force demand. They start with the customer, find what they already want, and then build the product around it.

You should not be trying to convince people to care. You should be building something they already care about.

This is a huge reason Portland Leather can move fast:

- We launch

- We watch what sells and what doesn’t

- And we make more of what worked… quickly!!

Marketing-first does not mean “ads-first”.. It means customer truth first!

Conclusion because that is all I have to say

I know the title promised psychology… so here it is:

The psychology behind DTC success isn’t a trick you run on customers.

It is the shift you make as the founder.

- Stop thinking you “sell stuff.” Start thinking you build what people want.

- Stop aiming for “everyone.” Start serving a real market deeply.

- Stop guessing. Start listening!!

There’s no secret formula or the perfect funnel that saves a business with no customer understanding.

Your company can only grow as fast as you grow…. So let go of the old version of your business.

Go talk to your customers.

Find the truth.. And build from that.

Curtis Matsko - CEO & Founder of Portland Leather Goods