How to deal with Trump’s tariffs

Since the new tariffs hit, a lot of brands have been asking us for a game plan.

Every eCom brand’s margins are under fire right now.

Last week, US President Donald Trump announced a 10% tariff on ALL imports into the U.S.

Up to 50% on Chinese goods. 20% on EU products.

That puts massive pressure on eCom brands’ profitability.

Many brands I talked to are already working on a solution.

Some are thinking about slashing ad spend.

Others are considering raising prices.

Because it feels like that’s the only way to stay afloat.

To make it worse, ad costs keep rising—and new competitors pop up every week.

It’s making the eCom game more brutal by the day.

But here’s the good news:

While you can’t stop the tariffs, you can build a smart strategy to tackle them.

Your margins will inevitably shrink, so your focus has to shift.

You need to lock in on MER—Marketing Efficiency Ratio.

In other words, how much you make for every $1 spent on marketing.

The great thing about MER is that it doesn’t just measure the performance of individual channels.

It shows how all your channels work together—and how they amplify each other.

In times like this, it’s not enough to make each channel work harder.

You need to make them work together.

That’s the key.

And Google is the bridge that connects them all.

Think about it.

When you do social media, Meta Ads, or influencer endorsements...

Some customers buy right there on the platform.

But a big chunk heads to Google to search for your brand, your products, or reviews.

Google is where that traffic turns into sales.

This means the stronger your Google strategy, the more money you make…

Not just on Google…

But across every channel feeding into it.

This is exactly how we helped brands like SNOW, ICON Amsterdam, and Collagen Co scale past $500k/mo in revenue while keeping margins healthy.

We focused on 2 things:

• Squeezing every drop of traffic from other platforms

• Taking advantage of Google’s massive customer base

Look… I get it.

You’ll be tempted to pull back on advertising to protect your margins.

And sure—it might help in the short term.

But that’s treating the symptom, not the root cause.

Low profit margins don’t always mean you’re spending too much on ads.

It often means you’re spending too inefficiently.

After working with over 500 brands, I can tell you this:

Making your ads work smarter—not smaller—is the real solution.

And in the long term, it makes you way more money.

Jackson

Founder and CEO of Echelonn.

How we can help:

• Get a free Google ads audit: For brands spending more than $20k/mo. or making over 1 million annually, we’ll identify the key bottlenecks in your account, and turn it into a free 90-day scaling plan. Click here.

• Get our E-commerce Growth Toolkit: Get access to our free resources and tools including the Product Feed & GMC Optimization Checklist, YouTube Shorts Ads Playbook, and 12 Plug-and-Play Dashboards. Click here.

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