Tariffs changed your costs five times since February. Here are 7 marketing moves that keep pricing, promos, and campaigns margin-safe through H2 2026.
Short answer: The tariff rules governing US imports have changed five times since February 2026, most recently on August 19. That instability changes what a brand can safely promise a customer. These seven marketing moves keep pricing, promotions, and campaign spend margin-safe without waiting for a stable cost base that is not coming.
Why does tariff volatility belong in a marketing plan?
Because marketing makes promises that operations has to fund. A price guarantee, a promo depth, a discount-led acquisition push: each one is a commitment made against a cost base, and as of August 2026 that cost base has moved five separate times since February.
The most recent change took effect on August 19, when an additional 50 percent duty on a list of Canadian goods came into force under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930. United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement origin does not exempt covered goods, and the annexes extend well past the headline categories into furniture, clothing, cement, and sporting goods.
A campaign built in July against a cost structure that changed in August is not a marketing problem discovered in marketing. It is discovered in the margin report.
This post is part two of a pair. Part one covered the seven operations moves that determine what a brand’s numbers actually allow. This one covers what marketing does with that information.
What are the seven marketing moves?
1. Draft the price-change communication before you need it
The customer-facing explanation for a price increase should be written and approved while nothing is urgent, not composed the night a supplier confirms the number moved.
A price increase communicated well costs a brand very little. Communicated badly, or late, or defensively, it costs trust that took years to build. The difference is almost entirely preparation.
Write three versions now: a small increase absorbed on a single line, a larger increase that needs explanation, and a product that has to be pulled or reformulated. Keep them in a doc with the numbers left blank.
The tone that works is specific and unapologetic. Name the cost that moved, say what the brand absorbed, say what it could not, and give a date. Customers forgive an increase they understand far more readily than one that appears without comment.
2. Stop promising what tariffs will not let you keep
Price lock and guaranteed pricing language should stay out of campaigns until the trade regime is stable, because a guarantee is a promise made on behalf of a cost base no brand currently controls.
These phrases test well. They convert. They also create an obligation that outlasts the campaign, and with five rule changes since February the probability of having to break one is no longer small.
Breaking a price guarantee costs more than the margin it protects. It removes the credibility that made the guarantee persuasive, and that does not come back with the next campaign.
There is honest language that does most of the same work. Holding this price as long as costs allow. No increase before a stated date. Both are commitments a brand can actually keep, and both convert close to as well as the version that cannot.
3. Turn cost transparency into a trust asset
A short, honest explanation of why costs are unpredictable right now builds more credibility with customers than staying quiet about it does.
Most brands treat supply chain volatility as something to hide, on the assumption that customers do not want to hear about it. The assumption is wrong. Customers are reading the same headlines and are already forming a theory about why prices are moving. A brand that stays silent lets them form that theory unassisted.
The version that works is brief, factual, and free of self-pity. What changed, what it means for the product, what the brand is doing about it. No request for sympathy and no long explanation of trade policy.
This works particularly well in an owned channel, where the audience already has a relationship with the brand and the post reads as candour rather than as an excuse.
4. Segment messaging and spend by margin resilience
Paid spend should lean toward SKUs with high margin and low tariff exposure while volatility continues, rather than being distributed evenly across the catalogue.
Even distribution is a reasonable default when costs are stable. It is a poor one now, because a cost increase lands very differently on a product with 70 percent margin and domestic sourcing than on one with 30 percent margin and a single overseas supplier.
Split the catalogue into three groups: high margin and low exposure, thin margin and high exposure, and everything else. Weight spend toward the first while the regime moves.
The uncomfortable part of this exercise is that a brand’s best-performing creative is often running on its most exposed product. Scaling that campaign is scaling the exposure with it.
5. Shift acquisition toward retention and lifetime value framing
Discount-led acquisition carries more risk than usual when the cost base underneath it can still move, so more of the budget should sit with retention while that is true.
A discounted first order is a bet that the customer becomes profitable later. That bet depends on the margin on their second and third orders holding, which depends on a cost base that has changed five times since February.
Retention spend does not carry the same exposure. The margin on a repeat purchase does not rely on a price set before the cost moved.
This is not an argument for pausing acquisition. It is an argument for changing the metric it is judged against. First-order contribution margin is a harsher filter than blended customer acquisition cost, and it tells the truth faster when costs are unstable.
6. Pre-build the supply disruption message
A customer-facing template for a delayed, repriced, or unavailable product should exist before it is needed, so the response goes out the same day rather than three days later.
Delays are not the thing that damages a brand. Silence during delays is. The gap between a customer noticing a problem and the brand acknowledging it is where the negative review gets written.
Build three templates: shipping delay with a new date, product unavailable with an alternative offered, and product repriced with the reason stated. Fill in the specifics on the day.
Keep them in a place the customer service team can reach without approval. A template that requires a meeting before it can be sent is not a rapid response.
7. Coordinate promo depth with operations’ real numbers
Before locking any H2 discount, check it against the current landed cost and the per-SKU hold-versus-reprice rule, not against last month’s assumption.
This is the move that connects the two playbooks. Part one built a landed cost variance tracker and a written repricing rule. This is where marketing uses them.
A 30 percent Black Friday Cyber Monday discount modelled against a July landed cost may be a 30 percent discount against an entirely different margin by November. The promo does not know that. The margin report finds out afterward.
The check itself takes minutes. Pull the current landed cost per SKU, apply the intended discount, and confirm the result still clears the contribution margin floor. Any SKU that fails either comes out of the promotion or goes in at a shallower depth.
Move Supply Chain sees this single check catch more margin than any other item on either list, because BFCM discount depth is usually set once, early, and never revisited.
Which of the seven should be done first?
Start with move 7, then move 1, then move 2, because all three protect commitments that are being made in the next few weeks.
Move 7 protects the BFCM promo, which is being locked now. Move 1 and move 2 both govern what campaigns say about price, and campaign copy for Q4 is being written now too.
Moves 3, 4, 5, and 6 are structural. They change how a brand allocates and communicates over the rest of the half, which is slower to show up and easier to postpone.
Frequently asked questions
How should a DTC brand tell customers about a price increase?
Name the specific cost that changed, state what the brand absorbed and what it could not, and give a date the new price takes effect. Specificity is what makes it credible. Vagueness reads as an excuse.
Is it safe to run price lock or guaranteed pricing campaigns in 2026?
Not while the trade regime keeps moving. The rules governing US imports have changed five times since February 2026. Language such as holding this price as long as costs allow converts nearly as well and does not create a promise that may have to be broken.
Should marketing spend be reduced during tariff volatility?
Not reduced, redistributed. Weight spend toward products with higher margin and lower tariff exposure, and move some acquisition budget toward retention, where profitability does not depend on a cost base that can still move.
How does promo depth connect to landed cost?
A discount is applied to a price, but the margin it consumes is measured against landed cost. If landed cost rises after the promo is set, the discount quietly deepens in margin terms without anyone changing it. Checking promo depth against current landed cost before locking it is what prevents that.
Where to go from here
These seven moves are the marketing half of a pair. The operations playbook is the half that produces the numbers this one depends on, and the full Operations Playbook with templates is here.
For anyone whose promo depth is the specific problem, start with what landed cost actually includes and run the numbers before the discount is locked.
Move Supply Chain works with consumer and product brands on exactly this gap between what operations knows and what marketing has already promised.
And for brands where the real constraint is not the calculation but the fact that only one person in the business can make any of these decisions, Move Supply Chain is hosting a free session with Michael E. Gerber on August 20 on exactly that problem: the eight roles inside every business and why most founders end up holding all of them at once.
Until next time,
— Lara
Your Landed Cost Changed. So Did the Tariff Environment Behind It.
The July 24 reset is the fourth tariff change this year, and it won’t be the last. If you’re still sourcing from China, this isn’t just a cost update, it’s a strategy reset. Lara Guevara covers scenario planning for 145% tariffs, sourcing diversification, pricing under pressure, inventory positioning, vendor negotiation, and cash flow protection in one full workshop.
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