Post‑Purchase Survey Strategy for DTC: Fairing and Enquire Setup, Attribution Models, and Decision Loops That Improve ROAS

If you are scaling a Shopify DTC brand in a post-ATT world, you already feel the measurement gap. Platform pixels miss upper funnel and dark social, and last click undervalues what actually created demand. Post‑purchase surveys close that gap fast by asking the buyer at the moment of truth. Inside Byte & Buy, our members trade survey prompts, dashboards, and playbooks sourced from top sellers. This guide distills the essentials so you can set up in a day and make smarter creative and channel calls the same week.

Why surveys matter now

The rise of dark social means analytics undercount the sources that prime demand. The Refine Labs hybrid study that Recast summarizes observed a 90 percent gap between software attribution and self‑reported data for channels like podcasts, social, and word of mouth. That gap widens as users adopt privacy features. While many marketers now rely on data‑driven models, Google Ads explains data‑driven attribution as credit allocation across touchpoints and Meta’s help center describes 7‑day click and 1‑day view windows, both still lean on observed digital signals. Survey data adds the missing human layer.

You can also catch trends before your competitors. Fairing’s Q2 2025 benchmarks show LLMs are emerging in discovery, with a more than tenfold rise in HDYHAU mentions and roughly 1 in 7 brands reporting LLM attributions (Fairing’s benchmark). That is the kind of signal your ad platforms will not highlight.

Tools and setup: Fairing and EnquireLabs

Fairing and EnquireLabs are the two PPS veterans most DTC teams deploy. The Fairing Shopify app listing highlights post‑purchase placement on the order status page, LTV analysis by response, and native integrations to Klaviyo and Google Sheets. Response rates are strong. The 1‑800‑D2C profile notes Fairing customers often see 40 to 80 percent completion on the thank‑you page (1‑800‑D2C’s overview).

EnquireLabs publishes a practical walkthrough. The team shows how to create a Question Stream, choose phrasing that biases toward first touch or last touch, and preview before enabling, all in minutes. The EnquireLabs setup article on Medium is a good checklist.

Implementation tips you can copy today:

• Place the survey on the order status page, not via email. You will capture more responses and closer to the purchase moment.

• Keep load time clean on the thank‑you page. Popups and heavy scripts can reduce response rates.

• Send responses to a spreadsheet or warehouse on day one. You want to join answers to order, product, and cohort LTV.

If you are just launching, start your store on Shopify so you can deploy PPS via checkout extensions and integrate answers into flows quickly.

Ask better questions and follow‑ups

Great survey programs start with clean prompts and purposeful follow‑ups. Recast’s guidance emphasizes that HDYHAU should capture demand creation rather than only last touch and warns about recall bias; a free‑text option with light categorization often yields richer insights than a rigid dropdown (Recast’s analysis). EnquireLabs recommends tuning the wording. Asking “How did you first hear about us?” surfaces first‑touch, while “What brought you here today?” leans last‑touch (EnquireLabs setup).

Prompts you can paste into Fairing or Enquire today:

• How did you first hear about us? (free text, plus smart categories for word of mouth, creator, podcast, LLM)

• Which creator, podcast, or publication influenced your purchase most? (free text with auto‑tagging)

• What product problem were you trying to solve today? (multiple choice for CRO insights)

• What almost stopped you from buying? (free text for objection mining)

Follow‑up logic to consider: if HDYHAU includes podcast or creator, ask which show or handle; if LLM is mentioned, ask which assistant and query style.

Triangulate attribution, do not replace it

Surveys are not a silver bullet. Triangulation is the operating model. As Measured’s triangulation guide explains, blending methods yields more robust decisions. Pair self‑reported attribution with platform models like Google’s data‑driven attribution and Meta’s conversion windows, then sanity check with incrementality tests or MMM. For teams exploring MMM, Recast’s MMM Academy is a strong primer on validation and geo‑testing.

Practical triangulation workflow:

• Self‑reported: HDYHAU distribution and trendlines by week.

• Platform‑reported: Meta 7‑day click results, Google Ads DDA paths, GA4 assisted conversions.

• Experiments: geo holdouts for large channels and short lift tests for creators.

Layer LTV on top. The Fairing app details LTV analysis by survey response, which lets you allocate budget to channels and creators that recruit higher value buyers even if last‑click is muted.

Decision loops that improve ROAS

Here is the weekly loop we see working inside top DTC teams and in Byte & Buy member playbooks:

• Ingest daily: Pipe PPS responses to Sheets or your BI, join to orders and first product purchased.

• Enrich and tag: Group free‑text into channel, creator, show, content angle, and funnel stage.

• Compare and calibrate: Stack survey share vs Meta, Google, and GA4. Flag channels where survey share exceeds platform share by 2x. Use this as a hypothesis list for budget testing.

• Decide and deploy: Shift 10 to 20 percent of spend toward creators, podcasts, or angles with consistent positive gaps, then re‑read survey share and LTV after 2 weeks.

Dashboards to build on day one:

• Channel share by HDYHAU vs platform share, 7‑day and 28‑day.

• LTV by first product and HDYHAU tag, cohorted by order month.

• Creative angle map: attach survey‑tagged reasons to ad concepts. Refresh winning angles into new hooks weekly.

• Non‑click media tracker: podcast, creator, OOH, and LLM mentions trendline.

If you buy non‑click channels, quantify the hidden lift. ADOPTER Media uses a survey‑informed “multiplier” to reconcile direct redemptions with customer‑reported influence. Their approach, described in Fairing’s ADOPTER Media case study, calculates a ratio of survey‑attributed to code‑attributed conversions to guide spend at a show level.

From data to creative and channel moves

Survey answers are a creative brief. If buyers cite a specific problem or influencer, build landing pages and ads around that language. Our members combine survey‑mined objections with landing page sprints like the Byte & Buy walkthrough on Figma to Framer LPs for paid social and apply CRO patterns from 100 Shopify PDPs that drive 3 percent CVR. When HDYHAU surfaces emerging channels, move quickly with distribution, like our playbook for TikTok Shop for Shopify.

Pricing and offers also respond well to survey intel. If many new customers cite bundles or gifting, use the 2025 DTC pricing playbook to test anchors and urgency. If preorders are attractive for launches, plug survey‑validated demand into the Shopify preorders guide.

Your next step is simple. Install a PPS tool, ship three questions, and wire a one‑page dashboard that compares HDYHAU to platform data. In most stores, you will get statistically useful responses within a few days. As completion climbs, so will your confidence to reallocate budget and refresh creative with what customers actually say is working. For the templates, dashboards, and case studies our members rely on, explore the latest inside Byte & Buy and unlock full access with an upgrade.