Every catalog follows a lopsided rule: a few products carry most of the revenue. Most teams stop there and put the best seller in the ads. The better question is narrower: which product do strangers buy first, and which of those first purchases turn into customers?

Step one: rank first orders, not all orders

Pull every customer’s first order for the last twelve months and rank products by how many first orders contain them. Do the same by units and by revenue. Three things usually jump out:

• Two to five products take most first orders. On a hero-product brand, one does.
• The first-order ranking differs from the all-orders ranking. Repeat customers buy refills and add-ons; strangers buy the thing they saw in the ad or the thing that costs least to try.
• Cheaper products rank higher on first orders. Strangers take the least risk they can. A $60 entry product usually out-acquires a $250 one from the same catalog.

Before you trust the ranking, check whether it’s circular. If a product leads first orders only because it’s the only one you’ve ever advertised, the ranking measures your media plan, not demand. Look at first orders that came from organic search, direct traffic and email signups. If the same products lead there, the demand is real.

Step two: split the cohort by the door it used

Now take the same customers and, for each first product, measure what share ordered again within 180 days, and what they spent in those 180 days. This is the table that decides your first offer.

Made-up numbers, but a common shape. The best seller brings volume and leaks. The refillable brings fewer strangers and keeps almost half. The gift box brings buyers who were shopping for someone else and never meant to come back, which is fine if you know it and price it that way.

The door grid

Plot each first product on two axes: how many first orders it wins, and how often those customers come back. Four kinds of door fall out.

Scale the door. Fix the leaky door. Test the hidden door. Stop advertising the wall.

The hidden door is where most of the upside hides. A product with a small first-order count and a high return rate often just hasn’t been shown to strangers. Give it a real test, with enough creative behind it that the creative can’t be blamed (chapter 20).

When the two axes disagree

Sometimes the product strangers want most is the one they leave after. That tension is a business decision, not a data problem, so surface it rather than settling it quietly. Put both numbers in front of the founder: the leaky door acquires customers at a lower cost; the hidden door acquires fewer customers worth more. Then price both with the tool in chapter 9, which includes the reorders.

Price is part of the door

If the door is expensive, the first offer may need to be its affordable sibling: a smaller size, a single instead of a set, a starter kit. The job of the first offer isn’t to sell the flagship. It’s to get a stranger through the door that leads to the flagship. Chapter 14 covers trials and samples, and the one-dollar door that built a razor company.

Do this

• Build the table above for your top ten first products, with counts. Appendix A has the query.
• Put each product in one of the four boxes. Whatever sits in “the door” is your first offer’s product unless a hidden door beats it in a test.