What we are thinking about.
Notes from running 8 publications and building tools for them. Restaurant SEO, local marketing, the boring parts that move the needle.
AI Data Brokers: The New Middlemen Who Swipe 100% of Publishers’ Content—and Profits
Publishers are facing a new breed of middlemen: AI data brokers who scrape 100% of their content without paying a dime, far worse than the old ad tech tax.
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AI Is Not Magic — It’s the Retail Media Wake-Up Call Brands Desperately Needed
AI isn’t a magic wand for retail media — it’s a brutal efficiency tool forcing brands to finally link ad spend with real sales. CVS Media Exchange shows how lazy legacy models get disrupted.
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Programmatic Media’s Civil War: New Trade Bodies Expose Industry’s Turf Wars and Stalled Innovation
New rival trade bodies battling over programmatic media’s future expose an industry stuck between legacy turf wars and the desperate need for real disruption.
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The AI Content Detector Scam: How Detection Tools Destroy Publisher Trust
Since late 2023, AI content detectors like OpenAI’s own classifier have shown error rates over 40%, wrecking publisher credibility and fueling misinformation.
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How Lazy Structured Data Implementations Are Killing Google AI Overview Features
Over 70% of websites with structured data fail to make Google’s AI Overview features due to sloppy JSON-LD and schema misuse.
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TikTok’s Billboard Ads Are Not Just Resized Videos — They’re Rebuilt From Scratch, Thanks to Vistar
TikTok is ditching lazy repurposing and rebuilding their ads from scratch for billboards through a strategic partnership with Vistar, demanding better creative control and execution.
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Authenticity in Creator Campaigns Is a Myth Until You Nail Prep, Not Just The Shoot
Authenticity in creator-led campaigns isn’t born on shoot day. It starts in the ugly, overlooked prep work that most brands and agencies skip.
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Generative AI in the Creator Economy: More Hype Than Help, But The Hustle Isn’t Dead
Generative AI in the creator economy is mostly a productivity tool, not the creative revolution it’s hyped up to be. The real winners know where to draw the line.
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The Brutal Truth About Growing a CPG Challenger Brand: Why Grit Beats Gloss Every Time
Launching a challenger brand in CPG isn’t about grit and storytelling alone—it’s a brutal fight over distribution, margins, and real consumer access.
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Marketers Ignoring CTOs and Specsavers’ Cringe Tagline Tweak Prove the Industry Still Doesn’t Get It
Marketers ignoring CTOs and Specsavers’ weak tagline change reveal a marketing industry stuck in shallow tactics and tech ignorance.
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Core Web Vitals in 2026: Google’s Overhyped Metric Nobody Actually Measures Right
Since its 2021 rollout, Core Web Vitals have morphed into SEO’s biggest distraction despite 73% of sites misreporting metrics in Google’s own data.
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OpenAI’s Consent-First Ad Gambit in the EU: A Privacy Theater or a Real Shift?
OpenAI’s new consent-first pixel signals upcoming ChatGPT ads in Europe, but don’t mistake compliance theater for true privacy respect.
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Applebot-Extended Visibility: The Mirage Behind Most Site Invisibility
Despite Apple launching Applebot-Extended visibility in late 2023, over 80% of tested sites remain unseen in Apple Search results as of June 2024.
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The Myth of Unified CTV Measurement: Why Independent Metrics Are Still a Pipe Dream
The CTV measurement hype cycle is spinning out of control, but the dream of a truly independent, unified system is still a farce. Marketers deserve better.
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Applebot-Extended Visibility: The Mirage Behind Most Site Invisibility
Despite Apple launching Applebot-Extended visibility in late 2023, over 80% of tested sites remain unseen in Apple Search results as of June 2024.
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TikTok’s Billboard Ads Are Not Just Resized Videos — They’re Rebuilt From Scratch, Thanks to Vistar
TikTok is ditching lazy repurposing and rebuilding their ads from scratch for billboards through a strategic partnership with Vistar, demanding better creative control and execution.
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Spirit Airlines’ Low-Cost Branding: How Cheap Gimmicks Blew Up Its Business
Spirit Airlines’ fixation on ultra-low base fares and endless add-on fees turned its brand into a customer turnoff, paving the way for competitors to steal its market. This is how cheap gimmicks crash a business.
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Why Data-Driven Audience Connections Are Still Mostly Marketing Bullshit
Marketing’s fetish with complex data to decode purchase intent is mostly a lazy narrative that confuses correlation with genuine audience connection. Here’s why.
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