Happy Sunday, Everyone! Q1 is in the rear view mirror. 2026 is officially 25% over, conference season is in full swing, and most clients are wildly optimistic about growth despite the macro uncertainty of the last few weeks. That optimism is fine — it's useful, even — as long as it doesn't lead to the most common strategic mistake I see teams make during this particular season of reflection: mistaking diminishing returns for failure. It happens everywhere, every Q2, like clockwork. A team...
17 days ago • 12 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! Before I get into this one, quick ask: if you’ve been enjoying the newsletter, forward this issue to someone on your team who runs creative production. They’ll want to read it before June 9th. More on why in a moment. On December 11, 2025, something happened that most brands & agencies haven’t even started to think about its implications. That was the date that New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed S.8420-A into law. It’s the first state law in the country requiring...
24 days ago • 17 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! Before we talk about how to work with automation, we need to talk about something most marketers refuse to acknowledge: ad platforms are not on your side. That's not a conspiracy theory. It's a business model observation. Meta, Google, Amazon, AppLovin, Snap, LinkedIn - they’re all in the advertising business. Their revenue goes up when your spend goes up. Their incentive is to create systems that maximize the budget captured in their ecosystem and minimize the surplus...
about 1 month ago • 10 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! Every marketer I know has blown up a strategy that was working. Not because the data justified it, but because something felt wrong. A down week. A “suggestion” from an exec. A pointed question from a client. A competitor launch that triggered a reflexive need to move. In each case, the math didn't change; it stopped mattering. This is the most persistent failure mode in the marketing/advertising industry. It isn’t incompetence. It isn’t a lack of data. It’s emotional...
about 1 month ago • 11 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! I hope you’re all enjoying the first hours of daylight savings time (which, we can all agree, is the best time). A few weeks ago, I was reviewing a Meta account for a brand spending $40,000 a month. Their agency had told them they needed more creative. It was the same feedback they heard month after month. In the interim, they hired a UGC shop, added a designer and 3x’d the number of assets they were adding to the account. Everyone on their (admittedly small) team was...
about 1 month ago • 13 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! We've officially made it to March. If you've been following along with these intros for the past few weeks, you've likely picked up that I've been doing some shopping. I finally decided to get a grown-up wardrobe and — in my typical style — I did it all at once. We all have our things. After an initial round of shopping for basics, I identified a few gaps that needed to be addressed and thought I should explore a different store to fill them. I visited the nearby mall...
about 2 months ago • 18 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! I hope everyone's having a good week - it's difficult to believe, but this is the last full weekend in February. 16.6% of 2026 is already in the rear-view mirror. The Olympics are coming to a close and the final month of Q1 is on the 7-day forecast. Winter is, at least, going. This week's issue is one I've thought about for the better part of 5 years. During that time, it's gone through more drafts than I care to remember and more revisions than I can count. But, after...
about 2 months ago • 22 min read
Happy Sunday, Everyone! I hope everyone’s having a good week. Happy (belated) Valentine’s Day to those who celebrate - may your significant other appreciate you as much as Google appreciates your ad budget (which is to say: quite a lot, but mostly when it’s convenient for them). This week, I want to talk about something timely that’s been on my mind. Over the past few weeks, Marty Weintraub and the team at AIMCLEAR published a fantastic two-part “Gut Check” series. Part 1 focused on...
2 months ago • 13 min read
Happy Superbowl Sunday, Everyone! I hope everyone's having a good week and - if you’re like me stuck in the northeast US - finding a way to stay warm during the “hard freeze” (or whatever meteorological branding is now in vogue). The idea for this week’s issue started earlier this week (yes, I do write these every week!). After months of putting it off, I finally organized my closet. Donated bags and bags of stuff I never wear to people who will (hopefully) appreciate them. Took dozens of...
2 months ago • 16 min read