Hi Reader - While LinkedIn bros the world over have been going 'RIP designers,' I've been having more and more conversations like the below lately. Here is what they were expecting me to say Some clever stack of AI tools wired together with prompts. Maybe a word-salad about 'skills' and 'agents' or 'n8n workflows'. While what we actually do is boring. We use the standard AI models(same as your favorite LinkedIn bro). Then we hand all of it to human designers & strategists. The designers &...
13 days ago • 3 min read
Hi Reader - I was not a programmer. My entire technical background was: ‘hire a developer and hope for the best’. As of a year and a half ago, my big AI move was exporting a CSV from my MMP, uploading it to ChatGPT, and asking it questions about my performance data. I thought I was ahead of the curve. I was very proud of myself. Turns out I was doing pivot tables with a chat interface on top. Something changed though. I started writing code with AI. I now spend 35 to 40 hours a week on my...
27 days ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, Every week I pick apart subscription app ads on LinkedIn. What's working. What's broken. What could be fixed in thirty seconds. Hooks that tap into the lived experience of users(and those that are written by brand managers that have never spoken to a user). I've done this long enough: 50,000+ ads produced, hundreds monthly, $100M+ in spend managed: that the pattern recognition is basically automatic at this point. I've built AI agents to help with parts of the workflow(based on...
29 days ago • 1 min read
Hi Reader, In 1994, McDonald's hired a Harvard professor to help them sell more milkshakes. This man went to Harvard. And ended up in a McDonald's parking lot with a clipboard watching people drink milkshakes. For eighteen hours. I just want to know if he put that on his LinkedIn. He did figure something out though. In the past they'd tried better flavors, thicker consistency, lower price: everything. Nothing moved. So this dude Clayton Christensen just watched. Counted. Asked questions....
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Hi Reader, I was reading the AppsFlyer 2026 State of Subscriptions report last week(it’s free, there’s no email gate, you can click and read directly). For fun. On a Sunday. I’m a lot of fun at parties. One set of numbers has been living in my head rent-free ever since. In Photo & Video, the top 5 apps’ share of UA spend dropped from 64% to 45% in a single year. Every other category got more consolidated. This one went the other way. New entrants took spend share away from incumbents, which...
about 2 months ago • 2 min read
Hi Reader - I was doomscrolling the other day on LinkedIn. Everyone was going on about RIP media buyers, RIP designers. …and how to write better prompts. how to get better outputs. Utterly fascinating stuff. All that stuff LinkedIn thought leaders love to post about between their humble brags about revenue milestones. And I noticed something that made me laugh. All of the AI prompting advice was also just… management advice. The exact same stuff people have been saying for 100+ years. So I...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Hi Reader - Del Close taught basically everyone who's been funny in the last 40 years. Tina Fey. Bill Murray. Amy Poehler. Mike Myers. The godfather of modern improv. He wrote a book called Truth in Comedy. The title is the lesson. His whole thing: nothing is funnier than the truth. The audience laughs when they recognize something real. The moment you abandon truth for something clever, you lose them. I keep coming back to this because ads work exactly the same way. We've all been in that...
2 months ago • 2 min read
Hi Reader - "Many a false step is made by standing still." - old jungle saying. So I did something kind of obsessive this month. I roasted 2 very different apps after pulling the entire Meta Ads Library for them. Headway. Book summary app worth $400M+. And Ladder. Premium fitness app backed by some serious names. On the surface? Couldn't be more different. Headway is static images and text overlays. What some might call 'cringe' ads - BUT a staggering variety(45 different angles across 730...
2 months ago • 4 min read
Hi Reader - There’s a 5-step death spiral that kills subscription apps trying to break past $100k/month. And the brutal part? Every single step feels like the responsible call. Every decision sounds smart in the meeting. Everyone nods along. That’s what makes it so lethal. Let me walk you through how it happens. $50k/month: Everything’s working. You tested your way here. Found some winners. Scaled them hard. You’re pumping out 15-20 ads a month, creative velocity is humming, performance is...
3 months ago • 3 min read