Zach Coelius

A marketing measurement perspective that I don't see represented often is that, for a substantial proportion of advertisers, last-click really is optimal. If a fairly new mobile app with low TAM penetration scales exclusively on Facebook, how much actionable insight is gained by introducing complex measurement machinery? While I'm certainly guilty of advocating it, the viewpoint that more sophisticated measurement infrastructure is always better strikes me as overly generalized. In certain contexts, orchestrating experiments or building, tuning, and deploying probabilistic models probably won't meaningfully impact advertising efficiency. And in those specific (again: not all!) contexts, with limited data and a homogenous (possibly, single-channel) channel mix, reducing interpretability and overhead might do more harm than good. Creating complexity where last-click may perform just as well as an ensemble of methodologies doesn't actually optimize the bias/variance tradeoff -- it may not reduce bias sufficiently to compensate for a large increase in variance.

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Founder intuition eats unit economics for breakfast. Yet, understanding go-to-market fundamentals is necessary before raising and deploying capital. A helpful question to ask is "how much do we spend per $1 new ARR?” (Screenshot is from our dashboard at Unloc) It's a useful metric that indicates how a business will likely perform after raising capital, and more importantly that helps founders calibrate spend. But beware: Spreadsheets are only theoretical and never capture reality. Founder intuition is the true leading indicator. Founder mode all the way.

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If anyone is in North County San Diego, on Thursday May 2nd, we will be hosting a tech entrepreneur and investor meet up at 5:30pm. We’ll have a couple speakers, one of which is a fin-tech start-up raising a round, followed up by a presentation on the state of the stock & crypto market. We host these events quarterly and usually get a lot of founders and investors to attend. If anyone is interested, please message me and I can send you the details. LaunchPad San Diego #startups #startupincubator #entrepreneur #investing #crypto #meetup

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new episode alert: Magnite $MGNI CEO Michael Barrett breaks down the future of independent ad tech. we talk competing with Google, why The Trade Desk won, and what actually works in M&A. Plus some great insights on leading turnarounds: https://lnkd.in/eAKc84Qi

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Back in 1997, The New York Times highlighted a “Roundtable in Multimedia” attended by senior media executives. They lamented that apart from a few exceptions like pornography websites and Amazon, no one had cracked the code for a viable 'interactive' media business model. Fast forward to 2024, and Fable has launched Showrunner, a revolutionary platform known as the “Netflix of AI" , which allows users to create their own TV shows with just a few prompts. 📺✨ The way we create and consume content has evolved dramatically. But what does "interactive media" really mean today? We break it down, exploring how it intersects with massive shifts in technology, culture, and new media. And how with a growing "Swipe before Type" generation, there is now an ingrained expectation of interactivity in all digital experiences. We dive into the future of interactive media and gaming and see where we're headed next! Link in comments. #InteractiveMedia #Gaming #AI #TechRevolution #ContentCreation #NewMedia

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This is not your typical podcast episode. We just went deep on all the web3 growth strategies we're seeing work today! Definitely one you won't want to miss. Thanks for having me, Jax!

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Learn a bit more about our DNA and how we operate at Acurio Ventures from Kate Cornell

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DeepCast shipped a number of really cool new features recently in advance of a broad outreach push to podcast listeners. One new feature is our new Daily DeepDigest tool that sends you a concise daily email including any new episodes from the trailing 24 hours from any podcasts you Subscribe to (on DeepCast). Think daily podcast cliff notes or podcast news ticker tape, with a hint of Morning Brew various brews or PitchBook News—it's increasing information throughput when you're pressed for time. And this feature is rapidly evolving to distill other key extractions from shows you're already interested in, but also exposing you to other shows you might be unfamiliar with that also have nuggets to share—and thus increasing your aperture yet still conscious of your time. Want to go deeper on any given episode? Click the episode detail and you're off to an episode on DeepCast, where you can subsequently read a longer form distillation of that episode or go straight to the source and listen to the episode. (And podcaster friends, these pages are definitely increasing indexing and thus Google entry points to your shows!) I'm loving this feature as a user, personally. Can't wait to see what others think! #BuildingInPublic #Podcasts #AllTheWorldsInformation #HowYouWantIt

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Packed house for #ATSL24 and a great discussion between Jeff Green, CEO of The Trade Desk and our own Ciarán O'Kane of FPC and ExchangeWire. The discussion touched on the lack of VC participation in AdTech (despite being a $1 Trillion addressable market). “Generalist VCs avoided AdTech because it’s complex. They often don’t understand why they’d win or lose”. This summed up exactly why FirstPartyCapital exists. A $1T+ complex sector needs specialists to fund innovation, provide deeper DD, illuminating context, access to networks and relevant portfolio support. Over time we hope this provides a stronger signal to generalist VCs and PEs. Look out for Rich Ashton Jack Tunney Alex Powell Mike Follett Mark Giblin Dan Jones Rafael Michelucci Ed French Shane Shevlin Lumen Research LightBox TV Contxt Media Bedrock Platform Exiber Pixels AI

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tl;dr: Finding external advocates for your product is one of the most foolproof ways to build developer trust. If you’re generous enough with your incentives, loyal customers don’t just become endorsers — they become revenue-generating machines. Your biggest fans could be generating 10% of your revenue. At ScraperAPI, our affiliate program did just that by converting loyal users into top salespeople. Here’s how we spotted the opportunity: We realized that a lot of our customers would outsource web scraping tasks to freelance software engineers who would use the same tool over and over again for different companies. That left us with a great opportunity to build relationships with those freelancers who had the potential to bring us more and more new customers over time. Here’s how we did it in practice: It’s super simple. We offered killer incentives to everyone involved: -25% recurring commissions for affiliates -10% first-month discount for the new customers they referred Because our product was well-designed and easy to use, freelancers were happy to recommend us over and over again.

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Big announcement below! 👇 Let's talk about the current state of GP-LP affairs: 🤯Emerging VC managers have absolutely exploded over the past 5 years. 📈 At the same time, more and more data has surfaced that shows that emerging VC firms tend to outperform larger, established firms. 🤔 All of this has made it intriguing but tough for LPs to know where to direct their attention. 🛍 GPs frequently meet LPs at conferences who are window shopping but not committed to the asset class or emerging managers. 🧾 And both crews get overwhelmed by transactional convos. So Sydney Paige Thomas and I created Abundance. Abundance is a private, nomination-based retreat for active LPs and top emerging GPs to form new experiences together and build lasting relationships. Why Abundance? Abundance is knowing that there is more than enough for more than one to succeed. And a single win within a community is a win for the community itself. The journey of an emerging VC manager from 1st close to final close or Fund 1 to Fund 2 is (1) communal and (2) requires an abundant mindset. LPs look for structure and confidence to feel comfortable investing in early VC firms. Yet many of the feeds we scroll and conferences we attend reinforce inherent power dynamics and transactional thinking, which allows scarcity mindset to creep in for emerging GPs. Some of the best events I’ve attended have been intentionally non-transactional, e.g. Camp Hustle, Recast Summit, and other GPs’ AGMs. The fundraising success stories we see usually involve a community (usually of other GPs & LPs) coming together to support and open doors for the emerging GP. We designed Abundance to be an immersive gathering that fosters these connections. Starting tonight, ~100 GPs and LPs are descending upon Seattle for the inaugural Abundance retreat. This has been under wraps for months and I can’t wait to see it come to life! Thanks in advance to our awesome sponsors who were the earliest believers in this vision: Sydecar, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Gunderson Dettmer, & Zelda Ventures. And shoutout to my dad Ed Illig for logo design & Halle Kaplan-Allen being the first sponsor to say yes 🤩 Presented by The Council Capital & Symphonic Capital.

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Join Me this Thursday 6PM with Nate Zaru for Creating Product Videos that Drive Sales Workshop. PLUS networking happy hour at Gambit Lounge. Learn and mingle with the top marketers in the San Francisco SaaS world! Join us for a workshop on how to jump into 2025 with an unforgettable product video. You’ll learn what makes the best product videos and what mistakes to avoid. Bring your projects and case studies. Hosted by Nate at MyProductVideo.com with yours truly. AGENDA: 6:00-6:30 Welcome and networking 6:30-7:15 Workshop Presentation 7:15-8:00 Happy hour networking What You’ll Learn: The New Opportunity of Product Videos Why SaaS is different and how to leverage it The Story Comes First Crafting a narrative that defines your brand Work Backwards from Your Dream Context and Formats Planning with purpose for maximum impact Focus on One BIG Idea and a Strong CTA Simplify your message for clarity and action Show People—People Love People Harnessing the power of human connection Show the Product Without Showing the Actual Product Building intrigue and interest creatively Remix and Repeat Strategies to keep your content fresh

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Hey folks, I think you might be aware that what we're building at DeepCast includes a podcast discovery and exploration platform for listeners at www.deepcast.fm. We also recently unveiled www.deepcast.pro -- a promotions, marketing, and monetization platform for podcasters (and folks like networks and agencies who support them). "You make the shows, let us help you with what comes after." Shows claimed and processed via DeepCast Pro are also published for listener consumption on DeepCast. High value all around! If you're a podcaster, claim your show at www.deepcast.pro to get started. Free speaker-labeled transcripts for all your episodes as well as generated insights for each (key takeaways, quotes, topic & keyword sets, summaries, and more) plus many more features—and growing daily! We're shipping fast over here! (Thanks to Rachel Perez Hosna Qasmei Kim Burgaard Benjamin Moon Rachel Magana Hari Ramachandran!)

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Black-box automation systems like Advantage+ and PMax are designed to deploy the entirety of an advertiser's budget while meeting their performance targets. This creates the incentive for waste: a platform can balance high-value and low-value inventory to exhaust an advertiser's budget while delivering the requisite ROAS. How does this dynamic change in a recession? Advertisers will likely a) cut brand spend and b) shift budget to the largest, most dependable, and most sophisticated platforms. But to what degree do black-box automation campaigns scale? Far more low-value inventory exists than high-value inventory. With more money being allocated to the largest platforms' automation tools -- placing more demand on their high-value inventory -- can these platforms continue to deliver acceptable performance while consuming additional budget? What's the upper limit?

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Special Episode: The Trade Desk’s Ventura: Disrupting CTV, Monetization, and User Experience! In this special episode of the Refresh by AdTechGod (™), we discuss The Trade Desk's big announcement about Ventura, their new TV operating system set to drop in 2025. We chat about what this means for the connected TV (CTV) space; everything from possible conflicts of interest and the role of OEMs to how it might shake up the user experience. The panel takes a closer look at the challenges and opportunities this new OS brings, including the need for better interoperability and smarter monetization strategies. We also touch on the current state of CTV, how consumer experiences are becoming more commoditized, and what The Trade Desk’s strategy might mean for the market. Thank you to my guests: Tony Marlow from LG Ad Solutions Scott Ensign from Butler/Till Shiv Gupta from U of Digital Thank you to Azerion US for Sponsoring this episode.

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As we stand on the brink of 2025, the world's technology, infrastructure, AI, Data, Cloud, Crypto, venture and everything else in tech are poised for a transformative year. I am excited to share my predictions for 2025 — insights that I believe will guide us through the next wave of innovations as important as the internet and smartphones. Together, let’s explore the trends that will not only guide and influence our thinking and investment strategies but also inspire us to create a better world through entrepreneurship. Here are a few predictions 💡💡💡: -  Imagine the creation of HealthGPT, BioGPT, NuclearGPT, LogisticsGPT, GovGPT and more - Establishment of a US Bitcoin Reserve by the end of 2025 - SpaceX, OpenAI, Stripe, SHEIN, Databricks, Canvas, Chime, Anduril, and Scale AI are anticipated to go public - 50% of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) new hires are from Silicon Valley. #prediction #2025 #venture #funding #M&A #DOGE #bitcoin #AI #GPT #IPOs #exits #startups #venturecapital #USmarket #databricks #chime #anduril #scaleAI #OpenAI #stripe #spaceX #bytedance #canvas Read more on my Substack  👉 👉 👉

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Wooooow! Who could explain it pls?! O_o zero budget for advertising, SEO, context, social, etc - zero, no money at all. The image&data provide analytics for a link https://lnkd.in/eSAT_9VF, which redirects to my new book on https://amzn.to/3NYxnSc Amazon page. Here’s a breakdown of what is displayed: Human clicks - 14,000 (Redirects: 22,000) Date Range: November 8, 2024 – December 8, 2024 (The peak traffic occurred on December 5, 2024 with 2,601 clicks - why?! O_o) Top Countries & Top Cities: Singapore: 86% (12,000 clicks) Woooow O_o United States: 12% (1,756 clicks) Other countries include Indonesia, Belgium, India, and more, each contributing marginally. London: 11% (1,580 clicks) Other cities include New York City, Jakarta, Santa Clara, Mumbai, etc. Top Browser: Chrome Mobile Web (93% of clicks, 13,000 users). Top OS: Android (98% of clicks, 14,000 users). Most traffic comes from unidentified sources (99%, 14,000 clicks). A small portion (0.3%) from nansen.id. Most social traffic is unidentified, with a small fraction attributed to Google.

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I enjoyed going on Nick Telson-Sillett’s podcast, Pitch Deck by Forward Pursuit. Nick is a serial founder and investor (founded and exited DesignMyNight) so knows both sides of the table which always makes for an enriching chat. Some things we discussed: - The perceived power dynamic between VCs and founders can hinder productive conversations. - A compelling product demo can significantly influence investor interest. - Founders must focus on solving real customer problems to succeed. - Hiring standards are crucial for building a successful startup team. - Behavioural roadblocks can prevent the adoption of new solutions. - Validation from potential customers is key for pre-revenue startups. - The early-stage funding landscape has become more efficient and selective. - Pace of execution is a critical factor in attracting investment.

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