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T

Timothy Davis

Performance Marketing Lead

Shopify

📈 Growth & Metrics (1)👥 Team & Culture (1)⚡ Execution (1)🎯 Product Strategy (1)

Key Takeaways

  • 1.Paid search is user-driven and essential for almost everyone, while social is disruptive media.
  • 2.Start with 'Signs of Life' tests using 1% lookalike audiences based on your own customer data.
  • 3.Do not scale paid spend before achieving Product-Market Fit (PMF) and operational readiness.
  • 4.Video creative targeting emotion is currently the highest leverage asset.
  • 5.Hire generalists who can distinguish signal from noise before specialists.
  • 6.Use a strict 'Ops Cadence' spreadsheet to manage ad account hygiene and accountability.
  • 7.Ignore vanity metrics; focus on incrementality and multi-touch attribution.

Methodologies(4)

📈 Growth & Metrics

A systematic approach to validating paid channels by starting with small, highly targeted experiments using first-party data. Instead of aiming for scale immediately, the goal is to detect a pulse of positive unit economics before increasing investment.

Core Principles

  • 1.Leverage 1st Party Data: Start by uploading existing customer lists to create Lookalike Audiences (LAL), specifically targeting the top 1% match.
  • 2.Tiered Expansion: Test ad sets in tiers (1% LAL, 2-4% LAL, 5-7% LAL). If the 1% doesn't work, broad targeting likely won't either.
  • 3.Embrace Failure: View tests as binary outcomes—either winning or learning. Don't force a channel to work if the 'sign of life' isn't there.

"It's okay to fail because we're either winning or we're learning."

#'signs#life'#testing
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👥 Team & Culture

A hiring philosophy derived from Nate Silver's concept, focusing on a candidate's ability to parse through the overwhelming amount of data in ad platforms to find the few metrics that actually drive business goals.

Core Principles

  • 1.Data Interpretation over Tool Knowledge: Anyone can learn the interface; look for the ability to distinguish between vanity metrics (CPM, Impressions) and business metrics (Conversions, CAC).
  • 2.The 'Scenario' Interview: Provide candidates with a raw data dump containing conflicting signals and ask them how they would optimize the account.
  • 3.Rapid Onboarding: Aim for impact in 30-45 days (not 90) by giving new hires ownership of a specific campaign or test immediately.

"I can teach anyone how to do Google ads... It is the data part that is the hard part because there is so much noise going on in those accounts."

#signal#noise#hiring
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⚡ Execution

A structured operational framework (often a spreadsheet) that categorizes marketing tasks into 'Rocks' and 'Pebbles' and assigns a specific frequency (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly) to each, creating accountability and visibility.

Core Principles

  • 1.Categorize Tasks: Break down work into major buckets (e.g., Structure, Keywords, Creatives) and sub-tasks (e.g., Search Query Reports, Negative Keywords).
  • 2.Define Frequency: Explicitly state how often each task occurs. Example: Review budget pacing (Weekly), Ad copy refresh (Bi-weekly), Competitor analysis (Monthly).
  • 3.Visual Accountability: Use a shared tracker to ensure tasks are done. This prevents 'set it and forget it' behavior common with agencies.

"I'm a firm believer in getting shit done... making sure that they're doing the things that need to be done in the account."

#performance#cadence#execution
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🎯 Product Strategy

A data-driven method using Google Auction Insights to identify actual threats versus perceived ones. It involves creating custom metrics to measure how often a competitor actually ranks above you in relevant auctions over time.

Core Principles

  • 1.Ignore Search Results Page: Your personal Google search results are biased by personalization. Do not use them to judge competition.
  • 2.Calculate 'Position Above Rate': Use Auction Insights data to calculate specifically how often a competitor shows up AND ranks higher than you.
  • 3.Identify Anomalies vs. Trends: Look for sustained trend lines (orange/green lines in his report) versus short-term blips caused by Google's 'close variant' matching errors.
  • +1 more...

"It's not about showing as often as possible... It's about showing to the right person as often as possible."

#competition#analysis#strategy
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