Chris Riley

Building brands across software, services & media. 🏢 @AcmeStudio_ ☕ @cuppa_ai 🎯 @bullseye_so 🧠 📱 Click to see the portfolio.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

Another month in the books, another donation.

@dogart_ai

Grab a portrait today and help save some animals.

[Paul Mit @pmitu]

Bootstrapping vs VC-backed:

✦ VC: 50% time building + 50% time raising
✦ bootstrapped: 100% time trying not to die

[DogArt AI @dogart_ai]

😍😍

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

I promise the best return on a marketing tool you've seen in 2026 with @bullseye_so

1. Totally free to try (without CC). 100 identifications on us.
2. I'll set up your flows so that the data goes to where it needs to. A couple of obvious integrations:
- Email drip
- Audience building for ToF and Retargeting in paid

API/Webhook is the easiest to send it, but we also have native integrations with....

Klaviyo
Google (sheets/docs)
Hubspot
Salesforce
Pipedrive
Any email connection
Slack
Teams

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

Just added IP @bullseye_so

Simple question, would this data help you land more customers?

{
"event_type": "visitor.identified",
"timestamp": "2025-01-15T10:30:00Z",
"organization_id": "uuid",
"session_id": "uuid",
"workspace": "Org Name",
"visitor": {
"id": "uuid",
"email": "[email protected]",
"personal_email": "[email protected]",
"first_name": "John",
"last_name": "Doe",
"job_title": "CTO",
"phone": "[phone]",
"location": "San Francisco, CA",
"photo_url": "https://t.co/UpaN4Aw7gi",
"linkedin_url": "https://t.co/ii6CKTvjOU",
"facebook_url": null,
"twitter_url": null,
"address": "123 Main St",
"city": "San Francisco",
"state": "CA",
"postal_code": "94102",
"gender": null,
"age_range": null,
"income_range": null,
"net_worth": null,
"homeowner": null,
"married": null,
"children": null,
"icp": true,
"icp_statuses": {},
"persona_match": true,
"created_at": "2025-01-10T08:00:00Z",
"last_seen_at": "2025-01-15T10:30:00Z"
},
"company": {
"id": "uuid",
"name": "Acme Inc",
"domain": "https://t.co/ojxgSDyePZ",
"industry": "Technology",
"size": "150",
"employee_size_range": "101-500",
"revenue_range": "$10M-$50M",
"linkedin_url": "https://t.co/qPpJhsc7wH",
"website_url": "https://t.co/mjjJOUMNAt",
"description": "Enterprise software company",
"logo_url": "https://t.co/S2yKlh5tBl",
"address": "456 Business Ave",
"city": "Austin",
"region": "Texas",
"postal_code": "78701"
},
"session": {
"created_at": "2025-01-15T10:25:00Z",
"landing_page": "https://t.co/eovRouQrTQ",
"entry_page": "https://t.co/mjjJOUMNAt",
"exit_page": "https://t.co/6b8dycV9aN",
"referrer": "https://t.co/AZ2Kg5dAXV",
"device_type": "desktop",
"first_visit": false,
"utm_source": "google",
"utm_campaign": "brand",
"utm_medium": "cpc",
"utm_term": "visitor identification",
"utm_content": "banner",
"campaign_name": null,
"campaign_source": null,
"campaign_medium": null,
"campaign_term": null,
"campaign_content": null,
"search_term": "visitor identification software",
"search_engine": "Google",
"country": "US",
"region": "California",
"city": "San Francisco",
"tracking_params": {}
},
{
"ip": "8.8.8.8",
"hostname": "https://t.co/vtZmdG3eBI",
"geo": {
"city": "Mountain View",
"region": "California",
"region_code": "CA",
"country": "United States",
"country_code": "US",
"continent": "North America",
"continent_code": "NA",
"latitude": 37.4056,
"longitude": -122.0775,
"timezone": "America/Los_Angeles",
"postal_code": "94043"
},
"as": {
"asn": "AS15169",
"name": "Google LLC",
"domain": "https://t.co/1RvB6S65KB",
"type": "hosting"
},
"is_anonymous": false,
"is_anycast": true,
"is_hosting": true,
"is_mobile": false,
"is_satellite": false
}%
"page_views": [
{
"url": "https://t.co/eovRouQrTQ",
"visited_at": "2025-01-15T10:25:00Z"
},
{
"url": "https://t.co/q16Lx26tBX",
"visited_at": "2025-01-15T10:28:00Z"
}
]
}

[Aaron Levie @levie]

As token budgets take on a larger part of operating expenses over time, model routing is the inevitable conclusion. This is also one of the biggest areas of differentiation for the applied AI layer over time.

By understanding the different work patterns in your domain, and having strong evals for that domain, you’ll be able to cost/performance optimize effectively.

We’re still likely at the point where most use-cases will need frontier performance for the foreseeable future; but soon you will be able to peel off individual use-cases and send them to lower cost models once the quality is sufficient for the task.

Enterprises individually trying to figure this out themselves at scale will likely not be possible, so the products that can intelligently route these workflows to the right tier of model will be in a strong position to aggregate more demand.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

I'm 100% convinced...

Routing (Model and/or Workflows) is very important for the future use of AI and how consumers & professionals interact with it; especially for brand engineering.

The key to long term success of this Routing moat will be constantly improving the router with a real data feedback loop....

All with the assumptions that:
1. Everyone is going to have access to strong(er) models.

2. The edge is knowing which model, research layer, prompt structure, quality check, and workflow to use for the job(s) in building brands.

- A cheap model is fine for some tasks in the workflow
- A premium model is required for others.
- A research model as a supplement can be required.
- Some content needs SERP data.
- Some needs live research.
- Some needs competitor checks and anaylsis.
- Some needs source/risk checks.
- Some flows should touch 4 different APIs, 2 research elements, and brand knowledge.
- A premium model to input BRAND DNA

3. The mistake and prior way of thinking... is making marketers guess.

3a. Its the outcome stupid. The second mistake was assuming customers care between $.15/article vs. $2.00/article, a $.15 video vs a $5.00 video, etc, etc...when it should be outcome based. (you'd rather have a ranking $2.00 article than a total zero of $.15/article)

What I've been building.

The @cuppa_ai Router will route the workflow automatically - balancing quality, costs, speed, and most importantly outcome; across the entire Cuppa ecosystem. Text, Images, and Videos.

More routed workflows → better routing data.
Better routing data → better outputs.
Better outputs → stronger brand engineering workflows.

The amazing news, our dataset is already building. 3+ years of data. 15b words, 12M articles, 3M images, and a growing 100k+ of social posts. We will harness the power of this dataset, amplify it with more usage, and build the most powerful, data-backed brand building router ever.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

My current content and brand workflow with Cuppa for any new brand builds.

Setting up to hit go.
1. Brand DNA fully turned on, internal and external links on, & accurate with Brand Knowledge sources (can add up to 5)
2. Add in your sitemap, turn on GSC and GA4 (the data feedback loop is critical for your agents now to autobrand and improve)
3. Add your integrations & set any automations in place (social, CMS, etC).

Learning first.
1. Always test one $ content and one informational content across 4 different models. Don't worry, we grade and score these for you to give you some guidance on what model makes sense.
2. Always test one $ social and one brand image and video generation across 4 different models.

Draft Generation time.
1. Toggle on Perplexity auto-research, toggle on SERP pull, and make sure your AI Brand instructions are set. INPUT IS CRITICAL!
2. With Brand DNA fully on, Brand Knowledge(s) ready to fire, and armed with your learnings (best model to use for your type of content), you are ready to fire for your draft.

My typical workflow is:
- Opus 4.8 for text generation.
- Still using Grok for added research (highly dependent on vertical - great in @cuppa_ai chat)
- Full SERP research dumped in.
- Auto-Research Perplexity toggled on.
- Generally Nano Banana Pro for images.
- Seedance for video.

This workflow touches 4 different AI models, pulls in critical brand context, and pings in 2 APIs for search data.*

Human in the loop.
1. Check your work. 10-15 minutes of human eye edits and optimizations in our editor goes a long way to make sure your content stays visible the longest.
2. IMPROVE. With the data connections in the system, you can make data backed improvements every single monthly (download and use our autobrand skills!)
3. TEST. Models spring up weekly. Test. Test. and then test more.

What most people still do wrong (or are still learning).
1. One workflow (one model) for building content. That's just not going to cut it. For long term visibility, you can't just use {insert latest model here} as a stand-alone
2. Brand Inputs and Brand context are not set. The more you feed into AI, the better the result.
3. Publishmaxxxing. Set a realistic cadence for publishing articles, landing pages, etc.
4. No human in the loop. side note; If you have churn and burn sites, godspeed and do what you got to do. Fire away. But for brands that want long term visibility, our tool can help you get there faster & cheaper than ever before, but it still requires real human work (hate to break it to you).

*One thing I'm most excited about in the roadmap is our Cuppa Router. It is actually the most excited I've ever been about the future of Cuppa in 3 years. As a heavy user and owner (seeing first hand outcomes and working with 1000s of marketers), I've come to the conclusion that real power of software is the outcome from workflows like this. The Cuppa Router workflows will automatically do this all for you. and, the most brilliant aspect of the router... it improves across the entire Cuppa ecosystem every day. The more usage from the router workflows, the stronger it becomes.

More workflows → better routing.
Better routing → better content.
Better content → more trust.
More trust → more workflows.

This is the future of Cuppa: not just generating content, but learning which execution paths create the best outcomes across thousands of brands.

[Alberta Tech @albertadevs]

BREAKING: CEO discovers tokens cost money

[Garry Tan @garrytan]

Model routing is an important thing

Controversial idea: the frontier labs will want their AI harness to be the moat, but ultimately the best case for consumers is that model capabilities flatten and commodify

Preview of the AI Harness Wars of 2027

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

@rincidium @charlietlamb @trybloomai congrats!

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

you sure you want organic traffic on auto-pilot?

congrats, you are page 1 and ranking for: "search google or type web address/url" in nigeria, us, ethopia, kenya, and ghana.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

@manoj_ahi one step further... add a @bullseye_so pixel to your site and make sure you identify leads/customers!

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

Still amazed by this.

brand engineering is just beginning.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

Be right back... building entire social calendars for the month.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

👀👀

[Paul Yacoubian @PaulYacoubian]

$220m ARR implies 5-7x ARR exit multiple

was a competitive bid process

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

The only cancellations we get.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

We built a new brand KPI for your marketing and distribution channels, calling in Brand Visibility Score.

Will require some tweaking on our part, but for right now it is....

Your Brand Visibility Score (0-100) measures how discoverable your brand is across four channels:

• Organic (40%): GSC clicks, impressions, CTR, rankings
• AI (25%): ChatGPT and Google AI Overview citations
• Content (20%): Content grades and published page quality
• Social (15%): Impressions, engagement, reach

*ps, use this with your agent to gain insights on where to improve every month.
**ps, next steps will be to have some layer of value associated with the GSC clicks (real intent clicks - not clicks on totally irrelevant and worthless KWs in geo's outside of anywhere you actually do business -- you might want to stop doing that!)

@cuppa_ai

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

@Nickeubanks 100%... always the most important work is on the input and context side.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

prompt:
"Using the Cuppa MCP, I need to generate the next 30 days worth of content and have it scheduled and ready to post to the platforms.This is for CatArt AI. Make sure to account for any upcoming holidays like Father's day in your scheduling. As a reminder, use the agent and autobrand skill from Cuppa, always adhere to best practices (visual) for each social platform, never use em dash or hastags in any of the conent; let the performance hub in Cuppa via the MCP be your guide for improving. Nano Banana Pro for all images. X, Instagram, Tiktok, Pinterest, Threads.

This month, let's mix the content up a little bit and have some posts (say 30%) not be directly selling. I'm curious as to the results."

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

Be right back... building entire social calendars for the month.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

My current content and brand workflow with Cuppa for any new brand builds.

Setting up to hit go.
1. Brand DNA fully turned on, internal and external links on, & accurate with Brand Knowledge sources (can add up to 5)
2. Add in your sitemap, turn on GSC and GA4 (the data feedback loop is critical for your agents now to autobrand and improve)
3. Add your integrations & set any automations in place (social, CMS, etC).

Learning first.
1. Always test one $ content and one informational content across 4 different models. Don't worry, we grade and score these for you to give you some guidance on what model makes sense.
2. Always test one $ social and one brand image and video generation across 4 different models.

Draft Generation time.
1. Toggle on Perplexity auto-research, toggle on SERP pull, and make sure your AI Brand instructions are set. INPUT IS CRITICAL!
2. With Brand DNA fully on, Brand Knowledge(s) ready to fire, and armed with your learnings (best model to use for your type of content), you are ready to fire for your draft.

My typical workflow is:
- Opus 4.8 for text generation.
- Still using Grok for added research (highly dependent on vertical - great in @cuppa_ai chat)
- Full SERP research dumped in.
- Auto-Research Perplexity toggled on.
- Generally Nano Banana Pro for images.
- Seedance for video.

This workflow touches 4 different AI models, pulls in critical brand context, and pings in 2 APIs for search data.*

Human in the loop.
1. Check your work. 10-15 minutes of human eye edits and optimizations in our editor goes a long way to make sure your content stays visible the longest.
2. IMPROVE. With the data connections in the system, you can make data backed improvements every single monthly (download and use our autobrand skills!)
3. TEST. Models spring up weekly. Test. Test. and then test more.

What most people still do wrong (or are still learning).
1. One workflow (one model) for building content. That's just not going to cut it. For long term visibility, you can't just use {insert latest model here} as a stand-alone
2. Brand Inputs and Brand context are not set. The more you feed into AI, the better the result.
3. Publishmaxxxing. Set a realistic cadence for publishing articles, landing pages, etc.
4. No human in the loop. side note; If you have churn and burn sites, godspeed and do what you got to do. Fire away. But for brands that want long term visibility, our tool can help you get there faster & cheaper than ever before, but it still requires real human work (hate to break it to you).

*One thing I'm most excited about in the roadmap is our Cuppa Router. It is actually the most excited I've ever been about the future of Cuppa in 3 years. As a heavy user and owner (seeing first hand outcomes and working with 1000s of marketers), I've come to the conclusion that real power of software is the outcome from workflows like this. The Cuppa Router workflows will automatically do this all for you. and, the most brilliant aspect of the router... it improves across the entire Cuppa ecosystem every day. The more usage from the router workflows, the stronger it becomes.

More workflows → better routing.
Better routing → better content.
Better content → more trust.
More trust → more workflows.

This is the future of Cuppa: not just generating content, but learning which execution paths create the best outcomes across thousands of brands.

[Chris Riley @LCSlates]

New pricing toggle on @bullseye_so