Matt Snow

@boredwalktees co-founder. Satanically cursed baron. Rants about e-commerce, digital marketing, music, baseball, and being Satanically cursed.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@herrmanndigital "Move fast, indiscriminately, never fix things."

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

Hey guys — did you know that you could save 3% on your CPA based on this experiment from 5 years ago that wasn't using purchases as its conversion objective?

True story!

p.s. - Results will *definitely* vary

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@natelagos

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@herrmanndigital Probably because Shopify makes money off the processing & monthly plan fees regardless of whether the person behind the store is legit or a bad actor duping a legit store.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@herrmanndigital The new system is already ignoring tons of positive sentiment in ad comments that are happening in-app that it could be using to inform targeting but isn't; zero confidence their AI is going to do a better job of parsing off-platform signals.

[Sarah Carusona @sarah_carusona]

Striving for excellence is not being "too much."
Holding your team accountable is not being too hard on them.

Having the same expectations for everyone is not being unfair.

But somehow these perceptions happen too often. And they lead to an underperforming team and business.

Accept mediocrity and it becomes part of the soul of the company. Or it becomes the bitterness that takes over the people still working their asses off.

Striving for excellence means you give a damn about yourself.

Holding your team accountable means you give a damn about their growth.

Having the same expectations for everyone means you actually respect them all equally.

High standards aren't cruel. They're a form of belief.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@PhilKiel Fully insane. 🙄

Anything but fixing the root problem.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@codyplof @herrmanndigital Oh, I know. Your tweet was great! I thought your comment on the overcorrection in the execution was 100% correct.

It’s a net-good if it can improve as we all continue to adapt. Painful transition till then.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@codyplof @herrmanndigital Your tweet yesterday. 😂

I kid, but I was like “Hasn’t Cody been talking a lot for the past 2 years about the struggle w/ net-new and incrementality?”

Feels like maybe your Operators eps have more pull than you think they do. 😂

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

#4. And this is what I was talking about here: https://t.co/cckxt5dHNv

What's playing out rn is the end stage of *buying* attention w/ paid exclusively instead of *earning* it w/ organic to restock the TOFU. But buyers have made it everyone's problem instead of just their own.

[Cody Plofker @codyplof]

Seeing this and hearing it increasingly common. Check out Oddity’s last earnings which essentially echoes this.

I think there are a few factors:

1. Bad macro

2. Certain categories coming off a high and really struggling (cough cough beauty)

3. Ai? Not sure how but there’s slop and likely lower engagement everywhere

4. I believe Meta has pushed too hard (or incorrectly) into new customer expansion. We used to really struggle with reach and new visits. It’s significantly, significantly better. But the quality of the traffic is so much poorer that it’s still a huge net negative. And it doesn’t seem to just be “colder” and need more time. Just worse quality.

We used to think that Meta was almost too good at finding high intent audiences. But my theory here is it’s pushed into expanding audiences at the expense of intent. Combined with a few other factors.

We’re finding significantly more reels delivery but with very poor quality traffic.

I applaud the efforts and think their heart was in the right place. But outside of a few categories that are likely riding tailwinds, there seem to be broader issues.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@Tylerz_55 This is why we can’t do it.

I think you need 4 things for TTS to work:

1. Sick gross margins
2. Lightweight (shipping)
3. Midwest fulfillment ops (shipping)
4. Low price point

We have 2/4. Postage costs on 1-5 lb pkgs fulfilling from SoCal makes TTS a nonstarter for us.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@rokhladnik Literally anything but improving his core product. 🙄

I guess you can’t outrun Shiny Object Syndrome at any revenue level. 😏

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

Me, every time a Meta employee hypes their AI creative generation capabilities:

"Tell me you've never actually seen your product in action without telling me."

The lack of interest Meta's leadership has in their own products would put the avg dropship demon to shame.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@jaketheadnerd @PhilKiel I’ve been this guy the whole time! 😂

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

Hot take: all you morons whining about "net-new customer acquisition" and "incrementality" are the reason Meta's been a shit show since Feb for most advertisers.

Congrats: you made the churn caused by YOUR shitty products & CX everyone else's problem.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@herrmanndigital We're 100% on manual bids (auto just won't work for us anymore outside Q4), & Meta won't spend on stuff w/ inflated budgets despite hitting/beating targets. It's not a creative or TAM issue — it's b/c the NC metrics aren't hitting the targets, and that's all they care about now.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@PhilKiel It's a valuable metric, and your work on this front has been great for establishing a new lens for historical context. I think CPMr rise is a symptom of all the wrongheaded prioritization of net-new customer growth paired w/ Zuck's AI obsession. But it seems the damage is done.

[Matt Snow @MattSnowBW]

@danavirsarria I think Meta heard all the whining & now optimizes for ncCPA (orncROAS) rather than blended for all cost controlled campaigns. This is why our BCs, CCs, & tROASs won't spend full budgets despite coming in at or below bids — b/c Meta is going off the nc numbers.