axel sukianto

HubSpot just released the ability to connect your own OpenAI API key. Did AI in Clay just became redundant? I don't think so... here's why: This new HubSpot feature is a huge win if all of your inputs are already housed in your CRM. For example, if you want to quickly categorize an inbound inquiry into “sales” or “support” using the message text right in HubSpot, it’s a game-changer. You’re transforming data that’s already living inside your CRM with AI – no clunky copy/paste needed. Plus, you get to use your own OpenAI API key, meaning you have far more control and potentially lower costs (instead of paying HubSpot’s markup on tokens). That’s awesome! But if you need to “go out into the world” to gather the right inputs – like researching a prospect’s product lines, scraping their website for core data, or pulling any external enrichment beyond your CRM – that’s where Clay still dominates. In Clay, you can: - Run your own AI agents to research companies in real time. - Integrate 100+ enrichment providers to supercharge the context. - Scrape websites with Apify and other custom web scrapers - Feed all that external insight back into your AI prompts. And since Clay also lets you plug in your own OpenAI API key, you’re not missing out on the cost savings or the control benefits. Bottom line: HubSpot’s new AI feature is a big step forward if you’re working solely with existing CRM data, but if you need robust, flexible ways to research and enrich that data from external sources, Clay is still very much in a league of its own. Both can co-exist beautifully depending on your workflow and needs. BTW - Grabbed this screenshot from David Schuh

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You're hurting your Google Ads account by micro-managing your way to that incremental 1% higher click-through rate... when you should be doing this instead to continuously drive up lead quality. Step 1: Walk away from the ad account Step 2: Understand what's really important to the business (it's not CTR) Step 3: Spend 10 minutes automating lead scoring Step 4: Upload valuable leads back into Google as offline conversions Clients and employers don't care about anything but business results. Lead scoring is one way of understanding which online conversions are "good" and which ones aren't - without any guesswork. But it demands a real understanding of which actions and traits make someone truly valuable to a business - a vital step that many PPCers skip or gloss over. If you can record those actions as property values in a CRM, you can score them automatically and pass the good ones back to Google as offline conversion data. This begins an ongoing cycle of feedback and optimisation that delivers better business outcomes and also cements your reputation as a Google Ads specialist who can deliver the goods. If you've never done lead scoring before, Ashwin Balakrishnan has done a tutorial which is now up on my YouTube - full video in comments.

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7 types of CTA’s to increase your CTR: 1. Pain CTA 2. Benefit CTA 3. Scarcity CTA 4. Urgency CTA 5. How-to CTA 6. Objection CTA 7. Social proof CTA Credit: EmJoServices on Twitter/X

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Scaling fast shouldn't be your priority as an agency owner There's so many agencies who've scaled faster than they should have Now they're bloated, get mediocre / bad results and have super high churn Figures on your Stripe dashboard aren't everything. Take it slow + steady

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A DTC founder reached out, frustrated about hitting 4.2x ROAS on their Facebook ads last month. The brand was spending $175k/month, but made no money that month despite the "great" performance. He shared his confusion with me: → "We hit 4.2x ROAS but broke even" → "How is this possible?" → "Should we scale or not?" My response: "If you're getting decent ROAS on Facebook but your bank account isn't growing, you have an attribution problem." Here's exactly what's happening and how to fix it: Facebook is taking credit for sales it didn't actually drive. You see a 4x ROAS in ads manager, increase your budget, but your overall revenue stays flat. This happens because Facebook's attribution window is too generous. It claims credit for anyone who saw your ad in the last 7 days, even if they bought through Google, email, or direct traffic. You're essentially paying for conversions that would have happened anyway. The fix👇 Track blended metrics, and not just platform ROAS. Instead of only looking at Facebook's 4x ROAS, calculate your Marketing Efficiency Ratio (MER): Total Revenue ÷ Total Ad Spend = MER If you spent $10k on ads and made $25k total revenue, your real MER is 2.5x - not the 4x Facebook is showing you. This gives you the truth about what's actually working. We've seen companies cut "profitable" Facebook campaigns that were actually cannibalizing other channels and redirect that budget to truly incremental growth. — The founder called me two weeks later: "You were right. Our MER was 1.8x while Facebook showed 4.2x. We were haemorrhaging cash and didn't even know it." — Stop trusting platform metrics blindly. Start tracking what actually matters: your real profitability.

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20-40% conversion rates on Amazon are "normal" Your DTC website? 2% if you're lucky. Why the massive gap? Because Amazon didn't just build a marketplace. They built trust at scale. Here's what most brands miss: When someone lands on your website, they're thinking about security, shipping costs, return policies and whether you'll actually deliver. On Amazon? None of that mental friction exists. ✅ One-click checkout they've used hundreds of times ✅ Delivery promises they know Amazon keeps ✅ Return process that just works ✅ Payment security they never question 𝗔𝗺𝗮𝘇𝗼𝗻 𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗱 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹𝘀 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘄𝗲𝗯𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝘀𝗮𝗹𝗲𝘀. Your customers aren't comparison shopping between your site and Amazon's features. They're choosing between effort and ease. Between uncertainty and confidence. Between starting a new buying relationship and using one that already works perfectly. This is why treating Amazon as just another sales channel misses the point entirely. The brands winning on Amazon understand this. They're not fighting the platform's strengths, they're leveraging them. What's your website conversion rate compared to Amazon? Let me know in the comments. P.S. If your Amazon conversion rates are below 15%, that's not an Amazon problem. It's a content and positioning problem.

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I've seen inside over 400 Klaviyo accounts in the last 7 years. 90% of the incremental revenue opportunities Magnet Monster are able to generate for our clients consistently come back to these 5 steps. 1. Deliverability Your strategy counts for nothing if your emails are landing in spam. Ensure the correct technical setup + email authentication and monitor inbox placement consistently. 2. List Growth How many customers you get permission to market to is the limiting factor of scaling your program. Analyse pop-ups across mobile + desktops & omnichannel initiatives to drive growth. 3. Omnichannel Retention Strategy Relying on email alone isn't enough - only 50% of your customers will open them from day 1. You have to build consent aggressively from the customers first interaction. That means WhatsApp, SMS & Push Notifications to maximise your chance for repeat sales. 4. Big 4 Flows Don't waste time adding layers of complexity. Go back and re-optimise the big 4: > Welcome Flow > Abandoned Cart > Post-purchase journey > Browse Abandonment This is where customers have the highest intent to make purchases. 5. Campaign Retargeting You're leaving up to 20% of revenue on the table from every promotional send. Retarget people who click but don't convert within 24 hours. Thank me later when the $$ roll in. What did I miss on this list? #emailmarketing #klaviyo #ecommerce

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Your marketing team shouldn't be running the same manual analysis every day when AI exists. Do this instead: Step 1: Identify the data and metrics you care about daily. This is likely your conversion rates, campaign ROI,  attribution by channel etc. Step 2: Figure out where that data lives. Is it in your BigQuery, Snowflake, Postgres? Is it in your Google Ads account or in some CRM? Ask people on your team, they can likely point you in the right direction. Step 3: Connect data to an AI Data Analyst agent in 30 seconds (Julius) Step 4: Prompt it to run the analysis for you and generate a report Step 5: Schedule it to run daily 8 AM, straight to your email inbox and your team's slack. Get everyone's eyes on the metrics first in the morning. Don't start your day without data because data-driven decisions compound daily. Missing trends for even a week means lost opportunities, wasted budget, and competitors gaining ground. Your best marketers shouldn't be data jockeys. They should be strategists armed with insights.

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