Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast

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Velocity by Hawky: Performance Marketing Podcast is aimed at fostering a community of digital marketers and performance marketing leaders to share insights and real-world campaign experiences. The goal is to collectively gain knowledge and accelerate these learnings across the industry. We host marketing experts, CMOs, and agency founders from leading brands across business verticals and geographies to understand their performance marketing philosophy. In this podcast, we will cover topics spanning campaign optimization, creative scaling, audience targeting, attribution modeling, and cross-channel performance among other key aspects of digital marketing velocity. Whether you're scaling Meta campaigns, optimizing Google ads, or building high-performance marketing teams, Velocity delivers the insider strategies that drive measurable results and sustainable growth.

  1. 3d ago

    EP 18 - Why AI Gets Your Marketing Data Wrong: GA4, Attribution and ROAS | Ahmed Elsamadisi

    Fifteen years in data. He created the Activity Schema. He still can't fact-check what an AI tells him. Here's why that should worry every marketer running numbers through an agent. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we sit down with Ahmed Elsamadisi, Founder of Polyform and creator of the Activity Schema, the open-source event model that other companies now consult on. Ahmed has spent his career on the layer between raw data and the questions people ask of it, and he built Polyform because that layer is where AI answers quietly go wrong. Ahmed makes the case that AI is optimised to be helpful, not to be right, and that most teams have no way to tell the difference. He unpacks why the best models still get most data questions wrong, why he forbids his own AI from writing SQL, why pointing an agent at GA4 returns confident answers instead of correct ones, and where 10 to 20 percent of ad budgets quietly disappear. He also tells most brands not to fix any of it: under 5,000 dollars a month in spend, his advice is to accept that you are guessing. 🎯 Key Topics Covered: 00:00 - Meet Ahmed Elsamadisi: fifteen years in data and the Activity Schema 01:09 - Why you can't fact-check an AI's answer, and the accuracy numbers nobody quotes 04:57 - How to engineer an agent that gets it right, and why his AI never writes SQL 08:56 - Stop putting everyone in a room to define a metric: build seven instead 11:34 - Where this actually gets deployed, from go-to-market to product analytics 13:54 - How Poly works, and the moment it escalates to a human 17:45 - Kodak, Blockbuster, and why bolting AI onto legacy doesn't work 20:37 - Salesforce, MCP servers, and the CRM shift already underway 22:58 - Why he pays 5x more to leave HubSpot 24:35 - Where chat stops and the UI has to take over 27:01 - Performance marketing: attribution, junk clicks, and where budget dies 31:31 - What to actually connect, starting with raw GA4 rather than reports 32:30 - Why GA4 breaks AI agents in two different ways 33:46 - Don't fix your data under 5,000 dollars a month 34:40 - The linearity test: double the spend, do the sales double? 35:51 - What "AI native" actually means for a product 38:42 - Dashboards, daily digests, and what belongs in an email Meet Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Ahmed Elsamadisi: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elsamadisi/ 🔗 Polyform: https://www.polyform.to/ 🔗 Activity Schema (open source): https://activityschema.com/ About Hawky: An agentic performance marketing platform. Two always-on agents and a Copilot that buy media against your KPI, generate on-brand creatives from your winners, and answer any question about the account instantly. Other tools generate. Hawky operates. 👉 Book a Hawky demo: https://hawky.ai/get-demo 🎧 More episodes: https://hawky.ai/podcast #PerformanceMarketing #GA4 #MarketingAnalytics #Attribution #AIAgents #MarketingData #DataStack #MarketingPodcast

    EP 18 - Why AI Gets Your Marketing Data Wrong: GA4, Attribution and ROAS | Ahmed Elsamadisi

  2. Sep 3

    EP 17 - $1.5 Billion in Ad Spend & Why "Best Practices" Are Dead | Patrick Gilbert

    $1.5 billion in ad spend. Two books. A section in Google's own Ads certification. Here's what Patrick Gilbert says actually wins in the AI era, and why most of the old rulebook no longer applies. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we sit down with Patrick Gilbert, CEO of AdVenture Media Group and author of two books, Join or Die: Digital Advertising in the Age of Automation and Never Always, Never Never: Strategic Marketing in an AI World. Patrick has overseen more than $1.5 billion in ad spend, and his work on AI-driven campaigns is featured inside Google's official Ads certification. Patrick makes the case that the era of "best practices" is over — marketing is poker now, not blackjack. He unpacks why the decade-long arbitrage of buying underpriced attention has completely dried up, why he won't put a single dollar into ChatGPT ads yet (and why Google is still the best ad platform on the planet), why ROAS is quietly pushing marketers toward the wrong decisions, and how an AI-first agency decides what to build versus what to keep buying. It's a first-principles tour of what really drives growth once the algorithm advantage is gone. 🎯 Key Topics Covered: 00:00 - Meet Patrick Gilbert: $1.5B in ad spend, two books, and a seat in Google's certification 00:53 - From living inside the Google Ads UI to full-funnel, first-principles marketing 04:13 - "Join or Die": the 2017 bet on AI, the resistance, and how Google featured his work 11:21 - Marketing is poker, not blackjack — why "best practices" are over 13:54 - Always vs. never: where the playbook still holds, and the first dollar — Google or Meta? 15:17 - Why he won't spend on ChatGPT ads (and why Google still wins) 18:10 - Digital arbitrage is dead: the 10-year run that just closed, and where marketers add value now 24:03 - Channel specialists vs. the full-funnel operator: Red Ocean vs. Blue Ocean 30:17 - Why ROAS is lying to you: how he halved it and tripled profit (+ the 4 numbers to watch) 36:01 - Build vs. buy in an AI-first world: the SaaS purge, keeping HubSpot, and why the back end is the moat 44:12 - The takeaway: an AI coach trained on his books Meet Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Patrick Gilbert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickjamesgilbert/ 📘 Patrick's new book & newsletter: https://neveralwaysbook.com About AdVenture Media Group: A digital advertising and education company founded by Isaac Rudansky, specializing in Google and Meta ads — pairing hands-on campaign management with training that's reached students worldwide. About Hawky: A creative intelligence platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-powered optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. 👉 Book a Hawky demo: https://hawky.ai/get-demo More episodes: https://hawky.ai/podcast #GoogleAds #PerformanceMarketing #DigitalAdvertising #AIMarketing #MarketingStrategy #PPC #AdVentureMedia #VelocityPodcast #Hawky

    EP 17 - $1.5 Billion in Ad Spend & Why "Best Practices" Are Dead | Patrick Gilbert

  3. Apr 29

    EP 16 - The Ultimate LinkedIn Ads Playbook from $200M in Spend | AJ Wilcox

    $200M+ in LinkedIn ad spend. 14 years on one channel. Here's the playbook AJ Wilcox swears by. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we spoke to AJ Wilcox - Founder of B2Linked, host of The LinkedIn Ads Show, and author of LinkedIn Ads Demystified. AJ is widely regarded as the world's most concentrated authority on LinkedIn Ads, having managed over $200M in spend across some of LinkedIn's largest accounts globally, including 5 of LinkedIn's top 10 spending advertisers. In this masterclass, AJ unpacks his complete LinkedIn Ads playbook - from the 3 default settings silently killing your budget, to why he's pulling clients off Conversation Ads, to the 3-stage retargeting funnel that actually converts B2B buyers. If you run LinkedIn ads, this is the deepest tactical hour you'll spend this year. 🎯 Key Topics Covered: 00:00 – 02:35 — AJ's journey: From SEO to founding the world's first LinkedIn-only ad agency 02:35 – 07:54 — Conversation Ads vs Message Ads + when Thought Leader Ads actually win 07:54 – 10:33 — Why AJ bet his entire agency on ONE channel (and how AI is reshaping it) 10:33 – 17:06 — 3 default LinkedIn settings killing your budget + the 3-stage retargeting funnel 17:06 – 24:08 — The most expensive mistakes from $200M+ in LinkedIn ad spend 24:08 – 33:16 — The creative playbook: founder-led, witty B2B, and format stack rank by funnel stage 33:16 – 47:00 — AI in agency workflows, lead magnet posts, and LinkedIn vs Google Ads 47:00 – End — Future of LinkedIn Ads + rapid fire: overrated metrics, CTV, advice to his 2014 self Meet Surender (host and co-founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet AJ Wilcox: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wilcoxaj/ 🎧 Listen to The LinkedIn Ads Show by AJ Wilcox: https://b2linked.com/podcast 🌐 Learn more about B2Linked: https://b2linked.com About Hawky: A creative intelligence platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-powered optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. 👉 Book a Hawky demo: https://hawky.ai/get-demo #LinkedInAds #B2BMarketing #PerformanceMarketing #AJWilcox #B2Linked #DigitalMarketing #PaidSocial #LinkedInAdvertising #CreativeIntelligence #MarketingPodcast

    EP 16 - The Ultimate LinkedIn Ads Playbook from $200M in Spend | AJ Wilcox

  4. Mar 28

    EP 15 - Breaking down the "AI Native" Enterprise | Nishith Srivastava

    In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we sit down with Nishith Srivastava (Nish), Founder of Agentics (the "Anti-Consultancy") and a 26-year veteran of global giants like Ogilvy, JWT, and Tech Mahindra. Nishith breaks down the structural shift required to survive the next decade: moving away from "strategy on slides" toward multi-agent orchestration where 100+ AI agents work in sync to solve complex business problems. 🎯 KEY TOPICS COVERED: 00:00 - From Digital to Intelligence: Nishith’s 23-year evolution through the world's biggest agencies. 05:47 - The "Anti-Consultancy" Philosophy: Why strategy without execution is just a deck. 08:19 - The Multi-Agent Opportunity: Scaling beyond one chatbot to 100+ autonomous agents. 13:34 - The "Validation First" Framework: How to scale AI across 100 stores without breaking the system. 18:43 - AI Transformation vs. AI Native: Moving from "Rule Engines" to "Reasoning Engines". 23:29 - The 10x Productivity Leap: Why AI shouldn't replace humans, but make them superhuman. 34:35 - Rapid Fire: Why Claude is for research, and why Grok has "advertising flair". 35:45 - Build vs. Buy: The CMO’s roadmap for custom AI implementation. MEET THE SPEAKERS: Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky):https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Nishith Srivastava (Founder, Agentics):https://www.linkedin.com/in/nishith/ Ready to scale your creative production like the pros? https://hawky.ai/

    EP 15 - Breaking down the "AI Native" Enterprise | Nishith Srivastava

  5. Mar 18

    EP 14 - How Topmate Turns Creators into ₹4L+/Month Earners | Anuj Niranjan

    How Topmate Turns Creators into ₹4L+/Month Earners | Creator Economy Sales Playbook Followers don't pay bills. Sales systems do. In this debut episode, Anuj Niranjan reveals how Topmate built a sales-assisted engine that takes creators from inconsistent revenue to ₹4L+/month — without needing a single new follower. From cold-calling 200 people to land his first cohort, to building a 25-person sales floor that closes for creators across AI, product management, and tech — this is the BOFU playbook no one talks about. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we spoke to Anuj Niranjan, VP of Creator Growth at Topmate and an IIT Bombay alum who's gone from Citibank risk modelling to trading floors to running creator monetization at one of India's fastest-growing creator economy platforms. KEY TOPICS COVERED: 00:00 - Introduction: Meet Anuj Niranjan & the Velocity Podcast 04:30 - From Citibank to Manali: The unconventional path to Topmate 11:00 - The pilot that proved it: 9 creator sales in 12 days 18:30 - Pull vs Push: The sales philosophy behind ₹50K cohort closes 29:30 - Followers ≠ Revenue: Why trust beats follower count every time 37:00 - How performance marketers can start selling courses as a side stream 40:30 - Hiring freshers at speed: 3-day onboarding vs 30-day campus cycles 47:30 - AI's real impact on creators: What it replaces and what it never will Meet Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Anuj Niranjan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anujniranjan/ About Hawky A creative intelligence platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-powered optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. Ready to scale your creative production like the pros? https://hawky.ai/get-demo

    EP 14 - How Topmate Turns Creators into ₹4L+/Month Earners | Anuj Niranjan

  6. Mar 5

    EP 13 - Real Estate Marketing 101: Moving from Lead Gen to Revenue Accountability | Kapil Arora

    In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we dive into the complex world of real estate marketing with Kapil Arora, Assistant Vice President of Business Strategy & Marketing at ANAROCK. With over a decade of experience across leading firms like Shriram Properties and Xanadu , Kapil reveals how marketing in the "realty" space is shifting from selling mere specifications to selling a lifestyle. Discover how ANAROCK operates as an end-to-end "mandate firm" for developers , the role of Anarock.ai in optimizing the buyer journey , and why "trust" remains the most valuable currency in an industry with increasingly long decision cycles. Kapil also breaks down the evolving persona of millennial and Gen Z home buyers and why influencer marketing is becoming a dominant force in property sales. Chapters:0:00 - Journey to the C-Suite: From Direct Sales to Marketing Strategy 3:51 - The ANAROCK Blueprint: Scaling Real Estate via the Mandate Model 6:59 - Decoding the Modern Buyer: Content Strategy for Millennials & Gen Z 15:03 - Performance Over Hype: The Site Visit Metric & Pricing Psychology 21:11 - The Digital Shift: Anarock.ai, Influencers, and the Future of AI 31:57 - Closing Thoughts & Industry Recommendations Meet Surender (Host & Co-founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Kapil Arora: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kapil-arora-598072101/ About Hawky: A Creative Intelligence Platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-Powered Optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. More Episodes: https://hawky.ai/podcast

    EP 13 - Real Estate Marketing 101: Moving from Lead Gen to Revenue Accountability | Kapil Arora

  7. Feb 24

    EP 12 - 10 Years of Insurance Industry Secrets | Varun Kaushik

    How Insurance Marketing Actually Works: 10+ Years of Industry Insights with PolicyBoss CMO Building trust in a skeptical market takes more than flashy ads. In this deep-dive episode, Varun Kaushik shares how he's transformed insurance marketing at PolicyBoss over the past decade, moving from pure B2C to B2B2C, scaling a 40,000+ agent network across 800+ PIN codes, and discovering why traditional marketing channels still outperform the latest trends. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we spoke to Varun Kaushik, Chief Marketing Officer at PolicyBoss and a marketing veteran with 18+ years across IT, B2B SaaS, and InsurTech. Varun leads marketing for one of India's largest insurance broking platforms, managing the critical bridge between business, technology, and customer experience. Key Topics Covered:00:05 - Introduction: Varun's versatile marketing journey across B2B, B2C, and B2B2C01:45 - From IT to Insurance: Why Varun made the contrarian career move 10 years ago05:04 - PolicyBoss's unique positioning: Comparison, convenience, and trusted advisory09:12 - The POSP model explained: How sub-broking transformed insurance distribution12:40 - Trust as the defining factor in insurance vs other financial services18:25 - Brand vs Performance Marketing: When PolicyBoss chose performance-first22:30 - Multi-channel vs Omni-channel: Why insurance needs different personas per channel28:15 - The creative bottleneck: Why 200+ creatives/month aren't enough32:40 - Attribution challenges in insurance's long buying cycle (6-12 months)38:20 - Why celebrity endorsements don't work as well as customer testimonials43:15 - Regional marketing strategy: Scaling across 800+ PIN codes47:30 - The brand awareness mistake most insurance companies make52:45 - Why SMS and email are resurging as marketing channels in 202557:22 - Rapid Fire: Customer testimonials vs celebrity endorsementsMeet Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Varun Kaushik: https://www.linkedin.com/in/varunkaushik82/ PolicyBoss: https://www.policyboss.com/ About Hawky A creative intelligence platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-powered optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. Ready to scale your creative production like the pros? Book a Demo #PerformanceMarketing #InsuranceMarketing #B2B2C #MarketingStrategy #CreativeOptimization #DigitalMarketing #InsurTech #AgencyLife #MarketingPodcast #PolicyBoss #Hawky

    EP 12 - 10 Years of Insurance Industry Secrets | Varun Kaushik

  8. Feb 12

    EP 11 - How Vikas Chawla Built Social Beat into a ₹2500 Cr Digital Agency Powerhouse

    Most agencies chase Mumbai and Delhi. Vikas Chawla built Social Beat from Chennai and turned it into a ₹2500 crore powerhouse. In this episode of Velocity: Performance Marketing Podcast by Hawky, we sit down with Vikas Chawla, Co-Founder of Social Beat, Influencer.in, and D2Scale. Vikas shares how contrarian decisions, starting outside India's advertising hubs, organizing around media instead of creative, and building complementary businesses instead of chasing vanity scale, created one of India's most successful independent agencies. From Facebook page likes in 2012 to full-funnel attribution in 2026, Vikas walks us through the evolution of digital marketing metrics, the structural advantages of a media-first approach, and why AI is forcing agencies to double down on business strategy and creative strategy as their only defensible moats. 🎯 Key Topics Covered: 00:00 - Why Chennai became Social Beat's secret weapon, not its limitation08:15 - The media-first architecture that changed everything16:30 - From vanity metrics to business outcomes: The evolution of digital marketing measurement24:45 - Building Influencer.in and D2Scale as complementary businesses, not distractions33:20 - How Social Beat is preparing for the AI transformation41:10 - Why business strategy and creative strategy are becoming the only agency moats48:35 - The full-funnel approach: Why performance and brand can't exist in silosMeet Surender (Host & Co-Founder at Hawky): https://www.linkedin.com/in/say2surender/ Meet Vikas Chawla: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vikaschawla/ About Social Beat: India's leading independent digital marketing agency managing 300+ brands with 540 people across India, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East, delivering ₹2500 crores in annual media spends. About Hawky: A creative intelligence platform that transforms marketing guesswork into data-driven success. From Ad Creative Analysis to AI-powered optimization, we help B2C brands and agencies achieve higher ROAS and predictable campaign performance. Related Episodes & Resources: Full blog post: https://hawky.ai/podcast/social-beat-vikas-chawlaMore episodes: https://hawky.ai/podcast#PerformanceMarketing #DigitalMarketing #AgencyGrowth #MediaStrategy #CreativeStrategy #AIinMarketing #SocialBeat #Influencermarketing #D2C #MarketingPodcast

    EP 11 - How Vikas Chawla Built Social Beat into a ₹2500 Cr Digital Agency Powerhouse
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Velocity by Hawky: Performance Marketing Podcast is aimed at fostering a community of digital marketers and performance marketing leaders to share insights and real-world campaign experiences. The goal is to collectively gain knowledge and accelerate these learnings across the industry. We host marketing experts, CMOs, and agency founders from leading brands across business verticals and geographies to understand their performance marketing philosophy. In this podcast, we will cover topics spanning campaign optimization, creative scaling, audience targeting, attribution modeling, and cross-channel performance among other key aspects of digital marketing velocity. Whether you're scaling Meta campaigns, optimizing Google ads, or building high-performance marketing teams, Velocity delivers the insider strategies that drive measurable results and sustainable growth.

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