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Timothy Davis

Performance Marketing Leader at Shopify / Consultant for Pinterest, LinkedIn, Redfin, Eventbrite

Timothy Davis has led performance marketing for all of Shopify and consulted for Pinterest, LinkedIn, Redfin, and Eventbrite on kickstarting and scaling performance marketing teams.

Dimension Profile

Strategic Vision 50%
Execution & Craft 70%
Data & Experimentation 75%
Growth & Distribution 90%
Team & Leadership 45%
User Empathy & Research 40%

Key Themes

paid growth is for everyone signs of life tests on platforms right person over right position agency mistakes performance marketing first hires platform investment strategy

Episode Summary

Timothy Davis gets incredibly tactical on performance marketing, arguing that paid growth is for every company since organic reach has shrunk dramatically on Google and Meta. He shares how to run signs of life tests on each platform, what agencies consistently get wrong (ego marketing vs right-person targeting), when to invest pre vs post product-market fit, and what your first three performance marketing hires should look like.

Leadership Principles

  • Paid is for everyone — Google makes you scroll far for organic, Meta is pay-for-play
  • Show to the right person as often as possible, not just be number one on the page (that's ego marketing)
  • Run signs of life tests on each platform before investing big

Notable Quotes

"Hot take: paid is for everyone. If you look at Google, you have to scroll pretty far to get to organic. Meta is almost pay for play now."

— On why every company should invest in performance marketing

"Instead of thinking about being on top of the page — that's ego marketing — it's about showing to the right person as often as possible."

— On the most common mistake agencies make in performance marketing

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