Episodes

The mysterious deity of adtech, Adtech God, joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa on the pod to discuss how to build an audience and community, why most adtech companies are still approaching marketing with a 2005 playbook, and what individuals and organizations can do to capture the precious attention of their audiences.

It's just Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa, your humble hosts, on this episode as they break down the ever-increasing power of content to influence your reputation and relationships, the companies that dominated adtech in 2024, and the adtech and advertising sectors to watch in 2025. Plus, Eric hates dogs (if you know, you know).

tvScientific CEO and co-founder Jason Fairchild joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa to talk about the lessons he brought from OpenX to tvScientific, inventing the performance TV category, and which big players, including The Trade Desk and AppLovin, might get into performance TV (or not).

AdLib CEO and co-founder Mike Hauptman joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa to tell the story of meta DSP AdLib's reinvention after the collapse of MediaMath in 2023. We go deep into the story of the day MediaMath was shut off and explore how AdLib reoriented itself and came back stronger in the wake of that event. Plus, Joe makes fun of Eric for being old — replete with nautical metaphors!

Permutive CEO and co-founder Joe Root joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa to discuss the evolution of the DMP category and how to evolve the identity of a company as market forces shift around it. Eric and Joe put Joe Root in the hot seat, too, as they workshop Permutive's message in real-time.

Matt Barash is perhaps the best example of an adtech influencer. The master networker and content creator joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa to discuss what most people get wrong about building influence, his theory of attention, why executives shouldn't be afraid of controversy, and the opportunities Matt is excited about today in the advertising industry.

Jay Friedman, CEO of Goodway Group, joins Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa to talk about elevating marketing within organizations, developing a distinct marketing philosophy, driving incremental returns on advertising, and carving out space for yourself and your business with bold, provocative takes.

Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa interview Mathieu Roche, CEO & co-founder of ID5, about evangelizing identity solutions before it was cool, driving urgency, competing with big players, bringing a European business to market in the US, and managing a remote-first workplace.

Co-hosts Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa speak with Vibe founder and CEO Arthur Querou about an unconventional adtech product launch, aligning product with marketing and sales, and the differences between enterprise and SMB sales.

Co-hosts Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa interview Terry Kawaja, founder and CEO of LUMA. They cover the existential importance of marketing to acquisitions, the role of the CEO in building the brand of a startup, and the optimal conditions for exiting.

Joe Zappa interviews co-host Eric Franchi about the biggest lessons he learned building and selling Undertone. Eric talks about his best-ever hires, the biggest challenge Undertone faced in his tenure, and how he approached life and business post-exit.

Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa interview Sincera founder Mike O’Sullivan about the category Sincera is creating, marketing early-stage startups, and the risks of playing it safe.

This week on the pod, co-hosts Joe Zappa and Eric Franchi dig into the new frontier of taste in Silicon Valley, whether you should hire a head of growth and what they should focus on, the MrBeast memo, viral adtech social posts, and Mark Zuckerberg’s live interview on stage with the Acquired pod. Links: Taste is Eating Silicon Valley. by Anu Atluru Andrew Yeung’s LinkedIn post on “Head of Growth” MrBeast memo

Co-hosts Joe Zappa and Eric Franchi chat with Eric Seufert about how he's used thought leadership, especially via his blog Mobile Dev Memo, to launch successful tech, media, and investing businesses and become one of the best-known voices in mobile.

Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa chat with Tim and Chris Vanderhook, co-founders of Viant. They discuss the Vanderhooks’ creative approach to the extremely successful launch of ViantAI, their take on “founder mode,” and how their approach to adtech entrepreneurship has evolved over 25 years. (Note: Viant is a client of Joe’s agency, Sharp Pen. This episode was not sponsored.)

Joe Zappa interviews co-host Eric Franchi, a general partner at the venture capital fund Aperiam, to identify the three traits his three most successful investments have in common. They discuss Kevel, Transmit.live, and tvScientific.

Michael Katz, CEO and co-founder of the customer data platform mParticle, joins Joe Zappa and Eric Franchi on the pod to discuss his take on founder mode. Michael argues that founders can most effectively build organizations by focusing on two factors, context and culture, but most leaders optimize for the wrong factors when they make key hires.

Eric Franchi and Joe Zappa interview adtech entrepreneur Brian O’Kelley. The former Right Media and AppNexus executive turned co-founder and CEO of marketing sustainability company Scope3 discusses how his approach to leadership has changed and how to inspire boldness and drive as organizations scale. Brian also touches on whether he’d do the AppNexus acquisition the same way today and responds to common criticisms of Scope3.

This week on the pod, Joe Zappa and Eric Franchi interview the sharpest-tongued CEO in adtech, Lauren Wetzel. Newly minted as the CEO of InfoSum, Lauren talks about her journey to the position, including: How her consulting background launched her into the adtech C-suite The Venn diagram between a COO and a CEO Why a company should hire a chief of staff (or not) Why CEOs shouldn’t be afraid of speaking out about industry issues

Joe Zappa and Eric Franchi mourn the death of PR as we know it. Listen to the episode to learn how PR and other forms of marketing are becoming more entwined — and how CEOs should assume the mantle of PR on social.

Joe Zappa interviews his co-host, Eric Franchi, a general partner at the venture capital fund Aperiam, about how to become an investor. They cover: The difference between being an operator and a VC How VCs decide which startups to fund What founders should expect from investors How to get into investing Whether non-professional investors should do angel investing

This week’s episode is a marketing grab bag! Eric and Joe discuss: Why most companies misunderstand B2B marketing attribution How companies should respond to the latest on cookies from a GTM POV What founders can be doing early on to market themselves What companies should be getting out of a 20-person marketing team

This week on the pod, Eric and Joe are joined by Chris Riedy, former VP of Global Sales and Marketing at Twitter and current CRO at tvScientific, to discuss how to build sales organizations. Chris has the answers to all your sales development questions, whether your business is an early-stage startup or tech behemoth.

Joe gets his Bill Simmons on in this quick solo episode on how to do strategic marketing. If you go on B2B marketing LinkedIn (God help you), you'll see tons of people talking about strategic marketing. But what actually are the components of a marketing strategy? How do you put one together? Joe explains how he writes a strategic marketing plan in this episode so that you can do the same — or know what to expect from your marketing colleagues.