Growth marketerFractional CMOSenior media buyerGTM engineer

Full-stack growth marketing for brands doing six figures to close to $1B a year.

  1. I solve tracking.
  2. I solve creative.
  3. I solve landing pages.
  4. I solve media buying.

I do all four myself, code included, so nothing falls between the ad, the page and the CRM.

Michael O'Brien13+ yearstwo exits300+ brands19 in 2026

Get my free full-stack audit

Nothing changes until you've seen what I find. Need marketing now? Hire me to start.

Michael O'Brien
Michael O'Brien

A media buyer runs the ads. A growth marketer owns what the ads run on.

What Meta and Google can't make is the creative, the page and the signal they optimize on. That's where a buyer-only setup stops, and where my job starts.

Just a media buyer vs a growth marketer, stop by stop
Just a media buyerA growth marketer (how I work)
Before the first ad
Asks what your budget is.I ask about your goals, margins and close rate first, then set the most a lead or sale can cost. Then I size the budget to those goals: the least that can prove it out, the most it can take, and how long the money takes to come back. On a call funnel that can be one to two months.Margins first, in my own words from an interview
The ad
Runs the ads someone else made, then waits for the next batch.I make the ads too: 100+ hook variants a cycle, checked against your claim rules.20 hooks in one day
The page
When the leads dry up, blames the website.I rebuild the page myself. First I put agents to work finding 10 to 20+ pages that are working in the wild. Then I build a custom UX for faster leads, better-qualified leads and more sales after the form.Landing-page conversion, before and after
The form and CRM
Counts a lead the moment the form is filled in.I check that each lead actually reached you, and how fast someone called it. I also make sure the pixel and Conversions API are set up right on the form and in the CRM, so each lead is counted once.A lead-delivery failure, found and fixed
Back to Meta and Google
Lets the platform optimize to every form fill, junk included.I trace each lead to the sale and send the qualified ones back to the platform. Depending on your volume, I fire the event only when a lead qualifies, or send qualified and unqualified leads as separate events, so Events Manager and your datasets get clean, consistent signals to scale on. In special and sensitive ad categories, I set up custom conversions so you can keep scaling inside the rules.A remodeler’s leads, traced from Meta through the CRM to the sale
The report
Reports ROAS and cost per lead from the ad platform.I report cost per qualified lead, booked job or new customer, as close to your CRM as your setup allows. Each report joins many data points, so you can read the same results by first click, last click, modeled attribution like Hyros or Triple Whale, or incremental lift, and see what would have happened anyway.
The code
Waits on a developer for every tracking fix or page change.I write it myself: server-side tracking, lead APIs, landers with A/B tests, and the read-only tools that pull your reports. That includes the data layer and custom GTM listeners and triggers built around your page, so every user action is tracked with no race conditions and each event fires once. PostHog, Clarity and custom tracking sit on top, so there’s data to build on.
The business
Stays inside the ad account.I work on the offer, pricing, channel mix and margins too, as your fractional CMO when you want it. Offer testing is key: I engineer offers from your margins, COGS and perceived value, and weigh higher AOV and LTV against short-term wins. A small test that looks good isn’t the same as growth.

Same ad account, same budget. The difference is one person owning the whole stack, so nothing falls between the pieces.

The name says media buyer. The job is the whole stack.

This isn't a knock on media buyers. I've been one for 13+ years, I was head media buyer over 8+ others at a 100+ person agency, and I've coached buyers on live account reviews. It's about where the job stops.

The future isn't ten media buyers. It's one multi-faceted operator who owns growth, by any means necessary. That means finding the bottleneck, whether it's the creative, a bad pixel setup or the landing page, and unlocking it. On one account, fixing them one after another took the landing page to 5x its conversion, the ads 2 to 3x, and the whole account to 10x+ performance: from losing money to printing it.

Four things I check first

Worth checking on your own account before any call.

  1. Do you own your accounts? The ad accounts, pixel, Business Manager and domain should sit under your business, with your card on file.

  2. What are you telling the platform to find? If the only conversion you send back is a form fill, it will find people who fill in forms. Send it qualified leads or sales where you can.

  3. How fast does a new lead hear from you? A lead that waits hours has often called someone else. Check the time between the form and your first reply.

  4. When did anyone last change your account? Google Ads and Meta both keep a history of changes. If you can't log in to see it, or the last real change was weeks ago, that's worth knowing.

Get my free full-stack audit

Free, across the whole stack. If I'm not the right fit, I'll tell you.

It wasn't just the agency. It was the handoffs.

Leads that never turn into booked appointments, reports that say it was a great month, and an ad account you can't log into.

Business owners on Reddit, about the people they hired to run their ads:

  • “He eventually started blaming my website, so I fired him immediately.”

    r/FacebookAds, business owner

  • “I feel like I’m held hostage because I don’t have access to everything.”

    r/smallbusiness, local-service owner

  • “I am the one making the content and all he does is run the ad pretty much and set up the pixels.”

    r/Entrepreneur, business owner

Whether it's one agency or a few freelancers, the work gets split. Your agency runs the ads, someone else built the page, and nobody owns the tracking until something breaks. Each dashboard can say performance is great while the business barely grows. Nobody owns the gap between the ad and the sale.

I've seen accounts where the buyer blames the page, the page builder blames the traffic, and the tracking is too half-built to settle it. Your budget spends either way.

Meta and Google automate more of the buying every year, and they optimize on whatever signal you send back. Send them form fills and they find people who fill in forms. What they can't do is make your creative, build your page or fix that signal, and those are exactly the pieces that fall between people.

The fix isn't another vendor to manage. It's one person who owns tracking, creative, pages and buying, and the gaps between them.

One ownerno handoffsOne line through tracking, creative, pages and buying.

  1. Tracking

    Every lead traced from ad to CRM to sale, and each event fires once.

    Pixel + CAPIGTM data layerCRMHyros

  2. Creative

    100+ hook variants a cycle, checked against your claim rules.

    HooksUGCAI video

  3. Pages

    Custom UX I code myself, after studying 10 to 20+ pages that work.

    QuizzesQuote formsA/B tests

  4. Buying

    Breakeven math first, then cut what loses and scale what works.

    MetaGoogleTikTokChatGPT Ads

Then the signal goes back. Qualified leads and sales return to Meta and Google, so the next ads learn from buyers, not form fills.

Get the free auditFree. I look at all four and show you where it's breaking.

Full stack, itemized.

Each of the four, with the work to show for it.

I solve tracking.

I find out which leads and orders are real and make sure the platforms learn from them, because a platform fed junk leads goes looking for more junk. Each lead is traced from ad to CRM to sale and deduplicated across platforms, on server-side GTM, Conversions API and Hyros. I regularly fix tracking stacks others set up wrong, the kind nobody owns until something breaks.

See it: Tracked revenue and leads at one agency The channel attribution table A Facebook-led store month Fifteen days of Meta: lead gen plus a book funnel The attribution log

Full tracking list ↓

$3.58M of Facebook spend in an account tracking $10.7M · Wicked Reports, channel attribution table

I solve creative.

I make the ads myself, so you're not the one making the content: UGC creators I brief and direct, plus AI image and video from my own production. The platform can only pick a winner from the ads it's given, so a cycle runs 100+ hook variants, built from a 5×5 grid of personas and angles, and every batch is checked against the brand's claim rules. I still love to crack an angle.

See it: $555K+ of TikTok spend for a skincare brand The hook tracker How I pick the next ads TikTok, since before TikTok Shop

Full creative list ↓

My TikTok ad tracker: one day of hooks, logged as launched

I solve landing pages.

I build the pages myself; I was a lead web developer first. If the page is the problem, I fix it instead of sending you a list of website changes. My rebuilt pages have lifted conversion, and the before-and-after is in the results. I check that every lead actually reaches you, because a lead that waits hours has often called someone else.

See it: Landing-page conversion, before and after The Shopify conversion card A store's growth month

Full landing-page list ↓

The Shopify conversion card

I solve media buying.

The math comes first: the most a lead or sale can cost before you lose money. Past that number, spending more isn't a strategy. Then I cut what loses and scale what works; on scaled accounts that's been 5 to 7x weekly tracked ROAS. My core platforms are TikTok, Meta, Google and Microsoft Bing, with Meta in almost every account, plus ChatGPT Ads, which I launched on a client account in October 2026. On Google I rebuild accounts, run negative-keyword passes and match spend to the tracker's revenue campaign by campaign, so the search terms that lose money get cut.

See it: True ROAS and cost to revenue, Meta and Google Facebook spend against the account’s tracked revenue Fifteen days of Meta: lead gen plus a book funnel $24.9K of Google Search and Display

Full media-buying list ↓

Fifteen days of Meta: lead gen plus a book funnel · Meta Ads Manager

In most setups the four are split between people who never see each other's numbers. I see all four, so a problem gets fixed where it starts, not argued about on a weekly call.

Get the free auditFree. Bring the account and I'll show you where it's leaking.

Anonymized results, with the context left in.

Here's the proof in order: what I'm working on in 2026, my headline numbers from client work, then further down the screenshots from client dashboards. The clients stay unnamed because their dashboards aren't public.

If you've ever thought “case studies are obviously cherry-picked”, fair. Every card says what it shows and what it doesn't, client names and dates are taken out, and I left in a down month and test ads under 1.0 ROAS. One rule covers every card below: Shopify figures are store sales, not sales I'm claiming my ads caused, and ROAS is the platform's or the tracker's number, not profit.

What I'm working on in 2026

These are live or recent accounts, and their numbers stay private, so here's the work itself. Notice how many of the problems sat between two of the four, not inside one.

  • A home-improvement lead funnel that was quietly losing leads. Leads were failing to reach the client without anyone noticing. I found it, fixed delivery, then split-tested the form steps.
  • A B2B agency with a booked-call drought. I followed the spend through to closed deals, and the problem was the audience, not the page.
  • A local remodeler's leads, traced from Meta through the CRM to the sale. I found where good leads were leaking between the ad and the signed job.
  • A brokerage's seller-lead funnel, rebuilt around appointments instead of form fills. Landers whose headline matches the ad that sent the click, and server-side A/B tests to pick the winner.
  • An education lead-gen publisher's search account. I match ad spend to the tracker's revenue campaign by campaign, so every campaign is judged on money in, not clicks.
  • A home-services installer's booked appointments, tied back to Meta, Google and ChatGPT Ads through the attribution tool and the CRM, so each channel gets credit for jobs, not form fills.
  • An online healthcare-certification school: Google Search rebuilt, purchase tracking repaired, and creative kept inside the platform's health rules.
  • A hospitality venue's private-event inquiry campaign. I rebuilt the tracking from scratch, then launched it.

Plus the rest of the 19, across home services, real estate, insurance, mental health, apps and DTC.

Get the free auditFree. Bring the account and I'll show you where it's leaking.

Who I've bought media for

  • nationwide dental implant and orthodontic groups, including fly-in implant centers
  • DTC supplements, peptides and men's health
  • beauty and skincare at six-figure monthly TikTok spend
  • large pay-per-lead brokers in finance, insurance and home services
  • tax strategy and financial planning
  • real estate
  • HR and staffing
  • med spas
  • SaaS and apps
  • high-ticket local services (solar, turf, pools, walk-in showers, backyard renovation)
  • ecommerce and DTC, from six-figure stores up
  • supplements (gut health, blood pressure, joint, shilajit)
  • GLP-1
  • medical devices
  • home goods, apparel and tech
  • home services (roofing, HVAC, windows)
  • insurance
  • pay-per-lead networks
  • education
  • health
  • hospitality
  • alcohol
  • B2B
  • info products and high-ticket coaching
  • I've managed DTC supplement brands doing seven figures a month, sustained.
  • Client wins at five, six and seven figures a month in ad spend, at 2 to 5x+ tracked ROAS.

Results, clients unnamed

Grouped by the kind of business, so you can go straight to yours.

Scale and return

  • $50M+ in ad spend managed and 300+ brands marketed across 13+ years.
  • Seven to eight figures a year in ad spend, for years.
  • 10x+ performance on one account from fixing its bottlenecks: the landing page converted 5x better and the ads improved 2 to 3x.
  • $7M+ in Hyros-verified ad revenue on a single client, across Meta and Google.
  • $5M+ revenue at 2.4x tracked ROAS on one client, and $5M+ at 6x+ tracked ROAS on another.
  • 7.17x true ROAS (tracked) at a 13.9% marketing cost to revenue: Meta 5.17x, Google 9.99x.
  • 5 to 7x weekly tracked ROAS on scaled accounts, 12x+ in select periods, which isn't typical.

Ecommerce

  • Media buyer for a DTC company acquired for nine figures.
  • $555K+ TikTok spend at 2.4x tracked ROAS for a DTC beauty and skincare brand.
  • 10.71% store conversion rate, a 53% increase. The screenshot is the Shopify conversion card below.

Lead gen

  • Seven figures a month in revenue on six-figure monthly ad spend for several dental implant clients.
  • Lead pipelines for dozens of home-services brands, built and run by me.
  • Cost per lead cut from hundreds of dollars to under $20, and landing-page conversion lifted from 3% to 9% with rebuilt pages, and from 5% to 10%+ on another.
  • $5M+ tracked revenue across 301+ campaigns and 48,000+ leads at one agency.
  • Sub-$5 leads on Meta at scale: single campaigns producing thousands of leads at $3 to $4.

Info and high-ticket

  • 6.6x front-end tracked ROAS on a high-ticket webinar funnel: low five-figure spend, six figures cash collected.

Email and SMS

  • Klaviyo email and SMS flows producing 21%+ of a store's total revenue, up 39% on the prior period.

Get the free auditFree. Ask me how any number above was made.

Three ways to work with me

  • I run your account.

    For brands and lead-gen businesses already spending $5,000+ a month on ads.

    Tracking, creative, landing pages and media buying on TikTok, Meta, Google and Microsoft Bing, done by me rather than handed to a team.

    It starts with the full-stack audit. Then you get a written day-30 plan, a written update every week and a review every month, and you own every account, pixel, page and creative file throughout.

    I report against the number that matches how you make money: cost per qualified lead, booked job or new customer.

  • I work inside your agency.

    For agencies that need a senior buyer, or a straight read on their own ads team.

    I run your clients' accounts as your contractor, inside your own funnels and lead infrastructure, so your clients stay in your systems.

    Or I audit and fix your whole ads team: structure, creative strategy, tracking and process. I've also coached media buyers on weekly live ad-account and creative review calls.

  • I sit in as your fractional CMO.

    For owners who want me at the business level too, not just in the ad account.

    I work on the offer, pricing, channel mix, P&L, margins, LTV and CAC, and build the growth roadmap around what a customer is worth on the front end and the back end. I've built offers from scratch for ecommerce, lead gen, info products and SaaS.

All three start with the same free full-stack audit. Not sure which fits? Say so when you ask for it. Already know you want me on it? Hire me now.

Audit first. Nothing changes until you've seen it.

  1. The call. Twenty minutes. Margins and close rate before budget, because a good cost per lead or purchase depends on what a customer is worth to you. You leave with my first read on where it's leaking.
  2. The free full-stack audit. All four, looked at together: your tracking and the signal it sends back to Meta and Google, your creative, your pages and forms, and your buying. The problems usually sit between them, so that's where I look. Nothing changes until you've seen what I found.
  3. The day-30 plan. In writing: what changes first, what stops, and what you'll know by day 30.
  4. The work. Speed on new tests, patience with what's working. New concepts go out fast; anything already working gets one change at a time, logged in a change log you can read, so it stays working.
  5. The rhythm. A written update every week, not a vague text, and a review every month. Reports come from the ad platforms' own data, pulled by read-only tools I built, not from screenshots.
How I pick the next ads · Motion creative report, over two weeks: each ad scored on hook, watch, click and convert. Several sit under 1.0 platform ROAS; that's the testing stage before a winner shows up.

You own every account, pixel, page and creative file, with your card on file. I'm a user, never the owner, so nobody gets held hostage. If we stop working together, nothing has to be handed back.

Get my free full-stack audit

Or skip ahead and hire me now. If you don't book a time, I reply within one business day.

Client dashboards, anonymized

The biggest numbers

Wicked Reports, channel attribution table

$3.58M of Facebook spend in an account tracking $10.7M

$3,584,846 of Facebook spend at 1.61 tracked ROAS

I managed the Facebook spend. The account's total tracked revenue was $10,736,660.

Shopify, Total sales card

A DTC store's year

$4,716,972.02 in store sales for the year

a full yearon a store I worked on

Store sales

Shopify, Total sales card

A DTC store's fourth quarter

$1,440,936.44 in store sales, up 28% on the previous 90 days

90 daysI was the media buyer on this store.

Store sales

Shopify, Total sales card

November, the peak month

$628,748.37 in store sales for the month, up 49% on October

one month, on the same store

Store sales

Shopify, Total sales card

December, the down month

$406,434.48 in store sales for the month, down 35% on November

the slow month after a peak

Store sales

Three more store cards: Black Friday, a $1.39M month, a 1,019-order month

Shopify, Total sales card

Black Friday

$40,144.89 in store sales in one day, up 113% on the day before

one day, against the day before

Store sales

Sygnal (attribution and analytics)

A Facebook-led store month

$1,392,041.94 in store revenue and 15.7K orders

about a monthfrom my own login

Store sales

Shopify Analytics

A store's growth month

$42,861.85 in store sales, up 494%, and 1,019 orders, up 549%

one month, against the month before

Store sales

Get the free auditFree. Bring the account and I'll show you where it's leaking.

Meta Ads Manager

Fifteen days of Meta: lead gen plus a book funnel

$25,356.15 spent across 17 campaigns I ran

15 days

Meta Ads Manager

Meta purchase campaigns

$12,620.53 spent, with cost per purchase from $13.98 to $28.52

no date range on screen

Google Ads, account overview

$24.9K of Google Search and Display

22.9K clicks at a $1.08 average CPC, from 620K impressions

I managed this account's Search and Display spend.

Shopify, conversion rate card

A store converting 10.71%

10.71% of sessions converted (695 converted sessions), a 53% increase

Amazon product listing

The brand I built and sold

4.4 stars from 1,279 ratings, and “300+ bought in past month”

a private-label product I built from scratch

Internet Archive, the agency’s own site

The agency I co-founded and sold

“Crawford & O’Brien was acquired … in September of 2017”

Proof I was running internet marketing and media buying on client accounts more than ten years ago, back when Facebook Ads were brand new.

archived Oct 18, 2019see the archived page

Get the free auditBring your own numbers. The audit is free.

More proof: TikTok tests and daily store work4 TikTok cards and 12 daily-work screenshots

TikTok, since before TikTok Shop

Small accounts and tests. The big TikTok number, for a DTC beauty and skincare brand, is in the results above.

One ad group, $80.99.

67 conversions at $1.21 each.

A conversion campaign.

$1,260.81 spent, 42,115 impressions, 55 conversions at $22.92 each.

A UK consumable brand's launch week.

Six ads in a GBP account, conversions at £11.56 to £45.43 each.

How I test products.

29 test campaigns, 347,647 impressions at a 1.70% click-through rate.

The daily work

The unglamorous part: store days, research, tracking logs and test sheets. Click any tile to see it full size.

Process

Store days: eight of them, big and small

Get the free auditFree. Bring the account and I'll show you where it's leaking.

How I buy on TikTok, from an interview

It was about TikTok, but the same rules run my Meta and Google accounts now: make the creative for the platform, test fast, and know your margins before you scale.

  • Why Facebook ads struggle on TikTok. I've seen accounts where they come over with the same type of creative, never TikTokify it, pop it into a CBO on a brand-new account with a brand-new pixel, and it just doesn't quite hit.

    My answer, condensed

  • Faster angle and offer testing. Quick creatives let you find out who your customer actually is on the fly, much faster.

    My answer, condensed

  • Margins. Better margins are what allow for faster scaling.

    My answer, condensed

  • Speed. In some people's minds, taking two to three months to do something is OK. As a TikTok marketer, speed should be almost intraday.

    My answer, condensed

How I test products · TikTok Ads Manager: 29 test campaigns. This is product testing, not results.

Who this is for, and who it isn't

A good fit if

  • You already spend at least $5,000 a month on ads.
  • You run a lead-gen, local-service, ecommerce or info-product business, or an agency that needs a senior buyer.
  • You're on either side of lead gen: a network or marketplace that sells or routes leads, or a local business that buys them.
  • You've been through at least one agency or freelancer and know what you don't want.
  • You want one person answering for the result, from the ad to the sale.
  • You'll share your margins and close rate, so we can set the most a lead or sale can cost before you lose money.

Not a fit if

  • You're starting from zero with no budget to test.
  • You want a ROAS number promised before anyone has seen the account.
  • You only want buttons pressed in one ad platform.
  • You want an account manager between you and the person doing the work.

Get the free auditIf you're not a fit, I'll tell you on the call and point you somewhere better.

Everything I do

You won't need all of this. It's here so you can check that whatever your account needs, I've already done it myself, over 13+ years.

Tracking & attribution

Getting the numbers right before anyone spends against them. I regularly fix tracking stacks others set up wrong.

See all 42

server-side GTM and StapeMeta Conversions API and TikTok Events APIHyrosad-to-CRM reconciliationGA4GTM (web)Meta pixelGoogle Ads server-side trackingMicrosoft UETmulti-platform deduplicationAggregated Event MeasurementEvents Manager and Pixel Helpercustom events and pixels on ShopifyUTMsWicked ReportsTriple WhaleCometlyTrue ProfitSygnalRedTrackVoluumClickFlareTheOptimizerBraxCrossroadsLooker StudioGoHighLevel, HubSpot and vertical CRMslead-delivery fixesTrustedForm consent captureClarityPostHogcustom lead APIs with server-side eventspartner lead APIspractice booking and venue inquiry tools wired to the ad platformssilent lead-delivery failures found and fixeddata layer buildscustom GTM listeners and triggersevents that fire once, with no race conditionsqualified vs unqualified event designEvents Manager datasetsfirst-click, last-click and modeled attribution viewsincrementality reads

Creative

Cracking the angle, then making enough ads to prove it.

See all 28

hook variants every cycle5×5 persona-angle matricesAI image and video adsUGC creators I brief and directangles cracked from ad researchhooks for every awareness levelbriefs, scripts and shot listshooks at volume (20+ in a day)copywritingTikTok native, Reels, Shorts, carousels and staticsgreen screen, text-over-video, before-and-after and testimonial-style formatsVSL-style videoradio and streaming promosAI image: GPT image, Flux, Gemini (Nano Banana 2), MidjourneyAI video: Kling, Veo 3, Sora 2, Seedance, Hailuo, Wan, PixVerse, Creatify, ArcAds, SyntheticUGCediting in CapCutpipelines with FAL and RemotionUGC through Billo and JoinBrandspurchase tracking by creative, hook and angleiterating on winnerscreative analysis in Motion and ForeplayApp Store screenshots and ASO keywordsemail reactivation flowsMicrosoft search ad copyHyperFrames motion graphics1:1 feed and 9:16 story formatsfunnel teardownswinners libraries

Landing pages & CRO

Pages I code myself; I was a lead web developer first.

See all 32

landing-page rebuildsmulti-step qualifying formsquizzes and VSL pagesGoHighLevel funnelshand-built landers and quote funnelsHTML, CSS and JavaScriptAI-assisted rebuilds in Claude Code, shipped on Netlify and Vercel with gitwebinar and book funnelsShopify multi-store, themes and page builders (PageFly, GemPages)bundles (Kaching, Bundle Bear)Checkout ChampKajabiSamCartWebflowClickFunnelsWooCommerceLeadCapture.iotrust and message-match workA/B and split testsCRO auditsAOV and upsell work from customer surveystwo-step quote forms with ZIP gatingseller-moment and rebate quizzesappointment funnels whose headline matches the adeducation opt-in pageshigh-ticket VSL audits and rebuild planssub-brand funnel systems under one parentserverless landers with edge A/B testsGoHighLevel custom-code quizzesend-to-end lander tests before launchagent research on 10 to 20+ live pages before each buildcustom UX for lead speed, lead quality and downstream sales

Media buying

Breakeven math first, then cut the losers and scale the winners.

See all 29

TikTokMetaGoogleMicrosoft BingYouTubenative (Taboola, Outbrain, Revcontent)SnapchatChatGPT AdsAppLovinStackAdapt, including CTVBing launches for Google-only accountsvalue optimization (Meta's Maximize Value of Conversions, with proper value passing)breakeven ROAS and CPA mathstatistical kill rules and phased budgetscutting losers, scaling winnerssurf scalingautomated ruleslead genpay-per-callecommerceinfo productsapp installs (AdMob, Google App campaigns)SaaS on freemium and trial modelsad arbitrageGoogle Ads account rebuildsnegative-keyword passessearch-term profitability studiesspend joined to tracker revenue by campaignclient accounts in more than one currency, including GBP

Strategy & fractional CMO

Where the ad account meets the P&L. Before the first ad I size the budget to your goals and work out how long it takes to pay back. I help your CFO forecast, with AI-built data models for budget scenarios, and I separate what’s actually driving new-customer growth and new-customer CPA (nCPA) from sales you’d have had anyway.

See all 20

fractional CMOoffer architecturepricingchannel mixP&L and marginsLTV and CACgrowth roadmapsguarantee framingurgency mechanicsfront-end vs back-end economicsoffers built from scratch for ecommerce, lead gen, info products and SaaSlow-ticket to high-ticket ascensionbudgets sized to goalsminimum and maximum spendpayback windowsCFO forecasting supportAI-built forecast and budget modelsnew-customer CPA (nCPA)offer engineering from margins, COGS and perceived valueAOV and LTV vs short-term offer wins

Lead-gen backend & routing

The work after the form fill, where lead money is made or lost. I work both sides of lead gen: the networks and marketplaces that sell or route leads, and the local businesses that buy them. That includes brokerage-owned seller-lead funnels and pay-per-call. I've audited and rebuilt ping-tree routing, buyer filters and reject monetization for large pay-per-lead brokers in insurance, finance and home services.

See all 12

ping-post and ping-tree routingbuyer filtersreject monetizationclose-rate optimizationrefire queuesbuyer coveragepay-per-lead brokers and networkscall-center scriptsSMS and email dripsappointment bookingGoHighLevel CRM integrationdemographic spend allocation

Email & SMS

Revenue you don't have to buy another click for. On one store, the email and SMS flows I ran brought in 21%+ of total revenue.

See all 8

Klaviyo flows and campaignsOmnisendSendblueGoHighLevel email and SMSShopify EmailSMS recall funnelsdrip sequencesrevenue attribution

Ecommerce & product

I've run the store side, not just the ads.

See all 12

Shopify multi-store operationsAmazon FBATikTok Shop and creator programsmy own brand, built and soldFBA listing optimization and PPCcreator seedingSpark Code trackingcreator-to-paid workflowscommission structuressourcing on 1688, Alibaba, AliExpress, Taobao and Tmallproduct testingTikTok Shop creator seeding programs with 50% commission structures and a creator-to-paid ad pipeline

AI & automation

I build my own tools, so the work gets faster without getting sloppier.

See all 21

Claude Code toolsMCP integrationsAI SEOdata enrichmentautomated creative pipelines, from competitor scraping to image, video, copy and test plansCodexa local LLM rig (Mac Mini, Ollama, LM Studio) for private competitive analysisAI citation auditsschema markupbrand monitoring across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI OverviewsApifyPhantomBusterScrapeGraphAIApollon8nMakeread-only Meta and Google Ads data pullersMicrosoft Ads over MCPscripted ad-spend vs tracker-revenue joinsCRO check scriptsautomated lander tests

Research

I'm in the ad libraries almost daily, working out what's actually running and why.

See all 14

Meta Ad Library and its APIPiPiAdscompetitor reverse-engineeringforensic ad teardownsKalodataAdSpyMineaAdBeatSpyFuAhrefsSimilarWebWHOIS lookupscustom scraping toolsturning ad data into briefs for CRO, offers and creative

Teams, agencies & coaching

I've built teams and fixed other people's, so I know which parts of this work can be handed off and which can't.

See all 13

agency ads-team auditscoaching media buyershead media buyer at a 100+ person UK agencyteams of up to 50co-founded, built and sold an agencybest record of the 8+ buyers I oversawweekly live ad-account and creative review callsUSA, Europe and the Philippinesa Philippines team for 8+ yearshiring and trainingcustomer-service processesphone and email support systemsSlack, Notion, ClickUp, Asana, Monday, Trello, Confluence

Compliance-heavy verticals

Accounts where one wrong word gets the ads rejected. I set up the core events and custom conversions that let them keep scaling in special and sensitive ad categories.

See all 11

insurance (TCPA consent)real estate (housing special ad category, Fair Housing)health and supplementseducationalcoholhome improvement financingfinance offersdentalmedical devicesmental health (sensitive content, health privacy)custom conversions for special and sensitive ad categories

Get the free auditFree. I look at all four and show you where it's breaking.

The stack, hands-on.

Every tool here I’ve used myself, in client accounts or in my own builds. Whatever your account already runs on, I’ve probably been inside it.

130 tools across 10 categories

ads/Ad platforms15

  • Meta
  • TikTok
  • Google Ads
  • YouTube
  • Microsoft Ads (Bing)
  • ChatGPT Ads
  • Snapchat
  • Taboola
  • Outbrain
  • Revcontent
  • AppLovin
  • StackAdapt (CTV)
  • Amazon PPC
  • Google App campaigns
  • AdMob

track/Tracking & attribution26

  • GA4
  • GTM (web)
  • Server-side GTM
  • Stape
  • Meta Conversions API
  • TikTok Events API
  • Google Ads server-side tracking
  • Microsoft UET
  • Events Manager
  • Pixel Helper
  • Aggregated Event Measurement
  • Hyros
  • Triple Whale
  • Wicked Reports
  • Cometly
  • Sygnal
  • True Profit
  • RedTrack
  • Voluum
  • ClickFlare
  • TheOptimizer
  • PostHog
  • Microsoft Clarity
  • TrustedForm
  • Looker Studio
  • Motion

pages/Pages, funnels & checkout18

  • HTML, CSS and JavaScript
  • Netlify
  • Vercel
  • git
  • Webflow
  • Framer
  • ClickFunnels
  • Checkout Champ
  • SamCart
  • Kajabi
  • WooCommerce
  • PageFly
  • GemPages
  • LeadCapture.io
  • Kaching
  • Bundle Bear
  • Playwright
  • Puppeteer

crm/CRM & lead ops9

  • GoHighLevel
  • HubSpot
  • Calendly
  • Fireflies
  • Real-estate and home-improvement CRMs
  • Custom lead APIs
  • Partner lead APIs
  • Ping-post and ping-tree systems
  • Railway

email/Email & SMS5

  • Klaviyo
  • Omnisend
  • Sendblue
  • Shopify Email
  • GoHighLevel email and SMS

aimg/AI image & video21

  • FAL
  • GPT Image
  • Flux
  • Nano Banana
  • Midjourney
  • Recraft
  • Kling
  • Veo 3
  • Sora 2
  • Seedance
  • Hailuo (MiniMax)
  • Wan
  • PixVerse
  • Creatify
  • ArcAds
  • SyntheticUGC
  • CapCut
  • Remotion
  • HyperFrames
  • Billo
  • JoinBrands

ai/AI, data & automation12

  • Claude Code
  • Codex
  • MCP servers (Meta, Google Ads, Microsoft Ads)
  • Ollama
  • LM Studio
  • n8n
  • Make
  • Apify
  • PhantomBuster
  • ScrapeGraphAI
  • Apollo
  • ScrapeCreators

research/Ad & market research10

  • Meta Ad Library and API
  • PiPiAds
  • Kalodata
  • AdSpy
  • Minea
  • AdBeat
  • Foreplay
  • SpyFu
  • Ahrefs
  • SimilarWeb

ecom/Ecommerce7

  • Shopify (multi-store)
  • Amazon FBA
  • TikTok Shop
  • 1688
  • Alibaba
  • AliExpress
  • Taobao and Tmall

ops/Team ops7

  • Slack
  • Notion
  • ClickUp
  • Asana
  • Monday
  • Trello
  • Confluence
Michael O'Brien
Michael O'Brien · Based in Scottsdale, Arizona (MST)

Thirteen years in, two exits, and I still do the work myself.

I'm Michael O'Brien, and I've been self-employed as a media buyer and fractional CMO since 2013. In that time I've run marketing for 300+ brands and managed $50M+ in ad spend. These days the job is just as much GTM engineering: the tracking, lead APIs, landers and AI tooling, built by me. I started as a lead web developer, which is why I still code my own landing pages.

I work with a brand doing close to $1 billion a year, and I was the media buyer for a DTC company acquired for nine figures. Between May and September 2026 I took on work for 19 brands: six in home services, three in real estate, three in auto insurance, two in education, and one each in mental health, hospitality, B2B services, a consumer app and DTC. Several belong to the same agency or parent company, and I only take on what I can run myself. Most are in the US, from national accounts down to a single metro, and two are outside it.

I've had two exits. I co-founded a dental-focused agency, Crawford & O'Brien, built it on media buying and sold it to a larger agency in 2017. So I was running internet marketing and media buying on client accounts more than ten years ago, when Facebook Ads were brand new. And I built an ecommerce brand, Keeva Organics, from scratch: the product, sourced in China, the offer, the Amazon FBA listing and the ads. I sold that too. That was the whole stack with my own money on it, and it's why I don't split the four between people now. Two exits means I've sat on both sides of the table.

At a 100+ person UK agency I was head media buyer. I oversaw 8+ other buyers and held the best performance record of any of them.

I've hired, trained and managed teams of up to 50 people across the USA, Europe and the Philippines, including a Philippines team I led for more than eight years. That's how I know which parts of this work can be handed off and which can't. On your account, I do the work.

The job is the same at every size, from six-figure stores up: get the numbers right, make ads worth testing, build pages that convert, and buy the media against what a customer is actually worth.

Get the free auditFree, and done by me: the person who'd do the work.

Straight answers

Who owns the ad accounts?

You do. Every ad account, pixel, Business Manager, domain and creative file sits under your business with your card on file. I work as a user, so you can log in and see every change I make. If we stop working together, nothing has to be handed back, because it never left.

Is it you, or will I get handed to a team?

Me, for all four. I do the buying, the tracking and the page builds myself, and I make the creative too: statics and video from my own AI-assisted production, plus UGC creators I brief and direct. I'm the one on your calls and the one who checks every ad before it launches.

Can one person really do all four well?

It's a fair question. I've done each one as a job on its own: lead web developer, head media buyer over 8+ other buyers at a 100+ person agency, and the creative on my own accounts. I've also run teams of up to 50, which is how I know which parts can be handed off and which can't.

We're a much larger brand. Is that a fit?

Yes. I've spent seven to eight figures a year on ads for years, I was head media buyer at a 100+ person UK agency, and I was the media buyer for a DTC company acquired for nine figures. I've been the sole or lead senior media buyer on five-, six- and seven-figure monthly budgets for brands doing seven to nine figures a year. I work as a user inside your accounts, so your access and security rules stay yours.

Can you be our fractional CMO?

Yes. Some clients want the four run well; others want me at the business level too: offer, pricing, channel mix, P&L, margins, LTV and CAC. Tell me which on the call and I'll say whether it fits.

What does it cost?

I don't publish prices. Once I've seen the account, you get a straight number and the terms in writing before anything starts. The number depends on which of the four you need and what the account involves. I take on accounts spending $5,000 or more a month on ads; below that there usually isn't enough data for the platforms to learn from.

You've taken on 19 brands this year. Will I get your attention?

Nineteen brands isn't nineteen clients: several belong to the same agency or parent company. I only take on what I can run myself, and if I'm full, I'll tell you on the call. Once we start, you get a written update every week and a review every month, and I'm the one on your calls.

Meta and Google automate most of this now. Why hire anyone?

They automate the buttons, not the inputs. The platforms optimize on the creative you give them, the page the click lands on and the conversion signal you send back. Feed them weak creative and form fills and they get very efficient at the wrong thing. Those inputs are what I work on. Here's the difference side by side.

Cheap leads are easy. Will yours turn into customers?

Cheap leads are easy to screenshot, so cost per lead isn't where I stop. I send the platforms the leads that qualify or buy, not every form fill, and I judge the account on cost per qualified lead, booked job or new customer from your CRM. I also check that every lead actually reaches you; this year I found a client losing leads in delivery without anyone noticing.

Do you report ROAS, or what I actually make?

I'll show it, labeled as the platform's number, because that's what it is. It isn't profit. I report against the number that matches how you make money: cost per qualified lead, booked job or new customer, measured as close to your CRM as your setup allows. Meta and Google will each take credit for the same sale, so their numbers get checked against yours.

What if my website is the problem?

Then I fix it. I build the landing pages myself, so a page problem doesn't come back to you as a list of changes, or get blamed for why the ads aren't working. Rebuilt pages of mine have lifted conversion; the before-and-after is in the results.

Will you wreck what's already working?

No. I start with the full-stack audit and change nothing until you've seen what I found. After that, new tests go out fast, but anything already working gets one variable at a time and room to breathe, and every change goes in a change log you can read.

How soon will I know if it's working?

You should know inside 30 days whether the account is going the right direction, even if it isn't where you want it yet. The written plan says up front what you'll know by day 30, and the weekly update shows it as it happens. I won't promise a number before I've seen the account.

Do you know my vertical's rules?

Yes, and they're different in every vertical. Insurance: TCPA consent, publisher rules and making clear you're not the insurer. Education: conditional grant language and the words you can't use. Real estate: the housing special ad category, Fair Housing and brokerage disclaimers. Mental health: sensitive-content policy and health privacy. Alcohol: age and state rules. Home improvement: TCPA and financing terms. I've also run supplement, dental and medical-device accounts, which carry their own rules.

Have you ever had your own money on the line?

Yes, twice. I built an ecommerce brand from scratch, Keeva Organics, sourced in China and sold through Amazon FBA and Shopify, and sold it. I also co-founded an agency, Crawford & O'Brien, and sold it. I know what a bad week of ads feels like from the owner's side.

Do you work with agencies?

Yes, two ways. I work as a senior buyer on your client accounts, inside your own funnels and lead infrastructure, so your clients stay in your systems. Or I audit and fix your own ads team: structure, creative strategy, tracking and process. If that's you, book the same call and say so in the form.

Four things to check on your own account before any call ↑

Get the free full-stack audit. Or hire me and start now.

On the call I look at all four at once: the ads, the page, the tracking and the buying. When they're split between people, nobody gets that view.

What happens on the call

  1. You tell me what you sell, what you spend and where it's breaking.
  2. I ask about margins and close rate. Share your screen if you want to look at the account together.
  3. You leave with my first read on where it's leaking, and whether I'm the right person to dig further.

What I'll be looking for

  • Whether Meta and Google are learning from your sales or from your form fills.
  • Which handoff is leaking first, and whether it's the one that's been getting the blame.
  • The most a lead or sale can cost you before it loses money, from your own margins and close rate.
  • What I'd leave alone, because it's already working.

The audit is free, with no pitch deck. You own every account. Nothing changes until you've seen what the audit finds, and you get a straight number and the terms in writing before anything starts.

Get my free full-stack audit

Need marketing now? Hire me to start. Or email mr.obrien.michael@gmail.com

I only take on what I can run myself. If I'm full, I'll tell you on the call.