Jay Gamey

@zachmstuck 👏👏👏

I started a little marketing agency 7 years ago called Homestead, named after the street I grew up on. I had the vision to build something special and looking back now, I think we did exactly that. Today I’m excited to announce that Homestead has been acquired by Verndale (also recently acquired VAAN Group) in an effort to create a DTC growth platform built to support brands across the entire commerce lifecycle. I’m extremely grateful to my business partner @_RileyTrotter for all of the time he’s given this company and all the incredible work that he’s done. Riley took over as CEO a few years ago and Homestead wouldn’t be where we are today without his leadership and pursuit of greatness. I can’t say enough about my other partners @kellybird__ and @jsappington. These two have shown a level of commitment to building this company that is unmatched. Watching them both grow as leaders over the last few years has been nothing short of inspiring. To all our current and past team members, thank you for always giving Homestead and our clients 100% effort. Will forever be grateful to you all for helping us get to where we are today. To all of our clients, thank you for trusting in us to help grow your businesses. This is not an easy task and we have never taken it lightly. As for me, I’m officially stepping out of the agency business, but as most of you know I haven’t been involved in the company for some time as Riley/Kelly/Jacob have been and will continue to lead Homestead for years to come. Expect to see more updates on the brands I’ve been building in weeks to come.

Client’s reply after seeing the ads we made: “Wow, these are phenomenal.” 15 creatives built using AI + human editors. AI generated the assets. Humans turned them into real ads.

Most companies solve one part of the creative flow. AI generates. Editors refine. Agencies bring strategy. Media buyers manage spend + data. It’s fragmented. Separate tools. Separate teams. Separate handoffs. The leverage isn’t in one piece. It’s in how they connect.

800+ sales calls in 3 years. Founders want more creative. Cheap. Fast. High quality. They don’t care if it’s AI or human. They just want it to work. When it doesn’t — they want iteration. The friction isn’t talent. It’s coordination. The complete workflow doesn’t exist. Yet

AI makes assets. UGC clips. B-roll. Photoshoots. Static drafts. Pieces. Not the full puzzle. Hooks, sequencing, variation, refinement — that’s still human. Speed is solved. Assembly isn’t.

Creative expectations are insane. More volume. Lower cost. Faster turnaround. Higher quality. Meanwhile performance decays. Eventually something fails. That’s not a talent issue. It’s structural.

I’ve mostly been building, not posting. Creative in performance marketing is honestly unstable. Entrepreneurs pivot fast. Budgets move. Performance drops. Expectations don’t. AI helps. It doesn’t solve it. We’ve been rebuilding the workflow around that reality. More soon.

@Bears_Hype_Man Bear

Which logo do you prefer to represent the Chicago Bears?

@iamshackelford Clear expectations (briefing) = strong creative, less revisions = increased creative output =. Creative diversity = winners

My creative strategist friends are going to be a tad triggered.. or maybe I'm on the nose we will see. Creative briefs are broken :/ - and we currently do anywhere between 10-30 a week right now! Most brands tell creators what to do but never what NOT to do. Here's what we include that others don't: 1/ Examples of winning ads AND examples of what didn't work 2/ Small stuff. Everything we shoot has to be sunlit. Sounds basic, but it's part of our brand. 3/ We tell creators exactly which placement the content is for, ie. Meta reels in 9x16 or 4x5 format. The detail in briefing gets way more intricate now. When creators send content back and the product's cut off or they're too close to camera, we have to fix it all in post. Kent Yoshimura from Neuro Gum has his creators in a Slack group sharing what's working in real time. That flywheel spins fast when everyone's incentivized to share wins. The upfront investment in briefing saves you 10x on the backend. Be specific about placement Tell them what failed Show examples That's the difference between content that converts and content that just looks pretty.

@NHLJets Announce this uniform update tomorrow, and sell those #19s! cc. Huster - @SportsTalkWPG What say you?

Meant to be.

@iamshackelford Breakfast burrito?

Today we did Coffee Park IKEA

Diving into lens this morning @foreplayzach

@jpolly22 Jets in 5

What are your predictions for Jets vs. Stars? I’ve got Jets in 7.

@NHLJets in 6

Stronger borders. Better ads. Too many weak creatives have made it past our checkpoints. That ends now. We’re not here to copy briefs. We’re here to close the loop—on strategy, execution, and results. Quality over speed. Effective immediately.

AI has warped expectations. 24–72 hours used to be fast for ads—now, clients expect perfection in minutes. But AI alone doesn’t deliver that. Creativity, strategy, and refinement still matter. We’re testing Ad Packs—AI-assisted, human-curated, ready in 24 hours.

Ai supports ad creation. It doesn’t replace it.

@jeremygeist @iamshackelford @KonstantDesigns Thanks for sharing this @jeremygeist. Great to see you up and running quickly as designed. Reach out if you need any support along the way. 👊

@iamshackelford I looked at @KonstantDesigns website on Monday night for the first time, and had our sales call > onboarding > first campaigns submitted (and moved into production) by 9pm Tuesday night Phase 4 in action. Really well designed systems

Every agency founder wants to grow out of being a day to day execution lead (which isn't a problem when you're building it) but everyone of the calls or questions I get starts something like, "I love this but I need to be thinking about what's coming next, how do I step into a role of true ownership" Before you can fully transition from IN IT to ON IT, you have to understand what EACH phase of agency growth looks like Here's a visual gut check for you:

@iamshackelford Truth

I’ve spent an absolute BAG of money on paid media. I’ve seen the cycles. We've been spending this. Our own money, other peoples money whatever it all spends. Here’s the reality.. Meta and Google aren’t going anywhere. Everyone keep asking if TikTok or AppHatin or some new platform will take over, but the core ad ecosystem isnt changing anytime soon AI or no AI What’s changing? ‣ Ad costs are rising ‣ Privacy rules are tightening ‣ Brands can’t rely on lazy, one-size-fits-all campaigns anymore So what works in 2025? 🎯 Creative-first strategy You can not longer boost a static image and expect results. Video is king. Strong hooks, fast pacing, and platform-specific storytelling win every time. 🎯 Landing pages that convert Your ads are only as good as the page they send traffic to. If your site isn’t dialed in, you’re burning cash. 🎯 Measuring beyond ROAS If your entire strategy is based on “what’s my ROAS today?” you’re cooked. The best brands are looking at blended CAC, LTV, and retention to drive long-term profitability. Organic is great.. some brands are crushing it with community building.. but if you launch a product tomorrow and think you can rely only on organic, you’re setting yourself up to fail + it's almost as slow as SEO so you WILL invest real money time and process development there. The best strategy is two prong.. 1 - paid as a foundation (all things paid) 2 - organic to amplify growth (all things organic) Many new founders come from a product perspective. They have something cool to sell, but they haven’t thought about how to distribute or market it Paid media is incredibly competitive, so your product margins and customer lifetime value must justify the spend.. if they don’t, you’ll burn your budget fast In 2025, your success hinges on real brand-building, solid retention strategies, and a willingness to invest in creative storytelling. It’s less about hacks, and more about operational excellence.