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Daniel Perumal and Nick Alter (ThriveSide/Founders Best Friend) explain why paid ads don’t work like they used to...and what founders should do when they can’t “buy growth” anymore.
We unpack the post-iOS reality, shrinking trust, platform incentives, and ThriveSide’s founder maturity model for building sustainable growth without skipping steps.
You’ll hear when ads still help (micro-validation), why founders confuse spend with strategy, and the simple move most people avoid: build a list, start real conversations, and build community that referrals can run through.
Guests:
Daniel Perumal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-perumal-882a1652/
Nick Alter: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholasalter/
ThriveSide: https://thriveside.com/
Founders Best Friend: https://www.foundersbestfriend.com/
Host: Adam W. Barney
Transition Leadership Foundation Call (20 min): https://calendly.com/adamwbarney/foundation-call-20min
Creators and Guests
What is Is Anything Real??
Is Anything Real? is the Reality-First Leadership podcast for builder-leaders who want outcomes, not optics. Each week, Adam W. Barney sits down with founders and operators to unpack positioning, marketing, community, energy management, and influence - plus the numbers behind what actually worked.
You’ll hear: a quick Reality Check, a practical Proof Stack (inputs → actions → outcomes), and one EnergyOS habit you can run this week. Specifics over slogans; humane systems over hustle cosplay.
New episodes every Wednesday at 12:00 PM ET.
👉 Book your 20-min Exploration Call: https://calendly.com/adamwbarney/explorationplugin-20min
[00:06.2]
Welcome back to Is Anything Real? The podcast where we torch dashboards, laugh at the spreadsheets, and tell the truth no CMO wants to hear. Here's today's hot take. Paid ads don't work like they used to. The machine is broken. Ten years ago, you could drop 50 bucks into Google and build a business, and today you drop five grand and maybe you get three calls if you're lucky.
[00:30.1]
With me are Daniel Perumal and Nick Alter, co-founders of ThriveSide. Between them, they've run ads for Google, for Apple, Gartner, startups, and agencies. They've seen firsthand that the playbook is toast, and they're building a new one for founders who can't just buy growth anymore.
[00:48.3]
Daniel, Nick, welcome to the show. Thanks for having us. Awesome. Yeah, thanks for having us. You got it. Daniel, I'll start with you. You've run ads at Gartner, Alert Media, even Apple. When did you first realize this doesn't work anymore? Yeah, you know, I think for me, the iOS changes, I think in 2021, was a big, big, just shift in the industry.
[01:16.5]
And I don't think I realized how big it was until a few months down the road. And I just remember running campaigns and thinking, I don't know what happened. All these little lookalike audiences that were just amazing and we could just rely on and just hammer and hammer and hammer.
[01:33.4]
You know, they weren't doing it anymore. And remarketing wasn't the same anymore. And so I think that was the first inkling I had that something was really different. Something was wrong in the universe. And, I didn't, you know, understand how long that would be, what would that actually be.
[01:50.9]
But that was really the first time I was like, yeah, something's weird. I mean, I love to get weird. But, Nick, you've got 15 years running agency ads for smaller businesses. Would you say it's the same story or is it just about different scale?
[02:06.7]
Well, I mean, so my on it was that the rug got pulled out from underneath us, you know, pretty early on in terms of, you know, especially when Facebook first changed its algorithms. And that actually forced us to get more into different ad complexes, if you will.
[02:31.3]
And then, and then just, you know, con. And then so we kind of clued in, in the very, very early days that it's like, wait a second, this is going to change constantly, and it's going to change a lot. And just the question of is this, that, and then the idea of diminishing returns.
[02:49.0]
The interesting thing about that, and it's me and a guy named Rusty Shelton, we used to talk a lot about this, way back in the day. Back in, you know, 2009, 2010. Right. And, when we were looking at, you know, and how we were starting to, at that time, we were like, okay, what is rented media?
[03:10.4]
What is earned media? What is owned media? And we started actually having to. We were coining those phrases at that time to make sense of, and navigate. It's like, okay, so how do we, how can we even approach this idea of rented as it continues to shift and change?
[03:28.8]
Yep, yep. So, I mean, you've both said, you know, and we all kind of understand because I come from that same, background of, for instance, running ads through the 2008 financial crisis. You know, I think we would all argue here that the platforms look the same, but the dashboards and therefore the results aren't.
[03:50.1]
What do both of you think has actually changed under the hood that's driving that difference of where we are today? Yeah, I think just on a basic level is the Internet has changed and like, everything has changed in that way.
[04:08.9]
Right. The way that people interact with the Internet is different. Right. And I think you're seeing this more and more with AI now, although this wasn't the beginning of it. But, you know, now people instead of going to Google, they're going to AI, they're going to cloud, they're going to ChatGPT, you know, whatever it is, or they're just reading a little snippet on Google from Gemini.
[04:29.0]
And then also, I think just people in general a little bit more ad savvy, even though, you know, the ad platforms have largely stayed the same. But over the years, the, the actual ads themselves look more and more native to the platform.
[04:45.6]
But I think people have kind of gotten wise to it. And, you know, there used to be this sort of feel of like, yes, it's an ad, but people are used to seeing ads. They would see it in tv, they would see it in newspapers. It was very familiar to them. And now there's this drive towards native content, towards content that is just interesting to people and things like that.
[05:06.0]
And so just the paradigm for me has really shifted, on how people interact with the ads. And so, you know, that in and of itself, no matter what the algorithm is doing and everything else, like people interact with content differently and it's getting more and more different.
[05:26.7]
And that's going to necessarily change the ad platform. Yeah. Yep. I think it's trust. I think that the idea of where and how. Sorry, if the light keeps changing, it's because we have these automatic lights that are freaking out for some reason.
[05:44.1]
We love a good dance party here, though. Everyone. That's fine. Yeah. Just strobing it. So we, you know, I think we go back to this idea of trust is something that how people trust is changing, continuing to change.
[06:01.0]
And I think that's a large part of. And on top of that, it's not only is that there's a trust problem. So which actually is where I think buying behaviors ultimately culminate, if that's the right word. That's where, the things intersect and that's where the action happens.
[06:23.0]
But I also think that we have to take into account that there are agendas that are even competing against people's trust that are. That those that own the platforms, they are also there's a, like they're trying to accommodate, like.
[06:40.5]
And they're not always transparent about what their agendas are. Right, right. And so we, we have to be mindful of what that looks like. And the thing is, is that because historically, when we think about ads.
[06:55.5]
Right. Is that, I mean, in that space, we had, you know, these platforms that I could get on there and I could go post my ads. But then it got to the point where their platform, it became way more sophisticated to a degree or to a level that if I wanted to be competitive with the ads, then like, you had experts that were coming in and they were looking at how they were getting like people that figured out how to game the systems.
[07:18.0]
And then, and then the thing is, is that you had the people that own the platforms themselves that are then they're going to war with the people that are trying to game their systems. Right. There's that. So, like, things are changing there that way. And now with AI doing what AI is doing and like, I think wasn't it that didn't, Facebook announced that and I think Google announced that.
[07:39.4]
Like, you're. It's. They're kind of almost coming back full circle. It's like, hey, you'll no longer have creative control over the ads, here soon. Right, right. And so like, because we're like, we understand our algorithms and our audience's buying behaviors better than anybody else does, or so they claim.
[07:59.9]
And so therefore, we're going to control that experience to another degree using these, you know, and they're leveraging the AI piece. So it's kind of an interesting route to look at as to, like, what exactly are all the kind of different, facets of effect that are happening not only in tandem, but also that are affecting one another at the same time.
[08:22.4]
Yeah, yeah, that's. I mean, that's valuable. So, I mean, you know, obviously, paid ads don't work the way they used to. Right. Kind of shifting gears a little bit here into the founder mindset, I know you built ThriveSide on a founder maturity model.
[08:38.1]
Can you break that down for us? What does that actually mean? Sure. So idea state is that business is really predicated on what we sell, right? It's like, you don't have a business without something to sell.
[08:55.3]
And so the confusion that a lot of founders have is that they lose track and lose sight of what is it that matters the most to being successful in a market. And that is focusing on. It's being able to establish and say, like, look, the blue dot of my business is what I sell and my ability to actually focus on the right things at the right time, to prioritize the right things.
[09:20.0]
Right now, not to go from this idea stage to scale, for example, which we hear that a lot. Right? It's just like, I've got an idea and how do I scale this? How do I. How do I get that rocket ship to fly? Right, right. And the problem is that, like, that's. like saying, well, you know, it's like, one, two, skip a few, and a miracle happens.
[09:38.2]
And then suddenly, you know, we're Facebook and, or, you know, something else. You're like, that's not how that works. And so instead it's identifying and saying, like, no, no, zone in on. It's just like, let's focus on, like, complex. Like, think about all the things that kill businesses, right? Like, complexity kills business.
[09:55.2]
Too much business kills business, Too little business kills business. You know, that kind of thing. But the reality is if we instead, if we broke it up, broke apart and said, no, no, the thing that we need to focus on in business is what we sell. And it's the stages of, that we find ourselves in.
[10:10.8]
In market is the way we describe it and saying, like, here are the seven stages of market that we find ourselves in based on what we sell. And these are the things that. These are the resources we should be deploying based on the things we need to be accomplishing to achieve or to graduate from that position in the market to, let's say, you know, how do we go from the discovery stage, the validation stage, and how do we get to mainstream adoption, right?
[10:34.8]
And then from mainstream adoption to really, what we're all really desperately trying to get to is sustainability. How do we get to a sustainable, profitable position in a market that we can then build a base foundation from and expand upon and create that reliability? And so it's just basically, it's like you hear all this advice out there, you hear all these different experts, and what I learned over the 15 years that I ran Alter Endeavors, that I ran my marketing agency was, is that we desperately need to take a flying leap back and up and go further left in the equation to really look at and say, like, hey, guys, like, you're not wrong when you're at that stage, but you're not, you're discounting or discrediting that.
[11:17.1]
There are actually probably three or four stages before what would. Before your expertise or your, you know, what you champion that they need to graduate from, that they need to get right in order for them to successfully navigate where, you know, you know, where you come into play, which is where a lot of VCs are, a lot of private equity groups and a lot of these guys that are, you know, that they're like, I've studied Coke and Apple and everybody else.
[11:42.5]
And you're like, uh-huh, and neat. How do I, how do I distill that backwards down to a smaller level? And so the thing, like, even, like this morning, I was, you know, I finished, Pattern Breakers today, and, and like, it's brilliant. I freaking love that book.
[11:58.6]
And it. But that is like. And he does an extraordinary job of codifying what I call basically, like, how do you actually establish or determine that this is the right idea to pursue and, like, what makes it uniquely better? Right? And then it's. And so, like, the thing is, is just that that's extraordinarily important.
[12:15.4]
I mean, at that, you know, in that very beginning stage. And so, anyway, so, like, I can go on and on, but you get the idea that that's really what it is. No, and I get it. And there's so much about, you know, within that, you know, from, from both of you about pushing founders to be proactive and not be reactive in the way that they market.
[12:36.3]
I think that impacts the growth curve. You know, Nick, as you were just, you know, speaking towards. And there's a lot of noise out there in the world. Right. Whether it's, you know, cohort based programs, it's growth accelerators, it's thinking maybe, oh, maybe I need a fractional Chief Growth Officer.
[12:52.8]
Right. That is confusing for founders. A thousand percent. I think the other thing is to like, especially in the spirit of this podcast and just kind of keep, you know, dial this in. Sure. Like ads. Ads are useful. They can be, they can be useful in the right, you know, in again, in the right circumstances, in at the right time.
[13:15.4]
And it's not to say that there aren't ad platforms out there that aren't, you know, that aren't doing their job, that, you know, there's people that aren't being successful at that. Right. And, and so I mean, but the reality is this, is that like, just because that's working for, you know, this group. Yeah.
[13:30.6]
Well, these guys over here, like, I mean Danny, and I, we come across all these different coaching people and these different coaching platforms and it's like, here's how you use ads. And it's kind of like. And the thing is this, is that like what they're touting, it's like, they're like. I'm like, yeah, you know what, that actually might be working for you in this particular scenario.
[13:49.1]
But then for everyone that, that is the case. It's like they're creating. It's more of a mimicry model rather than an established like this is like, you know, this is how we, you know, can prove out and say like, here's why this works.
[14:05.1]
Right. Rather than just saying, oh, this works for me. And it's like, can you, can you actually justify and can you logically, you know, tie back to this is why it works. Right. So it's not, it's not about, it's not about like a lack of ads.
[14:20.6]
It's mistaking ad spend for strategy almost. Right. Yeah. And you know, I think when ads really started getting big and there was a lot of people who made a lot of money in the 2000s when, right, from ads, and they just kind of hacked their way to it.
[14:37.6]
Right. And there is this view of ads that I think has been pervasive since then, that you can just kind of run ads and be a little hand wavy because they'll deal with your audience and they're going to help you with creative and they might even have some sort of score on your landing page or whatever it is.
[14:57.0]
Or we have a native form. And it's not that those are bad in and of themselves, but you're abdicating your role as a founder of understanding what you sell, understanding who you sell it to, and understanding the true value of your product. And what we're seeing now with this kind of like, rejiggering of everything that's going on in that world is actually really what it is, is, you're going back to the foundations, you're going back to, you know, what is truly compelling about your product.
[15:27.9]
And so in the ad space, if you can understand and be proactive about, hey, this is what I sell, this is my guarantee, and this is why the people buy it, why they care, then ads still can be useful, right?
[15:44.7]
And so I think, in some ways it's really good, right? We're going back to like true business, not just. I'm going to just hack my way to prosperity. Right? And, that's good, right? And that's what we need to do.
[16:00.0]
Because ultimately, what it created is it this idea of ads. And like, you know, I'll get some VC running and I'm going to start running ads. It like, it created this like false incentive structure that really didn't exist and you could get money for free, you know, 2019, 2020.
[16:17.1]
Yep. And from like a VC who's like, I'll throw you, you know, $4 million to go run ads. And it's like, hey, you have a B2B SaaS company, and why are you running ads when your entire world would be different if you only had five clients? And so instead of going to run ads and just hope that I lead gen 1,000 and then my funnel is really wide, right?
[16:38.4]
Like, then just go talk to people, have a conversation, and work them through methodically. And then when you are ready to go to market more broadly in that adoption stage, then you can do it. And I think just to pile on that. Yeah, yeah, no, go ahead. No, I'll say something real quick about it.
[16:54.7]
And then. Because then, we move on. But like one of the things that, like Daniel champions, or that, you know, one of the things that, that we've leveraged leverage really, really well is just that like using like, almost like ad micro dosing has been, you know, it can be a really useful way to quickly validate very cheaply that, you know, what we do have from a compelling narrative standpoint, that what we do have is actually functional.
[17:23.2]
Like, we one time, you know, we had a. This is from another company that I own. And we were doing a women's period health quiz, for example. And we've run a bunch of different assessments and quizzes and things like that across a broad spectrum of stuff.
[17:40.6]
This one in particular, like what we stumbled across, you know, ran only a few hundred bucks and got you know, several thousand responses in a, that were very, you know, with a lot of data and you know, a lot of desire for follow up action.
[17:55.7]
And it was like, oh, okay, so like, like there. I mean so that's, that's a way that like when we see this like, you know that's still true that you can, we can leverage tools like you can leverage this ad tools to kind of help rapidly iterate on what is compelling.
[18:11.5]
Right. So it's the combination of doing that at micro scale. Right. So you can validate. But then also we've got the impact, you know, we've seen the post-Covid rebound with conferences and personal networks being key there.
[18:27.7]
I think that's another piece of the puzzle in this thing, especially as we talk about AI even creeping up like you were talking about earlier, right? The personal connections are the secondary or primary validation for the business ideas.
[18:44.8]
You can build very solid, like multimillion-dollar businesses. I mean depends, sort of somewhat depends on what you sell, right. If you're selling a snack then that might be a little harder but maybe you can, right. You get the right distribution partners. But yeah, that was the other thing I was thinking about even as we were talking was you know, you know, this post-Covid boom of in person, and just this desire to be in community with one another in just a way that didn't quite exist before.
[19:13.1]
You know, I think we probably knew it in the back of our heads going into Covid. But then when you're you know, sitting at your house all day, and you know, doing whatever you're doing that like, you know, you actually realize you really desire that. And you know I, I don't think it's unique but I know here in Austin there is such a strong community of people who legitimately just want to get to know new people.
[19:35.2]
And it's really cool. And you know what we can. I found that there are very few places that I can't have some sort of access to in Austin just by knowing people. Right. And not being an asshole. And just like going to talk to people.
[19:50.5]
It works for him, it doesn't work for me. Flip side to the coin. Daniel, you said snack earlier. Now I want to snack. You better give me one after this. But yeah, I really do think, I mean, with a lot of the work that our clients, like we've done with our clients is actually building that community.
[20:12.0]
And especially as you continue to grow and you kind of have your core customers, it is important to eventually start, you know, owning and championing that community. And that really is sort of the backbone of everything you're doing from a revenue standpoint and a growth standpoint.
[20:28.8]
And you know, just think about it like if, if you have a really compelling, whatever it is offering service or product, what will really happen? If it is so compelling, and if you do a good job of reminding them why it's compelling, then you'll get a lot of referrals.
[20:48.7]
Then a lot of people are going to be like, oh, I know this person. Like, this person is great at this. And they'll just do the sales for you and you don't need to go spend money on the ads, and you know, and be next to some, you know, Temu, like knockoff soap or something like that.
[21:04.2]
Like, you know, they'll just do it for you. And that is so much more compelling. If you hear from a friend that this is really good, you need to be doing this, then great, right? Like that's, that is what we're going for. And how do we articulate that so they know that, and how do we remind them,' and just stay on them and be like, hey, like, remember this feeling that you had?
[21:26.2]
It's like the feeling of buying a new car or something like that. Like, I accomplished my goals. This is so cool. But the thing is that new car smell wears off and so you need to remind them, you need to give them a little spray and just keep them reminding that like you used to be in the dumps.
[21:41.4]
It used to be bad, right? But you're okay now. Right? And remember how good that felt. And Febreze does not turn a new car smell back on. Right? It changes. No, no, it does not. It, yes, people know. It kind of smells like sadness a little bit., actually.
[21:59.8]
One of many things in the world that smells like sadness. Well, you know, Daniel, Nick, incredible conversation here. From ads collapsing to new models for sustainable founder growth, you've given our listeners a blueprint for the post-ads era.
[22:18.1]
Where can folks find you and ThriveSide? Yeah, come to thriveside.com. And if you're founders, specifically kind of, we, we work on thriveside.com and also foundersbestfriend.com. So find us there.
[22:34.0]
Would love to have a chat and, you know, we, like, just love to get to know you and figure out, you know, if we can help or we can connect you to someone or anything like that. Cool. And then finally, guys, you know, for the founder, listening, frustrated that ads are draining cash with no return.
[22:49.8]
Just really quickly, in a few words, what's the one move they could make this week to fix that scenario? I mean, besides stopping spending money on ads? Is that like, that's the obvious answer? That's an acceptable answer.
[23:05.9]
Right. There's go buy a snack with the money you save. Right. I would just say go to foundersbestfriend.com and we'll fix that for you. Yeah. And stop spending. Right. There's truth in that. But I think that in all seriousness, one of the things that if you're a founder right now, and it goes back to what I said about rented, earned ,and owned, is that right now, desperately, is that if you are not in the discipline of starting to build out a list of whether it's through a CRM or heck, like, I just use a spreadsheet sometimes, right?
[23:43.3]
Being like, hey, here are five new conversations with people that are the right people for me to be talking to this week. And you're like, well, how do I find them? Stop sucking. Stop being lazy and go out and actually have conversations. Right. And the thing is, it's just that, like.
[23:59.3]
And by the way, AI, for the most part, just so everybody is aware, it's not going to solve that for you. It's just not. And yeah, I mean, there's tools out there that can be helpful. They can be useful, but it's got like. But, you need to figure out how, what it means to go back to community grinding a little bit.
[24:17.6]
Right, Right. If you're really struggling with that, if you're not sure how to dial it in, and how to get there, then it's like, okay, then you probably need to go back to doing more of the community grinding piece to figure out what that narrative is in order, you know, because those tools won't be useful until you get that dialed in.
[24:34.2]
Right. Fair point. Very good. All right, guys, well, you know, thanks for tuning into "Is Anything Real?" the show where we sift the signal from the noise and torch the mirages this industry still worships. I'm Adam W. Barney. Just one final thought here: Ads aren't dead, but easy growth is.
[24:50.8]
The winners are building businesses that don't need to bribe Google or Meta to survive. But Nick, Daniel, thank you for joining today. Thanks for having us. Thanks for having us