I'm Raghav Mehra.

On the sell side, I worked inside the plumbing: publisher monetization, header bidding, OpenRTB, supply path optimization, fraud, inventory quality, and ad tech infrastructure. On the buy side, I have run performance and programmatic campaigns across brands, marketplaces, and growth teams.

That double view is why this site exists. Most marketers only ever see the dashboard. I have seen what sits behind it, and I have bought ads through it.

Why I write this

I kept noticing the same thing: smart marketers operating tools they did not fully understand, getting faster while quietly feeling more replaceable. I wanted a place to think this through in public, share what I see from both sides of the screen, and help other marketers feel less exposed in a world where the visible work is being automated.

I am, by temperament, a systems person. I like taking something that looks like noise and finding the structure underneath it. I read widely, build small things to test ideas, and care more about whether something is true and useful than whether it sounds impressive.

What I believe about marketing now

Marketing is not just making ads anymore. A few systems decide whether anything works:

• Platforms decide what gets distributed.
• Psychology decides what people notice, trust, remember, and buy.
• Ad tech decides how media gets bought, sold, measured, and wasted.
• AI changes how fast a marketer can research, make, test, analyze, and build.
• Strategy decides whether any of it produces real business value.

So this is where I write about ads, platforms, psychology, ad tech, AI workflows, and the small experiments that help marketers understand how modern marketing really works. The goal is simple, and I mean it: to help you get sharper as the rest gets automated.

An invitation

The best way to follow along is the newsletter below, one practical note at a time. And if something here made you think, I would genuinely like to hear from you. Say hello.