Performance marketing agency for accounts where every spend ties to CAC payback and incrementality.

Performance marketing is the practice of paid media managed to a business outcome. AI performance marketing is the same practice running on platform-AI surfaces where the platform's model handles audience selection, placement, asset rotation, and bidding inside bounds we set. Senior practitioners decide the bets and the bounds; platform AI executes within them.

The 2026 reality is that AI-augmented is becoming the default architecture across major platforms. Legacy hand-built campaign structures are migrating away. We treat that not as a binary but as a calibration question: where on the curve is each platform's AI, what manual override should stay on, and what brand-search exclusion stops the algorithm cannibalising channels you would have closed anyway.

Above the calibration threshold, AI scales faster than any manual structure. Below it, hand-built keeps control of conversion-event volume the AI needs to learn from.

• Meta Advantage+ Shopping: wins above ~$50,000 monthly spend plus fifty weekly purchase events.
• Google Performance Max: wins above ~30 weekly conversions per asset group, with brand search excluded.
• TikTok Smart+: wins above Event Match Quality 6.0 with stable purchase volume.
• LinkedIn Accelerate: wins once Conversions API is flowing qualified events and Predictive Audiences has a seed list.

The audit reads your platform-by-platform position on the curve and prescribes the architecture per platform.

Google announced AI Max for Search at Google Marketing Live 2024. It blends keyword targeting with AI-generated assets and broad-match expansion into a single Search campaign type. From September 2026, legacy Search campaign types begin force-migration; advertisers can no longer build new pre-AI-Max Search structures from scratch.

The pre-migration work:

• Review every current Search account against asset coverage
• Re-audit negative-keyword discipline so broad-match does not bleed
• Sequence the cutover with a measurement baseline before and after
• Run a holdout on at least one campaign for incrementality read

Migration done well lifts five to fifteen percent. Migration done badly costs twenty to thirty percent for one to two quarters.

Three triggers usually justify the cost of a senior outside read.

1. The platform stack has shifted under you. AI Max migration ahead of September 2026, Advantage+ Shopping defaults on Meta, Smart+ on TikTok, Microsoft Performance Max May 2026 transparency. A team running the 2024 playbook widens the gap every quarter.
2. Cost-per-acquisition drift of 20 to 40 percent over two quarters. Without a clear cause, the drift usually traces to a signal-quality gap: Conversions API not dual-tagged with Pixel, Event Match Quality below 6.0, server-side GTM stitching broken.
3. The board is asking for a causal read. If nobody has run Conversion Lift, Brand Lift, or a geo experiment, there is no evidence the spend is incremental.

The audit is the cheapest way to find out which one is actually breaking the account. Findings document yours regardless of next steps.

Three lenses, applied platform by platform.

• Intent depth: does the platform reach buyers at a stage where conversion is realistic? Search and high-intent retargeting score top; broad social discovery scores lower except where brand demand is structurally underbuilt.
• Signal quality: is the platform receiving clean Conversions API or offline-conversion events with EMQ above 6.0? If not, the calibration cannot work and budget is wasted.
• Calibration position: is your account above or below the AI-surface threshold? If below, hand-built; if above, the platform's AI will outperform manual structures.

The audit publishes a per-platform recommendation rather than a generic ranking. Every engagement is scoped to your data, industry, and market.

Three things working together.

1. Marketing Mix Modelling refreshed quarterly on twenty-four months of weekly spend and outcome data. MMM is the only honest cross-channel read; platform attribution is not.
2. Incrementality calibration via Conversion Lift, geo experiment, or matched-market hold-out, run quarterly per platform that has the volume.
3. Cross-platform reconciliation through MOS (our marketing operating system) or, where MOS has not yet shipped to your engagement, through a manual reconciliation built off your CRM source of truth.

The pattern: platform-reported ROAS is overstated by 30 to 50 percent against an incremental-lift study; MMM catches the cannibalisation; reconciliation lands the read inside the CFO's view of revenue closed.

Monthly: cost per outcome by channel, conversion-rate by stage, pipeline contribution to revenue closed, payback period on customer-acquisition cost.

Quarterly: incrementality testing where volume supports it (Conversion Lift on Meta and TikTok, geo experiment on Google, Conversion Lift on YouTube); marketing-mix-modelling refresh; competitive share-of-voice analysis.

We do not report on vanity metrics (raw impressions, raw clicks) without context. The report tells you whether the spend moved the metric you care about.

Three layers.

1. In-platform attribution: cost per outcome, conversion rate, return on ad spend. AI campaigns produce these natively.
2. Incrementality testing: Conversion Lift Studies on Meta and TikTok, geo experiments on Google, Brand Lift on YouTube. These reveal the causal lift AI campaigns produce over baseline.
3. Marketing-mix-modelling for cross-channel: AI campaigns concentrate spend on whatever surface the algorithm finds cheapest, often cannibalising the rest of the funnel. MMM catches that cannibalisation.

Without all three, AI-campaign performance is partially illusory.

Payback is gross margin divided by fully-loaded customer-acquisition cost, expressed in months. Fully-loaded includes media plus platform fees plus tooling plus the sales-team allocated cost for opportunities sourced from paid plus creative production.

For B2C: under 90 days payback on first-purchase margin is excellent, 90 to 180 days healthy.

For B2B with multi-year contracts: under 12 months payback on first-year revenue is excellent, 12 to 18 months healthy. Beyond 24 months requires lifetime-value expansion or margin improvement.

Quarterly cohort analysis (acquisition cost by month, revenue realised by month) is the format your CFO will recognise.

Per platform, with cadence tuned to volume.

• Meta Conversion Lift: every quarter on Advantage+ campaigns above the volume threshold. The lift number is the only honest ROAS you have.
• Google geo experiment: twice a year on Performance Max and AI Max. Use Designed Market Areas or postal-code groups as the test/control unit.
• YouTube Brand Lift: on any video campaign over a $50,000 spend threshold. Awareness, ad recall, consideration.
• TikTok Conversion Lift: on Spark Ads partnerships running at scale.
• Holdout matched-market test: annually on the overall paid programme to read the always-on baseline.

Three layers.

1. Business outcomes. Cost per qualified opportunity, contribution to pipeline closed in the period, payback period on customer-acquisition cost, return on ad spend net of platform fees. The board does not need impression count or click-through rate.

2. Attribution caveats stated up front. Platform-reported ROAS is typically overstated by 30 to 50 percent versus a true incremental-lift study. Cite the most recent Conversion Lift Study for the causal number.

3. The bets. What we tested this quarter, what worked, what we are killing, what we are scaling. The pattern that wins board confidence is naming what you got wrong alongside what you got right.

Performance marketing earns the next dollar when the funnel has clear intent capture (search, retargeting, qualified prospect lists) and conversion measurement is clean.

Brand earns the next dollar when reach, recall, and consideration are underbuilt (Brand Lift Studies show the gap) or when category awareness is structurally low.

Other channels (PR, content, partnerships) earn the next dollar when lifetime-value expansion or new-market entry is the strategic priority.

The audit reads your funnel and tells you which lever has the highest marginal return.

Above the calibration threshold for the platform's AI, the next dollar goes to AI-augmented. It executes faster, scales better, and the platform's signal access beats any third-party data we can bolt on.

Below the threshold, the next dollar goes to hand-built. Manual control is the only way to feed the conversion-event volume the AI needs to learn from. Most accounts have a mix: AI-augmented on Meta and Google, hand-built on LinkedIn or Microsoft, depending on the calibration position.

Six things need to land 90 days before launch.

1. Conversion tracking dual-tagged across browser-side Pixel and server-side Conversions API on every relevant platform, with Event Match Quality at or above 7.0.
2. Compliance review of every ad asset against the regulator frame (in Singapore: MAS FAA-N03, on-screen disclosure burnt into the video, creator authorisation log per Spark Ads partnership).
3. Aggregated Event Measurement (Meta) and SKAdNetwork (iOS) events ranked correctly.
4. Catalog feed quality for Dynamic Product Ads or Advantage+ Shopping.
5. Lead-quality feedback loop from CRM back to platforms via offline conversions.
6. Cross-platform attribution model with the chosen north-star metric.

Most launches skip three of these six and pay for it for two quarters.

Six things 90 days before launch.

1. Conversion tracking dual-tagged server-side plus browser on every platform, with Event Match Quality 7.0 or higher.
2. Catalog feed clean for any Advantage+ Shopping or Performance Max retail variant.
3. Predictive Audiences seeded on LinkedIn once Conversions API has enough events.
4. AI Max for Search migration plan if launching with Google Ads, given the September 2026 force-migration.
5. Symphony Creative Studio set up on TikTok for the 48-hour testing loop.
6. Conversion Lift Study baseline scheduled for Q+1 once volume supports it.

AI campaigns calibrate over 14 to 30 days. Lead time matters.

Three-phase cutover.

1. Phase 1, two weeks pre-migration: baseline measurement (Conversion Lift Study or geo experiment), asset library audit, negative-keyword pruning, brand-exclusion list locked.
2. Phase 2, cutover week: AI Max campaigns launched in parallel with legacy Search at 20 percent budget split. Daily monitoring of broad-match expansion against the prune list.
3. Phase 3, four weeks post-migration: budget split rebalanced based on cost-per-conversion comparison and incrementality read. Legacy structures retired in week four if AI Max holds.

This pattern is the one that lifts five to fifteen percent rather than the one that drops twenty.

Three patterns.

• Audit-only: we read the programme end to end, write findings, you or your incumbent execute.
• Embedded strategist: we provide senior strategic and technical direction while your team or agency runs day-to-day.
• Takeover: we assume full management responsibility with a structured handover from the incumbent.

We do not bid against incumbent agencies in pitches or take accounts mid-contract.

Senior practitioners decide:

1. Which campaign type per platform
2. Audience signals and exclusion lists
3. Creative asset library plus Symphony and Avatar variants for fast testing
4. Bidding strategy and conversion-value targets
5. Compliance pipeline (especially for regulated-sector clients under MAS FAA-N03)
6. Manual override of AI on hostile placements and brand-safety-sensitive moments

Platform AI executes: bidding, ad-set allocation, asset rotation, frequency, placement.

The senior practitioner reviews weekly and intervenes when AI optimises against business outcomes rather than for them. The most common intervention is turning off Advantage+ placements on Audience Network where conversion quality is poor and excluding brand search from Performance Max.

A senior practitioner is named on every engagement. For most accounts that means one of the four leadership team members below sits inside the account from the first conversation:

• Siddharth Surana, Founder and CEO, 18+ years. Ex-Regional CDO Havas, ex-COO Media360, Programmatic Pioneer APAC 2011.
• Sundeep Surana, Managing Director, 16+ years.
• Ratnakar Nemani, Operations Director, 11+ years, Google Ads Certified.
• Nitesh Sanghvi, Search and Social Director, 11+ years, Google Ads & Google Analytics certified.

50+ combined years across the leadership. No account-manager handoff after the pitch.

MOS is our in-build Marketing Operating System: a unified intelligence layer that reads spend, outcomes, incrementality, and compliance fields across every platform. We use it internally to run engagements; we ship it to anchor clients as part of the engagement scope where it is ready.

Currently deployed first with Travel Guard Singapore. Broader engagement access rolls out as the platform hardens. Where MOS is not yet live for your engagement, the reporting still happens, manually built off your CRM source of truth, until MOS takes over the read.

Data stays yours, always. No vendor lock-in. The principle behind MOS is that no platform vendor will tell you the honest cross-platform story; we built the thing that does.

Three structural differences.

1. Compliance pipeline first. Every ad asset clears MAS FAA-N03 review before scheduling: burnt-in disclosure on video, creator authorisation log on Spark Ads partnerships, no implied returns or guarantees in copy.
2. Special Ad Category routing on Meta. Lookalike audiences disabled, age and geography targeting restricted, creative reviewed against Financial Products policy.
3. Auditable workflow. All approvals logged so the compliance team can reconstruct the path from brief to publish for any asset that runs.

The engagement scope adds review time but does not change the channel mix. MAS, FCA, OSFI, ASIC, and OCC accounts have run on this pattern across the team's history.

The five anchor markets are run on a single account architecture with market-specific overlays.

• Singapore + Malaysia (en-SG, en-MY): shared creative pool, separate budget and bidding by market, MAS / PDP Commissioner Malaysia compliance pipelines.
• Australia (en-AU): ASIC RG 234 review on financial-services copy, ACMA-aware media buys.
• United States (en-US): FTC dot-com disclosures, state-specific compliance where relevant, SKAdNetwork tuning for iOS-heavy traffic.
• Canada (en-CA, fr-CA): OSFI Guideline B-13 for financial accounts, Quebec Law 25 consent management, French-language creative variants.

Global engagements outside the anchor five are taken where the work fits. Geography is signal, not gate.

Every engagement is scoped to the data, industry, and market. Pricing is banded by engagement type (diagnostic audit, build sprint, managed subscription, embedded retainer) rather than tied to a percentage of media spend. We do not mark up tool subscriptions or platform media spend.

International engagements are billed in the equivalent currency on every invoice. Tools, reporting, and quarterly incrementality testing are included. Talk to us about the specific challenge and we will come back with a scoped proposal.

Yes, on a structured-handover pattern. Three phases.

1. Discovery and audit (weeks 1 to 3): we read the existing account end to end, document the structure, identify the lift opportunities and the risks.
2. Handover (weeks 3 to 5): account access, asset library, tracking setup, creative pipeline, reporting handoff. We work with the outgoing agency on a professional handover where possible.
3. First sprint (weeks 5 to 12): highest-priority fixes shipped, measurement baseline locked, first incrementality test scheduled.

We do not steal accounts mid-contract. Where the current contract has not ended, we wait or run audit-only.

Look for three signals.

• Regulated-sector operating experience plus MAS FAA-N03 fluency.
• Technical depth on the 2026 measurement stack (Conversions API, server-side GTM, Enhanced Conversions, Consent Mode v2, Event Match Quality tuning, AI Max migration planning).
• Senior practitioner involvement on the account, not an account manager funnel.

Our leadership team brings 50+ combined years: Siddharth Surana (Founder/CEO, 18+ yrs, ex-Regional CDO Havas), Sundeep Surana (MD, 16+ yrs), Ratnakar Nemani (Ops Director, 11+ yrs, Google Ads Certified), Nitesh Sanghvi (Search and Social Director, 12+ yrs, Google Ads & Google Analytics certified).

Travel Guard Singapore is our named live client. Engagements across the five anchor markets and global engagements where the work fits.