Episode 759: Why Meta is The Best Ad Platform on The Planet in 2026 Part 1

December 19, 2025

Meta’s global reach and heavy AI investments give it an undeniable edge over other digital marketing platforms. In today’s episode, we are exploring how Meta’s ongoing innovations will reshape advertising in 2026 and what this means for your business or agency.

Lauren shares her firsthand experience testifying at a House subcommittee about how Meta’s AI tools are helping small businesses scale. We unpack why Meta’s capabilities (like Andromeda) are game-changers for businesses that overcome AI fears and leverage Meta’s creative diversification.

Plus, we look at real-world examples of how AI is amplifying business growth, and how Meta’s ecosystem can supercharge marketing strategies in ways other platforms simply can’t match. Join the conversation now if you want to stay ahead of the curve in 2026.

In this episode:

03:45 Lauren’s AI testimony at a House subcommittee

09:46 Fear of AI replacing jobs vs. AI as a growth opportunity

23:27 The rising need for human interactions

30:28 Meta’s global influence on internet users

36:52 Why Meta is the best ad platform

41:10 Meta’s investment in AI and its implications for 2026

43:17 Statistics on Meta’s usage and revenue growth

Thanks so much for joining us this week. Want to subscribe to Perpetual Traffic?

Have some feedback you’d like to share? Connect with us on iTunes and leave us a review!

READ THE TRANSCRIPT:

Why Meta is The Best Ad Platform on The Planet in 2026 Part 1

00:00:00:00 – 00:00:07:06
Ralph
73.7% of people on the planet who have internet access use matter on a monthly

00:00:07:06 – 00:00:08:01
Ralph
basis.

00:00:08:06 – 00:00:12:02
Lauren
What do you think about it? Like the Roman Empire? Like Zuckerberg is the

00:00:12:02 – 00:00:15:12
Lauren
Julius Caesar. Today’s day and age.

00:00:15:14 – 00:00:37:14
Ralph
If you want to get to your client or customer or grow a business, meet is the place to do it, because that’s where the eyeballs are. A couple of different friends of mine, non-tech industry, and they express their deep concern about their jobs in legal in architecture and building are all going to be I out? And I’m like, no, there’s one thing that’s counterintuitive to all of this is.

00:00:40:11 – 00:00:52:03
Ralph
Hello, and welcome to the Perpetual Traffic Podcast. This is your host, Ralph Burns, founder and CEO of tier 11. Alongside my amazing state capital hopping co-host.

00:00:52:05 – 00:01:04:13
Lauren
Lauren Petrillo, founder of Mongoose Media. I wouldn’t stay, I’ll be awake thinking I’m in heels like hopping like a rabbit. Between the old Capitol building and the new Capitol building.

00:01:04:15 – 00:01:36:20
Ralph
Just hopping from Capitol Building to Capitol Building. Well, is suffice to say, you probably want an answer as to why I’m actually saying that. If you’re listening to this show, which you probably are, because here we are. What exactly have you been doing aside from getting a lot of dental work done this week? And we are going to leave a link in the show notes to the the perpetual traffic episode that could have been when you like basically you’ve got like some kind of dental daddy cavity.

00:01:36:20 – 00:01:40:15
Lauren
Okay, let’s be real. I’m not a very good philosopher. I’m sorry.

00:01:40:17 – 00:01:43:22
Ralph
Scooby, real kind of floss. Gotta floss every day.

00:01:44:00 – 00:02:05:21
Lauren
They actually said it’s because I. Apparently I don’t grind in my sleep, but I compress in my sleeves, so my upper teeth made divots in my lowers. And so there’s just like embankments of bacteria. Like I made their own extra house because a wax compress. So anyways. Yeah, whatever. Now I’m going to get a night garden super bath.

00:02:06:02 – 00:02:06:17
Lauren
Well, that’s.

00:02:06:17 – 00:02:31:02
Ralph
Great content right here. Thanks. Thanks. Or leave it a link of the show notes. Guys, just because it’s so funny, we couldn’t record because I couldn’t understand what Lauren was saying. Like a mouth full of. It’s actually lidocaine. Everyone say it says it’s no, it can I use two cylinders drugs, believe it or not. So anyway, whatever point is, is like, you sound like a Rhode Island New York, Boston mash up.

00:02:31:02 – 00:02:42:04
Ralph
And I couldn’t understand, like, every, like, third or fourth word. We’re going to leave a link in the show notes on that on Lauren’s. Definitely check out Lauren’s Instagram. Anyway, just just finished the.

00:02:42:04 – 00:02:51:06
Lauren
Video where I recorded it being like, there’s proof I’m memorializing what I sound like, and I like watch it. Yesterday I was like, oh my gosh.

00:02:51:08 – 00:03:14:14
Ralph
What what what is going on here? That’s the crate. That’s the funniest thing. I was laughing my ass off anyway, so you are in the state capitol right now? Yes, in Tallahassee. But first off, you know, aside from my wife, who knows every state capitol, I don’t I think probably the majority of listeners are like, yeah, state capitol, Florida’s Miami, unless you actually live in Florida.

00:03:14:16 – 00:03:34:06
Ralph
The point is, is you’re there and you’re there for a very interesting reason, which relates directly to all the stuff we’re going to be talking about on today’s show, which if you’ve already seen the title of today’s show, we’re going to go back in time and tell you exactly why Metta is the best ad platform on the planet for 2026.

00:03:34:06 – 00:03:52:15
Ralph
But a lot of it has to do with AI and a lot of their investment in artificial intelligence. Llama platform, obviously the algorithm, all of that. And you were testifying yesterday, in front of what, a House subcommittee tell us exactly.

00:03:52:17 – 00:04:17:19
Lauren
Yeah. I was super grateful I got an invitation to join the subcommittee. There’s a panel on professional and businesses of AI. It was led by, Chair, Mike Salvador. And then, there was my representative from Orlando that was there. So it was the subcommittee. They had several other things before, but I was last and longest, and it was myself.

00:04:17:21 – 00:04:23:04
Lauren
There was, representatives with executives from Microsoft, from OpenAI, ex bailed.

00:04:23:05 – 00:04:23:16
Ralph
Really?

00:04:23:18 – 00:04:45:14
Lauren
Whatever. Yeah. So, they were there were something that was supposed to be there. There had a policy like we had the head of solutions of AI for open AI leadership at the others. And then, Matt, because of how much I use meta AI specifically and my personal usage of it invited me there to speak on this panel.

00:04:45:14 – 00:05:15:02
Lauren
And I was amazing because while the other two zoomed in, they zoomed in like I drove up from Orlando. The other guys just joined in, it was a lot of fun. I had a very different way. I shared how I use AI and the opportunities behind AI, like not to the other gentlemen’s like detriment or anything, but they were very policy forward in their speak, like they were talking about alarms and where data lives.

00:05:15:02 – 00:05:46:23
Lauren
And it was something that I can keep up with, but I couldn’t imagine that the rest of the representatives necessarily could not the world that they live in. And so I thought I had done a good job of, bringing actual use cases of how we use AI, generative AI specifically using in sales and marketing the opportunities of leveraging AI to augment and employees better output versus just like replacing people that we’ve never hired more people since I, we we hire more or we hire more local.

00:05:47:01 – 00:06:10:18
Lauren
And so I was sharing that side of the story because they’re, they’re going to be making committees across the US and nationally that’s going to govern AI. And before they make that type of a legislative override. And while we’re still in this development stage, our elected leaders are trying to get a grasp on it. Well, that’s not necessarily the tool.

00:06:10:18 – 00:06:37:11
Lauren
The so and so that’s what I get to talk about how easy AI how has really helped and empowered my business. And that I could advocate for small businesses of, when they’re making these policies to know how we’re actually using it. And, I fell, I legit fell. I was on the podium and it slipped. And so I stayed in character and I was really grateful six representatives had come up to me afterwards saying that they appreciated my liveliness.

00:06:37:11 – 00:06:59:01
Lauren
Despite that, like, not only did I fall during this, like hour long panel or whatever, I also started crying like the very first moment when I had two minutes to introduce myself. I was bawling. It was not necessarily the best intro, but the bill that was passed right before me that was like unanimously approved was about, accessibility.

00:06:59:06 – 00:07:15:21
Lauren
Well, I mean, I choked up again, and just allowing Floridians a chance to, find solutions to accommodate their wheelchairs or excuse. And my dad was handicapped. He was six, eight and a half, so he couldn’t fit in his wheelchair. And he was a VA. So we had to wait two years before he could get his next ECV before it would have been approved.

00:07:15:23 – 00:07:34:10
Lauren
So he didn’t travel with us the last four years of his life because we were waiting for his next wheelchair, because we weren’t allowed to modify his. So they had passes unanimous and came up. I was like, I’m sorry guys, let’s Bleep. Like you got to see was so good. What. Oh do it was embarrassing. But whatever I guess that’s what I did.

00:07:34:10 – 00:07:42:07
Lauren
It was like a very great session talking about AI, talking about meta AI and how helpful it’s been for me and the small businesses I represent.

00:07:42:07 – 00:07:46:13
Ralph
And so that was really it’s a year. Like, how long did you speak for? How long was your.

00:07:46:14 – 00:08:11:00
Lauren
Oh, it was like it was great. It was a dialog. There were questions back and forth. There’s a lot more like, proper etiquette CS that maybe I wasn’t aware of or prepared for, like. Thank you, chair. Thank you, Representative Hinson. That was a wonderful question. Thank you, chair, for recognizing me. Like, there are those type of moments that the other gentlemen on zoom were doing.

00:08:11:00 – 00:08:25:05
Lauren
And then it was very politic. Meanwhile, they were like, okay, the floor is yours to myself. And then the panel. So I was like, I’m gonna go first. I got five brothers let me in. And I had to be I had to wait till I was recognized to speak.

00:08:25:07 – 00:08:28:14
Ralph
Oh, right. Yeah. Protocols. Right?

00:08:28:19 – 00:08:32:04
Lauren
Yeah. Protocols.

00:08:32:05 – 00:08:35:17
Ralph
Whatever you’re probably not so good at protocols.

00:08:35:18 – 00:09:02:17
Lauren
That’s like one of the representatives told me I should run for office one day. She did say when I’m older. But they said I was the most lively, speaker they had. They said, thank you so much for your testimony. Thank you so much for your presentation. And it was very grandstanding. But it was full of my personality from crying out the gate and then, like, all these, like, movements around and falling, I felt like Jennifer Lawrence.

00:09:02:17 – 00:09:07:04
Lauren
But in politics.

00:09:07:06 – 00:09:11:06
Ralph
I think it’s just that the the falling. You didn’t hurt yourself on the phone?

00:09:11:06 – 00:09:16:02
Lauren
No, not at all. But they were like, oh, none of us knew that platform moved.

00:09:16:04 – 00:09:30:23
Ralph
Yeah. Oh right. Right. Oh of course. Yeah. Well they probably don’t like move around a whole lot. You’re I would imagine you’re gesticulating and you’re doing your Lauren Petrillo thing. And like most people just sort of stand there right at the podium and, you know, deliver with hand gestures. Yeah.

00:09:31:01 – 00:09:35:04
Lauren
I look like the blow up thing in front of a used car lot.

00:09:35:06 – 00:10:02:09
Ralph
Right? So yeah. Everywhere. No, I know you’re constantly like, you know, you know, knock and your, your microphone and shows like this. So the bottom line is, is like you were there for a while to understand from the small business perspective, the power of AI, the threat of AI, like what was what was sort of your your summary of it, your takeaway for those who are listening.

00:10:02:11 – 00:10:26:05
Lauren
I think my takeaway be is that are the representatives are afraid or afraid of job loss, employee replacement. They’re afraid of the expenses and acquired to small businesses to adopt AI. The lack of, learning and education on the matter. And then there was definitely one representative who was, very adamant on Brown A’s influence on minors.

00:10:26:07 – 00:10:43:09
Lauren
And so I was glad for, like, the different things, because when one representative said, like, hey, I don’t is this going to replace jobs? Are we going to harm our economy by having small businesses and medium to large businesses adopt? Yeah, I was like, I’ve never hired more because of AI, better output because of AI. I can empower and connect.

00:10:43:11 – 00:11:05:16
Lauren
And I talked about how like AI is this like great equalizer in the sense that I, I volunteer at juvenile detention centers and I teach incarcerated youth how to become people after being prisoners. And like that, the records, not the resume. And a lot of these very talented young adults who maybe were great at sales, but selling something illegal have incredibly transferable skills.

00:11:05:16 – 00:11:32:23
Lauren
And how AI allows them to compete against MIT graduates and other students that maybe didn’t graduate out of a JDC because they have an attitude for hustling and an aptitude for technology. And we were able to talk about how there is an opportunity for ex-cons to use AI. And I gave an exact example that I’ve done with some of the stuff I’m doing for my nonprofit, where I talk to ex-convicts and I say, great, let’s let’s have a dialog with AI.

00:11:33:05 – 00:11:50:11
Lauren
I talk to them into AI or talk to judges to find a job that you’re interested in. Upload the job description. Now have a conversation with. Chat back and forth for 30 minutes so that you can, at the end of the session, build a resume that the job where you submit your application to will see you as a person and not as a prisoner.

00:11:50:13 – 00:12:12:00
Lauren
And for that, they were like, this isn’t how we thought about using AI. They’re only using it to like get recipes or plan vacations. So exchanging how I actually use it against their fear of this is going to hurt the American people. This is going to hurt our job force is going to hurt our kids. Was an opinion that hadn’t been well-represented previously.

00:12:12:02 – 00:12:33:22
Ralph
I think one of the things that people are so worried about, and this has not come up and we haven’t talked about this in quite some time, is the job loss factor or the fear factor when it comes to AI? We’ve really been just sort of talking about how great it is, how great it is for obviously the meta algorithm, which we’re going to be talking about here today, but also just AI in general, and how it’s a force multiplier for your best people.

00:12:34:00 – 00:12:55:06
Ralph
The adoption of that is still, in my opinion, lagging like we still have the people that are sort of the early adopters really doing a lot with it. And then there is sort of a drop off, I’m seeing that, you know, within not only just my company to a certain degree. Like, that’s just the normal course of how any new technology is adopted.

00:12:55:06 – 00:13:08:18
Ralph
You’re always going to have the, you know, the people that are going to be on the leading edge and they’re going to have the ones that kind of come after that, and then you’re going to have the skeptics, and then you’re going to have the ones that are just never going to do it. So and I think that has played itself out to a certain degree.

00:13:08:23 – 00:13:30:11
Ralph
I think our space and digital marketing has adopted it probably quicker than maybe a lot of industries that are less tech heavy. I mean, obviously you’ve got the tech sector, for example. But, you know, if you look at like meta, you look at Amazon, you look at layoffs and then hiring. You’ve got layoffs that have actually happened this year for sure.

00:13:30:13 – 00:13:56:17
Ralph
So meta laid off 3600 people in January of this past year, but they’re also hiring 2000 people right now. Amazon laid off 14,000 people back a few months ago, but now they’re hiring another 3000. So I think there’s a shuffling of the deck here that goes along with AI. Is all that related to AI? You know, some of it is, of course, like it’s hard to really say.

00:13:56:19 – 00:14:33:05
Ralph
But I know this is like we have the same staff number today that we did probably about a year ago, and we’re better leveraged for future growth. We have shuffled the deck quite a bit. We have changed people out that are not adopting the new technologies, that are resisting the way that things are going to be, and to sort of, you know, bring you back to the days of, oh, I remember when we used to be able to charge $25,000 for a sales page, you know, now we get a, a 5% tail on that into perpetuity.

00:14:33:05 – 00:14:51:03
Ralph
Well, those days are over. Like, I’m using an extreme example here because obviously something like that is completely replaced by God knows how many different tools that create landing pages, sales pages. Now, I’m one of my favorites right now is lovable, by the way. But anyway, the point is this is that all of this is moving forward no matter what.

00:14:51:05 – 00:15:12:02
Ralph
Yeah, I had a conversation with a couple of different friends of mine, non-tech industry, this past weekend, and they expressed their deep concern about all of this, meaning that their jobs in legal, in architecture and building are all going to be I out. And I’m like, no, it actually you still need human in the middle of it.

00:15:12:04 – 00:15:12:18
Lauren
Yeah, I’m in.

00:15:12:18 – 00:15:36:02
Ralph
In the loo. But yeah, my my architect friend was complaining about I am so backed up right now I’m like, I’m so I’m like, that’s great. How is AI helping you become more productive? Oh I haven’t used any of the tools. So if he use some of the AI tools and yes, he does do a lot of things that are sort of leading edge in the past in the architecture space, I’m like, you need to look at this in a different way.

00:15:36:04 – 00:16:08:09
Ralph
You need to be able to adopt it to make yourself more productive and find tools that enable you to be not only more creative, but but produce better work and that was sort of the big breakthrough I like. I don’t know if I necessarily got through to him, right. With my lawyer friend, I was like, yeah, I’m definitely outsourcing some of our contract work to AI and Gemini and ChatGPT when I needed to put together an addendum, and then I might run it by our lawyer, but I don’t incur the $600 an hour fees anymore that I used to.

00:16:08:09 – 00:16:27:02
Lauren
So there’s cost in discovery. Yeah. To leverage that $600 to invest back into your business. So it’s it’s I think the reshuffling is the best example. I told them that like there’s definitely going to be jobs that will go away without without a doubt because the same as we do not have telephone switchboard operators anymore. Like there is positions that will absolutely go away.

00:16:27:08 – 00:16:48:17
Lauren
But you know, we do have instead of telephone operators, we have hundreds and hundreds of stores across the state of Florida that sell cell phones. We have salespeople, we have door to door salesmen. It’s just it’s a reshuffling of what those jobs are. And, there’s tasks and skills that I can help you with, where it can help you have better output.

00:16:48:17 – 00:17:11:11
Lauren
I like how you would express that really well. And so I think it’s a there’s a lot of fear around it. And there’s stuff that’s definitely going to replace and go away. But like even like today’s topic, it’s just like technology evolves. It’s robotics with AI that’s going to facilitate greater examples. They were concerned about, like the non-tech, like the more manual jobs.

00:17:11:11 – 00:17:12:08
Lauren
And I had talked about how

00:17:12:08 – 00:17:21:16
Lauren
there’s this one plumber that we consulted with where they’re able to use AI, like the meta glasses, for example, where they can have a junior apprentice on site. The older gentleman is too.

00:17:22:16 – 00:17:43:08
Lauren
Arthritis prone to get under the sinks anymore. So he’s a younger apprentice. And then with AI and with glasses, the younger apprentice is now supervised by the experience individual. So the younger one can get in, understand what are the different pieces, and have conversations back and forth. So instead of the cost of one plumber being there, you’re actually getting two.

00:17:43:10 – 00:18:09:21
Lauren
Because innate AI has now enabled you to double the workforce, but then you’re also able to be more efficient because that gentleman who’s overseeing it can check in with 2 or 3 of a supervisor overseeing 2 or 3 jobs at the same time. So that small business owner is expanding his ability to work. And if you think about it like from a VA perspective, or for an elderly, like an aged home, because that’s like half of Florida, right?

00:18:09:23 – 00:18:29:01
Lauren
You have such long queues before an Hvac person can get to you, before a plumber can get to you, and now you’re able to just help a lot more. I think of your architecture friend like you’re able to support more growth. All the people that he’s backlogged with are preventing from contributing to the economy because they can’t get their renderings done, they can’t build their stuff.

00:18:29:04 – 00:18:32:23
Lauren
So AI is excellent amplifier of growth.

00:18:32:23 – 00:18:53:19
Ralph
Excellent point. Yeah. And like he hasn’t used any AI tools at all. He hasn’t even used ChatGPT at all for any of this or created a GPT for architecture. Now my point was this is obviously we’re going to get out of the show here. But the point is, is you have to be able to be open to it and understand it’s not a threat, it’s actually an opportunity.

00:18:53:19 – 00:19:04:05
Ralph
I think he said it great, especially in that now, like I’d never thought about that niche in the plumbing niche like Meta’s AI glasses, which by the way, are.

00:19:04:07 – 00:19:08:13
Lauren
Oh, I got them. So I guess I’m high level right now right here. Oh, let me go.

00:19:08:16 – 00:19:19:03
Ralph
So cool. I got to try them out in a conference about six months ago. And I thought they were they were a little bit clunky then, but now I’ve not seen them as of yet, but they look amazing.

00:19:19:04 – 00:19:23:19
Lauren
So shout out to my level because they gave them to me after speaking at the event in Dallas.

00:19:23:21 – 00:19:26:11
Ralph
That’s fantastic. Yeah, there you go.

00:19:26:13 – 00:19:31:09
Lauren
Looking good. And so like here I can like take a picture and you can see that there’s a flash or you see.

00:19:31:09 – 00:19:31:17
Ralph
No.

00:19:31:21 – 00:19:54:21
Lauren
Well there you can see that it’s recording with the light flashing. Yeah. So now I get a minute of recording whatever I want or the same as I can say, like, hey, yeah, hey, I was in front of me. Hey, Metta, what’s in front of me at work? Okay, now you can’t hear her, but she’s explaining to me what’s on the screen in front of me now because I can’t see reading from my prescription lens into it.

00:19:54:23 – 00:19:57:08
Lauren
I’ll switch back to my glasses.

00:19:57:10 – 00:20:16:20
Ralph
So I that continuation on the plumber thing. So I had a plumber at our house. We had this of this pedestal sink that we wanted to change out. We got the wrong size cabinet sink. And so the thing didn’t like line up. And so they for like two hours like tried to figure out like how to actually do this and how to figure it out.

00:20:16:22 – 00:20:35:18
Ralph
And what’s worse yet is that the, the, the, the new faucet that Jen wanted was like made in Germany. So it didn’t like match anything that they had, you know, in the truck. And so it took them another two days to figure this out. If they had meta glasses, I guarantee you they would have been able to say, what is this?

00:20:35:19 – 00:20:51:02
Ralph
How can I order it and where can I order it, like the attachment for the sink, like and then the problem that they have with the pedestal going to the cabinet sink, how can I actually get around this? Is there a better solution? And there was two of them. There was the guy that was working. And then there was my.

00:20:51:02 – 00:21:09:00
Ralph
My buddy has been doing this for years and years, and he doesn’t really do much of the work anymore. But he’s like the sensei when it comes to like heating and cooling and plumbing and so his apprentice could have used the meta glasses to at least give ideas to him, and then he would then say, oh, I don’t know if that would necessarily work.

00:21:09:02 – 00:21:09:06
Ralph
Great.

00:21:09:08 – 00:21:10:03
Lauren
Yeah.

00:21:10:05 – 00:21:30:11
Ralph
Yeah. What matters class is you’re using meta SLM. So there might be a creative solution that he’s never talked to or that isn’t in the public domain, that he might know that the meta llamar, you know, Lem, which is basically powering everything for meta right now, like behind the scenes, not necessarily the algorithm. Now we’re going to be talking about.

00:21:30:12 – 00:21:47:18
Ralph
The point is, is that like, that’s a whole other thing. And like, they could have taken a three day job and compressed it into maybe a day or come back with the right attachment and gotten it from, you know, I don’t even know how they fix the damn thing. I think they just sort of jury rigged it. And so far it’s not leaking, which is good.

00:21:47:20 – 00:21:50:14
Ralph
The point is, it’s like I couldn’t help there.

00:21:50:16 – 00:22:14:06
Lauren
Absolutely. And then they could have had more jobs. You wouldn’t have had to spent as much and paid for their lack of discovery. They could have, used that time to invest in marketing for their business, to attend a trade show, to upgrade their license. Sure. Like it’s just allowing you to be more efficient. So as you said, you kept the same headcount, but you amplified your ability to grow.

00:22:14:08 – 00:22:39:00
Lauren
You are more prepped to take on more than you were a year ago with the same staff. But what I know you’re doing is instead, I mean, you are taking in more always, but you’re also making better from existing. So your output the same as like so many other marketing agencies and advertisers. Which is why I say like the media buyers role that is going away, like the telephone switch operator, it’s not the same role anymore.

00:22:39:00 – 00:22:57:18
Lauren
You’re a strategist, you’re providing more value. Like I had given an example of how they had, like just before me, a 450 page bill that they were examining. So that’s a lot. And like I’m in the middle of reading, you know, the what is it, the, Wheel of Time series. So have the first book, I don’t remember chapter two, because I’m like 800 pages in.

00:22:57:20 – 00:23:18:03
Lauren
And so for someone to have to go through it, you can leverage an on and say, hey, here’s all this source material, knowing what you know about me and my policies, knowing what’s important to my constituents. Please identify the seven things that I need to look at first in this bill to make sure I can form an opinion on whether or not this is written for my representatives.

00:23:18:05 – 00:23:25:04
Ralph
Super. That’s a great use for free. I right there also note taker. Oh yeah. Oh, was it even better?

00:23:25:04 – 00:23:25:16
Lauren
Yeah, I thought.

00:23:25:21 – 00:23:26:06
Ralph
I would.

00:23:26:06 – 00:23:26:14
Lauren
Be like.

00:23:26:14 – 00:23:50:09
Ralph
Oh, there’s one thing that’s counterintuitive to all of this. And I’ll, I’ll end on this. Before we get into our meta part to today’s show is because this is obviously this is something that you and I are super passionate about is because everything’s gone. I and everything’s gone virtual ever since the pandemic, people are craving more human contact.

00:23:50:11 – 00:23:51:05
Lauren
Absolutely.

00:23:51:05 – 00:24:13:19
Ralph
In-person events. You’re a great example of this. Like you have spent a tremendous amount of time on the road doing in-person stuff. It’s like old school. That can never be I out, I’m sorry, face to face contact, interaction with other humans in a physical space. There is there is no replacement for it. And I have a great client.

00:24:13:19 – 00:24:35:14
Ralph
We did actually a case study on this, a couple shows back, which I’ll, I’ll leave in the show notes in the software space. Great business. And before the pandemic, they would do small sort of get togethers for some of their like elite groups. They’re doing their first major conference for not only their members, but also for new potential clients.

00:24:35:16 – 00:24:49:05
Ralph
So a little bit less than a thousand people and we had a strategy, call them this week is how we can help. Obviously, you know, get them to that number and sell the place out and make it profitable as possible, which is hard to do with the physical event a lot of times.

00:24:49:07 – 00:24:55:12
Lauren
So you don’t make money on the event long term on these customers. And, right. Retention.

00:24:55:12 – 00:25:05:04
Ralph
But yeah, but my point to them was because this is the largest event ever, it’s like, you guys might not make money from this, but what you will do is you will get tremendous amount of goodwill.

00:25:05:05 – 00:25:06:02
Lauren
Yeah. So look.

00:25:06:07 – 00:25:22:17
Ralph
At retention. And I know what the retention numbers are. They figured out a lot of great ways in which to retain their clients, you know, through software stickiness, through the back end, like white label and reverb and all these other sorts of things, super smart things. But this is one more thing to layer on it. And I said, yes.

00:25:22:17 – 00:25:34:09
Ralph
The reason why, if you ever go to a concert recently, Jen, buy tickets to maroon five like three weeks ago, I don’t even know how much they were. Like, they were so freaking like, everything is so freaking expensive. Not even maroon five real.

00:25:34:10 – 00:25:36:18
Lauren
You haven’t been to a Beyonce concert? Hold on.

00:25:36:18 – 00:26:01:03
Ralph
Oh my God, it’s like insane. Insane, expensive. Yeah. You know, like we were going to go to, like, the Four Nations hockey tournament last year. It was like $4,000 a seat. All right. But anyway, it’s like crazy stuff. But the point is, is people are craving in-person events as a group. Yeah. As a reaction to a lot of this I ification and zoom and all the things that you do every single day.

00:26:01:05 – 00:26:16:19
Ralph
So if you can incorporate an element of human contact into your business, however possible, that’s a great play for you into the coming year because it differentiates you, and it also plays alongside the efficiencies that you get from I am.

00:26:16:19 – 00:26:51:05
Lauren
People buy from people and it’s so much easier to build trust so much of your marketing and earned equity or earned media like what they’re going to be doing on their brand equity, you get from in person. Per mosey. We talked about this a lot of how we cashed in on this massive brand equity deal. When he did his book launch, he had for two years leading up to that, hosted people every single week in his office, where he was just bringing troves of future customers, and they were building that brand equity, because then you saw the people that were in the zoom background.

00:26:51:05 – 00:27:18:15
Lauren
Those are individuals that had purchased Private Time with him and it was this whole, you know, ascension ladder into brand equity. So I think it’s a great way when you can have an in-person experience the same as, like just to end on like me visiting the capital. I now have in-person relationships with 13 different representatives from the state of Florida, all of which I’m like going to hand writing a letter and saying like, hey, if you ever want me to speak on this subject matter to your constituents, say less this.

00:27:18:16 – 00:27:47:04
Lauren
Let me know when and where, and I’ll be there to continue the conversation so that they’re the people that elected them. Can also have the opportunity to hear how I, as an adoptable resource to amplify your own personal growth and output. So that’s that’s how I’m doing it now, because I met them in person and I’m, I do a handwritten card and my call to action is like, if you want me to continue this dialog, put me in front of the small business owners in your district, and then I’m going to have an in-person introduction from their elected official.

00:27:47:05 – 00:27:58:15
Lauren
Hey, here’s Lauren, the founder of Mongoose Media, here to talk about how you can adopt AI into your business to grow in scale in 2026. I couldn’t have had a better introduction pipeline for 2026 now.

00:27:58:17 – 00:28:20:04
Ralph
Thank you. So to back to my last point, I mean, that’s that’s a tremendous example of the in-person effect and the networking that you can gain from it. We’ve always talked about sort of in-person events and how they’re important now, but I think now more so than ever. So great work on that. We’re going to transition here to a little bit.

00:28:20:04 – 00:28:32:02
Ralph
We’re only going to get into the first part of this. I have a feeling this is going to be a multi-part episode. Yeah. I got to quiz you on something here. You don’t I know this is this is turned into a quiz.

00:28:32:04 – 00:28:33:12
Lauren
Ready?

00:28:33:14 – 00:28:37:16
Ralph
The British Empire. We’re aware of the British, the British Empire. Right?

00:28:37:18 – 00:28:44:21
Lauren
My family. Yeah, there’s the people. I’m related to that murdered a lot of people. Yeah. Let’s go.

00:28:44:21 – 00:28:59:15
Ralph
Yeah. Hey, they sure did. Absolutely. We. We broke free from them here in the United States. Watch the American Revolution by Ken Burns. Oh, my God, it’s like nine hours of, like, cure for insomnia. It’s like, it’s just.

00:28:59:17 – 00:29:09:09
Lauren
You get it? Okay. Yeah. Like my family got kicked out. They married an Irish woman, and then Queen Victoria and Albert were like, nope, you must leave. And that’s how we end up in the States.

00:29:09:11 – 00:29:29:10
Ralph
Well, you know, the the big joke in our family is that my wife’s family came over on the Mayflower because we’re in, like, the Plymouth, like Sagamore Beach area. And I came over because I was, you know, I basically left Ireland because of the potato famine and, you know, came here diseased and, you know, barely survived. And, Boston, of course, landed in Boston.

00:29:29:12 – 00:29:46:10
Ralph
What are the chances of an Irish colony in Boston, anyway? So anyway, so she’s royalty and I’m just, you know, Irish scum, which my in-laws always sort of kicked me about. So British Empire, guess what? Percentage of the planet when the British Empire was at its zenith?

00:29:46:12 – 00:29:49:16
Lauren
What percentage? 1 or 2%.

00:29:49:18 – 00:29:51:05
Ralph
I don’t Google it.

00:29:51:07 – 00:29:56:04
Lauren
I didn’t I’m off the dome in 42% cutting.

00:29:56:05 – 00:30:13:02
Ralph
They they covered 23% of the world’s population. All right. Here’s another one maybe a little bit farther back. Portugal, probably. No, the Roman Empire, the Roman Empire at its zenith had had what percentage of the world’s population under.

00:30:13:03 – 00:30:18:02
Lauren
Well, that’s hard, because this side of the hemisphere didn’t exist during the Roman.

00:30:18:02 – 00:30:20:16
Ralph
Empire, so it’s harder. So I don’t know.

00:30:20:22 – 00:30:24:08
Lauren
I’m going to say, okay, I’ll stick to my 41, 42%.

00:30:24:10 – 00:30:26:17
Ralph
You’re right. Actually, it’s 40%.

00:30:26:18 – 00:30:27:19
Lauren
Yeah.

00:30:27:21 – 00:30:52:08
Ralph
Very good. All right. Now meta on a meta platform okay. Of the percentage of humans on the planet, I’m not even talking about humans that have internet. It’s percentage of humans on the planet. What percentage of humans on the planet interact with a meta application on a daily basis and daily basis.

00:30:52:10 – 00:31:13:22
Lauren
Humans on the planet. So we can eliminate, you know, children under the age of seven and then. Okay. And then we can I mean, even in remote areas, there’s a lot of tribes that have access to phone, internet. And so it could be a shared device, I’m going to say 61%, 61, no, 69, because that’s a funnier number.

00:31:13:22 – 00:31:14:05
Lauren
But I say.

00:31:14:05 – 00:31:33:12
Ralph

All right. Well, you’re a little bit high. You’re actually accurate on the internet side because on the internet side, somebody has access to the internet. It’s actually closer to 70%. Okay. However, for humans on the planet, 43.75% of.

00:31:33:12 – 00:31:35:14
Lauren
These is the Roman Empire.

00:31:35:16 – 00:32:04:09
Ralph
The same as the Roman Empire? Actually, a little bit greater by percentage numbers. Yeah. Slightly better, 40%, 43.5%. So no platform or in the case of the British Empire and or the Roman Empire regime has had this kind of influence on people on a regular basis. Now, obviously different. We’re talking about political, you know, we’re talking about, you know, civilization, which was very different.

00:32:04:09 – 00:32:25:10
Ralph
Obviously, the population was I don’t even know what it was during the Roman Empire, a lot less than it is today. We’ve got a billion people on the planet right now. The point is this is that we have got 3.5 billion people that are on this platform on a regular basis, and there’s about 8 billion people that live on this planet.

00:32:25:11 – 00:32:27:21
Ralph
That is the influence of meta.

00:32:27:23 – 00:32:50:14
Lauren
Now Google, I would I’m still gonna argue it’s more, though, because you said interact and there’s still people that are interacting with not tools like people that are watching over someone’s shoulder that’s aware of Instagram, that’s having conversations about WhatsApp. Like there’s children like I think of in Latam, like because WhatsApp is a meta owned device and that’s their primary means of communication.

00:32:50:16 – 00:33:09:07
Lauren
Even though the child is not using WhatsApp their family is using and they’re interacting in some way, shape or form. So I mean, maybe that’s like directly connected from a user. And then if you look at the smart tax that they’re debating in Chicago right now, like, oof, that’s huge. But wow, I mean, what do you think about it?

00:33:09:07 – 00:33:19:17
Lauren
Like the Roman Empire, like Zuckerberg is the Julius Caesar. Today’s day and age, Elon Musk hate that problem.

00:33:19:19 – 00:33:44:09
Ralph
Yeah. I mean, depending on which search you use, there’s one that says it’s 49% of all humans on the planet. So the point is this is that it’s greater than the Roman Empire. But to your point, anyone with internet access is the reason Rory Meta was actually doing these like planes that were low flying AI gliders over Africa with internet on them to remember that it was happening.

00:33:44:09 – 00:33:48:13
Ralph
This is like 5 or 6 years ago. Like, and that was like their play to expand or.

00:33:48:13 – 00:33:52:12
Lauren
Clip free Starlink. This was so what you had just did it better.

00:33:52:14 – 00:34:12:14
Ralph
Yeah, Oakland did it better. Obviously. Now pretty much everyone on the planet will can or quasi has access to the internet. But to your point, 73.7% of people on the planet who have internet access use meta on a monthly basis.

00:34:12:16 – 00:34:35:16
Lauren
Okay, now your monthly active users, that’s more impressive because while my mom lover, she’s 81 years old, has Facebook, she’s not using it as accurately as I am in any way, shape, form. So, it would be so interesting then to see that even that differentiation by generation, because gen Alpha is actually like one of the I don’t know, is it?

00:34:35:16 – 00:34:58:19
Lauren
Maybe it’s, Gen Z is the smallest use of social media in comparison to other generations, and millennials use it the most. So I mean, all that to say, like, there’s just so much going into how we interact and use these different devices, I’m still shook by the fact that Roman Empire comparable numbers. I mean, it’s when you go to.

00:34:58:22 – 00:34:59:20
Ralph
Crazy.

00:34:59:23 – 00:35:09:00
Lauren
Percentages, right? Like that’s when you talk about, oh, the Titanic was the biggest box office. If you bring inflation into dollars like that’s massive, massive.

00:35:09:02 – 00:35:31:10
Ralph
Absolutely massive. And I think that’s the reason why we’re going to do this. You know, 2 or 3 part series on why meta is the best ad platform on the planet. Because if you have a product or service, your customer is on there. I don’t I don’t guess you’re selling B2B even like we’ve seen that. We’re like, yeah, I don’t know, maybe we should try LinkedIn ads.

00:35:31:10 – 00:35:53:20
Ralph
And then we do LinkedIn ads versus meta. Now, especially with creative diversification where like it crushes it over. It might have just because like the platform is so good that the reach is so broad. So this is just sort of the first step. I mean, it’s it’s an incredible amount. Even if you can Google this, you can look it up, throw it into ChatGPT and check our math on this.

00:35:53:20 – 00:36:03:11
Ralph
The point is, is if it’s 73 or 71% or it’s 40 or 44%, it doesn’t really matter. It’s still like larger than the Roman Empire.

00:36:03:13 – 00:36:11:11
Lauren
Okay, I wanted to pull up one thing because I remember, like Saudi Arabia, because we would have clients are like, hey, we want to expand in the Middle East. We have European court irons, and.

00:36:11:13 – 00:36:17:09
Ralph
Let’s you answer when there’s no Facebook in in China.

00:36:17:11 – 00:36:20:23
Lauren
VPN it’s you know what I mean that could.

00:36:21:02 – 00:36:22:02
Ralph
I suppose.

00:36:22:04 – 00:36:48:12
Lauren
You know you you definitely you can use VPNs but you’re right there’s still like political of like restrictions on this. But like one thing like I remember when we were looking at expanding into the Middle East, Saudi Arabia had like 97% of their population is on the internet. And I just from the I overview is that WhatsApp usage from the Saudi Arabian population is 83%, with 72% of their population on Instagram.

00:36:48:14 – 00:37:16:06
Ralph
That’s incredible. That’s unbelievable. I mean, the goal of Meta and Zuckerberg’s vision, whether you like him or don’t like him, he is an absolute visionary. And there was a point, I think, during the iOS 14 update, which we’re going to talk about in this whole thing. And the point is this it’s like if you’re not on meta, if you don’t believe in what meta is doing, you’re missing out on basically 72% of the world in a in a very large way.

00:37:16:06 – 00:37:39:09
Ralph
And we’re not even including like the like there’s no there’s no matter in Russia. There’s no meta in China. So let’s take those populations even out. So it’s like it’s pretty much whoever you want to reach, especially in those countries like Saudi Arabia. Like I know, you know, United Arab Emirates, probably the same percentage as Saudi Arabia. If not higher.

00:37:39:11 – 00:37:57:21
Ralph
Talk about like when I was in like Thailand, Vietnam two years ago, internet like there’s so far advanced where we’re at right now as far as speed, especially at that point in time. The point is this is like if you want to get to your client or customer or grow a business, meta is the place to do it because that’s where the eyeballs are.

00:37:57:23 – 00:38:24:08
Ralph
And where’s the Meta Andromeda update and creative diversification. It makes it even better and easier and less difficult. Now we’re finding that media buyers are like, wow, I can actually set this thing up with creative diversification and let meta do the work. Even with open targeting, like with zero targeting whatsoever, maybe some age related targeting to a certain degree.

00:38:24:12 – 00:38:41:23
Ralph
But even that, like meta figures it out over time. And this has been building ever since, really since 2004 plus. I mean, that’s really when it all kind of started. I mean, if you look back on, you know, the Facebook, which really did start in two, oh.

00:38:41:23 – 00:38:44:16
Lauren
Oh, yeah, the Facebook that was in the.

00:38:44:18 – 00:39:11:16
Ralph
Book, it was in the movie. And I’ve read a lot about that movie, like The Social Network. It overly dramatized, dramatized. I never know what that word is, the sort of the Winklevoss twins and Zuckerberg and like, there were so many college campuses that actually had sort of their own social networks, and it wasn’t really a novel idea.

00:39:11:16 – 00:39:32:11
Ralph
But basically the story on the story is that Facebook actually started as a college campus social network on the Harvard campus. Here in Cambridge, just down the street from where it live. The point is this is that and then it expanded outward. Now, a lot of the Ivy leagues actually had their own individual networks. And so this was not a novel thing.

00:39:32:11 – 00:39:53:03
Ralph
But what Zuckerberg did is, he added, all these individual cool features, some of which actually got him in real trouble, was I think it was was it Larry Summers? I think it was the president of Harvard at the time. The point is this is that the that sort of intellectual property, that fight that makes a whole movie is a little bit overblown.

00:39:53:03 – 00:39:55:21
Ralph
But still, it’s it’s a great movie. If you’ve watched.

00:39:55:23 – 00:39:59:01
Lauren
Hollywood, that happened all the time.

00:39:59:03 – 00:40:17:01
Ralph
Yeah, of course it is. So the point is this, is that this is the this is the platform I think that you need to be on in 2026 and you need to master it whether or not you do it internally. You know, the your own team for a VP of marketing or a director of marketing or whether you hire out for an agency because this is the place where everything is going right now.

00:40:17:02 – 00:40:38:17
Ralph
We’ve geared our entire business towards this, and everything else is sort of secondary at this point. We’re having clients come to us and say, hey, I want Google Ads. And so we start Google ads. We’re like, you know, what you really need is you actually really need meta. And then all of a sudden the shift goes from 80% on Google to 80% on meta, like over the course of a few months.

00:40:38:18 – 00:41:01:22
Ralph
And all of a sudden results are where they need to be, you know, hey, I was looking for a 3.8 blended mirror. I never, ever got it on Google. I was always at like 1.2. And now with the difference in blend and creative diversification, everything that’s going on now with the Andromeda Update, like you’ve been able to sort of we’ve been able to reverse a lot of these trends and getting off like this.

00:41:01:22 – 00:41:09:10
Ralph
The standard sort of platforms and looking at meta as the discovery platform, I know you’ve sort of felt the same over at mongoose for sure.

00:41:09:10 – 00:41:35:19
Lauren
I mean, it’s the opportunity to cost effectively get in front of your intended audience. You have the ability to, expand at scale with your creators and with Andromeda. And then the gem update, especially of the organic side in 2026, small business owners, medium business owners especially, are going to be able to capitalize on all of their organic content they’ve been doing for years, like for 2026.

00:41:35:19 – 00:42:11:23
Lauren
For me at least. I believe that because of the Gem update, where it’s just essentially saying it doesn’t matter if it’s a paid out or organic post, all of your content matters into building up a better delivery service for your end customer. End user. So I think a lot of people who have invested in the organic side will start to see that if you do invest in meta and you, take advantage of the opportunities, you now get to not have an organic side and a paid side like you have these combined together for the intended output you want when you’re investing into meta as a platform.

00:42:11:23 – 00:42:38:00
Lauren
So like again, it’s like it’s looking at meta like you and I talk about the paid ads. So much of this, but now with organic, now with conversational marketing for messenger, IG direct or you have like WhatsApp, like all of this is finally coming together in culmination, where brands that have been investing organically for years, posting on social to crickets are now going to see an impact to their paid ad strategy because of their content organic.

00:42:38:00 – 00:42:52:20
Lauren
And that all tends to because of AI’s involvement, where it’s going to start pulling and extracting from your website, from your organic social media accounts and to create the ads that will likely lead to a higher probability of a purchase.

00:42:52:22 – 00:43:01:03
Ralph
Yeah. And it’s because they’ve got more data than that. Well, but maybe with the exception of Google, I don’t know who has more data. That’s really sort of the question.

00:43:01:04 – 00:43:08:00
Lauren
It’s all the same amount of data. There’s like who has more? It’s at this point infinitesimal inventor, whatever that word is.

00:43:08:02 – 00:43:10:23
Ralph
Infinitesimal.

00:43:11:00 – 00:43:11:18
Lauren
Oh yeah.

00:43:11:18 – 00:43:16:15
Ralph
Sure it’s infinite. We’ll just go with that.

00:43:16:17 – 00:43:17:14
Lauren
Yes.

00:43:17:16 – 00:43:50:06
Ralph
So I just want to end here with like on our first part here on some of the mind blowing like growth numbers for meta for the last few years. Because they just came out with their quarterly earnings just a few weeks back, their market capitalization, which is which was over 2 trillion, 2 trillion market cap, which is basically a share price multiplied by shares outstanding, 1.93 trillion.

00:43:50:08 – 00:44:16:12
Ralph
Nvidia is not too far behind. I mean, meta is just an incredible growth machine. Like I said, we’ve got 3.94, almost 4 billion monthly active users. We’ve got 4.3.4 daily active users. Like think about that percentage right there. We were just sort of quibbling over like monthly versus daily. Monthly and daily is almost the same. They’ve got so much engagement.

00:44:16:14 – 00:44:40:01
Ralph
And this goes back to Zuckerberg and his just, maniacal and in a good way, devotion to I need to connect the worlds that the people on this planet. I need a way to connect people. And the only way to do that is through engagement. And we’re going to get into that through this series and to show how they sort of did this sort of one step at a time.

00:44:40:03 – 00:44:52:07
Ralph
And it wasn’t all at once. It was sort of little improvements. And a lot of, you know, stealing, borrowing from other platforms, which I’m sure we’ll have some pretty or excuse on ends or acquisition.

00:44:52:09 – 00:44:59:13
Lauren
Acquisitions that came into play. But yeah, this is incremental growth towards their world domination of your time and attention.

00:44:59:15 – 00:45:08:14
Ralph
Annual revenue. Fiscal year 2024 164 billion. AD revenue 160 billion. By the.

00:45:08:16 – 00:45:18:09
Lauren
There’s just an ad platform of what is it for? What’s the other 4 billion or like was it a few billion dollars from is like what quest sales.

00:45:18:11 – 00:45:41:20
Ralph
Sales probably like yeah. They don’t sell data, by the way. Everyone Cambridge Analytica came out and said, oh, meta. You know, Congress actually said Senate said, oh, meta sells widget. They don’t sell data that we use, the data that they collect to make the advertising that much better. That’s what they do. They don’t sell data. So that’s a advertising company first, which I don’t want.

00:45:41:20 – 00:45:44:03
Ralph
Zuckerberg ever really thought it was going to be that way.

00:45:44:05 – 00:45:56:00
Lauren
That’s it. Was it like 97, 98% of their entire revenue came directly from ads. So every small business owner that donated to the fund to the cause, they’re like, thank you.

00:45:56:02 – 00:46:02:00
Ralph
We donate 107 million a year to it. It’s like, it’s crazy to think like we’re just here.

00:46:02:00 – 00:46:16:03
Lauren
11 very small, like a small ad. Numbers drop in the. Yeah, it’s a drop in the bucket. I remember like being in Silicon Valley like on campus, being told if you’re spending less than $200,000 a month, you are considered small for meta.

00:46:16:05 – 00:46:31:19
Ralph
Yeah. It’s true. It’s absolutely true. Like, I mean, that’s why they’ve geared a lot of their focus towards agencies. There’s a lot of stuff that they do for agencies because they they realized unlike Google, they realized, all right, we can get to like a lot of advertisers all at once by going through agencies. It’s a really smart move.

00:46:31:19 – 00:46:59:05
Ralph
Like I always thought that was a smart move, as ambitious for us as an agency. Of course. But one last number here. I remember a buddy of mine who runs a hedge fund, out in California. And here, I always say whenever there was bad news from from meta coming out, like, I remember early 2022 when after the iOS 14 update hit and their stock just cratered and it went down and down and down all the way through like October of 2022.

00:46:59:05 – 00:47:14:03
Ralph
He’s like, meta is done, dude. Like your business model is done. I’m like, I don’t know. Since that point in time, meta stock has actually increased five over 500%, nearing 600% since it’s.

00:47:14:06 – 00:47:35:12
Lauren
Well, this thing, if we do every year like an annual wrap up of like how much do they make from and what is their current stock price? Again, we’re not financial advice. It’s not financial advice in no shape or form. But it’s like the platforms if you’re listening to this, the platforms we use, like we bought Shopify at the very beginning and then at like just like the tools that you’re using as like a small thing, like, are you using it?

00:47:35:12 – 00:47:57:14
Lauren
Are you continuing to use it more? Do you see more adaptability. This is not financial advice in any way, shape or form. But when I’ve looked at what’s in my portfolio, I’m always going to be like, yeah, if I’m using the tool anyways, I’m like, I’m just going to invest. Not in the software price alone, but I’m vested interest in their success when I like.

00:47:57:14 – 00:48:17:18
Lauren
Yeah, like I have a Shopify store, so I have Shopify stock like that type of situation because it’s the tools that I’m using. And when I stop using a tool and be like, okay, then this is again, I am not in this space in any way, shape or form. But when I’m using something, it’s like the kids that they pick the song like, oh, I love this game.

00:48:17:18 – 00:48:33:16
Lauren
It’s like, okay, well, this was made by Rocket Games or whatever. So that type of situation, like the Cruella de Vil style, where they had kids testing games because they have the biggest insight. I’ll just share back which tools I’m using and if I enjoy using them.

00:48:33:17 – 00:48:51:05
Ralph
Yeah, I mean, if I see a tool that makes sense, like Shopify, for example, meta, of course, Atlassian, which is another one that we use, like there is just there’s a lot of them that stripe for example, there’s like a private equity deal going right now with stripe. I got like all of these tools. I’m like, wow, these are really game changing companies.

00:48:51:05 – 00:49:15:07
Ralph
So yes, you can for sure make money off it through your own individual investments. I choose to actually leverage these tools primarily for the growth of the business, which is the largest investment that I have right now. Last year, total revenue 42 billion, 42 billion. And that’s a 16% year over year growth. But their earnings grew by 37%.

00:49:15:08 – 00:49:19:08
Ralph
This is after, what, 37%?

00:49:19:11 – 00:49:24:15
Lauren
But that’s all because they got rid of the whole, like question why they were doing the meta real estate.

00:49:24:17 – 00:49:46:10
Ralph
They did. They did. They definitely reduced a lot of that infrastructure. But they have been pouring into capital expenditures too. Like, let’s not forget the 72 billion they spent this year alone, probably even more now on AI infrastructure. And they’re going to be spending 115,000,000,000 in 2027. So there’s a lot of capital CapEx that’s going into all this.

00:49:46:12 – 00:50:04:07
Ralph
Does that affect earnings? I’m not a financial analyst. The point is this is like the thing is growing and it covers 70 some odd percent of the planet. It’s the place to be in 2026. We’re going to continue with this conversation on our next show. And of course, wherever you listen to podcasts, make sure that you leave us a rating and review.

00:50:04:07 – 00:50:25:09
Ralph
We really do appreciate that it gets us out to a larger audience and teaches people how to do this stuff the right way. We really feel very strongly about how we feel about meta right now. It’s not because we’re shareholders. We’re not giving financial advice. We’re doing it because we’re seeing its effect on businesses and helping business scale and grow and ultimately achieve the vision, through metrics that matter and growth at scale.

00:50:25:09 – 00:50:42:03
Ralph
So that is what this whole thing is about. So on behalf of my amazing globetrotting Senate House Capitol trotting co-host Lauren Petrullo. So the next show, see you.

Episode 759: Why Meta is The Best Ad Platform on The Planet in 2026 Part 1

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Why Meta is The Best Ad Platform on The Planet in 2026 Part 1

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