Michael Taylor's lab for AI evals, prompt optimization and synthetic research — plus an archive of 60+ growth experiments, econometrics and content marketing essays.https://www.saxifrage.xyzen-ushttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-agent-audithttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-agent-auditWe audited six companies’ AI support agents. The costly mistakes weren’t the viral ones. Here’s how to test yours against your own policies, regularly like pen testing.Mon, 19 Oct 2026 02:42:00 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/permanent-underclasshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/permanent-underclassAI spending ranges from $0 to $20,000/month — and the gap is growing. Explore the "permanent underclass theory," why Silicon Valley fears being priced out of AI, and what economics says about whether human labor really becomes worthless.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:31:24 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/pairwise-gold-triad-evalhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/pairwise-gold-triad-evalThe Pairwise Gold Triad is an eval pattern for subjective AI tasks. Compare challenger outputs against an incumbent using gold references and a fixed LLM judge—then hill climb with autoresearch.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:31:20 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/5000-ai-personashttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/5000-ai-personasDiscover hard-won lessons from scaling AI persona research to 5,000 simulated consumers. Learn practical tips for managing costs, ensuring statistical accuracy, and avoiding common pitfalls when using LLMs for market research.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:30:55 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/nco-gaphttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/nco-gapAI excels at strategy and execution but fails at creative problem-solving. Explore why humans will remain essential as "NCOs" in the post-AGI economy, bridging the gap between AI planning and AI action through adaptive intelligence and real-world judgment.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:30:55 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-engineeringAI art is here, and prompt engineering is the job of the future. Take my prompt template and learn how to find all the art styles, quality boosters and magic words to get the generative art you need.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 05:30:55 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/hide-your-shoggothhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/hide-your-shoggothLearn how ambitious generalists can succeed in a specialist's world through the 'Shoggoth Strategy' - a proven approach to presenting your diverse skills strategically while maintaining your broad interests. Includes real-world examples and practical career advice.Fri, 11 Apr 2025 13:25:08 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/bait-hook-reward-payloadhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/bait-hook-reward-payloadHow to (actually) write engaging LinkedIn posts with ChatGPTOne of the things people get super excited about with ChatGPT is it’s ability to write content for you.Thu, 30 Jan 2025 17:36:02 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/memetic-analysishttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/memetic-analysisLearn how two developers used data-driven memetic analysis to launch a successful Udemy course on prompt engineering, generating full-time income while working just one day per month. Includes actionable insights on course naming, pricing, and optimization.Thu, 07 Nov 2024 16:54:17 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-video-analysishttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-video-analysisEver wished you could watch hundreds of hours of video in minutes? We did it with AI. Dive into our journey of analyzing countless gaming streams, the hiccups we hit, and what this means for how we'll learn from videos in the future. Get ready for a world where no visual content goes unseen.Wed, 17 Jul 2024 15:32:20 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-engineering-bookhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-engineering-bookPrompt engineering is a fast moving topic, so to write a book on it, we had to zoom out and find transferable and timeless principles that worked with GPT-3, still work with GPT-4, and will work in the future with GPT-5.Wed, 12 Jun 2024 21:35:37 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/vision-promptinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/vision-promptingVision models are underrated, and in may ways are the future of LLMs. Learning how to prompt them now will pay off dividends in the future.Tue, 12 Mar 2024 09:48:52 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-writerhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-writerMost people using ChatGPT or AI writing tools for content marketing have it exactly backwards. You have to provide the secret sauce, and use AI as your ghostwriter.Sun, 25 Feb 2024 20:49:36 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-optimizationhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/prompt-optimizationIt's one thing to discover a prompt that works through trial and error, but prompt engineering is a whole other discipline with a lot more scale and robustness required. You need to be A/B testing your prompt by running them 20+ times in order to really understand what affects performance.Mon, 15 Jan 2024 12:07:47 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-wrapperhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-wrapperHow do you win the AI wrapper game and level up as an AI-powered company? There's a standard path to get there that you can follow, which will increase quality and (eventually) decrease cost.Thu, 21 Dec 2023 11:17:48 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-gsheetshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-gsheetsIf you've ever wanted to use the power of ChatGPT in Google Sheets, now you have a template which gives you access in a simple Custom Function.Tue, 17 Oct 2023 10:23:18 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-jokehttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-jokeChatGPT can tell jokes if you know how to ask. I use prompt engineering to make ChatGPT funny again.Wed, 04 Oct 2023 22:22:13 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-wordcounthttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/chatgpt-wordcountChatGPT can't count words, so stop trying to ask it. This is why prompt testing is important, because without it you wouldn't know what part of your prompts are performing.Wed, 06 Sep 2023 23:12:04 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/running-robyn-in-rhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/running-robyn-in-rFacebook is getting into Marketing Mix Modeling to solve the iOS14 problem, but how do you run Robyn, their open-source project in R-Studio? Step by step instructions including setting up your environment.Wed, 16 Aug 2023 12:32:11 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-writing-style-prompt-experimenthttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-writing-style-prompt-experimentHow do you get the AI to write like you? Here are my results of A/B testing multiple approaches, with the winning prompt that performed 20% better!Wed, 16 Aug 2023 12:30:39 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/gpt3-gsheetshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/gpt3-gsheetsGPT-3 is revolutionary but relatively inaccessible if you don't know how to code! Using GPT3 function in GSheets will make it easier to integrate into your workflow.Sun, 13 Aug 2023 12:23:01 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/value-based-pricinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/value-based-pricingValue-based pricing in agencies is alluring, but comes with serious risks that must be mitigated, as I found out with my 50 person agency.Tue, 30 May 2023 16:45:15 GMTGeneral Businesshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/aiohttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/aioAIs are growing exponentially and as a result consumer behavior is changing. There's an opportunity for forward-thinking marketers to invest in AIO or Artificial Intelligence Optimization and ride the wave as brands scramble to get into the AI training set.Wed, 24 May 2023 20:25:51 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-assistanthttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ai-assistantEverybody wants an AI assistant like Iron Man. For the first time it's becoming possible to actually build that, with completely open-source components.Tue, 04 Apr 2023 10:05:19 GMTAI & Evalshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/memetic-engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/memetic-engineeringElon Musk is fighting against the woke mind virus, but what are the tools memetic engineering gives us in this type of information warfare?Wed, 14 Dec 2022 08:13:40 GMTCreative Testinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/data-anonymizationhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/data-anonymizationAnonymize sensitive data for public use in online courses, blog posts, or product demos, without losing any patterns in the data.Tue, 11 Oct 2022 22:55:37 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-repurposinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-repurposingContent Repurposing, for example taking the videos you produce and turning them into other formats for promotion on social media, is the key to making the economics of content production work.Wed, 07 Sep 2022 08:55:57 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-marketingSEO has several dynamics that make content marketing a winner-takes-all market. This is why you should focus.Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-productionhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-productionWhat process do you need to follow to write content at scale for SEO? It looks very different from a normal writer's workflow - you have to be strategic.Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-strategyhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/content-strategyBusting three months about SEO that everyone believes. Best practices don't exist and you shouldn't just write evergreen content for your target customer.Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/keyword-universehttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/keyword-universeHow do you do effective keyword research? What types of keywords should you try and rank for? In what priority?Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/link-buildinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/link-buildingIf you don't have enough links you won't rank on the first page of Google, but how do you get them? What are the link building tactics and strategies that work?Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/recruit-writershttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/recruit-writersHow do you hire good freelance writers to produce your blog content? How does that compare cost-wise to hiring an agency?Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/seo-engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/seo-engineeringHow do you engineer growth via SEO? It takes engineering resource, but what do the developers actually work on?Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/technical-audithttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/technical-auditWhat's the minimum work you could do to make sure your site is healthy and ready to receive SEO traffic?Tue, 06 Sep 2022 13:27:20 GMTContent Marketinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-gsheetshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-gsheetsYou need to choose where to allocate your marketing budget, but don't know if you can trust the reports you're getting from Facebook and Google... and how do you even measure TV? Econometrics is the key to answering these strategic questions and making data-driven marketing decisions.Thu, 25 Aug 2022 08:29:17 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/causal-inferencehttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/causal-inference"Purchased and has clicked" is the not the same thing as "purchased because they clicked": learn how to determine the true impact of marketing with the causal inference toolbox.Fri, 18 Feb 2022 09:03:18 GMTGrowth Engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/geo-modelshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/geo-modelsHow do you know if you have enough data for an MMM? What do you do if you don't? Geo-level models are a great way to increase the certainty in your model, by introducing variance so you get to the truth of channels actually drove performance.Fri, 26 Nov 2021 21:33:04 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/simulator-based-courseshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/simulator-based-coursesSimulator-based courses are the future of online learning. Imagine being able to simulate what it's like to do the job in real-world scenarios, and apply in practice along with learning the theory.Fri, 26 Nov 2021 21:33:04 GMTLaunchhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/agency-economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/agency-economicsWhere does all the money go when you hire an agency? I reveal the economics of how an agency makes money, and what it spends it on. You'll see why agency employees are always underpaid and overworked, and why agency owners always look fraught.Thu, 18 Nov 2021 12:46:26 GMTGeneral Businesshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/bayesian-mcmchttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/bayesian-mcmcWhat are Bayesian methods and why are they being adopted by modern MMM practitioners? We share actual code that shows a side-by-side comparison so you can see one of the many benefits of these techniques.Tue, 31 Aug 2021 08:28:38 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/interpolationhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/interpolationIf all you have is weekly or monthly data, how do you convert it to build a model with daily data? The answer: Interpolation. (includes open-source code)Fri, 25 Jun 2021 23:19:12 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/tracking-brokenhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/tracking-brokenEveryone is looking to Server-Side Tracking as the potential saviour of marketersMon, 21 Jun 2021 20:18:43 GMTTracking & Analyticshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/privacy-backlashhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/privacy-backlashPeople hate being tracked across the web, and they're starting to fight back. With a third of people using adblocker, Apple's changes to ITP and IDFA and the GDPR and CCPA legislation, the ability to track users has been severely degraded.Mon, 21 Jun 2021 10:38:19 GMTTracking & Analyticshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/zero-party-datahttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/zero-party-dataWhat would you do in marketing without data? How would you survive a post-data apocalypse? Here's a playbook for how to do marketing with zero-party data.Thu, 27 May 2021 01:01:12 GMTTracking & Analyticshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/data-request-checklisthttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/data-request-checklistWhat data do you need before starting a marketing mix modeling project? Do you even have enough data? Use my data request checklist to find out.Wed, 19 May 2021 23:58:50 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/mmm-costhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/mmm-costHow much does Marketing Mix Modeling cost? We explore what $500, $5,000 and $50,000 buys you, and what kind of output you should expect, from Excel to Python code.Wed, 12 May 2021 21:58:59 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ios14https://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/ios14iOS 14.5 is the biggest change to to $350b digital marketing industry to happen in decades. It's great for user privacy andThu, 22 Apr 2021 10:18:28 GMTTracking & Analyticshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/diminishing-returnshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/diminishing-returnsHave you ever doubled your budget and not seen conversions increase by as much? You've encountered diminishing returns, a phenomenon you can build into your Econometric models to predict future performance at different spend levels, and make strategic decisions.Thu, 10 Dec 2020 10:14:37 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/server-side-trackinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/server-side-trackingServer Side Tracking is the latest tech released in the fight for digital attribution. It has the power to solve problems like Apple ITP or ad blockers, but with great power comes great responsibility (and a lot of complications!).Thu, 15 Oct 2020 22:31:06 GMTTracking & Analyticshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-pythonhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-pythonIf you're familiar with Econometrics, you've probably wondered how to do the analysis in Python. The benefits over using Excel or GSheets are reusability, scalability and the ability to productize the results.Fri, 25 Sep 2020 22:51:01 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-questionshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/econometrics-questionsWhat can Econometrics do for your business? What questions can it answer? And what is it not good at answering for you?Fri, 25 Sep 2020 22:51:01 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/halo-effecthttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/halo-effectHave you ever noticed your Facebook ads performance doesn't line up with Google Analytics? Using econometrics you can measure the 'halo effect' of advertising on organic channels and see if there really is an impact, independently of what Facebook is telling you.Fri, 25 Sep 2020 22:51:01 GMTGrowth Economicshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/flavors-of-viralityhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/flavors-of-viralityThere are 7 types of virality — which one is right for your business?Tue, 15 Sep 2020 23:36:30 GMTViralityhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineeringWhat is Growth Engineering and when does it make sense for your business? We discuss the Growth Hacking movement that made the role of Growth Engineer, and discuss what inflection point indicates you need to hire a Growth Engineer.Tue, 15 Sep 2020 23:36:30 GMTGrowth Engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/k-factor-benchmarkshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/k-factor-benchmarksWhat is a good level of viral growth? What K-factor should you expect? We look at all the public mentions of famous companies that grew virally to find out.Tue, 15 Sep 2020 23:36:30 GMTViralityhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/modeling-viral-growthhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/modeling-viral-growthIt's hard to really understand the power of viral growth without modeling out it's potential — let's see how to do that.Tue, 15 Sep 2020 23:36:30 GMTViralityhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/no-more-microtargetinghttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/no-more-microtargetingMicro-targeting has been called a threat to our democracy and has built trillions of dollars of value for some of the World's biggest companies... but does it actually work? Will we miss it when it's gone?Thu, 20 Aug 2020 08:26:21 GMTPaid Adshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineer-careerhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineer-careerIf you are in love with the idea of Growth Engineering and working hard to become one, you can learn how I built a career in Growth Engineering. We also discuss some tips on what to learn if you're a marketer learning to code, or a developer learning how to do growth.Tue, 18 Aug 2020 16:39:06 GMTGrowth Engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineering-case-studieshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineering-case-studies13 Growth Engineering case studies to show what's possible to achieve when inviting a developer into your marketing team. In each case we explain the problem we were solving, the strategy we used to solve it and what technology stack made the solution possible.Tue, 18 Aug 2020 11:37:09 GMTGrowth Engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineering-serviceshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/growth-engineering-servicesNot everyone knows what a Growth Engineer is or what they can do for your marketing organization. This is a comprehensive list of the types of activities that come up again and again for Growth Engineers.Tue, 18 Aug 2020 11:37:09 GMTGrowth Engineeringhttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/viral-growth-loopshttps://www.saxifrage.xyz/post/viral-growth-loopsViral growth can be tough to optimize for if you haven't mapped out your growth loop.Tue, 09 Jun 2020 14:13:56 GMTVirality