Zero Clicks #5: Going to the mattresses

Every week in Zero Clicks, we explore the interplay of AI, media, and commerce.

I’m currently in the market for a new king-sized mattress, which is to say I’ve entered both the tenth layer of Dante’s Inferno and the abyss of Google’s enshittification.

As of this writing, the SERP for “best mattress” proudly returns random blog posts from niche brands Big Fig and The Beloit Mattress Company… and a thread from an obscure golf forum ahead of Wirecutter’s review. Beloit Mattress is a two-door small business in Wisconsin and Illinois with a domain authority of 29. While “best x for y” variations of the search yield slightly more familiar sources,"best mattress for side sleepers” currently has a Quora answer with a whopping five upvotes near the top of page one.

For better or worse, Google has taken the war to sell you an internet mattress and gone full Michael Corleone on the review-industrial complex. But zooming out, the implosion of the SERP is but one example of how the entire digital marketing rigmarole of the last decade is now commoditized.

Mattresses have long been the ultimate blank canvas for marketing leaders to deploy their craft. Brands such as Casper, Leesa, Helix, Purple, Nectar, Tuft & Needle were basically slinging you the same fluffy rectangles with shockingly similar brand positioning– winning was a matter of who was best at performance marketing arbitrage.

At the risk of being reductionist, the broader formula for winning the mattress wars– and by extension all of commerce– for the last generation was pretty simple:

1) White-label a product and hire Red Antler, Gin Lane, or two dudes in Bushwick who only drink pilsners out of unmarked cans to build a Shopify website with a yuppie aesthetic. Print a few tote bags for good measure.

2) Outflank competitors on Google, Facebook, and Instagram with media buying and targeting wizardry.

3) Test the ever-loving crap out of funnels, offers, and other behavioral economics tactics to maximize conversions from cheap platform traffic

4) Buy as many favorable reviews as possible from shady pay-to-play media entities masquerading as organic editorial.

5) Beg and grovel at the feet of any publisher or creator who couldn’t be bought. At the height of their power, Casper’s CEO spent 10+ hours per week personally emailing mattress bloggers and other reviewers. 

All of the DTC mattress darlings were exceptional at executing the playbook above– several just took too much venture capital, forcing them to sacrifice sensible unit economics at the altar of growth. Resident– an exception that combined mastery of digital marketing with a basic understanding of the terms EBITDA and net income– sold for >$1B. Resident operates five brands– Nectar, Dreamcloud, Siena, Awara, and Cloverlane– have you heard of any of them? This is direct response all the way down.

But the game Resident excelled at is one of a bygone era. With Performance Max and Advantage Shopping + campaigns, Google and Meta respectively have existentially bet their future at fully commoditizing media buying to make it easier for anyone to spend money with them. When performance marketing is an even playing field and organic search is anarchy, the only real arbitrage opportunity is building a true brand.

Business Development Manager, Temu

Temu’s push to recruit US-based entities to the platform is in full swing and the company is staffing up aggressively to support, already hiring several employees away from Amazon and Walmart. Marketplace Pulse reports that the first US entities have started selling on Temu. Like Wish before it, Temu promises early US adopters increased exposure in the algorithm and the chance to ride the coattails of their gargantuan ad blitz.

The timing here is interesting– Temu looks the weakest it has in some time with parent company Pinduoduo stock down 29%, potential pending legislation to close the tariff loophole, and app downloads completely flat lining. If its fate even somewhat rests on convincing top US eCommerce entrepreneurs to list their products amidst a sea of counterfeits, Amazon can sleep quite a bit easier.

Head of New Verticals, Whop

I’ve been fascinated by Whop for a while. With two founders in their mid-20s and a shiny new office in the old Domino Sugar plant in Williamsburg, the company seems almost like a caricature of a tech firm started by a bygone era of Brooklyn hipsters. But the company is doing real numbers– creators have sold nearly $500M of courses, day trading strategies, and sports betting tips on the platform.

I’m hyper-bullish on the idea of Whop, but so far skeptical of the execution. Many of the digital goods on their marketplace have mega grifter energy– the eCommerce section in particular is filled with the type of dropshipping and Amazon FBA gurus that rent Lambos to build social clout. For better or worse, Whop is taking the true marketplace route and going for mass scale rather than a pared-down focus on sourcing top creators in just one or two verticals.

All that said, this job sounds like a hell of a lot of fun for someone looking for a consummate startup adventure.

Executive Director, Business Development, The College Board

The SAT is back en vogue at elite universities these days, and the company behind it is on a bit of an M&A spree. If you’re someone who just can’t get enough analogies or overly pompous adjectives in your life (*looks awkwardly in mirror*), this may be just the job for you.