What Meta Looked Like in 2014 · It’s Happening Again
The AppLovin Ads Playbook: Why Now, and How to Start
Learn How to Launch & Scale on the #3 DTC Channel — From the Team Running Real Campaigns on AppLovin Right Now.
Instructors
Ezra Firestone
Founder, Smart Marketer
Pep Hufen
CEO, Smart Marketer Agency
Want To Know More?
Join the Free
Live Training
Thursday, May 21st · 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT
Live. Real Campaigns. Walk Away With a Working AppLovin Playbook.
Grounded in real campaign data from agency clients running on AppLovin today.
Instructors
Ezra Firestone
Founder, Smart Marketer
Pep Hufen
CEO, Smart Marketer Agency
AppLovin is now $11B/yr in ad spend — bigger than Pinterest, Snap, and Reddit combined.
Get the exact campaign setup, attribution playbook, and creative system we use on AppLovin today.
Watch live case studies — Safe Sleeve & Sweet Flexx — with actual results on screen.
Most DTC Brands Won't Discover AppLovin Until It's Too Late
Right now, AppLovin looks the way Meta looked in 2014.
A massive audience your competitors are ignoring. Cheap reach. A learning curve that rewards the brands willing to climb it early. And in June 2026, the platform opens self-serve to everyone, everywhere — which means advertiser density spikes and the easy arbitrage window starts closing.
The brands learning AppLovin today will know what works in six months. That edge isn’t replicable later.
But most operators still won’t touch it. Why? Because they think the audience is teenagers playing mobile games. They’re wrong. According to a Kantar survey of 2,500 U.S. mobile gamers, the audience mirrors the entire U.S. adult population — across age, gender, income, and geography. 70% make most household purchase decisions. 77% spend $100+ per month online.
This isn’t a niche audience. It’s mass reach.
We built this training to give you everything you need to launch on AppLovin with confidence — the real platform mechanics, the campaign setup we use across agency clients, the creative concepts winning right now, and the mistakes that kill new accounts in the first 30 days.
Live Training Preview
Watch Us Build Real Meta Ad Campaigns – Then Do it Yourself
Across this live training, Ezra and Pep break down exactly how we approach AppLovin in 2026: the platform, the setup, the creative, and the case studies — so you leave with a working playbook, not theory.
- Live training walking through AppLovin's mechanics, campaign structure, creative, and optimization
- The exact ad setup we use for new accounts — campaign type, optimization goal, geography, creative volume
- Five video concepts and five interactive concepts winning right now
- Two live case studies — Safe Sleeve and Sweet Flexx — with real results on screen
- Live Q&A with Ezra and Pep at the end
Part 1:
The State of Meta Ads (And What's Actually Changed)
AppLovin is absorbing $11B/year in advertiser spend right now. In June 2026, self-serve opens to everyone — advertiser density spikes, and the arbitrage starts to close. We’ll show you why being in early matters, what the platform looks like at this exact moment, and why the mobile gamer audience isn’t what you think.
Part 2:
The New Creative Reality: Why Your Ads Are Your Targeting
Forget feed-based advertising. AppLovin ads are full-screen, unskippable, and watched for a 35-second median view time — longer than any other digital ad. We’ll walk through the two ad formats, the three-step ad structure (video, interactive, DPA), and why the mental state of someone playing a mobile game is fundamentally different from someone scrolling a feed. 38% of mobile gamers buy a product within three months of seeing it in a game. 71% of those buyers act the same day.
Part 3:
Stop Running the Same Ads: Master Creative Diversification for Meta Ads
The exact setup we use across agency clients launching on AppLovin: Universal campaign type, ROAS vs CPP optimization (and how to choose), the geography and budget configuration that gives the algorithm room to breathe, and the page-based testing structure that lets you read what’s actually working. Plus the attribution truth that trips up almost every new operator — and the one mistake that starves the model before it can find buyers.
Part 4:
What's Working Right Now — Creative + Case Studies
The five video concepts and five interactive concepts winning across our accounts — what they have in common, why they work on AppLovin, and why some of them wouldn’t work anywhere else. Plus two case studies. Safe Sleeve and Sweet Flexx both broke through with specific creative unlocks we’ll show on screen — including the campaign moment that turned each account from launch to scale.
Part 5:
The Creative System + The Mistakes That Kill New Accounts
AppLovin’s algorithm is hungry for creative volume. We’ll show you the production rhythm winning brands are using to feed it, the AI tools speeding up output (including ThumbStop), and the four mistakes we see kill new accounts in the first 30 days — copying Meta only, aspirational ROAS goals, misreading attribution, and not testing enough.
We’ll Be Live.
You Should Be Too.
March 5th. One Hour. Bring your questions and get unstuck.
- Join us on Thursday, May 21st at 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT
- Bring your questions on platform setup, creative, attribution, scaling — all of it
- Get answers from Ezra and Pep in real time
- Leave with a working AppLovin playbook, not more homework
Your Instructors
Ezra Firestone
Founder, Smart Marketer
Ezra is the founder of Smart Marketer and the owner-operator behind multiple eight-figure DTC brands — including Navage, oVertone, and Safe Sleeve.
Over the last 15+ years, he’s scaled these brands while teaching tens of thousands of marketers and founders how to grow profitably online.
He’s actively running AppLovin ads on his own portfolio right now — and Safe Sleeve, one of the live case studies in this training, is one of his accounts. He’s known for translating what actually works at the operator level into systems anyone can run.
Pep Hufen
CEO, Smart Marketer Agency
Pep Hufen, CEO of Smart Marketer Agency, is a direct response marketer, analyst, and AI first operator helping 7 and 8 figure ecommerce brands scale profitably.
Equal parts growth operator and numbers guy, Pep is known for building performance engines that connect marketing execution to real business outcomes, with a sharp focus on measurement, profitability, and scalable systems.
He directs tens of millions in paid media annually while helping brands turn data into confident decisions. He is currently building ThumbStop, an AI powered creative platform that helps brands generate high converting direct response ads faster.
This Works No Matter What You're Selling — Or How Much You're Spending
Any DTC Category
Apparel, supplements, beauty, home goods, or anything in between. The mobile gaming audience mirrors the U.S. adult population — your customer is already there.
All Spend Levels
Spending $5K/month or $500K/month, the platform mechanics and creative principles are the same.
All Experience Levels
New to AppLovin or already running campaigns — you'll walk away with frameworks that work either way.
Solo or Team
Founder running ads yourself or managing a full media buying team — the playbook scales with you.
Join the Free Live Training
Thursday, May 21st · 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT
Grounded in real campaign data from agency clients running on AppLovin today.