About Billy

Nobody predicted I would wind up in marketing, a profession that demands you get your name out there. I've always been a reserved and quiet person. After a few days at a business conference, I need a couch and a good book.

A bit nerdy, too. My favorite class in high school was AP Latin. In college, I got a degree in Integrated Science and Technology.

These traits don't exactly scream "marketer." Yet, here I am.

Marketing appeals to me because it combines creativity and commerce. It's a field with endless depth, a perfect playground for an insanely curious person.

From Science to Marketing

I studied Integrated Science and Technology at James Madison University. As an undergrad, I built a 220-gallon algae bioreactor and co-authored a book, Exploring Sustainable Biodiesel.

After college, I spent seven years at Antares Group working in renewable energy and biomass. The biggest project was a Department of Energy program to design and demonstrate the biomass harvest and supply system for Abengoa Bioenergy’s commercial cellulosic ethanol plant in Hugoton, Kansas. I worked the feedstock side: switchgrass, corn stover, wheat straw, and the equipment and logistics to get it to the plant. It was a world built on evidence, precision, and systematic thinking.

Homebrewing is how I found marketing. I built an online business, HomebrewAcademy.com, teaching people to brew better beer, and sold it in 2017. I'm still a certified beer judge. In 2023, when the National Homebrew Competition came to San Diego, I was one of the judges.

When I moved into marketing, I brought that same approach. I discovered that the principles of good argumentation, the kind I learned in science, work remarkably well in marketing. You can build genuine conviction through clear, coherent arguments. You don't have to manipulate people with psychological triggers.

Advising Online Educators

For most of the last decade, my clients were online educators and creators. In 2019, Tiago Forte hired me to help with the marketing for Building a Second Brain. He introduced me to David Perell, and later to Ali Abdaal, and both became clients too. Tiago and I eventually wrote a book together.

“I built Write of Passage on the back of Billy’s wisdom. For years, he was my #1 marketing advisor, and the course wouldn’t be where it is today without him.”

— David Perell, founder of Write of Passage

“The lessons and strategies I learned from Billy were what I directly applied to my own business to make 6-figures with our very first launch. Three years since that first launch, and we make several million dollars a year in profit directly from selling courses online.”

— Ali Abdaal, who later wrote the foreword to Simple Marketing for Smart People

You can read more of these stories on the Results page.

Today I work with serious experts: founders, coaches, consultants, and teachers who need to translate rigorous work into clear arguments. What unites them is a specific structural problem. They've built something serious, and their buyers can't easily evaluate the rigor.

The Five Lightbulbs

The Five Lightbulbs framework emerged from years of client work. I kept seeing the same patterns: great offers that weren't converting, smart people who couldn't articulate why their thing worked, marketing that was all tactics and no argument.

The framework gives you a systematic way to diagnose and fix these problems. Five beliefs your prospect must hold before they buy. That's the core idea.

I wrote about this philosophy in my book, Simple Marketing for Smart People, and in the manifesto.

I’ve taught the framework since 2020, personally, to over 140 people in more than 20 countries. About 10,000 people have read the book.

Fractal Thinking

Beyond marketing, I'm fascinated by how patterns repeat across domains, from branding to theology, from business strategy to symbolism. I call this Fractal Thinking: the idea that self-similar patterns reveal truth across every scale of business and life.

The seven-part Fractal Thinking series connects ideas that most people treat as separate: marketing, meaning, and faith.

San Diego

I live in San Diego with my family. More of my work happens here now, over coffee with founders and scientists, many of them building the kind of deep technology I used to work on. I’m also starting to teach the Five Lightbulbs here, in small, in-person sessions. More about my work in San Diego.

What I Believe

I believe humans are capable of reason and deserve to be addressed as such. I believe marketing should build conviction through argument, not manipulation. I believe you can be effective and ethical. Respecting your audience actually makes your marketing work better.

If that resonates, we'll probably get along.