David Ly Khim

I'm a Cambodian-American entrepreneur and growth practitioner. Currently building Omniscient Digital, an organic growth agency helping B2B software companies turn SEO, LLMs, and content into revenue growth channels.

Previously, I was Head of Growth at People.ai where I led the implementation of a product-led growth motion for the new freemium products, PeopleGlass and ClosePlan, overseeing product strategy, go-to-market, and customer acquisition initiatives.

Before that, I spent 6 years working on HubSpot's freemium business through multiple cross-functional projects including: driving the implementation of referral loops across the free product, bottom-of-funnel content strategy, and business development.

One key project I worked on was developing and executing a strategy to acquire users through marketplaces and integrations, which required collaboration across marketing, business development, and multiple product teams. This resulted in spinning up a new Growth Acquisition Team in Dublin. We revived and grew adoption of (a previously sunset) HubSpot WordPress integration from 8k to 110k+ installs (adopted by 22% of the customer base), drove 1000s of product signups a month, and influenced $3.6M+ in ARR. 

Skills: product management, growth experimentation, growth marketing, data analysis, user research, user acquisition, project management, SEO, content strategy, partnerships

Personally, born and raised in Long Beach, CA, now based in Boston. Into weight lifting, running, Muay Thai, reading, and whiskey. Not all at the same time.

Co-Founder, Head of Strategy & Operations

There was a period in SEO where you could win without ever talking to a customer.

Pull some keywords from ahrefs.
Write and publish some optimized pages.
Rank, bring in traffic.
Profit (maybe).

That era has been over but you'd be surprised at how many teams are still trying to run that playbook.

The teams winning now have a deep understanding of their customers' psychology

They know their customers’ pain points, ambitions, and the language they use. And it shows up in the content.

One company we work with sells financial planning software.

They’re frequently cited in ChatGPT.

It's not because they publish a bunch of listicles.

Instead, they've become a resource to help financial planners how to become better at what they do and to build their book of business. They share methodology. They have a point of view. They build topical authority.

So their brand get referenced even when someone isn’t asking ChatGPT for software recommendations.

They appear early and often in the customer journey.

If you’re not deeply embedded in your customer’s world and speaking to what they actually care about, you might be publishing content into the void.

Co-founder at Omniscient Digital | Ex-Growth @ HubSpot, People.ai

LLM visibility is having its vanity metric moment.

We just swapped keywords for prompts.

When measurement is unclear, marketers default to what’s easiest to count.

That’s the streetlight effect.

If you drop your keys at night but the only light is under a streetlamp, you search under the streetlamp. Not because the keys are there, but because the area with the most visibility.

In GEO, the streetlamps are:
- Category prompts (“best CRM for startups”)
- Trackable clicks from ChatGPT referrals
- Rankings for a small set of queries

Those are fine.

But if you only optimize for what you can measure, you miss what’s actually happening:

Whether we like it or not, this is the current nature of LLMs, where much of the influence they drive is upstream of measurable behavior.

It’s the same dynamic as zero-click LinkedIn content.

You read a post.
You remember the brand.
You search later.

Attribution says “organic.” Reality is “influenced by a LinkedIn post many weeks ago”

So what do we do?

- Track the streetlamp metrics
- But build a strategy for upstream influence
- And accept that all decisions include some level of uncertainty. Properly collected and analyzed data can reduce that uncertainty, but never eliminate it.

A month ago, G2 agreed to acquire Capterra, Software Advice, and GetApp.
Why does this matter for AI visibility?

One company will now control four of the most authoritative review domains in B2B software.

When a buyer asks ChatGPT "best CRM for a 200-person company," the sources cited in that answer shape the shortlist.

Review sites are heavily cited at this stage of the customer journey, the exact moment they're narrowing down their options.

Cate analyzed 25,000+ AI citations across ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overview, AI Mode, and Gemini and found something interest:

When you model the four domains together, G2's share of AI citations in bottom-of-funnel prompts jumps 76%.

They move from the 4th most-cited source to #2 (behind only Reddit).

In social proof queries specifically (customer reviews, case studies, testimonials), their combined share would give them a 93% citation lead over the next closest domain.

This is a consolidation play for the AI layer, not just the review layer.

For B2B software companies, the implication is straightforward:

The surfaces that influence AI answers are consolidating. If your review presence is weak on G2 and its new properties, you're losing influence at the point in the buyer journey that matters most.

Link to the full analysis in the comments.

Future-proof your brand | 2x Founder, Advisor, Dad

I’m an accomplished, strategic executive with extensive experience in building and leading teams, transforming brands, and developing innovative, long-term strategic plans. I’m known for cultivating trusted business partnerships and stakeholder relationships at all levels, including C-Suite leadership. As a visionary leader, I develop high-performing, empowered teams focused on achieving the organization’s short-term revenue goals and long-term growth objectives. 

I leverage a robust business acumen within brand development, creative, vendor sourcing and management, contracts negotiation, and budget management while staying informed of the latest trends and emerging technologies. I champion autonomous collaboration and bring a proven track record of designing scalable processes. Fluent in English and Russian.

Core Competencies:
Brand Equity | Operations Optimization | Strategic Planning | Team Leadership | Relationship Management | Innovation & Efficiencies | Process Improvement | Diversity & Inclusion | Systems Thinking | Design Thinking | B2B Marketing | Business Development | Solutions Development | Digital Agency Leadership | In-House Marketing | Creative Storytelling | Brand Strategy, Management & Transformation | Identity Development | Enterprise Partnerships | Consumer Experience | Financial Planning | Program Development | GTM Strategies | Organizational Planning  Project Leadership | Market Research | Product Positioning | Cultural Understanding | Emerging Technologies | Artificial Intelligence (AI) | Machine Learning (ML) | Web3

Dmitry Shamis

Never thought I'd be typing this...

Jenn and I are going to Cannes this year. First time ever. For both of us.

Look, I know the awards get all the headlines. But let's be real that's not why people go. It's the conversations, the handshakes that turn into deals, the "let's grab a drink" that turns into a partnership, the chaos of trying to find the right yacht.

And now OhSnap! is going to be in the middle of it!

If you're a CMO, head of brand, or CEO looking to scale your brand, let's find 20 minutes.

If there's a stage, panel, or conversation where we can add value, we want in.

Who's going? Drop a comment or DM and let's kick it.

And if you're not going but have been? What do we need to know?

OhSnap!

Making brands usable | Founder, Creator, Advisor, Dad

The waiting to board the flight home airport reflection period is one of my favorites. 

Tons of noise, chaos, people, yet somehow some peace.

I've never been to an event like this before. The knowledge was there. The speakers were phenomenal—Seth (I tagged you first), Nick, Kristin—thank you! But it was the people that made is something completely different. 

Every attendee has been through the same mentorship program with Musa (some would call it trauma bonding 😁) and we've become better people for it.

Not marketers.
Not leaders.
But people (well, we've become better marketers and leaders too).

The convos weren't about business or what can you do for me, it was about family, and direction, and connection. 

I'll share more about the content as I think about it further but as I start boarding I just wanna take a moment to recognize what taking a chance on yourself can do.

It's cheesy and cliche but fortune favors the bold. Do that thing you're unsure of bc you just never know!

Future-proof your brand | 2x Founder, Creator, Advisor, Dad

When the world best in-house creative teams come to our backyard, Jenn and I are there!

Spending the next two days with the UnderConsideration, LLC crew at In-House In-Focus In-Person in one of the coolest venues in Chicago!

If you're here, come say hi 👋 

OhSnap!

This is who you're asking to build your usable and scalable brand

OhSnap!

Your boss doesn't need you to be smarter than them.

They need you to make their job easier.

This applies whether you're an IC supporting your manager or a CEO reporting to a board. Everyone reports to someone.

I scribbled this down during KIND/RED and it stuck because I lived it in-house. Once I stopped trying to impress and started thinking about what my boss actually needed, everything changed.

Small stuff like:

- Writing emails with full context so they could forward them straight to leadership
- Building simple frameworks so decisions didn't require a 30-minute explainer
- Making sure deliverables told the full story without me in the room

None of this was complex. It just required thinking one level up.

When you make their job easier, they look good. And when they look good, they remember who made that happen.

That meant better projects. More trust. Promotions. Comp adjustments.

We bring that same mindset to our clients.

We've sat in those seats. We've made those bets on agencies and partners. We know how scary it is to stake your reputation on someone else's work.

So one of our biggest goals is making sure our clients look good internally. Making their jobs easier. Giving them wins they can take to leadership or the board.

For us, that means expanded scope, longer partnerships, and referrals.

They advocated for us. They took the risk. We make sure that bet pays off.

OhSnap!

I've been telling you to show up.

Post consistently. Build in public. Let people see what you're about before they ever need what you sell.

Some of you listened. Most of you didn't.

Now I have receipts.

My friends Drew Giovannoli and Jen Allen-Knuth just dropped Buyer Truths 2026 and the data is for real:

57% of buyers have already benchmarked you against your competitors before the discovery call. They're not curious anymore, they've already decided if you're worth their time.

55% of buyers only evaluate 2 vendors. Two. You're either on the shortlist or you don't exist.

62% stay with their current vendor even when something better exists. 

Read that again.

By the time someone books a call with you, the evaluation already happened. Your website, your LinkedIn, your content—that's not "awareness." That's the first round, and you weren't in the room.

Most deals aren't lost to a better demo. They're lost to not being considered at all.

Here's the flip side: if you're the incumbent, that 62% is your moat. The brand you've been building? The trust you've been earning? The work you've been delivering? That's why they stick with you.

But if you're the challenger trying to break in and you haven't been showing up... you're losing deals you don't even know existed.

I've been saying this. Now there's proof.

Go read the report at buyertruths.com. Then DM me because we've got work to do.

OhSnap!

My face sitting at a friend's house, listening to how her company paid some BCG consultants millions of dollars to tell them to use Claude code so they don't miss out instead of addressing their complete lack of strategy, goals, process, or prioritization... they're also not training them.

The FOMO has reached peak levels, folks

The busiest marketing teams are usually the least effective.

These past few years everyone's been obsessed with more. More videos. More social. More everything. And now that AI makes it easier, the instinct is to scale all of it.

But just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Here's what I keep seeing: teams that are exhausted, constantly busy, always behind. And when you ask what's actually driving results? Silence.

That's not a capacity problem. That's a strategy problem.

The ideas that could actually move the business? They're sitting in a backlog nobody opens. You can't take big swings when your team is buried in work that doesn't matter.

More isn't a strategy. It's indecision.

- What's driving results? Scale that.
- What's just noise? Cut it.
- What are you making because you always have? Question it.

AI gives you leverage. But leverage on the wrong things just gets you more of the wrong things, faster.

Your team doesn't need permission to do more. They need permission to stop. That's the job.

So what should you stop making?

OhSnap!

I keep thinking about Ryan Coogler's speech from the Oscars last night.

He spoke to his kids directly apologizing for the time away and reassuring them that he loves them more than anything.

The thing any parent can likely relate to is the push and pull between building something that can support the people you love and spending time with those people.

I know I do everything in my power to be with my wife and kids as much as possible but there are times when I have to be on the road or on a call knowing they're waiting for me.

It's somewhat reassuring to learn that even someone in a position like Ryan Coogler struggles with this too bc it's the daily battle.

To my kids, I love you more than anything.

To our clients, thank you for trusting us so that we can build something for our families

This really never gets old...

It was time to update my headline and about. It's something I've been thinking about bc my headline could share the POV more directly and my about looked like it was written by a job hunting AI in 2020 (...it was me, I wrote it...)

I was working with Perplexity to make some tweaks and work out some options and then Comet (the browser) asked if I wanted it to make the updates for me. It was a cumulative 5 clicks and 2 copy/pastes but it's so cool to watch happen.

What do we think of the new headline and about section?

I watched $75K get thrown in a dumpster. Literally.

I saw a TikTok recently of a woman digging through a dumpster to grab a piece of the Oscars red carpet for her apartment (TT: @hellopaigethalia). It reminded me of something I learned back in my large in person event days that still makes my blood boil.

Every single carpet at every convention center gets thrown out the next day. Every. Single. One.

When I found out, I tried to save $75K by skipping the carpet. I was told that wasn't reasonable because "people can't walk on concrete inside a convention center."

I was surrounded by smart people. People who understood exactly what was happening. And not one of them questioned it.

Meanwhile I'm scrapping for brand budget. Fighting to fund infrastructure that would pay off for years. Systems that would actually compound. And I'm being told $75K for carpet that gets trashed tomorrow is non-negotiable?

I was pissed. I was confused. Honestly, years later, I still don't get it. Especially knowing what I know now about where some of those companies ended up.

This is how budgets die. On "that's just how it's done" line items that nobody has the guts to question.

$75K on carpet = gone in 24 hours.
$75K on systems = value for years.

What's the dumbest "that's just how it's done" expense you've seen?

OhSnap!

sometimes on a friday night we do breakfast for dinner just because...

"WORKED REALLY HARD." 🪦 

I saw this design from one of my favorite artists (IG: @really_good_artist) and I couldn't stop laughing.

1. Because it's just a funny observation on life
2. Because I thought about how many brands (and of course people) this describes

Think about it... there are a million CRMs out there. A million AI tools. A million cybersecurity companies. Most of them do what they say.

So why should someone pick you over the other guy?

If your answer is "we work really hard"—you're in trouble. Because everyone works hard.

What you're known for is just as important as what you do these days (remember that brand moat??). Your product doing its job is table stakes now.

The brands that win have a point of view. Something the market associates with them beyond "we solve X problem." And they have the systems in place to share that message consistently—across every touchpoint, every campaign, every piece of content, and every team.

What would your brand's tombstone say right now?

OhSnap!

Between back-to-back calls and context switching, every good content idea disappears.

You're on a call, someone says something that makes you pause, and you think "that's a post." Then you hop into the next meeting and it's gone.

So I automated it with Zapier.

I built a Zap that pulls insights from our meeting transcripts, tags them by content pillar, and drops them into Slack so the whole team has visibility.

Here's the 6-step breakdown:

𝟭. 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗰𝗿𝗶𝗽𝘁 𝗧𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗴𝗲𝗿
We use Fathom.ai but any AI notetaker works. New transcript = Zap kicks off.

𝟮. 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗲
Most notetakers spit out UTC timestamps. This step converts it to something readable.

𝟯. 𝗥𝘂𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗜 𝗔𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁
This is the important part. I built a Zapier Agent that reads the transcript and returns JSON with: summary, content pillar, the exact quote that sparked the idea, context, and a gut reaction to the post.

𝟰. 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝘁𝗼 Slack
One message per meeting with the topic ideas as threaded replies. Clean and organized.

𝟱. 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗟𝗼𝗼𝗽
This takes the JSON from the Agent and loops through each idea so they post individually.

𝟲. 𝗧𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗜𝗱𝗲𝗮𝘀
Each content idea gets its own threaded message with the quote, pillar, and context. Timestamped back to the recording.

No more lost ideas. They're sitting in a channel, tagged and ready to write.

I can post all day, but OhSnap! grows faster when the whole team is sharing. They're on these calls. They have opinions. They should be sharing them too.

Your team should be doing the same.

Want to build this yourself? Use my Zapier link for 2 free weeks to try it out: https://bit.ly/3OjZv5G 

OhSnap!

#Sponsored #ZapierAmbassador

Brand partnership • Future-proof your brand | 2x Founder, Creator, Advisor, Dad

Turn your call transcripts into LinkedIn post ideas

Broken glasses, busted knees, bloody noses and that was just the first five minutes. 

Last night in the last practice of the season our third grade boys played their moms.

The moms won. By a lot...

What did this teach me about b2b marketing? 

Don't mess with moms!

Yesterday I shared how we built a system to mine content from our calls.

A lot of you asked: "But what exactly are you capturing?"

Here's the breakdown:

For each flagged moment, we grab 5 things:

1. Summary — one sentence on what the post could be about
2. Theme/Pillar — which of our 5 content pillars it maps to
3. The trigger quote — the exact words that sparked the idea. Verbatim. Include the timestamp.
4. Context — who you were talking to and what the conversation was about
5. Your gut reaction — what you thought in the moment. "This is so wrong" or "I've heard this 5 times this month" is enough.

What we don't need:
- Full transcripts (too noisy)
- Summaries written by AI (loses your voice)
- Polished thoughts (raw is better)

The goal isn't to capture everything. It's to capture the moments that make you react.

Those are the posts worth writing.

Full breakdown in the newsletter (link in comments).

OhSnap!

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