Most leadership teams approve marketing budgets with one expectation: growth. What they rarely see is how much of that capital quietly disappears into platform activity that never reaches the bottom line.

In this episode, Josh speaks with Jeff Swartz — founder and CEO of QJam, former CBS Television and Levenson Group executive, adjunct professor at Duquesne University's Palumbo-Donahue School of Business, and author of the Amazon number one bestseller The Intentional Leap — about where advertising dollars actually go and what it takes to stop the bleed.

Jeff breaks down the two root causes of ad waste, introduces his spiderweb effect framework for diagnosing whether your targeting strategy is built to convert or built to leak, and explains the six structural barriers that have historically locked smaller organizations out of geofenced advertising technology.

The conversation closes on the question most leaders are getting wrong: how to balance algorithmic execution with human judgment, and why technology without process is just expensive noise.

If your team is optimizing for impressions and clicks instead of incremental business outcomes, this episode is worth your time.

Full episode: https://cityshiftfinance.com/podcast-ceo-interview/wasted-ad-spend-marketing-roi-customer-acquisition/