# 2026-03-17 (Tuesday — St. Patrick's Day)

## Weekly Advisory Council Briefing (08:04)
All 3 analysts reported. Theme: infrastructure on fire, execution paralysis worsening.

Critical:
- GitHub PAT expires TODAY (Mar 17). Blocks all Cloudflare deploys across 4 products. Flagged daily since Mar 13, zero action.
- Google Ads verification deadline was YESTERDAY (Mar 16). Illumination 633/day account status unknown. If suspended, 54k/month offline.
- Illumination budget cut from 633/day to 188/day during peak growth (PMax +57%, Meta +41%, email +327%). Self-sabotage.
- Rob bottleneck has no relief valve. Same items flagged for 6-9 days running. Advisory council flagged paralysis Mar 10, 13, now 17. Zero improvement.
- Dream 100 Coole Swan email unsent for 9+ days.

Important:
- Ignite90: 19 funded startups, pipeline worth 285-855k. Zero outreach.
- Illumination conversion rate 0.67% vs industry 1.5-2.5%. Gap worth 130k+ annually.
- 13 unvetted skills still unreviewed (10 days). Security debt compounding.
- Products deployed but not launched pattern continues (Retail Targeting, Tradeify, AI Visibility).
- Zavi positioning: use UCD tender (Apr 8) as case study entry point.

New recommendations: escalation tiers for infrastructure, "Launch or Kill" Monday reviews, daily spend summary in morning cron, CRO audit for Illumination.

## 06:00 Memory Review (cron)

Reviewed daily logs Mar 14-16. MEMORY.md updated.

### Week Summary (Mar 14-16)

**Mar 14:** Resend email set up for Zavi (max@tilt.ie already on Resend team, used that — not SendGrid). zavi.ie domain DNS configured via Cloudflare API. App URL updated to zavi.ie. Service category feature built and deployed (13 types, AI auto-detects from PDF, manual override). "Built for Irish SMEs" badge removed. Auth confirmed wired.

**Mar 15 (major Zavi session, 08:00-19:30+):**
- Draft generation timeout fixed: per-section endpoint /api/draft-section/[tenderId] (~13s, avoids CF 100s kill)
- All 6 API routes switched from @anthropic-ai/sdk to raw fetch streaming (SDK fails on CF Workers edge)
- Human Input Guard added: blocks AI fill for case_study, insurance, financial, references, accreditation
- Multiple UI/UX fixes: case studies 3 blocks, team CVs 7 members, word count, markdown stripped, sort order, delete cascade, PDF deferred to analyse step
- MN Group tender knowledge bank downloaded locally: 45 KB sections + 10 full tender docs (528k chars)
- 23:37 Zavi: UCD Strategic Creative Marketing tender identified as live test case (deadline Apr 8 2026)

**Mar 16 (22:45-23:37 — late night session):**
- Illumination GA4 deep dive. Full year data extracted (1 Mar 2025 – 15 Mar 2026).
- Rob announced budget cut: €188/day rest of March (was ~€633/day Google alone), €250/day from April.
- Full channel analysis provided. Budget split recommended (Search €75, PMax €50, Meta €63 retargeting-only for rest of March; April: Google €165, Meta €85).
- Google confirmed driving 3x Meta's conversions (54% vs 14% of revenue). Organic Search nearly matches Meta for free (€30K).
- Email flows confirmed working (+327% in March so far). Zero repeat buyers in GA4 — possible tracking gap.
- Both Google campaigns already budget-limited — cuts will compress delivery.
- VAT clarification: Meta and Google spend shown ex-VAT. Add 23% for total cost.

### Critical Flags (as of Mar 17 6am)

- **GitHub PAT: EXPIRES TODAY.** Rob must regenerate at github.com/settings/tokens immediately. All CF Pages deploys (Zavi, Tradeify, Retail Targeting, AI Visibility Checker) will break today.
- **Zavi MVP: TODAY.** Rob + Tilt team testing with UCD tender (deadline Apr 8). Known blockers: storage bug (private bucket + getPublicUrl), category filter in drafting engine.
- **Google Ads identity verification:** Deadline was YESTERDAY (Mar 16). Status unknown. Check if accounts reinstated or still blocked.
- **Illumination budget cut:** Needs implementation. Rob to confirm which day to switch budgets. Rest of March plan ready.
- **11 outstanding tasks from Mar 11 voice note:** Now 6 days old. All still open.
- **Dream 100 Coole Swan email:** 9 days unsent. Needs rework + send.

### Notes
- St. Patrick's Day bank holiday — Rob may be with family. Zavi MVP test may slip to Wednesday if so.
- Likely a quieter day unless Rob initiates session.

## AI Video Tools Research (06:43-07:30)
Rob shared Arcads.ai link in group chat -- AI video ad generator for UGC-style ads with AI actors.
- Spawned research subagent to compare all major AI video tools for Tilt agency use.
- **Recommended stack:** Arcads ($110/mo) for best UGC realism, 300+ AI actors, bulk A/B testing.
- **Creatify ($49/mo)** tested by Rob -- he said "Creatify is bad" (avatar quality too low). Rejected.
- **HeyGen ($29/mo):** Too corporate/polished for cold traffic UGC. Good for explainers only.
- **Sora 2 API:** Just opened to devs (Mar 13), but NOT suitable for UGC ads (no talking heads, no lip sync, silent clips only). Could only do B-roll.
- **Key finding:** Arcads has integrated Sora 2 Pro directly into their platform. Best of both worlds.
- **Final recommendation:** Arcads alone. Rob asked me to sign up -- browser was down, asked Rob to sign up at arcads.ai with max@tilt.ie. Pending.
- **Proposed pipeline:** Research trending topics → write scripts → Arcads generates AI actor video → post to Instagram/TikTok → drive to landing page. For Love Irish Food, Burns Pet, Tradeify.

## Tradeify UI Fixes Session (18:59-19:21)
Rob went through the app on mobile, flagging issues. All fixed and deployed:

1. **Homepage featured cards too small:** Grid layout `max-w-sm` was constraining mobile cards. Changed to stacked `space-y-3` on mobile matching search page layout.
2. **"No reviews yet" text on cards:** Removed -- returns null instead for cards without reviews. Cleaner look.
3. **Internal pages too narrow:** TradesDashboard, MyJobs, JobDetail, PostJob all had `max-w-xl mx-auto` constraining width. Changed to `w-full lg:max-w-5xl lg:mx-auto` to match Home page width.
4. **Old navy colour scheme on internal pages:** Billing, EditInvoiceTemplate, TeamManagement all had hardcoded hex colours (#0F172A, #1e293b, #334155 etc). Claude Code refactored all to use CSS variable theme classes (bg-bg-base, bg-bg-elevated, text-text-primary, border-border-default etc). Zero hardcoded colours remaining.
5. **Popups converted to pages:** NotificationBell dropdown → full page at /notifications. QuoteBuilder modal → full page at /create-quote. Routes added to App.tsx.
6. **Logo navigation for paid users:** Logo in header now links to /trades-dashboard for trade users (was always linking to /). Uses existing `isTrade` flag.

All changes deployed to tradeify-v2.pages.dev across 5 separate deploys.
