{"id":8920,"date":"2026-10-17T23:35:40","date_gmt":"2026-10-17T20:35:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ivitskiy.com\/blog\/?p=8920"},"modified":"2026-10-17T23:40:27","modified_gmt":"2026-10-17T20:40:27","slug":"iss-barcelona-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ivitskiy.com\/blog\/en\/iss-barcelona-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Data Frameworks for Global Google Ads: Igor Ivitskiy at International Search Summit 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
In short:<\/strong> at International Search Summit Barcelona 2025, Igor Ivitskiy argued that marketers suffer from data overload, not data scarcity. His three frameworks, the Cultural Thermostat, the Profitability Map and the N-Gram Double-Edge, give advertisers quantitative levers: Hofstede’s six dimensions replace cultural guesswork, public benefit data by ZIP code replaces blind income targeting, and n-gram analysis of search terms usually lifts efficiency by 30 to 60%. The closing thought: best practices are paracetamol, mathematics is the differential diagnosis.<\/div>\n\n\n\n

International Search Summit Barcelona 2025<\/a> took place on November 13, 2025 in Barcelona, Spain. The talk was given by Igor Ivitskiy<\/a>, a PhD in mathematical modelling and the founder of Doctor Ads, who has spent 19 years applying mathematics to Google Ads budgets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/span>\"Igor
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Why polish the 80% to perfect it instead of finding the lever that gives you much better results?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Conference<\/strong><\/td>International Search Summit Barcelona 2025<\/td><\/tr>
Date<\/strong><\/td>November 13, 2025<\/td><\/tr>
City and venue<\/strong><\/td>Barcelona, Spain<\/td><\/tr>
Organiser<\/strong><\/td>TransPerfect Digital<\/td><\/tr>
Format<\/strong><\/td>~26-minute talk, English<\/td><\/tr>
Talk<\/strong><\/td>«Decoding Google Ads with a Mathematician’s Lens: 3 Data-Driven Frameworks for Global Scale»<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The talk is for performance marketers, agency owners and in-house teams who are scaling campaigns across borders and feel crushed by the volume of «best practices» advice. It is for those who suspect that the numbers already in their accounts have more to say than their dashboards are reading out of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Manual<\/strong><\/div>\n
<\/div><\/div>\n
10,000 hours<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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With multi-hour AI agent<\/strong><\/div>\n
<\/div><\/div>\n
8 hours<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Source: Igor Ivitskiy, ISS Barcelona 2025: 50 US states \u00d7 about 800 ZIP codes \u00d7 15 minutes each, against one 8-hour run of an AI agent.<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Why mathematics is a lever, not a tip<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Ten years ago, marketers had a shortage of data. Today, the opposite is true: there is more performance data in a mid-sized account than any human can read. The standard response, Igor argued from the stage, is to ship more «best practices»: build a custom attribution model, run 24\/7 multivariate landing-page tests, integrate a predictive LTV model for bidding, develop a proprietary in-house bidding algorithm. For most teams, none of that is actually buildable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The honest question is how to process the data that is already there. Igor pointed to Vilfredo Pareto, the economist who observed that 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. «Why should we polish the 80% to perfect it instead of just find the lever that can give you much better results?» Mathematics, in his framing, is that lever. It does not produce tips. It identifies the 20% that moves the account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The three frameworks he shared on stage are concrete examples of that approach: a six-digit cultural code for any new market, a public-data map of where to advertise and where not to, and a word-level view of search demand that exposes two kinds of waste at once. Each is built from data the account, the market, or a public register already contains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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1<\/span>The Cultural Thermostat<\/strong>
Use Geert Hofstede’s six cultural dimensions as a numerical coordinate when localising a new market.
Check: do you have a number, not a feeling, for the culture you are entering?<\/div><\/div>\n
2<\/span>The Profitability Map<\/strong>
Replace blind income targeting with public, location-based data on real earnings.
Check: can you put a postcode-level list of where to advertise and where not to?<\/div><\/div>\n
3<\/span>The N-Gram Double-Edge<\/strong>
Treat each word in your search-term report as a separate unit, first by profitability, then by click-through rate.
Check: do you have a word-level view of your search demand?<\/div><\/div>\n
4<\/span>Mathematics as Differential Diagnosis<\/strong>
Stop patching symptoms with best practices; find the root cause in the data.
Check: is the action you are about to take based on evidence from this account, or on a tip from the internet?<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Source: Igor Ivitskiy, ISS Barcelona 2025.<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Why should we polish the 80% to perfect it instead of just find the lever that can give you much better results?<\/p>Igor Ivitskiy, International Search Summit Barcelona 2025<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

How I enter a new country<\/strong><\/p>

I enter a new market with a cultural coordinate, not a guess. Hofstede’s six dimensions give me, in numbers, how a culture responds to authority, to risk, to group pressure, to long horizons. The numbers decide the brief. Everything else follows.<\/p><\/section>\n\n\n\n

None of this needs a data science team. It needs the habit of asking the account, the market and public registers a precise question before spending another dollar. That habit is what Igor teaches in his courses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Key insights<\/h2>\n\n\n\n