~/ independent operator

Hi, I'm Max Braglia.

I build, market, and monetize digital assets, and help businesses do the same. | Marketing, web development, and applied AI.

15+ years in digital marketing and web development. Former VP. Now independent.

LinkedIn X Substack GitHub
Max Braglia
~/ writing

The Operator's Notebook

Marketing, engineering, and AI — written from inside the work. What I'm building, what's working, and what isn't. No hype.

Read on Substack
~/ projects

Things I've built and shipped.

Owned properties, client work, and tools. Ordered by what matters to me right now.

01
MaxterMedia
Digital marketing agency. SEO, AI search, content, and websites for small businesses.
Agency
02
RIA Marketing Engine
Done-for-you search visibility, RIA content, local growth, and compliance review that help the right prospects find, understand, trust, and choose your firm.
Agency
03
Compliance Review Engine
Reviews RIA marketing docs against compliance rules. Fixes the copy, exports an annotated Word draft.
SaaS
04
Best RIA Compliance
Independent research directory of RIA compliance firms, with original profiles, comparison filters, and practical buyer guides.
Directory
05
Best RIA Marketing
Directory of independently researched RIA marketing providers, covering websites, content, SEO, automation, prospecting, lead generation, reviews, and events.
Directory
06
Advisor Content Engine
SEC/FINRA-compliant articles, posts, and newsletters for financial advisors.
SaaS
07
FinTool
Investment research workspace for RIAs. Screens tickers, ranks, drafts AI-powered briefs.
Internal tool
08
Web Archive
Captures permanent snapshots of web pages and social posts. Built for compliance recordkeeping.
Internal tool
09
LearnItalianPod
Italian learning platform I've run since 2004. 28M+ lifetime downloads.
Owned media
10
ItalianChat
AI Italian tutor with a bilingual voice. Built on the OpenAI Realtime API.
SaaS
11
I'm Alive Today
iOS safety app for people who live alone. One-tap check-in, auto SMS alerts.
iOS app
12
AI & The Future of Work
Research guide ranking 132 jobs, services, and products from most AI-resistant to most exposed, with one-sentence rationale for each.
AI Research
13
Learn AI Right
Open-source course: build AI without frameworks. Just Python and APIs.
Open source
14
JavaScript for Web Dev
Free JS course for Python developers. Fundamentals through React + FastAPI.
Open source
15
AI Bot Analyzer
Tests whether AI crawlers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Perplexity can reach your site.
Free tool
16
UTM Link Builder
Build clean, consistent UTM-tagged campaign links fast.
Free tool
17
The Current Proof
A ten-point manifesto on staying relevant. Experience only counts when it produces current work.
Owned media
18
FunWorldFacts
Facts site about the world. Ad-supported, and my testing ground for content systems.
Owned media
19
SEO Meta Tag Analyzer
A Chrome extension that analyzes SEO meta tags with visual feedback and recommendations to improve your website's search engine optimization.
Chrome Extension
~/ about

The operator behind it.

I came up through the work. Webmaster, then developer, then digital marketing leader, then VP of Digital Marketing at an agency where I drove 300% revenue growth and scaled digital properties to tens of millions of users. That stretch taught me how growth actually happens — and where most of it gets wasted.

I've run LearnItalianPod since 2004, one of the early podcast projects, now past 28M lifetime downloads. It's also home to ItalianChat, an AI Italian tutor I built with a bilingual voice character. Running a media property this long teaches you the unglamorous half of the business: retention, distribution, and shipping every single week.

I earned CS50W — CS50's Web Programming with Python and JavaScript from HarvardX. It's the credential I'm actually proud of, because it made me a better builder, not a better résumé.

// off the screen

I train hard. Strength six days a week, and I keep my nutrition tight — I'm a certified personal trainer and fitness nutritionist. Same discipline I bring to everything I ship.