[fpig]

I agree his explanation of purposefully under-optimizing doesn't make sense, however let me try to rephrase it in a way I agree with:

Paying someone to do something for you is as an investment. If you have no understanding of what you're investing in, it's not strange to be reluctant to make the investment. Additionally, if you're doing this type of marketing, but doing it suboptimally, you're not only wasting money, but an investor might not see the room for improvement because they may not see that you're doing it badly. They see "this is how many users they're able to get while doing all this marketing". If you haven't tried this type of marketing at all and the investor knows how it works better than you, they may see more room for improvement.

I think he is just being too liberal with the term "optimize" and what he means is, do the things you understand, and avoid doing the things you don't understand badly if you don't have to urgently deal with them.

[tylertringas]

^ this is a fair re-phrasing that I'd agree with.