[00:00:00] Donny Dvorin: Yeah, no industry changes faster than modern marketing. Great marketers need an edge. Great marketers need to be brave. The brave marketer podcast provides an opportunity for each guest to share a story where they exhibited bravery by taking a risk. They made a dramatic impact in the market. Our guests are marketers from top brands and agencies who share the exact strategies and tactics they used in their brave marketing moment. We then dive deep into topics like ethical advertising, consumer privacy, crypto marketing, brand safety, and navigating a future without third party cookies, hosted by brave software and me Donny Dvorin . Head of sales at Brave together. We’ll get a backstage view of the brave marketing moments and creative mindset work that shaping today’s most influential brands.

[00:00:55] [00:01:00] Yeah.

[00:01:00] Hello, brave marketer listeners. You’re obviously listening to a new episode of the brave marketer podcast. So this episode is a little bit different. What we’re going to do is we’re going to give you backstage access to what it’s like to be on the sales team at brave.. What advertisers are we talking to?

[00:01:18] Who’s having success. What were advertisers interested in before? What are they interested in now? And we’re going to do that with one of our regional leads, rich Rosenzweig. And this really came from a request from our audience that said, I love how you have brave marketers as guests, but I’m really curious what it’s like to talk to you.

[00:01:40] The brave marketers from an advertising sales perspective. And so that’s what we’re going to do today. So hope you enjoy this little different take on the episode, but before we hop in today’s episode, we want to highlight our brave pick of the week. So as you may know, every episode, we choose a brand that has run an ad campaign with brave as our pick of the week.

[00:01:57] And this one we’re doing corporate underwear. So they [00:02:00] ran push notification ads. . And really in talking to the founders over there, they were not satisfied with their Facebook ads and they were competing for the same audience as every other underwear company. And they wanted to reach an audience that was wider than their base.

[00:02:13] And their goal was to rapidly increase their sales. The first day of their campaign with brave resulted in five X, the number of sales from other advertising channels. And if you want to see a link to their case, study, just check it out and to show them. So now to today’s episode, you’re going to meet Rich Rosenzweig regional sales lead here at brave and rich as a seasoned vet.

[00:02:32] When it comes to internet advertising, his career spans over 17 years with stops at Yahoo Lou to me, Rubicon and a TiVo prior to joining brave in 2019. And he’s got really good knowledge across search display, video programmatics, and he seems to have an idea for all new products. I brave releases. What he’s not talking about the digital space.

[00:02:53] He’s spending time with his wife and two kids at the beach or skiing and with no further ado, here’s today’s [00:03:00] episode of the Bree leave marketer.

[00:03:10] Rich. Thanks for coming on the brave marketer podcast today. How are you doing? I’m doing good. How are yourself? I’m doing great. Thank you so much. As you know, this is a podcast that usually features brave marketers, but we’re going to put a twist on today and have you talk about. What it’s like to sell brave ads and a little bit about your history.

[00:03:31] I think the listeners are in for a treat. So as far as your brave marketing moments, I love you to talk about it. Now, the risks that you took, leaving a large corporation and joining startups that prepare people and advertisers for the future. Can you tell us about that brave marketing? Yeah,

[00:03:50] Rich Rosenzweig: for sure.

[00:03:50] there, there’s lots of moments that I’ve experienced in my career, but I think it actually goes back to around 2007. I was working at Yahoo, [00:04:00] selling search and, speaking to lots and lots of small companies on a daily basis and really becoming, I guess friends with a lot of these high powered CEOs and, one of them was that a company loaded.

[00:04:12] And, we started talking and building relationship and he was telling me about, opportunities around selling and, opening up new offices and so on. And, for me, it was kind of like, Hmm, this sounds pretty cool. I’m at this unbelievable company in Yahoo, I’m 25. I, I.

[00:04:29] a good paying job and, people know who Yahoo is. Nobody’s really heard of low to me at that time. And, I was kinda thinking, is this the time to take that risk and jump to a startup? if you think about it, there’s nothing really better than. a startup experience where you get to be part of building something from the ground up.

[00:04:48] And I guess my moment really was, understanding if you find that product that you really believe in, it just makes it that much easier to take that risk. And for me, I jumped from Yahoo to low to [00:05:00] me, and really what that did was prepare me for the rest of my career. for startups later.

[00:05:04] And here I am at brave and it’s been, one of the best experiences I’ve had for my life. No, I think it really started with, taking that risk and leaving that big corporation and joining the startup to really help build something from the ground up. That’s great.

[00:05:19] Donny Dvorin: So now that you’re here at brave, how have conversations gone since.

[00:05:24] Rich Rosenzweig: Yeah. So I started in 2019 and GDPR was in full bloom, here comes CCPA in California and then, a few months later, boom, Google drops this hammer on these cookies being eliminated. So for me, a few months in, and all of a sudden we’re having these interesting conversations with brands that, really there’s two different types of reactions that they were giving us, those first handful of conversations.

[00:05:48] Yeah. Oh, no, we’re in shock. We need to figure this out. some of the brands we spoke to actually created like cookie lists, task force and a few different types of, future of the advertising world [00:06:00] type groups. And for us, we were like, these are the types of people we want to speak to.

[00:06:03] Then you had other brands that were thinking. we have time. We’re not really in a rush to figure this out. So as a brave seller, what we want to do is speak with that first group. you want to have an answer for them today. And if you think about brave, it’s a privacy focused browser.

[00:06:18] Yep. check box. There. You have a cookie list solution, a check box, obviously we’re still early in the world. brands are starting to listen. So for me, it was like a really exciting time, again, took that risk to join a startup. And, within the first three months, the cookies were eliminated and people are starting to listen to what we have to say.

[00:06:37] Yeah.

[00:06:37] Donny Dvorin: And you talked about how brands are starting to cookie lists, task forces. Have you seen that extend into the agency side of the business or is there a dichotomy.

[00:06:49] Rich Rosenzweig: Yeah. it definitely started with the clients. but I do start, feeling like agencies. Yeah. Thinking in their heads, like we need to catch up and really understand, [00:07:00] like, where is this market going?

[00:07:01] So I think it started at the clients and now it’s rubbing into the agency’s minds and, we’re starting to get, folks reaching out to us to join some of these conversations. So I’d say yes, they definitely are starting to, create those types oforganizations within the agencies to figure this out.

[00:07:19] Gotcha.

[00:07:20] Donny Dvorin: Are those the main questions that you’re getting today, the GDPR, CCPA, CPRA and cookie LIS stuff, or has the conversation shifted at all?

[00:07:29] Rich Rosenzweig: yeah, I guess privacy and cookies are definitely a hot topic with advertisers, with any new platforms, there’s always going to be questions about your performance and your scale.

[00:07:39] the different access points, right? It’s are you available programmatically? what does your reporting look like? So I’d say the hardest part of my job is convincing these clients to really change everything that they’ve done. Over the last few years and, we’re being bold, right?

[00:07:54] we’re honestly we’re trying to change the internet. the question’s yes, they concentrate on that privacy [00:08:00] world, but there’s so many other factors because we’re becoming more mainstream in a sense, some of the questions align with the questions that I was getting at my previous roles, just around standard advertising questions.

[00:08:12] Rich, what

[00:08:13] Donny Dvorin: are advertisers really excited about? Right.

[00:08:17] Rich Rosenzweig: Yeah, I think the common theme, at least for like the last 18 months has really been around that privacy and cookie lose future that we just touched on.

[00:08:24] But I think what clients are super excited about is reaching a very unique audience. And if you think about. clients are always looking to market to a new person and, shameless plug here, it’s brave as unique, right? Cause we’re a browser that blocks all third party ads.

[00:08:40] if you think about programmatic ad spend, I think it’s going to hit $90 billion this year. because we’re blocking all of those, clients can come to the brave browser and our ad platform and really hit this audience that they’re not reaching. So I think advertisers need to understand.

[00:08:56] But there’s a whole world out there that they’re not hitting. And, you can come to that brave [00:09:00] ad platform and really hit those guys.

[00:09:02] Donny Dvorin: So what type of success are those clients having with

[00:09:05] Rich Rosenzweig: Braven? I think it’s important first to take a step back and just talk about the different ad units, because different clients have differentKPIs and whatnot.

[00:09:15] So like a client, like a Procter and gamble or a Toyota, these are very well known brands, right? They’re more interested in mass reach or top funnel awareness type executions. So they’re probably more interested in like our sponsored images. So these are those new tabs sponsorships that go out to really the entire audience.

[00:09:32] So their success is more about like mass reach eyeballsbeing able to own a browser. I think that’s pretty cool. So in their minds, A lot of times we’ll include surveys where we can actually get real feedback on how these performed around like Lyft or awareness or intent, things like that.

[00:09:50] So really when it comes to success, it really depends on the product. And then obviously on the flip side, there’s clients that are looking for some type of [00:10:00] conversion. So like high CTRs, there’s clients like the lending trees of the world. They’re progressive where. They’ll use push notifications to drive those signups or, some sort of acquisition.

[00:10:10] I don’t want to get into specifics, but like these clients really see a value of not only just hitting their goals, but again, hitting a new audience with different types of products that they’re not used to. Got it.

[00:10:22] Donny Dvorin: And I think a lot of our listeners know that we run a lot of crypto advertisers.

[00:10:27] The latest stat I saw was that around 70% of our advertising, it’s coming from the crypto categories. But the mainstream advertisers, like you were just talking about, they are catching way of privacy and cookie lists marketing, and they’re starting to come out. So what specific mainstream advertisers are you seeing in your book?

[00:10:48] Rich Rosenzweig: It. I think it’s funny if you interviewed me a year ago. I probably can name a handful maybe on one hand, how many mainstream advertisers work with us? Like you said, definitely [00:11:00] crypto heavy, fast forward to now.

[00:11:01] And we have new big time advertisers coming to the platform every day. brands like MasterCard, American express PNG Anheuser-Busch. Ashley furniture, home Depot, Napoleon. I can keep going and going. it just continues to excite me. You could probably hear it in my voice. It’s every day we start seeing these brands actually reaching out to us and, Donnie, we both have been doing this a long time.

[00:11:24] I don’t know a lot of startups that get the type of attention that brave is getting where brands are actually reaching out to us. And it’s exciting to be a part of it.

[00:11:32] Donny Dvorin: Yeah. Do you find that specific categories are working better than others?

[00:11:38] Rich Rosenzweig: Yeah, it’s a great question. Yeah. I mean, if you think about our audience, there’s definitely brands that are looking to target the early adopters tech enthusiast or, financial savvy. Those are definitely the best performing categories. gaming is definitely starting to take off as well.

[00:11:52] since most of our audience is in the gaming space, but I think one that’s super interesting is the CPG brands. I mentioned a large [00:12:00] one earlier. But, they love the fact that we’re reaching a very unreachable audience. And if you think about it, this audience is very vocal. And one of these brands that we spoke about earlier, they talk about talkability, they love the fact that brands, or I should say that people spend time on Reddit and actually share their feelings.

[00:12:20] And that’s something that you don’t typically get with standard advertising, like display ads or video ads in our world. people are going on Reddit and sharing their true feelings. The brand or not, that’s something that’s super cool to see from a brain perspective.

[00:12:34] Donny Dvorin: So why do you think brave is emerging as such an important ad platform?

[00:12:39] Rich Rosenzweig: the internet is changing, right? It’s you know, when I started in late 2019, I think we had about 10 million monthly active users. now we’re growing to over 32 million and these are monthly active users, but we’re also growing from a daily perspective. I think we’re up over 12 million daily active users.

[00:12:57] So it’s all about being in the right place at the [00:13:00] right time. And, because we’re making noise brands a hundred percent, want to be part of it.

[00:13:04] Donny Dvorin: And so what should advertisers be worried about?

[00:13:08] Rich Rosenzweig: Honestly, I think it’s missing it. Yeah. Hold on testing now, because it might be too late, even though Google changed its course again on eliminating of the cookies or when that might happen, brands still need to figure it out.

[00:13:20] And really that time is now. And I also think that there’s new privacy regulations coming out on a weekly, monthly basis. So you never know what’s going to happen next. So I think it is that they have to worry about.

[00:13:34] Donny Dvorin: Yeah. And you talked to a lot of different advertisers. What do you think that they’re saying is the biggest threat to the marketing

[00:13:42] Rich Rosenzweig: world? I think it is the unknown, I think Google changing its course trade desk and other big companies creating unified IDs there, there’s just a lot happening.

[00:13:53] You don’t want to get lost and that’s happening to a lot of clients today. they made the announcement that cookies aren’t going away for an extra [00:14:00] year or so. clients were like, wait, should we stop trying to fix things or stop trying to innovate? if they don’t start now, they could potentially miss it.

[00:14:08] So I, I do think that the biggest threat is that unknown. And not realizing like what could happen tomorrow.

[00:14:15] Donny Dvorin: Got it. And so on the flip side, what do you think is the biggest opportunity right now?

[00:14:21] Rich Rosenzweig: shameless plug. I think it’s testing us and working with brave and getting ahead of the unknown by saying, Hey, I figured out a cookie list solution, a privacy centered ad platform.

[00:14:33] Here’s a way that I could market to a very unique audience today and not having to wait. So I do think the biggest opportunity is really, testing brave. So

[00:14:41] Donny Dvorin: we asked this question of a lot of our different guests. so firstly, sentence, I wouldn’t be where I am today. If I hadn’t done that.

[00:14:49] Rich Rosenzweig: Wow. I, hopefully my wife is listening to this, but I would say I wouldn’t be where I am today.

[00:14:54] If I hadn’t started listening to my wife. And I say that because she does a [00:15:00] really good job of listening to me and calling out what I’m actually saying. She’s a, a teacher and always listens to what I have to say before giving her response. And a lot of times I go to her with these types of questions around marketing and advertising, taking risks.

[00:15:15] This company has these benefits. These companies have, these negatives and she’ll lay them out for me and really help. If it wasn’t for her, even back in 2007, I probably wouldn’t have left Yahoo because she was the one that voice of reason to say, Hey, now’s the time to take the risk.

[00:15:31] And I did. And, fast forward to, middle of 2019, obviously with brave coming on strong in the world, I had my positives and negatives of what I wanted to do. she laid it out for me and said, take the risk and, a year and a half later it’s one of the best risks I’ve taken.

[00:15:45] And I don’t even call it a risk anymore because I love every day of being at the brief. That’s

[00:15:51] Donny Dvorin: awesome to hear. is there someone that you think you’d like to nominate to be on the show? Yeah

[00:15:56] Rich Rosenzweig: I love for Proctor and gamble to get on. they did some [00:16:00] really cool stuff with us and, I love for someone like them to, really talk about their experience and how it performed, I can’t get into the specifics, but I’d love for them to, come on board and talk.

[00:16:11] Great.

[00:16:12] Donny Dvorin: So rich, thanks so much for being on the brave marketer podcast and really enjoyed having

[00:16:15] Rich Rosenzweig: you. Thank you. I’m excited to, to hear I’ve been a huge fan since season one and excited for what season two has in store.

[00:16:22] Donny Dvorin: hopefully you enjoyed that episode with rich Rosenzweig on the brave sales team. I thought some great takeaways, whereas rich talking about which mainstream advertisers are running with brave right now we discussed it really excites them and what they are faced with right now. So we talked about the dichotomy between agencies and brands are a little bit ahead of the mark when it comes to getting ready for the cookie lists area.

[00:16:53] And we did, we talked about different categories that are doing. Technology focused brands seem to do really well on brave. And, [00:17:00] obviously brave has grown at a really fast clip. So hopefully you enjoyed that. If you like what you heard today and found it valuable, it’d be super helpful.

[00:17:10] If you took one minute to leave us a short review in apple. Every review counts and helping us get our show and more ears. And on one final note, if you have a brand product or service they like to get in front of briefs, 30 million users, please email us@adsalesatbrave.com. And let us know you are a podcast listener to unlock one of two perks.

[00:17:27] If your budget is under $10,000 a month, we’ll bump you up to the top of our self-serve waiting lists. Or if your budget is $10,000 or over. We’ll qualify you for our 25% podcast listener discount. Just email us@adsalesatbrave.com. That’s a D S a L E S I brave.com and finally music credits for the intro announcer and all the music that you’re hearing today is my own brother

[00:17:54] And you can have a link in the show notes to his information. We’ll see you [00:18:00] next week on the brave marketer podcast. .