The Transaction Layer

Speaker 1: Hey, so I'm very excited to welcome to this edition of the Business Marketing recorded live here at Cannes Lions in the beautiful Dep's garden.

Speaker 2: It is pretty here. Very pretty.

Speaker 1: This is Ned Paul.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Um, Mr. Paul Blackburn, who's the chief growth officer-

Speaker 2: Yeah

Speaker 1: ... for, uh, for Vudoo. Um, we've just, uh, preambled this, this conversation with the fact that you are, um, podcast veteran advocate, um, and you've done 18 this week already. So we've had a mutual kind of conversation about that.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: I think it's very apt for what you do as well to be driving around Cannes in a, in a van.

Speaker 2: Th- exactly. You gotta walk the walk, don't you? If you, you know, and talk the talk.

Speaker 1: I-

Speaker 2: So there we go.

Speaker 1: But you're doing both.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Um-

Speaker 2: Happy days. Y- and it was, like, as I was mentioning to you, when you're in the corset, uh, and having people in the van with air conditioning, uh, and a, and a glass of rosé and, and do some great content and hear some great stories, it's a, it's a fan- fantastic way to meet people.

Speaker 1: So why don't we kind of start with the-

Speaker 2: Sure

Speaker 1: ... the kind of brilliant basics. Why don't you first of all just tell me kind of like a little bit about kind of why you exist and the problem you solve?

Speaker 2: Uh, we exist to make, um, you know, the transaction process, uh, seamless. Vudoo was started eight, uh, or nine years ago now almost as a video analytics business, um, by our founder Nick Morgan. Uh, Nick's background was in, uh, e-commerce, um, and the idea was for him is that he wanted to be able to measure the effectiveness of video. Obviously, the ultimate interaction, uh, uh, and, and show of effectiveness is that it drives a purchase. So with his e-commerce background, uh, he, he, he felt that, you know, it was wasted money sending people all the way around the internet with, you know, low click-through rates and all this money to send them to a location to buy something where there's huge a cart, cart abandonment rates. And so he believed that br- taking the friction out of that process meant that you were gonna get more return on your advertising investment and a better consumer experience, and that was what was critical. So, uh, they launched their first, uh, shoppable video campaign with Moët & Chandon. They did a D- D2C model. It actually won a, um, uh, a walk award here at Cannes, uh, three or four years ago, and since then, um, they've worked-- they're looking to make, uh, any, um, advertising or any content on the open web, social media, CTV, um, you know, instantly transactable. There's a lot of people saying, talking about shoppable media out there. I think, I suppose the big difference with the product that, um, Vudoo has created is that you do it all in-stream, that our retail partners, we don't disintermediate. So for example, if you're shopping with our retail partner Amazon on CNN, uh, you're, uh, w- uh, we're not disintermediating that base. We're not taking clip of the ticket. It's simply a pass-through, and you are shopping with Amazon on CNN without having to leave CNN's environment. Uh, you can add to cart for later, that sort of stuff. So that's kind of what we do.

Speaker 1: And sort of what are you seeing that tells you that this is really becoming a part of the market rather than just a, as you said, a kind of a, a nice story in some ways?

Speaker 2: Well, I think retail media has exploded.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: Uh, commerce media, where we have a, our podcast-

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm

Speaker 2: ... Commerce Media Matters. And I think the promise of retail and commerce media is the closed-looped, you know, um, uh, uh, the ability to do closed-loop attribution.

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: Uh, and so removing, um, the friction, uh, process, um, you know, seeing it happen in social media, I mean, I'm sure you yourself have bought something, um, with a couple of clicks in on Instagram or TikTok shop, and I think the consumers are beginning to expect that, right?

Speaker 1: 100%, but it's also, for me personally, um, high friction, right?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: And, and so I, I totally get kind of like the problem you solve. Tell me a little bit about kind of what you specifically do to remove that friction and make it as seamless as possible.

Speaker 2: Okay. What we do is we ingest the advertising content into our, uh, our ad center platform, the Vudoo ad center platform, which is the central nerve of everything we do. In that platform, uh, we're able to integrate, uh, via API to the D2C, uh, sites. We're able to integrate with the e-commerce platform, the payment gateway, uh, a- and all the product information. Uh, we're then able to cer- to, to spit that same advertising placement out with an overlay that makes it shoppable and traffic that same advertising tag across the programmatic ecosystem. And therefore, wherever that ad is seen, you can shop, but you're shopping with Moët & Chandon's D2C site, no matter which publisher you end up in, whi- which social media, um, you know, um, uh, whether it's, uh, some of the stuff we've done with Pinterest or some of the stuff that we've done with, uh, TikTok shop.

Speaker 1: So we've got the brands, we've got the retailers, we've got the publishers, we've got, in certainly in some cases, you've got your kind of ad tech, kind of programmatic kind of platforms. Tell me a little bit about that, that ecosystem and how it's all woven together.

Speaker 2: It's funny, um, wi- with some of the, uh, themes that have come out of the chats that we've had this week, um, they've talked about, uh, commerce media needing to be an ecosystem.

Speaker 1: Right.

Speaker 2: And there's so many people in the ecosystem that you need to form-

Speaker 1: Sure

Speaker 2: ... uh, you know, uh, a way to, uh, make it all connect, uh, and, and, and work as one. So, you know, at the, at the top end, you have brands that wanna reach audiences, and they wanna sell products. You ha- have retailers, um, that have the, the functionality, and, and all we are doing is making it easy for the brand to, to, to do their brand spend, to do the fanta- fantastic creative work to stand out, uh, and for the retailers that then be able to take the transaction on behalf of that brand. Um, and so, um, and just remove all that friction.

Speaker 1: And who's leading the way from a kind of brand or retailer or creator kind of perspective? Who's really nailing this at the moment?

Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, the obvious ones are really starting to nailing it- nail it. So you've got, um, Amazon, which are doing some really cool stuff. You know, they've just launched their new CTV product with Single Stick. Um, uh, we are a partner of Amazon. Um, I think that there's not many people in the space of have been able to make the transaction happen in the ad during the, during the programmatic, uh, across the programmatic ecosystem, which is, uh, we think we're, we're, we're category defining. Um, but there is some great products out there. You- uh, we look at our friends from Criteo, uh, you know, their retargeting capabilities that, you know, able to bring people down the funnel from, you know, consideration, uh, to purchase. Um, and, um, you know, I think you've got, uh, the, the Walmarts of the world, obviously what they're doing, um, the big guys. So there's a, a few guys there. But I, I've-- my hot tip is that we're gonna sit here next year, and we're gonna talk about the creator economy, and we're gonna talk about creators being able to create transactions as well as the brand part.

Speaker 1: I, I love it. I love where we're going on this.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: I think I, I think, you know, it's like what's driving this now-

Speaker 2: Yeah

Speaker 1: ... it just feels like there's a lot of conversation around sort of, you know, kinda going beyond, beyond the kind of traditional kind of like, you know, uh, sort of, you know, uh, commercial models of, of the sector into being more, you know, outcome-based or whatever you wanna kind of, um, describe it as. And obviously, as the rise of the creator, this provides them with another monetization sort of, uh, layer. Tell me a little bit more about kind of where you're going in that regard.

Speaker 2: Um, so our work with Amazon's really interesting. So, uh, in the US, uh, we are now live where we're a- the, the exclusive partner of Amazon to be able to, uh, enable a transaction off amazon.com. Um, where it's really interesting is where you add that to the mix with an influencer who's able to, you know, resonate with a particular audience, do some great content work. Uh, for the influencer or- or if they're a partner with Amazon themselves and if, uh, they have an affiliate a- account, we can tag their affiliate account so they can earn the affiliate commission. So essentially, you know, you've got these influencers that are able to then be, uh, effectively monetized for creating great content on behalf of brands, and the brands are getting what they need out of it too because they're able to place that and, and, and amplify that content into intermediate space. Um, so really exciting stuff. I think the other th- other, um, uh, I guess tailwind that we're gonna see in, well, um, what the transactable media space is that, uh, retail media has sort of got the brilliant basics right this year. Last year was, you know, AI was scary, and they were here on, on mass. Um, but I think they're in a really good space now on their owned and operated, and they're all looking at ways to do more with third party, uh, with their data and, and third-party, uh, advertising, uh, ecosystems. Uh, and so the next step of that is the creative layer to ensure that you can take the transaction wherever the consumer interacts with your brand.

Speaker 1: And from a, from a brand and from a kind of marketeer kind of perspective, maybe it's an obvious question, but what's the benefit to that?

Speaker 2: What's the benefit for, to that? It's efficiency, right? Um, and look, not every consumer is gonna see an ad, see the product, and wanna transact in the moment. Um, our technology allows them to browse and have a shopping experience in that ad, and they might come back later. They might add it to cart. With, uh, our, our partnership with Amazon, um, we can see when they're added to cart, and we have a 90-day attribution window, so we can retarget you, et cetera. But from a consumer's perspective, it means that they're not distracted from the journey that they set out on. So, you know, you sit there and you go, "Okay. That's a great product. I'll add that to my cart for later, but I'm gonna continue to read the article that I was reading." Um, and so you're actually performing a utility and providing better user experience for, um, for, for, for the consumer. Um, you know, fast-forward, um, uh, another 12 months to next CAN-

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm

Speaker 2: ... we'd also like to see, uh, the same sort of things happening in, uh, LLM surfaces. Uh, we have a product with conversational commerce where we'd like to be partnering with the LLMs. We think that where maybe, uh, OpenAI got it wrong is that they were disintermediating the, the, the retailer and, a- and, and, and therefore they didn't get a lot of retailer support. You've seen some of them pull back. They also didn't understand, I don't think, that it's really important to have a shopping experience on the surface. You need to at least almost touch, like be able to filter through the product, check the sizes, see the prices, and just a buy now button isn't gonna cut it 'cause it doesn't give you that brand experience that customers need to feel comfortable and trust the environment that they're in to then make a purchase.

Speaker 1: We need to be ready to buy, right, when we wanna buy it.

Speaker 2: That's right. That's right. I think you wanna be ready to buy. You wanna be, uh, buying from trusted partners, your preferred retailers, people that you have your loyalty programs with, um, because, you know, the trust is low, um, out, out there. I, I, I heard a stat, uh, yesterday, and I might get this slightly wrong, but it's like 40% of Americans are actively using, um, AI, um, e- every day, but only 2% trust it. And so trust is a factor. So if you can use technologies like, uh, Vudoo, uh, or, or, or some of our competitors to turn up and provide a, uh, a brand experience, so you're having a, uh, an experience with a brand that you trust and a retailer you trust in that environment, you're more likely to trust and therefore purchase. Yeah.

Speaker 1: And, and how do you kind of embed sort of trust into the product itself so that as a consumer, as a brand, I'm not even thinking or worrying about who I'm buying from and so on?

Speaker 2: So the-- That's a, a, a great question. Um, we put a lot of work into testing, um, the trust signals. Um, with the Amazon product, um, people trust Amazon. So when you, uh, purchase through, um, our, our shoppable ads in a, in a publisher's environment, when you interact with the ad, it looks, feels like, and it is essentially Amazon. So you've got the Amazon cues. You've got, um, the login with Amazon, all that information that you-- all those trust signals. We're only working with trusted retailers, so in Australia, we're working with the Coles group.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: We're talking to Sainsbury's and Argos, these big guys where they, they are trust signals on their own. Yeah.

Speaker 1: Where are you-- You're, you're a growth, you're a growth leader. The product removes the friction, but where, where's the friction in getting the product to market?

Speaker 2: Where's the friction in getting the product to market? I mean, I think the, uh, the hardest thing in an AI world in particular is, uh, is reaching the right people. Um, and especially if you've got a new product, um, you know, um, conversational, you know, uh, um, um, uh, like ChatGPT, et cetera, are great for helping you decide decisions and find things. But how, if you're a new product, do you get that discoverability factor? Um, and so I think, you know, this is where the influencer piece comes in, um, and why they're having their time in the sun. They're now on the front beach now instead of in the backstreets of Cannes, I noticed, taking over the place. Um, and that's because, you know, influencers have a great, uh, ability to resonate with a particular target audience. That trust factor's there with them. So, you know, I'm sure you have your, your, your, uh, influencers that you would follow or those people that you look up to that would recommend products. Um, and so, um, I think that's a, a critical part of the, the mix of discovery. Um, and so, um, if we can help then reduce the friction of that transaction, um, you know, that's, that's only gonna help.

Speaker 1: And, and f- and for you to get sort of a pr- program campaign, kind of a relationship going with a brand-

Speaker 2: Mm.

Speaker 1: Give me a sense of kind of like what steps we kind of need to go through to get me from being, "I've had a great conversation with you at Cannes," to, to us being live and transactional in the market.

Speaker 2: That's a really great question, and we've worked really hard on making it super easy 'cause that's where it can all go wrong. We know that ad tech, programmatic ecosystems, retail media fragmentation, all those things make it really difficult for marketers and agencies, et cetera. So what we've done is we worked really hard to make it super simple. So the way that our technology works is that we're able to take an existing ad tag, an existing piece of creative, pull it into our platform, and ma- put a, a, a layer over the top to make it shoppable. And that's the beauty of the product. It's that simple. We then send back that same ad tag to where it needs to be trafficked programmatically, and it's blasted out across the programmatic, uh, or, or, or, or direct IO, um, ecosystem. W- so it's really important to make it super simple. We work with partners like PubMatic, Index Exchange, uh, to curate, um, our inventory that we know is gonna have great effect for our particular, uh, execution. Uh, so we curate that inventory, you know, the quality inventory that we know is gonna have h- uh, high levels of attention so that people can engage witha- without with, with the creative and, and, and, and, and, and really explore the interactivity that we offer in that shoppable experience.

Speaker 1: And the commercial deal kinda has to work for everyone.

Speaker 2: Yes.

Speaker 1: So sort of really interested in kind of how you think about sort of building sort of, you know, value, you know, for ultimately, yeah, the consumer's value, that's clear. But the brand, the retailer, the agency, the ad tech partner, the publisher, the media owner, how does that kind of value kind of all up- line up kind of neatly?

Speaker 2: Yes. Well, we're, we're a CPM model. Um, uh, but I guess the great thing that, about our product is we're an outcomes-based product. So our CPM has to more than o- uh, you know, account for the, the outcomes that it creates. And when you're talking about transaction outcomes that we can measure, 'cause we can se- tell how many products were actually added to the cart or how many products were actually checked out, you can actually see the amount of purchase that you've generated for that CPM. Uh, and that's a really critical part o- o- o- of the product. So, um, yeah, I think that's one of the things that we're so excited about, is that we've, uh, been able to demonstrate the return on investment on these ads. Um, um, um, and that the consumers are, are really craving this experience. And they, like I said, they're not always going to check out the first time they see an ad. Um, but they're gonna add to cart, they're gonna explore the product more, they're gonna come down the funnel. And if we hit them at the right time with the right data set, they will purchase.

Speaker 1: And when you, when you look at kinda how things are running now and you think about the kind of the, where everything is going and, and the future kind of roadmap, what, what are the kind of the big kind of, big or just gnarly kind of like bits that you're really focused on now and on im- improving to just keep honing and refining that kind of, and removing that friction?

Speaker 2: Yeah. So I think for us, um, it's, uh, we've got some great partnerships, as I've mentioned some of them-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... Amazon and, and Coles in, in Australia. And it's about, um, ensuring that we have all the retailers, the big retailers a- across the world hooked up so that we offer the brand advertisers their choice of retailer. And as you're probably aware, if you're, say, a cosmetic a- advertiser, you're gonna wanna p- support all of your channel partners. So that's one of the things that we wanna work on. We wanna be able to democratize this across all of the different retailers so that you get to a point with when you're doing your ad campaign, it's a little bit like, "Would you like fries with that?" It's, "Would you like shoppable with that?" And that's one of the things we'll work on. So lots of partnerships by this time next, uh, year with Cannes, and the great news is with, with, with the, with a couple of the big partners that we've already mentioned, they're huge with, with Amazon. We've got runs on the board, we've got results. Um, we recently won, um, five, uh, uh, awards at the DRUM Commerce Media Awards, um, for our Mattel campaign. Um, and so we've got these results, and we can prove that, um, the outcomes are there. Uh, and so for us, it's the, the extra retailers. Um, I think the other thing that we'll be really interested in is also, uh, our ability to work across all the different surfaces. So AI. Um, obviously, uh, you know what? We haven't gone too far into AI. This is the first time, uh, uh, um, on a podcast I haven't been, it hasn't been all about AI for Cannes, but you know, we see, uh, that we're adjacent, we're an adjacent technology to AI, that we're an enabler for those environments, the LLMs. Um, the, in the ad environment, we're looking to create conversational commerce.

Speaker 1: Mm.

Speaker 2: So the same way our tech works that you can, um, interact with the product within the ad and look through it like a traditional, uh, PDP page in the ad and check out, we wanna be able to add the ability to talk. So you can ask, "Do you have it in s- a blue size? Is this going to fit, um, a, a, a, a gentleman who's six foot two, you know, this weight," et cetera. Um, and use, you know, natural language to, to, to, to, to help, uh, alleviate consumer questions and bring them further down the funnel and, and enable that purchase. So there's some of the things that we, we, we, we would love to be working on for next year and where we see growth.

Speaker 1: I think that's tremendously exciting, and it kind of m- it, as, you know, to your open AI point sort of earlier around sort of like, you know, that's exactly how I feel, you know, both sides of the table need to be thinking with regard to kind of how ads are moving, you know, in an AI kind of environment, right? The, the last thing we need are more sponsored kind of ad- ads appearing on, on our kind of, um, you know, prompts, prompt interfaces, right?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Embedding it into the conversation.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: What, what sort of- where are you on that s- on that kind of journey, and sort of what, what is the early kind of signs of, of kind of, um, success?

Speaker 2: Yeah, good question. So we've got a, a few prototypes, um, up and running with a couple of our publishing partners. Um, and, uh, we're really excited about, um, those sorts of conversations. We're talking to some of the LLMs. Um, it's early days. Um, we are, uh, heavily into experimentation, um, with, uh, consumers already, uh, with prototypes around, um, using MCP and UCP protocols and universal cart. Uh, really interesting stuff. It's gonna allow us to integrate much faster with much, uh, lower lift for, uh, for, for, for retailers, for those retail integrations as for, and for brands as well. Um, it's a little bit slow-

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm

Speaker 2: ... but three to six months' time in the world of AI, things could be a, a great user experience. So right now we're, we're seeing some really cool, compelling, uh, ways to use, uh, MCP and UCP protocols to, to create that transaction and, uh, to create, uh, uh, shoppable media, but it's not quite there yet. But I reckon this time next year it'll definitely be here. So agentic commerce will arrive.

Speaker 1: Tell me more about agentic commerce.

Speaker 2: Um, well, I think we've had a lot of experience in, uh, you know, uh, the, the, the e-commerce ecosystem, payment gateways, um, the different e-commerce, um, backends, the bespoke nature in which retailers have, uh, their setups, um, and their technology stack. Um, and we think, you know, MCP and UCP and, and all the different pro- ACP, all the different protocols are gonna go a long way to solving some of the friction. Um, but we know under the hood at most retailers, there's always the bespoke. Um, so we're really excited around the efficiencies that's gonna create for us to do and the, and the opportunities it's gonna create to, to create new product variants for us. Um, but we also know that it's, uh, it, there's some complexity there, that these things aren't gonna be silver bullets, at least in the next, uh, 12 months. Um, so our, our, our history in solving, um, you know, uh, um, the, the complexity of, um, API integrations, uh, and, and, and plugins, um, for, you know, uh, specific clients. Uh, I mentioned moat and Chandon out before. You know, there are, there are regions that they're not allowed to, to, to deliver alcohol to, and that is a bespoke API, uh, that may be not, uh, accounted for in MCP, UCP there. This is all experience that Vudoo's had. So we're really excited about the advances that these, uh, protocols are gonna make. Um, and, and, and, and, and who knows what, you know, three to six months looks like, but we think that there's, uh, uh, there's some, some, some really good signs that the consumer experience is, is, is getting there, and, uh, yeah, we think it'll, it'll, it'll, it'll proliferate very soon. Yeah.

Speaker 1: It's, yeah, it's very exciting.

Speaker 2: Yeah. It's very exciting stuff.

Speaker 1: Um, what's been sort of the reaction to conversations that you've been having in the back of the van in your podcast, but also in the conversations you've been having around, uh, prospective kind of new brands coming on to, onto the, into, into the Vudoo family?

Speaker 2: Um, I guess, um, more generally around the conversation we've been having, the general themes that we had, um, uh, conversations around is that your sort of AI, uh, table stakes is this year is kind of there, that everybody's, uh, got their backends in order and they're actually doing stuff, uh, for efficiency reasons. Um, the next, um, w- uh, wave is, is decisioning. Um, I wanted to, wanna shout out to Connor McKenna, who appeared on our p- podcast, and he sort of, I guess, you know, uh, enlightened us around his views on that's the next wave of AI. Um, um, so complex decisioning, personalization at scale, um, those sorts of things s- uh, seems to be, to be, um, the thing. Like we mentioned influencers before. This seems to be a common theme. Um, we are really excited to do some work in the affiliate influencer space for shoppable. So we think it's gonna be a really, uh, uh, a cool application of our product. Um, great for retail media, um, great for the entire ecosystem. Um, I suppose the, uh, the other theme I, I, I, um, I sense I'm getting, um, from, from Cannes just in general is the willingness for people, um, to just get stuff done, not talk about it.

Speaker 1: That's it. Yeah.

Speaker 2: To, to, to, to not wait for it to be perfect, to just to jump in and, and start trialing things. And, you know, I've been r- really inspired by some of the conversations. It was kind of like, um, I think, um, I think Kunal from InMobi, um, to, to quote him, he said, you know, "It's no longer sort of let's have a meeting about that down the track. It's let's build this now." We're technology companies. We've got everybody at the table here at Cannes. Let's get, let's get, let's, let's, let's move on these things. So they, they were the more, uh, uh, uh, general, um, conversations. Um, I suppose, uh, I'm really excited by the myriad of announcements that came out of the, in the retail media partnership se- sector. Uh, you saw purchases from Walmart in the CTV space. Um, I'm really excited to see what traditional media does. Um, uh, I think that, uh, News Corp-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... in general, um, their purchase of Roku, um, their capabilities with, uh, Tubi, uh, the way that Tubi's embracing the creator economy as well, I think that's a really interesting space and a traditional media company that's doing some really, um, great stuff. Um, so they were the, they were probably the common themes. Yeah.

Speaker 1: And let's talk about you for a bit. So you kind of came up through media sales and commercial sort of leadership, and then you've kind of moved deeper into kind of products and data and new growth. Kind of what did that sort of change, you know, how you think about building revenue?

Speaker 2: Um, I, I suppose, uh, I started in, uh, digital media pre, uh, dotcom boom, and enjoyed the dotcom boom. There was lots of parties, and I thought, "This, this, this industry is great." Um, but I, I suppose that, uh, you know, in those early days I did see where, um, you know, uh, there were some gaps in products. Um, and so for me, I've always been that annoying sales guy my whole career that wanted to help build products, and so I'm, I'm hoping that when we're doing, um, you know, um, uh, what we're doing now, um, i- and you know, where I've got to-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... is that I'm, um, we're starting with a commercial lens. Like, what do we need to solve? What problem do we need to solve for the client, and how can we demonstrate the ooh, uh, the outcome of that, I think. Those two things together.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: Um, and so that's kind of, I suppose, um, um, uh, you know, what I've, I felt that my... Where I, I've come from in my career and where I've got to. Um, and I'm really passionate about it 'cause, um, you know, I think that, uh, what we do is very creative. Um, I mean, we can't take ourselves too seriously. We're not saving lives, um, some would say. Um, but there's some really, uh, cool stuff that you can get your hands on a- and create.

Speaker 1: I think it's, it's, it's a really interesting route, isn't it?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: To have gone from kinda sales into kind of the role that you're in now. Obviously still with a growth lens, but often it's kind of the other route, right?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: And so it... You're a rare breed.

Speaker 2: Well, I, uh, if I'm honest, uh, the, uh, the frontline sales and the wining and dining is a younger man's game. Um, and I didn't wanna be that old guy who's trying to stay cool with the agency kids. Uh, so, uh, and my passion for product led me into the, into the product side, but yet always with that commercial lens. And, um, I still enjoy selling. I mean, I think everyone's a salesperson. Uh, I think the sooner that people every-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... like, you know, there's people-

Speaker 1: That's right

Speaker 2: ... that are scared of sales and kind of like, I guess shun the sales thing, but, you know, I think everybody's selling. Uh, so, uh, I enjoy the sales part of it. Um, but I, you know, I'm not a, I, I'm not a builder, uh, uh, in terms of, you know, I can't get my hammer out and, and, and, and I'm not a handyman, but I do love building digital products. Uh, and that's kind of, you know, it's, it's, it, it feels like I'm, you know, getting my hands dirty and doing some, some, some cool stuff. Yeah.

Speaker 1: In a digital sense.

Speaker 2: Yeah, in a digital sense.

Speaker 1: I love it.

Speaker 2: That's right.

Speaker 1: Um, what sort of... You know, back to the kind of annoying sales guy point.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1: Sort of, um, what do you have to kind of, you know, sort of recognize and unlearn to kind of, you know, help build a product business and go, "Hold on, hold on a second, I'm now... I'm over-indexing on the annoying sales component"?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, uh, patience, 'cause things take a lot longer than what the sales team think. Um, there is a lot more complexity. You have to ensure your Is and Ts are dotted from a legal perspective, from a data privacy p- perspective, and, uh, and these things, uh, take time. So patience, I think. Um, I think also focus. Um, it is easy to wanna build the world overnight, um, and I think what you need to do is, uh, i- is build something and rapid prototype and iterate. Um, I mentioned before what I liked about one of the things is that everyone just seems to wanna do that this year in Cannes.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: They just instead of talking about doing deals, they're like, "Let's just get it done."

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: "Let's just build something, and we'll iterate from there." And I think that's a really interesting, um, um, piece of the puzzle, and what I learned, um, um... So that's kind of, I suppose, taking my frustrations from the sales side, um, to product is, "Hey, can't we just get something out there and, and build upon it?" Um, but also, um, you know, you've, you, you, that's... I've had to learn the hard way. You've, you've got to be a little bit patient, you gotta do things properly, um, because, you know, you take a product to market and a few customers have a bad experience, it's very hard to win them back.

Speaker 1: You've led cross-functional teams in a variety of sort of different settings.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: You know, what have you found kind of really works when sales, products, and commercial people are kind of... I, I, I throw marketing in there rather than commercial people, to be honest.

Speaker 2: Yes.

Speaker 1: Are meant to be kind of building one thing together.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, at, at the, at the risk of, uh, being a cop-out, it's, it's communication is key. Um, to get all those teams on the same page, you... And, and, and on the same strategy. Uh, um, you, you, uh, you cannot repeat what the strategy is, uh, enough. Keep everybody, uh, you know, beating to the, to, to the, to, to the one drum. That's what'll make it a successful, uh, cross-functional team. Um, and when you tell them what we're doing next week and what our KPIs are, you gotta tell them again the next week and the next week. And tell... And then if you've told them already that week, tell them again, because the alignment is essential to get everybody working towards the same goals. And then with those same goals, you need to s- they need to be able to communicate to each of the different teams their role in achieving those goals, and make sure that they feel they have some ownership of, of, of how they go about doing that.

Speaker 1: And what are the habits of kinda high-performing teams that still hold up, even as with the world that we live in, working gets more and more technical?

Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting. I think from the sales side, um, when you really boil it down, it's a pretty simple game. Um, it is doing the brilliant basics really well, and it's a numbers game.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: And I think, you know, one of the things, um, that, uh, I've sort of instilled in my team and I, uh, and I still do, is the face-to-face meeting is really critical. Getting out there in market and doing, and, and KPIing yourself if y- if your company's not doing it on a certain amount of meetings per week to make sure that you force yourself out to the market because not only are you, you creating relationships, 'cause people buy, make, do deals v- via relationships. I think, um, uh, um, uh, Mark Benioff-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... was just saying that he's replacing a lot of his teams with AI and agents, but the one thing he's doubling down on is people to do the deals because all the... People are the ones that close the deals. AI can do all the setup for sales, et cetera. And so yeah, I guess that's one of the, the, the critical things, I think, is to really get out there to, to, to, to, to meet people face to face, not just the VC calls, not just the emails. Um, but that's, that's a critical piece of the puzzle.

Speaker 1: A real sense of kind of excitement a- and as we're very much kind of in a now moment for kinda shoppable media, kind of-

Speaker 2: Yes

Speaker 1: ... where, where are we and what is, what is the potential that you sort of see in front of you?

Speaker 2: I think the potential is, um, a, a, a, a win for everybody. So at, at Vudoo, we focus on the consumer first, and I think, you know, we learnt that from the likes of Apple. You know, if you do great consumer products, um, then everything else will follow. Um, so w- you know, I think what it's in it for the consumer is a, a, a much more frictionless process. You, w- you know, y- it- more time to f- uh, to, to get back into the creative process and create really great content that's gonna engage with it. So it's the win for the consumer. I suppose, uh, the win for the marketer is the ability to avoid some of the complexity and seeing an immediate return on your investment. Um, uh, uh, the, the retailer that's part of the ecosystem, it's incremental revenue. Um, it is, uh, less friction, um, and, um, it is, you know, uh, particularly with retail media operations, um, a more seamless way to transact both on, uh, owned assets and, and into the broader ecosystem. So there's incremental revenue, uh, for, for them. Um, and I suppose for the agency partners and all the other people in the ecosystem, um, it is, um, you know, about just making it really simple, uh, uh, to, to make that process happen.

Speaker 1: And if you're advising a CMO to place one sensible bet in commerce media right now, where would you start?

Speaker 2: Well, I have to give ourselves a plug. I'd have to say experimenting, uh, with, uh, Vudoo's capability around shoppable. Um, we've got the awards to prove it now with those, uh, those five drum, uh, awards for our Mattel, uh, camp- CTV online video and display campaign. We were able to generate shoppable outcomes from what was a brand piece of creative. So we were able to achieve double duty. So the marketer's dream, you know? They're being pushed by our CFOs to create return on investment and do performance marketing, but wh- they know they need to build a brand and connection with their consumer. And so what we're really proud of is that. So that would be, um, my, uh, selfish plug, but also number one tip. Um, um, and, uh, I think also, you know, outcomes. I mean, you've got to be able to prove outcomes. So anything you're doing, whether it's with an influencer, whether it's, um, you know, uh, performance media, it's really focused on the, the, the, the actual outcome, so a sales or a transaction outcome, not the, the vanity media me- metrics.

Speaker 1: Paul, it's been a real pleasure. Thank you for joining-

Speaker 2: Thanks for having me

Speaker 1: ... Business Marketing.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Thank you for having me. Cheers.