Scratch: CMO Interviews kapak görseli

Scratch: CMO Interviews

Scratch: CMO Interviews

Yazan: Rival
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Özet
 Why do some businesses grow faster than others? What do the marketers leading them do differently? How can we learn from them to grow our own businesses and careers? Scratch explores the world of challenger marketing - the thinkers and doers questioning the status quo and rewriting the marketing rule book ‘from scratch’. Each episode will dive deep into the experience and perspective of an industry thought leader to understand the unique insights and ideas that have powered their success. We will interview some of the biggest names in the marketing world - the people with the most interesting stories to tell. We’ll hear from the CMOs of the biggest brands in the world, but also the entrepreneurs building hyper-growth start-ups to really understand the full spectrum of challenger marketing today. We’ll get into the nitty gritty: the details of how they think and what they do differently in order to deliver simple, clear, and actionable lessons for all marketers. Scratch is the ‘How I Built This’ of marketing - we hope to inform and inspire a generation of marketers to grow their businesses and their careers like true challengers ‘from scratch’ every day.2026 We Are Rival Career Success Economics Leadership Management & Leadership Marketing Marketing & Sales
Bölümler
  • What Comes Next for Duolingo? The Plan for Growth after "Unhinged Marketing"

    What Comes Next for Duolingo? The Plan for Growth after "Unhinged Marketing"
    5 Nov 2026
    In a special edition of Scratch, Eric Fulwiler is joined by Rahul Chopra, Vice President at Duolingo, for the ANA's Global Day of Learning, for a fireside chat on what it takes to scale one of the world's most distinctive challenger brands. With a mission to bring learning to a billion people around the world, Duolingo is entering its next phase of growth: expanding beyond language learning, evolving its product and marketing strategy, and exploring how AI can help it reach more learners.Chopra shares how Duolingo brings product, marketing, and experimentation together to drive growth, why a great product has to sit behind great marketing, and how the company can continue evolving without losing what makes it distinctive. From the thinking behind its famous social campaigns to AI's potential to transform research, personalisation, and learning, the conversation explores what it takes to keep growing without losing sight of the mission.We get into:→ How Duolingo is working towards its mission to bring learning to a billion people — and expanding beyond language learning into subjects like math→ How product marketing helps Duolingo tell a stronger story about the value of its product→ Why great marketing starts with a great product, and how Duolingo connects its marketing, app experience, and product development to drive growth→ How the thinking behind the viral "killed Duo" campaign demonstrates the potential of turning creative ideas into meaningful business growth→ Why great social marketing takes more than a single creative genius — and how audience insight, clear guardrails, and collective thinking make the difference→ Why challenger brands need to keep evolving, balancing a distinctive brand personality with new forms of storytelling→ Where AI can accelerate content creation, personalise learning, and improve the way teams research and experiment→ Why AI-generated content volume is overrated, and why its potential as a listening, research, and R&D tool deserves more attention→ Why the people closest to the audience should be closest to the publish button — and how to make testing and learning part of your cultureThe key takeaways:A clear mission gives growth direction — Duolingo's ambition to bring learning to a billion people shapes its expansion into new subjects, product development, and approach to reaching learners. Growth is about more than acquiring users; it also means delivering learning that works.Great marketing starts with a great product — Duolingo's social presence attracts attention, but the product gives people a reason to stay. The strongest marketing reinforces a real product benefit rather than trying to compensate for its absence.Product and marketing should work as one — Campaigns, app reminders, and features like a changing app icon all reinforce the same experience. When marketing and product are aligned, the brand promise carries through from the first social interaction into the product itself.Viral moments need more than a good idea — From the "killed Duo" campaign to cultural moments like Charli XCX concerts and Apple's iPhone events, Duolingo knows how to turn attention into conversation. But sustaining that creativity requires a collective of audience-savvy people, clear guardrails, and strong internal communication.Challengers must keep evolving — Shock-driven content can generate attention, but relying on one trick eventually becomes a limitation. As Duolingo matures, it is exploring a broader range of storytelling, including more wholesome creative, without abandoning its distinctive personality.AI should accelerate the work, not replace the thinking — AI can ease content bottlenecks, help personalise learning, and speed up research and testing. But producing more content is not the same as producing better work. Human judgment remains essential to deciding what is worth making and publishing.AI's research potential is underhyped — Beyond content generation, AI can help marketers listen to audiences, investigate opportunities, and accelerate R&D. Used well, it can make teams smarter and more effective, not just faster.Put audience understanding close to the publish button — The people who understand the audience best should have a direct role in deciding what goes live. Reduce unnecessary friction with useful processes and guardrails, rather than burying creativity under layers of approval.Make experimentation part of the culture — Challenger brands cannot rely on a playbook that worked yesterday. Testing, learning, and adapting should be built into how teams operate, giving them the confidence to try new approaches and discover what works.Chapters00:00 Meet Rahul Chopra and Duolingo's growth challenge02:25 A mission to bring learning to a billion people04:41 How product marketing tells Duolingo's value story07:02 From the viral Duo campaign to organic growth10:10 The people, guardrails, and product behind social creativity13...
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    30 dk.
  • Rebundling Culture: How Cîroc is Building a Next-Gen Community in a Fragmented World

    Rebundling Culture: How Cîroc is Building a Next-Gen Community in a Fragmented World
    10 Sep 2026
    In the latest episode of Scratch, Nick Tran, President and CMO of First Round, breaks down what culture actually looks like when people put their phones down, why brands are over-indexing on micro-cultures, and what it takes to create work that cuts through the sea of sameness.From building Cîroc Athletic Club into a media and events platform to rethinking the traditional conference format at Cannes, Tran shares how brands can respond to changing social behaviors by creating spaces people genuinely want to be part of.We get into:→ Why culture is really about the “campfire conversations” happening off-screen→ Why the next big opportunity might be moving from micro-culture back to macro-cultural moments→ How Cîroc Athletic Club turned changing drinking habits into a 20M+ monthly-view media ecosystem→ Why the best experiential marketing gives people space to play, connect, and surprise each other→ What the “30 moons” approach to AI means for creativity, taste, and human judgment→ Why brands should stop worrying about who did an idea first and focus on who does it best→ Why intimate, practitioner-led conversations are replacing the traditional marketing conferenceThe key takeaways:Culture happens around the campfire — Culture isn't just music, sport, fashion, or whatever is trending on your feed. It's the conversations people have when the screens go away. That's where brands should be looking for cultural insight.Micro-culture isn't the only answer — The industry has spent years fragmenting audiences into increasingly niche communities. When everyone is doing the same thing, going bigger can be the more distinctive move.AI needs a human with taste — The first AI output is rarely the best one. Tran's “30 moons” principle is about pushing through iteration after iteration until you find something genuinely distinctive. AI can generate. Humans still need to know what's great.Socializing is changing — Younger consumers aren't necessarily going out just to drink. Active leisure like pickleball, tennis, and golf is becoming the reason to gather, with alcohol playing a secondary role. Brands need to build around the behavior, not force the old one.Build platforms, not campaigns — Cîroc Athletic Club turned a cultural shift into an ongoing media and events ecosystem, taking organic social views from 100,000 to more than 20 million a month.Kill the grind — At Cannes, First Round deliberately removed the panels, packed schedules, and endless meetings. Leisure created the conditions for the conversations and connections everyone was actually there for.Execution beats originality — Consumers don't care who technically did something first. They care about who did it best. Fear of being derivative shouldn't stop brands from executing a good idea brilliantly.The conference needs a rethink — Senior marketers don't necessarily need another panel. They need access to people who have actually done the work, in environments where genuine conversation can happen.Watch the video version of this podcast on Youtube ▶️: https://youtu.be/najVJ8Fd9lg Scratch is a production of Rival, a marketing innovation consultancy. Scratch is hosted by Eric Fulwiler, and he’s joined by Nick Tran of First Round in this episode.Find Rival: wearerival.com | LinkedInFind Eric: LinkedInFind Nick: LinkedInSay hi: media@wearerival.com Rival is a marketing consultancy for brands that want to challenge convention in their category. We’re on a mission to understand what challenger brands do differently to grow in categories that are being disrupted, and use a challenger playbook to deliver outsized impact through an integrated, tech-enabled approach. Past guests include CMOs from Mastercard, GE, Shell, Hyperloop, Adobe, PepsiCo, and Papa Johns.
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    50 dk.
  • How Ladder became Apple's favorite app and made Hilary Duff the face of fitness

    How Ladder became Apple's favorite app and made Hilary Duff the face of fitness
    24 Jun 2026
    In the latest episode of Scratch, Philip Edsel, VP of Brand & Creative at Ladder, breaks down why most marketing misses the mark and what separates brands that feel cultural from those that feel tone-deaf. As fitness platforms multiply and algorithms fragment audiences, Ladder's strategy isn't to chase trends. It's to listen obsessively to what members actually want—and let that drive every creative decision. We get into: → Why cultural relevance can't be outsourced (or bought from a report) → How to build culture listening into your creative process without overthinking it → Why structuring teams around culture matters more than having the right budget → The brands that win: Skims, Bandit, Nothing-and why art direction is strategy → What happens when you listen to members instead of investors The key takeaways: Self-awareness is the number one attribute of great marketing - Most work fails because it lacks it. It's not about being clever. It's about understanding how your brand is actually perceived and what conversations are happening around it. Culture listening is structural, not magical - Put 30 minutes on your calendar every week. Get obsessed with what your audience actually cares about. Make it non-negotiable. By the time most brands catch on, they're six weeks too late. Either you have the people or you don't - You can't bottle up cultural taste. Either your team feels the pulse of what's moving culture, or it doesn't. If you don't have those people, recruit differently or organize differently. Yeti structured their entire team around communities. Most brands didn't even think of it. Listen to what your members want, not what trends are screaming - Ladder runs 45-minute surveys by the thousands. They're drowning in feedback about what members actually want. That drives product and creative not investor mandates. Simplify your language - Bad copywriting is Philip's biggest pet peeve. If it's a teaser that says "something's coming"—that's meaningless. Use words you'd actually use at dinner. Momentum is found too late for legacy brands - Challenger brands can move faster because they're willing to take creative risks informed by audience data. The inflection point is real. You have to be willing to swing. Watch this episode: ▶️ YouTube: https://youtu.be/pYQH4xUeU9o Scratch is a production of Rival, a marketing innovation consultancy. Hosted by Eric Fulwiler, featuring Philip Edsel of Ladder. Find Rival: wearerival.com | LinkedIn Find Eric: LinkedIn Find Philip: LinkedIn Find Ladder: joinladder.com Say hi: media@wearerival.com Rival is a marketing consultancy for brands that want to challenge convention in their category. We’re on a mission to understand what challenger brands do differently to grow in categories that are being disrupted, and use a challenger playbook to deliver outsized impact through an integrated, tech-enabled approach. Past guests include CMOs from Mastercard, GE, Shell, Hyperloop, Adobe, PepsiCo, and Papa Johns.
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    53 dk.
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