Ariel: 0:00

We shouldn't be the homework assignment. We should be the song that you listen to on the radio, because when you listen to a song you like, you memorize it. Hands down. You could beat anybody in a test about it.

Joeri: 0:11

Hello everyone and welcome to the Web3 CMO Stories podcast. My name is Joeri Billast and I'm your podcast host, and today I am joined by Ariel. Hey, Ariel, how are you doing?

Ariel: 0:23

Hello, I'm doing well. How are you? Thanks for having me.

Joeri: 0:26

Really great. Actually, it's quite hot here today in Portugal, like everywhere in Europe. I don't know how it is where you are If you don't know Ariel. Ariel is someone who knows how to shape stories and that move people. Ariel Wengroff she's the EVP of Communications and Marketing at Ledger, where she's not just building a brand but helping reframe how we talk about digital trust and self-custody From producing Woman with Gloria Steinem to leading content at Fives and now launching bold campaigns like the Don't Get Rekt and the headline grabbing partnership with the San Antonio Spurs. I'm sure we'll talk about that. Ariel has built a career at the intersection of storytelling, innovation and purpose. So, Ariel, welcome to the podcast.

Ariel: 1:21

Thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here, and it is also very hot today in Paris, so I'm with you. That's why I'm hiding in the podcast. Thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here, and it is also very hot today in Paris, so I'm with you. That's why I'm hiding in the office.

Joeri: 1:30

Oh right, that's right, ledger, you know it's in Paris. That's right, yeah, because you know, as I mentioned before we started recording, I'm from Belgium, and then Paris was, you know, on the other side, actually very close, so it's the same climate. So let's start with a few questions about your personal strategic foundations. Actually, you've led storytelling across media, politics and now crypto. What, through line connects all of your work across these different worlds? Line connects all of your work across these different worlds.

Ariel: 2:05

When you think about you know anything from politics to media to now working in. You know crypto and blockchain. For me, it's always what is the best medium to reach people around the topic that you're trying to solve or give more awareness on. And in politics, I was really lucky to work in a place that had a lot of direct democracy, so you could really lucky to work in a place that had a lot of direct democracy, so you could really meet people, get a bill introduced and passed and feel like you were helping solve their problem.

Ariel: 2:32

At Vice, I was creating content when digital media was the ruler of the world and you could upload a video to YouTube and it would cut through the noise and you would have hundreds of millions of people seeing an issue or a topic that otherwise would have been ignored.

Ariel: 2:48

Similarly, for Web3, this was a time where creating more educationally friendly content that gave people a choice to participate could impact millions, and now we have the number three education platform with Ledger Academy, where all of our content is free. And so what motivates me is what's actually going to be the best thing to reach people right now because they deserve it versus you know how do I actually go through all of these outdated red tape processes exist for the sake of it, but that's never been an interest in my career, to kind of the description you gave at the intro. So I think it's really an exciting time to be in our space. I think a lot of people are just starting to open up to what it means to be learning about the future of financial literacy and education, and we absolutely want to be a part of leading the way for that.

Joeri: 3:40

And so thank you for that introduction, but now you're at Ledger, of course. So what was it actually that?

Ariel: 3:58

drew you to Ledger. And now, where do you see the opportunity around shaping the narrative around crypto, security, self-custody and so on? When I was at Vice Media, I started to understand and learn that young people wanted a brand to help lead their identity because they didn't trust governments to do so. And then, by the time that I left Vice, it became young people don't trust governments or media to lead their identity. They want help from a brand or from an individual. And that continues to keep going right, like there's an incredible amount of distrust in different types of institutions to tell people how they can be shaped for the future.

Ariel: 4:29

And so when blockchain was really created and Bitcoin was argue in the States in a more material way, and so around the time of 2021, after COVID, and again, these moments of change happen in response to great moments of crisis. So of course, covid happens. Blockchain starts to get more introduced because we're living more fully in an online world. It accelerates all of these human behaviors that bring us more and more online, because we need it to survive as a society. And through that, what ended up happening, which was quite interesting, is people started to say wait, maybe blockchain could create intergenerational change, maybe it could create more relationships, if you're in the music business, between artists and fans, or if you're in college, around education and certification outside of higher education right.

Ariel: 5:25

These traditional systems that we thought could never be questioned were being questioned, and so I was actually working with an investment fund that I was advising on the creator economy, and I was so committed to the idea of why aren't creators getting more revenue? Why don't they have more access over their audience? But most of the people who are coming and asking for advice on how to work with blockchain were just trying to create the same system that existed before, and they weren't trying to create a new world right Like. They were trying to take new tools and keep the old world, which is classic.

Ariel: 5:57

People don't like change and so I actually got introduced to Ian Rogers, who's the chief experience officer at Ledger, and Pascal Gauthier, who's the chief experience officer at Ledger, and Pascal Gauthier, who's the chairman and CEO, and they were the only two people I spoke with that wanted to use new technology to create radical change that supported choice and individual control, and for me, that gave me the same feeling in my gut that I had when I first met Shane at Vice. I thought this is going to be hard, but it's really new. I could be part of something when I really have a chance to help shape it and I want to make that bet. And so I really made that bet and moved from New York to Paris almost four years ago to be a part of you know, this experience.

Joeri: 6:42

That's exciting and exciting bet, and you know. Lots of, lots of things happened since then. Now it is when I speak to people you know about Bitcoin or crypto they all talk about you know price charge, ETFs, politics, so it's it's refreshing you know to to hear about the cultural narrative around it. You also said I think somewhere, or I read it on the Ledger website that crypto without education is liability. So how do you approach education in a way that it sticks? Because you know we live in a TikTok world?

Ariel: 7:23

Yeah, I mean listen, everyone deserves the choice to participate and so, therefore, if they deserve the choice to participate, they need to be given a chance to be educated about it. And when I was at Vice, we used to say you know, we shouldn't be the homework assignment, we should be the song that you listen to on the radio, because when you listen to a song you like, you memorize it. Hands down, you could beat anybody in a test about it, but if you're studying for a test, it's like the hardest thing in the world, and I think what's been a challenge to this point is a lot of people have introduced blockchain, language and information as if it's so complicated. Like I use the internet every day and I don't know how the fiber optics work around it right, I just use it and it brings me closer to things that bring me joy or curiosity and therefore I have a relationship to it that feels valuable. We need more people around the world to understand that, and it's very different by market. You know, people in the US who are adopting much more quickly now are doing it as a second choice, or they're doing it for a way to get a loan or to send a wire transfer, but in other markets. This is the only way you actually hold on to your value, because there's an unstable government or inflation or things like that, and so what we do is we try to make education free, accessible, joyful, translated into multiple languages and really inclusive, and that's worked for us.

Ariel: 8:47

You know we're the number three education platform globally, but we also have tried different things. Like you mentioned, Don't Get Rekt . We literally made a claymation series about you know, education, with catchy songs that get stuck in your head. We've created a video game that had, you know, over 3 million unique engagements a few years ago. That was just specifically for gamers learning about. You know why phishing attempts were like villains and things like that, like these are not easy topics to get people to care about, but there's no take backs in crypto, so if you only learn about why you need to understand crypto and security at the point of failure, it's like too late. You want to get people at the beginning, which is why teaching people when they're actually learning about finance and about money is actually what we need to do for this generation. But it's been really fun. It's such a good challenge.

Joeri: 9:39

You have to be okay, pivoting all the time yeah, absolutely, because it's in the world changes so fast and did you mention it right? Because people will look, you know, for insurance or how to protect their crypto better when you know they lost it, when they they fell for a scam or so they need to be educated beforehand and you know, every day there is something new that is happening. I like the . Um, it's very original. It's because these days you see a lot of ai everywhere. I call it ai noise. So it was definitely a choice from you and ledger to create this kind of content, right and we're physical, like we have a physical device.

Ariel: 10:20

so we believe I mean don't get me wrong we use ai, of course, but you know there's great artisans that can do things that AI can't do, and in the places where we should use them to get attention, that's the right way to do it. And you know, the person who made that is actually Mo on my team, who started Ledger Academy. Like you, have to let young people who are at the forefront of innovation ride the wave and get out of their way and let them try things you know. So I think when, if you pitch this in a normal boardroom, they would have said, well, can't you just take 200 and ai to do it? Won't you get the same effect? You have to kind of say like, no, no, we're making a different choice here for for this one and and that's important to set the precedent for in this world as well- yeah, and people can tell at least I can tell you know when it's authentic content and it also builds trust.

Joeri: 11:16

You can use AI, as you said. I also use it to amplify this podcast. We have a real conversation here. But I will use AI to get a blog article to repurpose, you know, to edit it, but it's a real conversation that we are having Now. It's interesting content is also what I'm doing. I love to. That's why I'm doing this podcast actually, you know, to connect with people, to educate, to also learn myself. But if you actually learned yourself about content, can it actually change behavior, user behavior?

Ariel: 11:50

Yes, I mean, I think different types of content evoke different behaviors. Right so like, and to your point, it's by platform. We see that a less crypto native user is finding us on TikTok and they're engaging in more friendly, unedited, playful, influencer-led content than YouTube, which is much more direct, educational, focused than X, which is much more informational, thread-based, hype-based, og, language-based right Versus Instagram, which we do a lot of our visual collabs, a lot more cultural things of that nature. Where we do use AI, where it works well, is helping us come up with listicles for certain glossary terms we use, or quizzes for different things that we do. But we really pride ourselves on starting at a level of luxury and then also from an editorial side.

Ariel: 12:45

I don't want to read something or put something out that we wouldn't have put out at Vice. Right so like. How do you start? It's much easier as a business and as a brand if you treat yourself from starting at the top and then choosing to do different partnerships or engagements, versus starting low and then trying to aim high, like you. Really, as a business, have to make that choice from the beginning and that's how we see ourselves. We see ourselves very much as like the apple of the space. We don't want to do things that bring us lower. See people in the space do it all the time. That's a short-term distraction.

Joeri: 13:17

It's not a long-term.

Ariel: 13:18

We are a long-term business, and so, therefore, it's my job to protect the brand.

Joeri: 13:25

Absolutely Now. I mentioned it in the beginning, in the intro already, that you have an exciting new partnership with the San Antonio Spurs. It's a bold move. So what made this actually the right time and the right partner for Ledger?

Ariel: 13:41

San Antonio Spurs are amazing and came at us from left field. We were not really looking to do a major sports partnership. In fact, we had said no to many of them and we met the team about six months ago and started speaking with them and really realized not only was there a historic French connection with Tony Parker and Wemby and others I mean, they were really one of the first teams in the league that looked for international talent but they also had incredible value alignment. You know, the Spurs really has this sort of like pound the rock mentality. There's no individual wins, there's only team wins. That line their halls. They're prompt, they're kind, they deeply care about youth education and STEM education. And so suddenly we started to see all of this overlap and for us, if we're going to put that type of partnership in place, it can't just be, you know, a jersey on a player. It needs to be like a way that we're bringing something to life. So we felt like we could do that. You know we're making youth education investment together. We're the official digital asset education partner for the Spurs. They do a ton in San Antonio.

Ariel: 14:53

In Austin, which is a huge tech hub, their Texas governor just passed the strategic reserve bill. We have a very strong enterprise business, so we really see all of these incredible opportunities for alignment and to bring it back home to Paris, which is so important to us as well with that like French connection. So for us it was okay. Let's actually make a choice as a company that's just celebrated its 10th anniversary, going into the next era of what this business is going to be, to double down on what we believe in be the defenders, be with this French team and really bring it incredibly forward.

Ariel: 15:34

And we were just so happy with the announcement last week. It was so much hard work going into it. But you have to also think about crypto. Fans within the NBA actually have a 2x higher purchase intent for crypto. It's a very young team. It has a lot of influence over this and there's a very big correlation. So we felt like the bet we were making on the NBA is actually just making a stronger bet with the Spurs on customers we're going to be getting eventually anyways, and how do we kind of like make that cut to get there faster with a brand that we respect and that we want to you build together for?

Joeri: 16:06

wow, yeah you mentioned is that it's a young team, um, you're supporting stem youth education with this collaboration. It's not just marketing. How do you see sport and then storytelling help on board this next generation actually?

Ariel: 16:25

well the players are interesting because a lot of players in the Spurs, but also in the league, don't come from backgrounds where they always have a ton that they come from, and so they are personally also quite interested in educating young people on having choice. I think choice is a big theme because choice gives you power, because you have information to make choices from. So for Ledger, we really want to be a part of financial literacy education with the players and with the team through programs they already have in place and then figuring out new ones that we want to work on. If we're doing work to rebuild courts in Paris and in France, which we're going to do, let's do something at the court that is like fun and playful and similar to our other values, like brings people in in a way that makes them super excited and then they leave with a better understanding about Ledger and about what we're doing, and so we feel quite committed that we can like figure out exactly what the pieces are that makes sense for that and it's just really been a joy to get to get to know the team so far and it's absolutely not just a marketing partnership I mean, I don't come from sports and I don't come from marketing and I'm definitely not going to pitch something for three years that I'm going to have to spend a ton of time on if it doesn't actually make sense for the business.

Ariel: 17:43

And someone posted about this on LinkedIn. I thought it was so right. I really appreciated it. They were like it's not just a crypto company like overspending for something they think gives them value. It's a company that, like investing in something in America that will give them, as a growth hack, so much more. And that is the way that we're approaching it, and I would encourage other brand leaders like try to be more bold, to find some of those connection points versus you know, just spending to say they did something. You know. That's really not our move yeah, got it.

Joeri: 18:15

Yeah, yeah, that's. I also appreciate the ledger brand you know and everything that you're doing. And but now about you personally, ariel um, about values, leadership from from broadly to woman Sitara, I think it's called. You've championed underrepresented voices. How does that commitment show up in Web3? And maybe, where is the space still falling short in your opinion?

Ariel: 18:43

Yeah, I think when you're telling stories or you're trying to get a message across, you should always kind of look around and say what's the voice or the perspective that we're not giving enough time to? How is that going to bring more people in? And that's usually the US and around the world. But crypto is a little bit more known as sort of like crypto bros or you know guys who are involved. I think what's nice about what we're doing is we're still serving our current customer fully right, like we're not changing the brand from what it's known for, but we're just being a bit more inclusive. And that's true in education and the language that you use every day. I mean, when we made Woman at Vice, which we were really proud to be an Emmy-nominated show, we didn't do it by radically changing things. We used a really successful format from the HBO show and then said let's tell stories about the characters we don't normally talk about, which, in that case, were women. Right, they were women's stories In this case for Ledger, actually thinking about who's the person that might benefit the most, whose face you don't see on screen.

Ariel: 19:57

Let me make sure, when I have hand models, that I have different skin tones. How do I represent different characters when I'm showing the employees that we have or making sure that we share UGC that people submit. So it's really small things that can make a big difference. I think we underestimate that, and it doesn't mean that we're over committing to anything. We're just reflecting the world that exists around us, and that's always my job, and if I hire a team that comes from different backgrounds, they do it naturally, which is what we try to do. So it's really something that I think we just try to bake into what we do because it's the right thing for the business versus needing to create something separate around it. And that was similar to how I felt about that advice as well.

Ariel: 20:41

And even Sitara Sitara we intentionally made as a Netflix film that has no dialogue, Because if you're watching animation with parents and kids, they're much more likely to feel the emotion and then feel comfortable expressing it to their kids, versus if they have language imposed on them with a script.

Ariel: 21:00

So there's just like a lot of like behavioral psychology that you can take into account, and I think a lot of marketing in today's culture is actually behavioral psychology if you are open to understanding it that way. And that's quite similar to storytelling, because you're trying to build human connection and a relationship to something that is predominantly a choice. Right, we pick a brand because it identifies with who we are. We don't pick a brand because if we don't, we'll lose our minds. Right, it says something about us, and I want people to see a ledger on a table and or see it pop up on a screen and say, oh, I have a sense of who that person is. It's probably like a cool, interesting person that has high values and that's like, honestly, a tech innovator and ahead of the game and and, and that's something that we really try to encourage I love that.

Joeri: 21:46

Yeah, authenticity purpose really important Also with culture and trust so fragmented today. Actually, what can legacy brands now learn from Ledger how you guys are building community and credibility?

Ariel: 22:05

It's interesting because I think some legacy brands have wanted to collaborate with us because of that. We're sort of like the bet that they'll take in the space on it and I think a lot of legacy brands come in quite late to the process. I think with Web3, which isn't even like a term I really like, but with this type of tech innovation, some jumped in really quickly and then realized they were trying to do it as sort of like a loyalty program and needed to retreat and I think are still figuring out now what makes sense. When I was at Vice, it was so hard to get legacy brands to see trends that we saw so early Like we were like. You don't understand. If you embrace this moment it will win you so many customers and so much credibility, but if you walk away from it you're just going to come back in a few more years and have to pay more to show that you're relevant.

Ariel: 22:53

I think for us, being an innovator, it inherently means that we're always taking risk. So you know some things aren't going to work out and you know you have to be ready to pivot all the time. That's the nature of it, Legacy brands. I think the smallest thing they could do. That would be a quick win, would actually just be comfortable to changing their schedule versus going quarter by quarter and assuming that that works out. And I think you see a lot more of them starting to do it, because for digital media it's very unpredictable to see what works. So if you're not willing to iterate or work with different folks that will help you iterate, you quickly fall behind. So I think we're seeing more of it. It's just still a lot of rigidity in legacy media and brands.

Joeri: 23:33

Yeah, and probably because they're doing what they always have been doing and they are maybe don't want to take the risks Now. Looking ahead, how do you see the role of the CMO evolving in Web3? What are maybe some of the skills that they will need to have or that will define the next generation of marketing leadership?

Ariel: 23:55

Yeah, it's interesting. I actually joined Ledger as editor-in-chief and then evolved into this role, and I think the reason for that is because the editor sets the voice and tone of the brand typically and here of the business, and that quickly became something that wasn't just on the side for, like, maybe some content you're making, but it was actually how do we look at, the whole underpinning of the brand itself. I'm lucky at Ledger to work with other great people in brand who understand the power of it and don't see it as something that you can buy on a daily basis. It's earned, it's not bought, and that's really important and I really value working with Ian and Pascal for that, because they're great believers in brand, like Ian brought me on for that and now working with both of them, it's a joy in that regard and that's why my role has evolved.

Ariel: 24:46

I would say, for the future of marketing, I think, like, ask yourself every day, like, would you want to spend all day, every day, talking to your customer? Do you actually understand what the customer need is for? You know, we're lucky. I'm not selling Coke or Pepsi, I'm getting people to use a product that actually changes their life on a daily basis. Right, and we don't compromise on our values as a business. Does your business have values? Do you understand what your ideal customer would do in a day and what other brands they would want to interact with, and what other brands would you want them to interact with? I think you really have to play that game and know that there's a few different versions of that, and also know that mass no longer exists, right Like we are a series of every day. If we spent every day together, our algorithm would be the same, or it would be different, excuse me. And so how do you make sure that you're building the different world orders that you need to that grow back together into a successful business, because you just don't have one set brand anymore? That would be impossible and I think that that's like really fun.

Ariel: 25:55

I think if you're into chewing on a meaty challenge, which is what we call marketing today, you'll crush it because there's not one answer. No one's figured it out. It's really hard. I think marketing gets a bad rap as a title and I think it's seen as like people who spend to try and know about a customer, versus actually like coming with the understanding of the customer. But I think that if it's used properly and it's really done mainly in-house. I think that like it's so innovative and amazing. But I'm also not a big title fan because I think it gives people a bad understand, like a bad box to think about what their ideas are for you know absolutely.

Joeri: 26:35

Yeah, I love that. Indeed, it's not like a box and you. It's not about limitations. It's about being open and see the possibilities. Now let me ask you a crazy question If you had unlimited budget and no red tape, what culture, cultural or maybe creative project would you launch to redefine crypto for the next billion people?

Ariel: 27:29

no-transcript sister cities, you're more likely to create opportunity of education and adoption in a scale that you just need for things to be successful today that are harder for other places to have laboratories for change. I think if it were for Ledger, I would really like. I would like buy the entire local media networks in key markets, because local media is like the only thing that's still trusted today with influencers, and I would have those influencers around the world create their own network where they're publishing off of each other at different times, and I think somebody should do that. I think we'll do micro versions of that. I think you know there's a lot to still be explored, but it very much for me is about how do you use like niche awareness to build mass adoption. I think that would be important.

Joeri: 28:23

Wow, powerful message, ariel. This was such a rich conversation. Thank you for sharing not only the strategies but also the values behind them. Excited to see where Ledger will go next and I'm sure my listeners will pay close attention. If people now they want to know more about Ledger or they want to know more about everything you do around education and so on, where would you like me to send them?

Ariel: 28:50

I would love for people to go to ledgercom slash academy and you can get started right away with our great education materials, and if they want to find me, you can just do at a Wengroff. That's me on everything, and I encourage them to follow Ledger, which is just at Ledger on everything as well.

Joeri: 29:11

Absolutely Well. As my listeners know, there are always show notes. There is a blog article, as I mentioned, related to this podcast episode. All links that Ariel mentioned and I have a project she mentioned will be in there. It's everyone tuning in. So yeah, follow Ledger, follow Ariel on LinkedIn. As I always say, if you found this episode valuable I'm sure you found this valuable be sure to share it with people around you. If you are not yet following the podcast, this is a really good moment to do this. If you haven't given me a review yet, if you you give me these five stars, it will help me reach an even bigger audience. The last thing I would say is thank you, Ariel.

Ariel: 29:54

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I'm a listener and excited to keep tuning in.

Joeri: 30:00

So, guys, what an amazing episode. I hope to see you next time. Take care, bye.