Meet Peter Wang: RAD's Community Director

How did you get started on your entrepreneurial journey?

In 2014 I got to work with my business mentor and friend Raitis Stalazs, CEO at Thrive Courses. While working with him, I understood how he was able to work 18 hours a day and still feel like he is on a vacation every single day.  His boundless energy and optimism taught me that work and play isn’t mutually exclusive and you CAN combine both. I remembered letting that really sink in as if this experience was re-wiring all the fixed beliefs I had about what a career was. I told myself I was going to create this for myself one day.

Before working with Ratis, I was at a huge digital agency running large Adwords media buys. I learned a lot from working at an established agency but I also felt limited. I felt like my contributions did not have a meaningful impact on the overall product and only got to see one moving part. It was hard to be motivated when I was deprived of the full picture. While working with Raitis, I saw an immediate impact. I got to touch, taste, and feel the results that we worked so hard to get. Throughout all of this, I remembered feeling this sense of accomplishment. I thought to myself, I like this feeling.

In 2017, I decided to start my own marketing agency. With my 10 years of digital marketing background, I initially wanted to create another boutique agency. At this point, I attended a gaming convention and I was introduced to the world of influencer marketing. Influencer marketing was in its infancy around that time but there were still enough resources that gave me the stepping stones to create my own agency.

What led you to RAD?

After my self employment journey, I was offered to build out the community for a coworking space for international entrepreneurs. Pro-tip, whenever someone gives you an opportunity to create something on their dime, you take it! Working for 360 Lab San Francisco was an amazing experience which helped me learn how to deal with people while building and nurturing a community. I was working at 360 for about a year and a half and then the pandemic hit. We had to shut everything down and the job that I had was gone almost overnight 3 months into my unemployment.

My two experiences of working in community and working with influencers collided when a buddy of mine informed me that he’d found the perfect team for me to be a part of. He worked with me while at 360 so he was well aware of my energy, my passion for community, and my experience with influencers in the past. He proceeded to explain to me a company that was solving the very pain point I had come across multiple times when looking for Influencers while I was running my own agency. He also explained how this company needed a liaison between influencers and their clients and told me that I was a perfect fit. Everything happened so fast. My friend called me on Saturday at 9:30 am. I had an initial interview with Jeremy at 10:30 am, I had another chat with Jeremy on Sunday and I was working with RAD on Monday. Life is crazy.

Overall, would you say things have been easy for you, what setbacks over time have you overcome?

When I was working with influencers on my own, one of the most challenging aspects of the business was figuring out how much influencers would charge and how much traffic each influencer would potentially generate. Because influencer marketing is relatively a new form of advertising, many processes are not fully built out like it is with Facebook Ads, Google AdWords, YouTube ads, etc. There is currently no visibility of when a user sees influencer sponsored content to when the user decides to convert. Currently many companies are using sales upticks as a way to correctly assume if influencer marketing is a viable option for them. These are huge pain points in the influencer marketing space.

I was intimately aware of these pain points and it was that experience that made interacting with influencers my first month at RAD a breeze. I knew where they were coming from but I also knew where advertisers are coming from and this helped my acclimation into RAD.

Though ease of experience is not without its setbacks. I can’t tell you how many sleepless nights and top ramen have peppered my entrepreneurial journey.

What's next for you and RAD?

The opportunity that RAD is offering to influencers is a game changer. Many influencers are unaware of the true value they are holding. As influencers continue to get an intimate understanding of their audience, the more value they’ll be able provide to the right advertiser. RAD is in a position to not only provide this level of visibility to the advertiser but also deliver a platform for influencers to learn the important skill of nurturing their audience.

I find this type of work to be very rewarding (not to mention that I’m also good at it too). My plan is to build out the influencer community and grow professionally here at RAD. I see big opportunities in cultivating a community where influencers share tips and tricks on how they are able to use the RAD platform to increase their earnings month over month.I’m spearheading plans to create tools that our influencer community to achieve meaningful levels of passive income.

Super excited for the future and the best is yet to come.