#2 Founder of REDAME - Anna Serner

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Welcome to Level Up, a podcast created and powered by Danish Startup Group where we explore the beating heart of Danish innovation. In today's episode, I'm joined by Anna Serner from Read Aim. Read Aim is a specialized retail media consultancy focused exclusively on helping multi-brand retailers and their brand partners unlocking new revenue streams through strategic advertising partnerships. Read Aim exists to bridge the gap between retail operations and the rapidly growing retail media opportunities. Today, Anna and I will talk about building the business from scratch as a solo founder, the retail media industry itself, but also about deeper layers on what the founder journey looks like behind the scenes. Let's get started. Welcome to our podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

Of course. Thank you very much for inviting me. I'm so happy to be here. So my name is Anna, and I'm the founder and CEO of REDAIME, which is the first or one of the first retail media consultancies in the Nordics. And then you think, what is retail media? Legit question. Actually, retail media is just a buzzword for marketing, but it's marketing sold by a retailer. So if you think about it, the retailers already have a lot of attention, which is attention that brands pay a lot of money to reach in socials or on Google. So Retail Media is retailers monetizing this attention they already have and offer um media placements in their channels. So a really good example is the grocery store. And I think you've all been exposed to this before. But imagine a grocery store, and then Coca-Cola would like to have an ad in the grocery store. Yeah. It could also either be in their physical store or in their online store. So that is Rita Media. And there's a lot of exciting more details to go into, but that's a very short intro.

SPEAKER_01 2:41

Yeah. And I think we'll for sure get to that. But it's also really nice to hear like a broad introduction into uh what do you do and um you as a founder? So that's very, very exciting. Um all right. So one of my very first questions would be that um like or maybe, yeah. So take us back to the moment before reading existed. Um so what problem were you personally running into that made you think that something here needs to really change?

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Yeah. So take you even further back than my previous role. I've always been very interested in uh entrepreneurship. And um I'm originally from Sweden, and in Sweden we have something called young entrepreneurship, which is a course you take during high school. And then you're supposed to start a company um for a year and run it. Wow. Um and that was a really great start because it was really like a playful time and um very protected environment as well. But you were also supposed to actually get some real revenue. Um and there were also a competition like the best young entrepreneurship or entrepreneur of the year. So I really um started to enjoy entrepreneurship from there. And after that, I'm always I've always had the thought that I would like to do this, and I had some projects before. But the actual problem I saw while I started with Dane was in my previous role when I was working for um uh in-store screen technology company. And I could see that in the Nordic market we are sort of behind in this Rita Media industry. Uh and there's not really anyone in the market wanting to help the retailers to uh excel and succeed with their Rita Media business. Yeah. Um so even though there's a lot of great tech out there, there's not really anyone consulting and and helping the retailers. So that's the the challenge or the problem I set out to solve.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

Okay. So if you were to phrase the problem in like one or two sentences, so would that be like bridging the gap between the retailers and brands, or how would you how would you describe that?

SPEAKER_00 5:10

Yeah, so I would say that my um what I'm doing is two-sided. Yeah. So on one hand, I work for the retailers, helping them um define and optimize their re-to media offering. So that could, for example, be what media products are you selling? Should you have digital screens to sell, or should you have uh an ad in your newsletter? On the other hand, I'm also helping the brands to know how to place your money in this um new channel. So that would be sort of a social media consultant, but a retail media consultant.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

And you saw this opportunity that to advance in this space, right? That there was like a real market gap for such an offering and services you provide, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:57

Yeah, exactly. Because there's so much potential here. And it's a whole new revenue stream that is based on something the retailers already have. Yeah. And since it's so close to the put point of purchase, the brands are also really interested in um buying this media space. Because it makes a lot of sense to buy an ad when the customers are ready to buy instead of like just some random scrolling on Instagram. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

It's quite interesting that like maybe a person who is not in the industry like that engaged, but would assume that this is a space that is already quite advanced and uh there's perhaps no gaps to be covered, right? But actually, that's not a reality, right? So you you were working in that space and you discovered this um this problem that you want to solve, and you decided to just like take the opportunity and create your own company, right?

SPEAKER_00 6:56

Exactly. So um what I saw that you have trademarking that has been around for a long time, but that is usually when brands and the the buyer from the retailer is sort of part of the annual uh contract negotiations, are also throwing in some media placements. So and that is usually part of a discount on the products, for example. But this more sophisticated uh media placements and defining them and selling them as marketing um is not that advanced. And as you say, you you would have thought that this is obvious, of course you would be doing it. Yeah, but we haven't really seen that in the northern market until now. It's been booming, like the hype has been booming for around three years, and now it's we're starting to see some actual results from it. But you can um see other markets that are come much further. So, for example, the UK market um have a lot of great examples of free media. And when looking at that market now, you can see that it's just growing and growing. It's not that uh it becomes full. And I think reasons for why the Nordics are a bit behind is first of all, we don't have um that much Amazon presence because Amazon is a real driver in this industry. And uh in 2025, they were projected to earn over 60 billion dollars on Rita Media. And then we haven't really had a big retailer like UK has Tesco really driving this space forward. And if you have those like strong providers in the market or strong market leaders, yeah, uh the other retailers will have to answer to that. Yeah, and that will drive the market forward. Yeah. But since we haven't had that in the Nordic market, we are a bit slower. But we're picking up the pace now, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:59

But I think it's quite fascinating to see that uh you see this opportunity, you know the Nordics, but you also know what is outside of the Nordics, so we can get then inspired and bring that um yeah, that opportunity actually, or or dissolution uh to Denmark, Sweden, perhaps Norway, and yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

And one thing that I've been very positively surprised by is how generous everyone is. Uh because this since this is a new market, um there's not that many working with it in the world, sort of. So uh yesterday I talked to someone from Greece, last week I talked to someone from Ireland, the week before I talked to someone from Singapore. Wow. So it's like a really international like crowd, and everyone is very enthusiastic and want to help because you don't really see the others at c as competitors, more like partners driving this forward. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

Okay, so that's that's quite exciting that actually you don't need to really fight for the market because the need is there, as I understand, and people want to close that gap.

SPEAKER_00 10:08

Yeah. Exactly. But the difficult thing with new new industries and new when you're trying to uh break barriers or create something new is that this nothing is established. Like how how do you buy this? Why would you need a consultant? Why um so you need there's a lot of like education in all the customer meetings. So first you probably well first you will have to educate the market and then um you can start selling your services or they go hand in hand.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Very exciting. Um so maybe my next question would be um you worked closely with the retailers and the brands. So what exact experiences most shaped uh how you see the retail media space today?

SPEAKER_00 11:07

Um, so I have a clear example uh from working together with a brand. And what I can really see is that the market is very inefficient today and unmature. So even though we talk a lot about AI and technology and super cool stuff, buying Rita Media is the same way you've done it for 30 years. Wow. So you need to like um contact a seller and you need to know who that seller is because you because you can't Google on this opportunity. So it's very like um there's a lot of gatekeepers in a way, which is a weird dynamic because you have a lot of brands that would like to invest in the space, of course, but it's almost impossible for them to buy anything. So this whole like market dynamics, how you how you buy needs to be more efficient.

SPEAKER_01 12:09

Uh was there a specific trigger moment um when an idea when the idea shifted to a real company in your mind? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:19

Actually, my the situation I was in was that I was I had been thinking about starting my own company for a long time, but I didn't really dare to take the lead because I had this full-time job and it was paying well and it was comfortable. Um but then all of a sudden my company uh chose to close the I was working for a Swedish company in Denmark. So then I stood in a situation where I had to find something new. And in some way that was like a sign from the you know whenever you need to to do this now, but it still took some time for me to um really figure out what to do and if this is the right path. And also for the first, so I had like um three months of resignation period. So for the first one and a half month, I was still like looking around a lot, shifting between ideas and taking interviews and um exploring it. And I think even though that period was very frustrating because of course you just want to take a decision and go all in, it was still important for my journey to um really come to the conclusion that this was the right choice. Um and I started the company officially where I stopped at my last in my last book last day of September. So Rudane was born on the first day of October. So it's only been four months. Um and I would say that this first four months has also been very explorative. Of course, you want to find like the market fit directly. Um but I I'm trying to convince myself that trusting the process, what I need to do.

SPEAKER_01 14:02

Yeah, yeah. And also I think it takes a courage uh and the self-trust that okay, now I have this opportunity and I might have some ideas, but how do I select it? Uh, which idea is the right one? And also can I actually push through this process, right? Because it also involves lots of uncertainty and unknown in front of you. Um so, and then you said something around trust in the process. So that was like the core kind of backbone that you went to when you had your doubts, or like how how did you deal with all of these um uncertainty? I'm still dealing with them.

SPEAKER_00 14:45

I don't I don't think you're ever like not gonna have those doubts and ups and downs. That's that's just the the life of an entrepreneur. Um and one thing when you have your own company is that you need to wake up every morning and believe in the idea.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

It's quite interesting to observe the entrepreneurial journey also from the perspective that it gives you lots of freedom and power to shape your everyday but also your company. And so I think it's kind of a double-edged sword, right? That it comes with lots of uncertainty and unknown. At the same time, it gives you lots of freedom to f shape and form your own decisions and decide how you want to run things. But I think um it also requires to be like well balanced and have like a good self-leadership and good control of like what is it that like what do you allow from the externalities to come inside you and also how to predict your protect your own peace, right? So to have the energy then to actually execute on your own business.

SPEAKER_00 15:58

And also this is still fun.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

I think it also reminds me of what we um talked the last time um about that comparison can be a thief of a joy, or like also these externalities, and when you overwork yourself, it can actually take away the joy, which is at the first place the reason why many entrepreneurs start their businesses, because they f they get energy from that. It's enjoyment for them to run their own business. So how do you balance that?

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Yeah, I really like that quote, like comparison is the things about joy. Um, because it's so true, everyone is on their own journey. You only see all the good things that are happening, you don't see the struggles. Um so and everyone has a struggle.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

I'm also interested to know on how how do you balance um saying yes to early opportunities while still protecting your long-term vision as a founder.

SPEAKER_00 17:00

Yeah. That is always a question, right? Money or or the division. I think in the beginning you can't be that big. And every project will um learn or give you a lot of learnings. I would say don't be that afraid to uh take on projects. Um because it's always better to have a reference case than um but maybe think a bit about the terms of the contract or the price, so it's possible for you to end it. If there's other opportunities that are more interesting, of course you should um leave in a good way. But maybe in the beginning be a bit more careful with not write writing three-year contracts. Even though it would be really nice to have a fixed salary for three years, it also takes away all the flexibility.

SPEAKER_01 17:50

And potential for growth of the company and scale of the solutions, how you want to shape them, right?

SPEAKER_00 17:57

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:58

Um but of course you also need to be careful in what is called like body shopping when that you're nuts, because that will affect uh the development of your company a lot. Um but in the beginning you can't really be that picky.

SPEAKER_01 18:15

Now touching a bit more the marketing side, read aim, or also you yourself as a as a professional or specialist uh working uh in the industry. So if there's like one marketing or sales belief that you had before, and now you think, okay, that's not what uh actually works. That's that's like a belief from the past. So I have to unlearn this. So do you have some some uh something I need to uh unlearn?

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Um I would say that the importance of relationship, that it takes time to build that trust, uh, but also to understand the needs of the that B2B sales is uh it's also a marathon. It's usually that you need to introduce yourself, you need to make the customer understand uh what you can do for them, understand that they need help, and then maybe in six months when they're ready, they will think of you. So you need to have a lot of conversations going. Um, but another thing that I've also uh learned a lot from this uh journey is that people really want to help, which is amazing, but also be a bit careful with using uh your contacts network. So if you want someone to introduce you, have a good reason for uh being introduced to that person because everyone is busy and they are also taking a risk in interview. So uh if you don't really know what you will need that contact for, why you want to speak to that person, maybe it could be a better idea to wait until you know.

SPEAKER_01 19:57

So maybe it's about like taking the chances, but it needs to be well-thought chances so you know what you actually are gonna get out of the meeting, right? And also the timing of it, because like the momentum is also everything in entrepreneurship, right? So to build up the momentum at the right time really matters because once you build it up, you don't want to lose it. It's quite interesting, like how you need to also engage in different strategies, uh, if it's either in terms of the customers or the partners, or also how you come across um towards them, really shaping your approach, uh, really defines your next steps, right? Um, so I want to also um touch upon about um how do you maintain the depth and quality of your work and services while growing and expanding your customer base? Is it something hard to balance and how how do you do that?

SPEAKER_00 21:00

Yeah. I think it's that classical trap that you when you get the first few clients are so caught up with with the work selling, and then uh when the customer engagement ends, you don't have any clients. I would on the other hand, I would also say like the best marketing you can have is a client recommending you. So it is also very important to succeed with the product you have because it's so much more expensive to get a new customer than uh like entertaining and existing. So I think I don't have a good answer to how to do it. Really focus on on doing good work and probably also as I said before, I said uh you can't be too picky, but maybe be a bit careful with your time as well. Like if you see that you won't be able to perform, usually customers are not uh or can be open for. pushing the start dates. Just be honest with it. Be like, I'm not I have so much to do right now, so I'm not I won't will be able to give your products that tension needs. Would it be possible that we start at a later date?

SPEAKER_01 22:12

And it also ties back to the uh trust that you build with the customer, right? It's with the honesty and also being transparent on how much time you can engage with them. And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:22

And I think it's a lot about trust and transparency.

SPEAKER_01 22:25

So if there was um if you have to think about what do you want read aim to be remembered for, what would that be?

SPEAKER_00 22:37

It would be a company that is bringing um bold ideas and also especially from the employee side was a joyful experience and they felt motivated and it was like a co-creation. So I think of course it's really important for the customers to to remember Redame as a great partner. But from the employee side it's even more important because that's what also forms the company right exactly and then you create a lot of great ambassadors especially when you're a consultancy the only thing you have is your people that's the capital invest in them.

SPEAKER_01 23:18

Really fascinating to get uh kind of into the head of a founder and understand uh how you think um amazing one last question I have uh so what's the biggest hack that worked for you I think like trust in your gut um what feels right rather than what others are expecting. You're giving us here a real golden nuggets. I think this is such a good uh advices and perspectives you shared um and definitely something that uh I at least resonate a lot with and I also hope our listeners um is going to enjoy this um conversation we had and also take some good pieces um of advice from you so Anna thank you so much what a pleasure to have you here um thank you very much for inviting me and uh if someone would like to connect just connect with me on LinkedIn my name is Anna Serner and uh I'm always happy for to take a shot so uh reach out