Huffington Post Women in Business Q&A: Claudia Page
Claudia Page is VP of Partner & Product Development at Dailymotion, the leading destination for online video discovery. In this role, she serves as head of the Vivendi-owned company’s partner-facing products, product owners, marketing and engineers responsible for the relaunch of dailymotion’s partner experience and streaming, distribution and monetization tools.
A 13-year veteran in the advertising, technology and publishing world, Page is passionate about launching and scaling digital marketplaces and consumer web products. Prior to Dailymotion, Page served as VP of Platform Growth and Creator Partnerships at Crowdtap, a leading influencer marketing and marketing intelligence platform. While at Crowdtap, she oversaw the evolution of Crowdtap’s expert influencer program and platform, bringing to fruition a new model that combined software and services to pair qualified content creators with the world’s leading brands, such as Target, McDonald’s and Absolut.
Before Crowdtap, Page was the first hire at Sulia.com, a subject-based social network (with 30MM monthly unique visitors) that raised over 11M in venture capital and monetized via an influencer marketplace and native sponsored ads. As Head of Product, she worked to connect leading publishers and brands with social influencers across Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter and Sulia’s own platform to drive trusted endorsements, authentic sharing and engaged audiences back to their properties. She also grew relationships with brands and publishers, delivering strategic, integrated social media campaigns on Sulia and beyond.
Before Sulia, Page was an early employee on the product team at Gerson Lehrman Group, the world’s largest professional learning platform that pairs leading professionals with independent subject-matter professionals.
A frequently published thought leader, Page has contributed her industry perspectives to publications like Adweek, iMedia, MediaPost, Social Media Week and more. In 2016 she was named to DM News’ prestigious ‘40 Under 40’ list.
How has your life experience made you the leader you are today?
I was raised by two very ambitious, self-made people who taught me the value of hard work and instilled an entrepreneurial spirit in me from a very young age. Both of my parents traveled significantly, so we were always moving around. Without a true “home base” for some of my earlier years, I learned to embrace diverse cultures and cities that I could make my own. I still have that same passion for exploring new places.
My mother, a serial entrepreneur, was an especially significant influence on my own career—especially as she started and scaled several successful companies in the 1990s. My mother is also exceptionally creative, and she used her knack for finding unique solutions to complex problems to pioneer new ventures.
I parroted my mother’s work habits as a kid. I guess you can say I caught the bug early. As a pre-teen I helped her run the operations of her businesses outside of my schoolwork. On my own, I always had projects in rotation, and I loved tackling problems from a business perspective. At one point, my high school was having an issue with graffiti on campus, so I pitched the idea of a project that would allow students to express themselves within parameters. I also remember buying up vintage jeans all over town, upcycling them, and then reselling them to my classmates. This was before the days of Etsy, so everything was analog.
While many of my classmates were drawn to one or two specific passions (sports, art, dance, etc.), I was always drawn to a diverse and ever-shifting set of interests. I was curious about learning about different subjects, and I loved using creativity to solve big challenges.
How has your previous employment experience aided your tenure at Dailymotion?
My passion for tackling complex problems has been the connecting thread in my career thus far. It’s brought me to a lot of startups and growth-stage companies—places where there isn’t a defined blueprint for achieving the mission. I love operating in an environment where part of my job is to define and, ultimately, execute on a new strategic plan of which I’ve played a significant role in setting.
More specifically, I’ve been an early employee at a then-tiny startup (Sulia), and I’ve also held positions working with fortune 50 global brands (Crowdtap) and at global brands, such as my current post at Dailymotion.
The current big challenge I’m helping to solve at Dailymotion has to do with the ever-growing complexity of the digital publishing world. Publishers and creators are looking for new ways to reach and engage audiences at-scale. On the flip side, consumers express increasingly high standards when it comes to the content they choose to consume.
Of course, the third piece of this puzzle is the advertiser, who wants to ensure their brand messages are appearing in a brand-safe environment. From a technological standpoint, I’ve always been drawn to opportunities that allow me to help build an entirely new product or evolve a product to a new state. Clearly, I’m no fan of inertia!