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Ray Cao

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74
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2024-03-07
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2024-03-07
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  1. “Won't be able to get a right product in the market. It just won't be. And they won't even tell a good go-to-market story to advertisers or even to our users because they just don't know what are the end users are thinking. So I think it's a very secret source for us is that our sellers and our engineering team and our product team and also data scientist team, we're all collaborating really, really closely. And that's very much a, I would say, such a big advantage for us compared to when a company becomes too big and nobody talks to each other. So I do hope that it is the thing that we're going to continue reinforced along the years where we'll continue grow the company.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Other company. It's very tied up to that. I have never seen a company, the engineering team, and the product team and the sales team are so close. That's definitely one of the aha moments I had because If you're thinking about if your engineer does not really know what the market wants and if your PM doesn't really know what is actually the client's feedback,”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Employees So, not necessarily, it's not going to be like the old days that the co founder is sitting among you. But I do think this company has a very interesting behavior. I see there is I can talk to anyone at any time via our internal communication system. I can ping show right now. I can ping the co-founder if I want to tomorrow. We always keep this kind of mentality internal is that we're still a young company we want to grow and you can feel free to talk to anyone. We don't have a limitation for that. As long as you have a good opinion, I would love to hear from you. Is that creating some of the chaotic situation? It might be, but I do think that this keeps the company very energetic. People are willing to share, people willing to engage. That's very important. I want to add one more thing. We just talked about, you asked me, what is actually the uniqueness of TikTok versus”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Another internal thing that we always say is always day one. We want to make sure that we always have this mentality. We are a startup. We are a young company. We always hunger for growth. We don't want to fall into the trap that people may think, oh, you guys are very successful in the market. And then you are not necessarily need to worry about your existence anymore. I think it is actually something we try to avoid. We always want to make sure that in our team members always think like, okay, if this is actually a new day for you, I know what other things that you always want to keep in your mind you want to do. And also keep that spirit is very important. A lot of times that I can see some of the mature company, they're not necessarily losing the edge of, I would say, these competition or losing the edge of being innovative. I think it's more about some of the culture has been shifted because you have a lot of new”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “How to collaborate. And the discipline here and also the rigorous approach here is also going to be very important. One of the good examples of that is the ability to prioritize. Because I don't believe one thing is everybody can do everything. You have to do a prioritize properly so that you're able to push the right agenda. So I think that's more of a kind of the quality of the people we're looking for is it is hard, don't get me wrong. It is really hard to say that we can find everyone like that, but we would love to believe that we can train our employees like that so that they're able to even do better in their longer-term career.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “I agree with you, right? So the caliber of these people is actually pretty important to support the structure I just talked about. And oftentimes I can see some people that with the quality of always curious. Curiosity is a very important quality when I'm actually talking to my interviewers because I want to see that they are naturally curious to new things. They want to learn more about the new things and don't really get stuck with their own things. That's one thing. And the other thing is the discipline. Because like I said, it is actually a double edged sword in this case, right? So it could potentially introduce some of the chaotic situation in a company because everybody is thinking everything. The discipline here is actually how you are really following the guidance on reactive during be always thinking about”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Yeah, I think it's context no control plus proactive thinking and reactive doing right so you have to do more proactive thinking with these contexts now reactive doing means that you need to collaborate but when everybody has this kind of mindset the collaboration should be very smooth because people have the context altogether right I think the part that I see other maybe some of the other companies facing challenges is actually there's too many aisles in between And you have people that are just protecting their own thing and working their own thing and then I'm delivering. But just like how I see some of my friends, their kids playing Legos, if we don't really see the full picture, you won't be able to make the Lego as of one thing at the end of the day. You have to see the other pieces. So I think that's the part I think it's really powerful and reasoning, really, really well when we're really thinking about product development and also product go to market. So it's a pretty”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Creating, you know, hey, you're on other people's working group now, you're actually stepping on other people's toes now. It is not the situation we're trying to encourage you, but what's encouraging more is contextual control. Think more about how you can change. And then when you do really actually take some actions, be active. You reach out to who's supposed to be the owner of that and then have a discussion, right? So then you can be able to really connect in the thoughts altogether. So that's one thing I think is very unique to our culture. I think it's very, very important for us to continue grow at this speed because everybody have a full visibility towards our food ownership to their mindset, how they can contribute.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Encouraging people to think out of the box and think more and think themselves as a business owner rather than a piece of machine, like keep the machine running. Oftentimes I would say context no control. That means you actually can go above and beyond to really think about your whole business problem as your own problem. And your piece is maybe one part of it to solve the puzzle. But how do you actually solve the puzzle by connecting all the dots together? We're encouraging all the people to think like that way. And by that, I think we kind of mentally break out those walls. So encouraging our team members to do a little bit more thinking is very important. It's a little bit more thinking because the think part is very important, right? And then now in terms of getting things into behavior or changes or getting to action, then you need to really collaborate with other teams because we don't want to necessarily create.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Number one thing reasoning really, really well with me is context no control. Oftentimes when we're looking around companies, different sizes, we're looking at how to collaborate. Oftentimes we see the behavior that a lot of people just working on a smaller piece based off their job description. So, hey, you're working on go-to-market and you're working on data analytics and you're working on this book of business, on e-commerce, and you're working on other industry, for example. A lot of times that these human-made silos is actually sloan safe. Because humans are not, or our talent, they're not supposed to be categorized into different baskets. They may have their own majority responsibility, for sure. But we don't want to cap them into this kind of a box we created. That's really why we always”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Important here to make a judgmental call for some of the situations like that. I think we still rely a lot on both machine and also our own experts to analyzing those trends and give it the recommendations.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Another good example will be creative, right? So it's a very good example how human can work with technology together. We have a ton of creatives and we have a ton of content, right? So of course we use machine to label those content, use metadata to analyzing those content. However, a lot of times you can find that when we really think about how creative can help advertisers, humans actually make a more interesting or more, I would say, influencing decisions over there. For some of the verticals, we can say that, oh, you know what? Maybe we can try a coupon image with a new product, like a sticker on the top. This maybe actually work better compared to some of the price promotion even. So a lot of things really depends on how do you actually interpret the numbers and interpreting the data points. But also at the same time, your business is going to be very”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Really like lip syncing at a very, very early stage, but now really we're expanding to shopping behaviors and also a lot of people using us as a main platform to acquire a new discovery for the product, right? So these are the things I think, yeah, different market definitely deserves and demand different kind of treatment. And if you are able to do this a lot and you're able to find success over there.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Yeah, I think we did a lot of fine tuning on our user product side to really think about content. So that's the number one thing. We're super different coming from each of the market and also from each of the culture. For example, in Japan, how do you actually get more content that are relevant for the culture? A lot of people may think, okay, are you guys only doing dancing or doing singing for Japan? The answer is not. It is actually more food on the TikTok side. Like how do you actually introduce new food to restaurant or new recipes? And also sometimes that you're introducing a new technology, I would say 3C product, like consumer electronics product over there. So these are the content that get really popular sometimes in Southeast Asia or even Japan area and versus in the US as everybody knows that we're starting from”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “You should not necessarily worry about if you are a premium product. It's actually more about how long, how durable, how reliable you're able to print things and people can really. So I think these are the insights I think a lot of times you will be neglected from some of the clients or the manufacturers or even the owner of the business because they think that we want to serve this segmentation. However, this segmentation is that big in this area, right? That's really why I said, you know, the culture is really the key part from the market. We don't understand the culture and you won't be able to understand the behavior over there. It's more about that. I think when we say about globalization or take the product go to market in a global scheme or even build the product, have to get your hands dirty and to really understand the local culture so that you can understand local behavior.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Of the things is always concern to my at that point the client was they cannot figure out why their premium product cannot sell in Thailand. And then we just figure out like, you know, because the quality of their printing machine and also their intercultures are premium. And the quality of the paper and everything is very good. But when you actually do talk to those consumers in those markets, the answer is very eye-opening. They literally told me at that time is I don't care. I don't care if your incartridges or your printer is at the premium quality. Maybe the printer I can use, but I can use compatible in cartridges or tuner for that because my consumer won't care about your printing quality or the majority of my consumer won't care. So in that case,”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Culture. I had a fun background for my first job is to really do market research in Southeast Asia area. I think there was only one thing opened my eyes after a year and a half in this career path is different markets have totally different culture. And these market behaviors are actually coming out of this culture. One of the fun example I've always been using was I was doing market research for one of the suppliers for Turner and also this Inca cartridges. For Thailand as a like a go-to-market research.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “The algorithm is definitely helping, right? Because it is basically the machine is doing a lot of heavy lifting. That's actually, I think, across the board on the technology company today. The difference is it's actually how much you are willing to take the heavy lifting over there in the market. By that, I mean really sending your troops into the market, hiring your local talent, understanding the culture and really understanding the behavior from those users. I understand like the machine can do things, but also at the same time that we need to actually get local talent to fine-tune the machine. So there was a lot of a conversation about how I would say technology is able to change our life. But I do think that at the end of the day, I do believe technology is a tool. So if we do have an ambition to go global, you have to do one more thing is actually take your step into global rather than having the machine that have a lifting, you have to really understand in local.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “With the US market. And there's nothing wrong with it, to be honest, because this is the biggest market for them. As a, I would say, far east-born company, I think a lot of times that we can take approach with truly how do we think about globalization. And for example, we launch a lot of product, not necessarily first in North America. We launched it in Southeast Asia, for example, for our shopping really very big initiative internally for shopping. And we launched our really creator fund here in North America. We launched our gaming approach, really service our EUI gaming advertisers really, really strong over there. So there are a lot of different approach in terms of how do we prioritize our go-to-market and also product development. So that's the part I feel like we're very unique in the market or unique to some of the, that was the tech company.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “And again, the customer here is not necessarily only for the business partner, but also for our regular user and the creators on the platform. And the second one is really thinking about how we take approach on product development, right? So a lot of times that we take a very rigid approach in terms of product development. And oftentimes you see us that experimenting a lot of different things at all at the same time. And also we do have a lot of engineering and led a project in the back end to really understand how can we optimize better for the platform. So a lot of time these are the things that I think TikTok is doing really, really well. The last piece I have to say is approach for global prioritization, right? A lot of times that you see a US-born company go global and oftentimes still they are really like”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “Three major things, I would say. Number one is really how these two companies are thinking about innovation. So I think Google has a very strong philosophy of we're engineering lab and there's a lot of technology driven and a lot of pieces they are not necessarily always trying to, I would say, cope with the market even, right? However, I think at the TikTok, I think besides the technology part, we do have a very keen, I would say, appetite to really understand what the markets really want and also how can we really service our clients in a better way. And the clients here is not necessarily only for advertiser, including our user and also creator altogether. So that's one of the things I think is very different in terms of TikTok way of work is very customer-centric in a way.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “We always have this mentality we are a startup. We are a young company, we always hunger for growth and very reactive way is like, how can I run my second half of my marathon faster than the first half?”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “Do you actually solve the puzzle by connecting all the dots together? Just like how I see some of my friends, their kids, playing Legos. If you don't really see the full picture, you won't be able to make the Lego as a one thing at the end of the day. You have to see the other pieces.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “Number one thing is context no control. That's really why we always encouraging people to sync themselves as a business owner.”

    2024-03-07 · Lenny's Podcast · Inside TikTok: Culture, strategy, monetization, and more | Ray Cao (Global Head of Monetization Product Strategy and Operations) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source