Ep 196: The door to more: DoorDash’s advertising journey

In this episode, Apptivate host Taylor Lobdell interviews returning guest Toby Espinosa, the Vice President of DoorDash Ads, about the company’s tremendous growth – from serving local restaurants to enterprise chains and eventually expanding into non-restaurant categories. You’ll learn more about DoorDash’s CPA advertising model that has been key to its success, their newest ad solutions, and the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

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• Can you tell me about a significant but small win from your early days as a launcher?
• When did the advertising component of DoorDash’s business begin?
• What role did you play in DoorDash’s transition to including non-restaurant categories in your platform? And how does the advertising strategy differ?
• Can you tell us about a key challenge you faced? Or which milestones you’re most proud of?
• Are there any trends or new initiatives that you see shaping DoorDash or the DoorDash advertising platform in the next few years?

• 0:38 Toby Espinosa’s background at DoorDash
• 1:36 DoorDash’s founding story & Toby’s first big win
• 9:09 Building DoorDash’s advertising CPA model
• 18:54 Expanding into non-restaurant categories
• 22:09 DoorDash’s newest ad solutions
• 23:33 DoorDash’s challenge and opportunity
• 29:28 How to invest in the future
• 31:51 Best of San Francisco

9.40-9:56
“So we started by building a discounting platform that allowed any one of our restaurant partners to discount an item and target specific outcomes, whether it’s a first time user, a lapsed user etc.”

20:05 - 20:16
“We want to bring consumers a relevant piece of content, and we might also bring them a promotion or discount to help increase the conversion rate of that sale.”

23:31 - 23:49
“The way we look at this space is that we were founded on a very simple principle – to help local economies grow. We are probably about two or three percent into that journey.”