Ricky Ray Butler is a 15 year digital veteran who has been at the forefront of reimagining the advertising landscape in a world of ever growing digital content. He found Plaid Social Labs in 2009 which was later acquired by BEN. Today BEN is leading the way in connecting brands to the right audiences in non-ad supported media across social, streaming and traditional platforms, and with the recent acquisition of TubeBuddy, has expanded that mission to help the 6M+ creators on the platform.
Butler serves as an advisor and investor for entrepreneurs and charities who share his relentless quest for disruption and deep learning, including applications of natural language generation in gaming with AI Dungeon and powering automated machine learning using unstructured data with Zeff (acquired by DataRobot). As one of AdAge’s 40 Under 40, and a member of Forbe’s Agency Council, Butler is serving as the catalyst for the next generation of data driven entertainment and advertising. Like any true digital nerd, Ricky spends his free time creating art no one should see and reading about the myriad of ways data has and can improve the 21st century.
