Kai Battaglene believes many creator campaigns underperform for a simple reason: they optimize for convenience instead of context. 

After more than a decade in Australian media and digital audio, including senior roles at Spotify and ARN, Kai watched podcasting scale quickly during COVID. But as the space matured, he also saw intimacy give way to standardization.

“Podcast ads started becoming more and more like radio ads,” he says. “They’re not the greatest experience for the user or the brand.”

For Kai, the issue wasn’t growth. It was how brands were applying old processes to new creator ecosystems. Multi-platform personalities with deep audience trust were increasingly treated like inventory.

In response, Kai founded Jetpak Media, a creator-partnership and media-strategy firm, in October  2025. Based in Melbourne, Jetpak works with creators to build integrated brand partnerships across their full content ecosystem, from YouTube and podcasts to Instagram and TikTok.  

“I think the most important thing is what you’ve got to say, not the channel you’re using to say it,” Kai says.

The Three-Sided Value Equation

Kai frames Jetpak’s role as balancing three stakeholders: creators, brands, and their shared audiences.

“Jetpak creates value for all three of these parties,”  he says.

He has seen campaigns where one party wins at the expense of the others. A creator might receive a strong fee, but the content feels forced and underperforms. A brand might hit reach metrics, but the creator is underpaid or creatively constrained. Audiences disengage when partnerships aren’t authentic. 

Jetpak’s strategy centers on contextual relevance.“The deeper your understanding of a creator and their content, the better you can build a story that integrates a brand in an authentic way,” Kai says.

Engagement Beyond the Buzzword

When it comes to common industry metrics, Kai is cautious. “Engagement is a very broad concept,” he says. Unlike reach, which is more standardized, engagement can include anything from likes, shares, and comments to word-of-mouth conversations.

For brands, that variability can create confusion. “You can create a campaign specifically to hit KPIs without necessarily driving meaningful results,” he says.

Jetpak’s approach starts with defining success upfront. Before ideation, Kai conducts discovery sessions to determine what outcomes matter most for a specific brand and creator. “Once you define your North Star, it becomes a process of figuring out how to achieve that definition of success,” he explains.

The Convenience Barrier

One of Jetpak’s biggest early challenges has been the ad-market’s structure, not creativity.

“Just because you have product-market fit doesn’t automatically qualify you for success,” Kai says.

Kai points out that brands operate within established trading frameworks and measurement systems. Even when marketers express interest in integrated creator campaigns, budgets and KPIs often default to legacy channels. “The biggest factor in decision-making is convenience,” he says.

To overcome that inertia, Jetpak leans heavily on delivering high-quality service and ensuring concepts are mocked out and workflows are clear.  

Kai’s background in podcasts has also helped secure early trust. “I have prior experience I can lean on to understand what the opportunities are to deliver partnerships that aren’t available elsewhere,” he says.

Building Lean, Moving Fast

Launching Jetpak as a solo founder has required adaptability. Kai contrasts his experience running a startup with his corporate experience.

“I came from a publicly listed broadcast media company. It’s like an elephant with 800 legs,” he says. “There’s a lot of scale, but it couldn’t get out of its own way.” By comparison, Jetpak is agile. “I’m able to build partnerships bespoke for clients and creators, rather than force them to do business a certain way.”

Still, that agility comes with responsibility. “As a solo founder, if you don’t do it yourself, nothing gets done,” he says.

AI tools have enabled lean operations, but Kai is realistic about their limits. They accelerate workflows; they do not replace strategic thinking.

Niche Today, Network Tomorrow

Jetpak currently operates within a focused segment: Australian-based sports and fitness creators, primarily targeting male audiences aged 18 to 44.

That niche emerged organically through Kai’s relationships and interests rather than a rigid market plan. Over time, he envisions building interest-based hubs across verticals, such as food, automotive, and arts, mirroring how audiences consume content.

“If people consume based on their interests, I’d like Jetpak to evolve into multiple interest hubs,” he says.

The long-term goal extends beyond his own company. Kai believes the Creator Economy in Australia is still forming. He notes that creator marketing is sometimes categorized as PR, sometimes as social, and sometimes as media.

“It’s exciting to watch Creator Marketing consolidate and develop its own gravity and impact,” he says.

For Jetpak, success would mean setting a benchmark for integrated campaigns. “I’d like it to still be here, doing campaigns recognized as the gold standard of the Creator Economy,” he says. “Campaigns that both creators and brands look at and say, ‘I want more partnerships like that,’ because they’re providing value for everyone.”