Adriene Bueno got 1,000 Arena signups in 7 days — but the real story started 8 years earlier.
Before the waitlist blew up, before the platform existed, before there was even a name for it — there was a kid from a low-income Bay Area household who didn’t have a single connection in the sports industry. No degree in sports management. No family in the business. Just conviction that the industry’s networking problem was real, because she’d lived it.
In this episode of Run The Play, Field Vision sits down with Adriene Bueno — co-founder and Chief Growth Officer of Arena, a curated networking platform connecting professionals across sports, media, and entertainment. Adriene’s career spans LinkedIn, the NBA, Electronic Arts, and the LA Clippers — and now she’s building the platform she wished existed when she was trying to break in. This conversation sits at the intersection of go-to-market strategy and conviction-driven entrepreneurship.
Why the sports industry’s networking problem still hasn’t been solved
Everyone in sports and entertainment will tell you the same thing: relationships are everything. But nobody’s built a great system for actually forming them — especially if you’re not already on the inside. Adriene breaks down the gap she experienced firsthand: you hear “it’s all about who you know,” but if you don’t know anyone, there’s no clear path in. Arena was born from that frustration. The platform isn’t trying to be another LinkedIn or job board — it’s a curated space designed specifically for the relationship-driven dynamics of sports and entertainment, where trust and access matter more than resumes.
What most founders get wrong about early growth
Arena didn’t grow through paid ads or a viral loop. It grew through one-to-one conversations. Adriene describes the unscalable tactics that drove their first 1,000 signups in seven days — showing up at industry conferences, having real conversations, and personally onboarding every early member. For founders trying to build in niche, relationship-driven industries, this episode is a masterclass in why doing things that don’t scale is exactly how you build something that does.
Why trust — not technology — is the real currency in 2026
One of the most striking moments in this conversation is Adriene’s take on vulnerability as a growth strategy. In a world where most founders only show the wins, Adriene argues that sharing your losses publicly — the failed features, the wrong turns, the hard pivots — is actually what builds the deepest trust with your audience. It’s counterintuitive, especially for someone who’s worked at brands like the NBA and EA where image is everything. But Arena’s brand has been built on authenticity, and Adriene explains why that approach is more powerful than any polished pitch deck.
What you’ll learn in this episode:
- How Adriene Bueno went from zero industry connections to co-founding a sports networking platform
- Why Arena’s first 1,000 signups came from unscalable, one-to-one tactics
- What happened when they pivoted away from an AI-first messaging strategy 18 months in
- How to build a platform in a relationship-driven industry where trust matters more than technology
- Why sharing your losses publicly can be a more powerful growth strategy than only showing wins
- What makes building in sports and entertainment fundamentally different from other industries
Listen to the full episode above, or find Run The Play on YouTube.
About Run The Play
Run The Play is a podcast from Field Vision, a fractional CMO and growth marketing firm for digital media, entertainment, and creator economy startups (seed to Series D). Hosted by David — former Global Head of Audience Development at Amazon and Senior Director of Global Integrated Marketing at Twitch — each episode features conversations with senior marketing, brand, and talent leaders on the strategies behind the world’s biggest brands and boldest ideas.