How Madalina Petrea Runs Marketing for 27+ Cybersecurity Franchise Owners Across 4 Continents

**SPEAKER_1** (0:02)
You're listening to the CyberWire Network, powered by N2K.

**Gianna Whitver** (0:09)
Hey, listener. Today, I just want to preface this episode. We have something really unique and awesome to talk about. We have Madalina Petrea on. She is the Head of Marketing at CyberGlobal, a security franchise company, which is so cool. Before we begin, just wanted to explain the concept of what a franchise is, because it's not something that we see in cybersecurity like ever, and that's what makes this conversation so fun and this company so unique and interesting. And honestly, you could talk about it all day. So as a franchise company, there's a headquarters company, which Madalina works at, where she leads the internal marketing team, which operates almost like an agency to the franchisees, which are usually founders who have created separate entities that serve local regions. For example, a franchisee of CyberGlobal could be in North Carolina, and that would be their region, or Italy. Well, a town in Italy, and that would be their region. The purpose of CyberGlobal is to serve small businesses, which is why this franchise model works, because small business is super local. We're so excited for a very interesting conversation, and can't wait to hear more about what it's like to be basically serving almost 30 franchisees across global regions around the world. Stay tuned for an amazing episode with Madalina Petrea.

**SPEAKER_1** (1:26)
Welcome to the Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing podcast, where we explore the hottest topics in cyber marketing, interview experts, and help you become a better cybersecurity marketer.

**Gianna Whitver** (1:44)
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Breaking Through in Cybersecurity Marketing. I'm your host, Gianna Whitver, here with a fabulous guest. We have Madalina Petrea. She is the marketing leader for CyberGlobal, which is, I think, the world's first cybersecurity franchise company. Madda, thank you so much for being on the show today.

**Madalina Petrea** (2:04)
Hi, thank you for having me.

**Gianna Whitver** (2:06)
Okay, so before we get in, when you first submitted to Speak on this podcast, I was so intrigued because I had never heard of a franchise for cybersecurity. Can you explain what CyberGlobal is?

**Madalina Petrea** (2:19)
Sure.
It's always about what we offer, of course, but for CyberGlobal, it's about what we want to do and our mission in cybersecurity. So basically, CyberGlobal is a group of companies that offer cybersecurity to small and medium businesses, not exclusively, but we focus on this market because they are the underdogs. It's a huge market that needs time and they don't afford the big prices, the big price tag that enterprise companies do. But we still want to offer them and we believe that cybersecurity should be affordable to all companies.
So that's how CyberGlobal started. To be super honest, it all started with one of our co-founders calling me. I was on my maternity leave. He called me and said, Okay, Mara, you know, I have this crazy idea. I really want to offer cybersecurity services like a global team that we have. Engineers that work on top 500 companies, super experienced. I want to offer these services to smaller companies and build this something. I need just 10 hours of your time and I'll let you be with your baby. I said, okay, 10 hours. I mean, it's fine.

**Gianna Whitver** (3:35)
I'm like, that sounds fun.

**Madalina Petrea** (3:37)
Exactly after, you know, with the baby and everything. In the end, fast forward, 2026, this is how we do this worldwide, right? So they came up with, okay, I want to do a franchise, franchise in cybersecurity. Because these people do have the stakes in it and it's just easier to open locations. And check us right now, we have 20, 27 locations.
Most of them are in the states, but we have in Africa, Asia, Europe, of course. So it's been quite a ride.

**Gianna Whitver** (4:09)
That's awesome. So obviously, this is now more than 10 hours a week of your time, right?

**Madalina Petrea** (4:13)
Definitely.

**Gianna Whitver** (4:15)
How long have you been the head of marketing at CyberGlobal?

**Madalina Petrea** (4:18)
So I started mid 2024 And I said, okay, I started first building, okay, what we want to do?
Is this a good idea? We started validating. We started selling franchises in Europe because it was closer to us. And after that, everything just exploded. We had a lot of people were interested because when you have a company that offers you marketing, sells information and you can go out there and also the cybersecurity market, which we are on the rise, they were super interested. So I started mid 2024
I started building the team. Right now, we are at the headquarters, nine people that are coordinating main things.