Rumble is today one of the most discussed, polarizing, and studied platforms by marketers around the world. It became a cultural phenomenon even before it became a video platform. Yet there’s a detail that many people ignore: Rumble wasn’t created to compete with YouTube for mass appeal, pop virality, or mainstream entertainment.
Rumble was born as a reaction. It was born as a response to a void. It was born to become a refuge, a container, and then an alternative media system for everything that didn’t fit into the centralized and hyper-moderated internet of Big Tech. This is crucial to understand because it’s not a “narrative” detail… it’s the very foundation of its marketing positioning.
And this positioning choice—extreme, counter-current, non-neutral—is what transformed Rumble from a marginal platform to a global player in digital culture. Rumble didn’t build an “audience.” It built a counter-audience.
1. The Origin: A Saturated Market Dominated by YouTube
In 2013, Rumble seemed destined to leave no trace. YouTube was overwhelming, all-encompassing, globally ingrained in digital habits. It had already created cultural, technical, and psychological standards. The industry was already considered “won” by a single player.
Entering that market was almost industrial suicide. And in fact, anyone who tried to compete took the most logical… and wrongest route:
copying YouTube.
This is the classic strategic mistake of follower platforms: imitating the leader, chasing features, trying to replicate the same experience… losing their identity and positioning. Rumble did the opposite. Rumble didn’t enter to steal audiences from the mainstream. Rumble entered to be the cultural alternative where those who didn’t have space could speak.
YouTube was beginning to be perceived as a “filtered,” regulated, controlled platform, where algorithms and policies decided what was “acceptable.”
Rumble built a completely reversed positioning:
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YouTube “defines the boundaries”
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Rumble “welcomes those outside the boundaries”
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YouTube decides who’s in
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Rumble absorbs those who’ve been pushed out
This is pure subtractive strategy: not stealing market share from the dominant… but collecting what the dominant rejects.
And this is advanced identity marketing. Rumble has transformed “not being accepted by the mainstream system” into a symbol. A cultural badge.
It has given voice to creators, ideological niches, journalists, opinion leaders, figures shadow-banned or penalized by traditional algorithms.
It has turned “algorithmic counterculture” into a competitive advantage. Rumble didn’t promise universal popularity. It promised narrative freedom. And this, in the digital world, is a value more powerful than any feature.
2. The Stroke of Genius: Monetizing the Rebellion
Many think Rumble grew thanks to big influencers. That’s not the case. That’s just the surface narrative. Rumble grew thanks to social friction. The element that generated acceleration wasn’t entertainment… it was conflict.
Rumble understood something before anyone else: in the modern digital world, polarization generates more retention of “neutral” content.
And so they capitalized:
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creators banned or demonetized by other platforms
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Independent journalists censored by traditional media
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Political and social commentators with a high narrative tension
Rumble hasn’t built a generic community. It has built tribes. And tribes are more loyal than communities.
Brand positioning:
Rumble isn’t defined as a video platform. Rumble is defined as publishing rights.
It’s not an alternative “social network.” It’s the anti-silence infrastructure.
And this is incredibly powerful on a psychological level: perceived value isn’t entertainment…the value proposition is freedom, self-determination, the possibility of unfiltered expression.
Marketing wasn’t push. It was magnetic. Rumble didn’t recruit: it absorbed.
3. The Rise: From Underground to Global Player
2020 is the strategic turning point. While mainstream platforms were altering algorithms, introducing stricter editorial policies, and intensifying moderation, bans, and shadow bans… Rumble had its historic open window.
Here comes the genius part: Rumble didn’t try to be “for everyone.”
It chose to be the home of the excluded. And by consolidating the polarized hub, it has increased cultural identity, attachment, and organic virality.
Result:
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Institutional investors have begun to see it as a real alternative to US digital oligopolies.
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Creators with millions of users have migrated, bringing real audiences, not “users to be conquered.”
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The mainstream media, by criticizing and attacking it, didn’t weaken it… they amplified it.
Rumble didn’t grow thanks to mass. It grew thanks to friction.
It grew as a counter-narrative. And in modern digital culture, counter-narrative is the fastest driver of social expansion.
4. The Marketing Lesson Behind the Rumble Case
This is one of the most underrated lessons in contemporary marketing, especially by those who still think with a ’90s broadcast mentality. Many brands think that to dominate, you have to please everyone. Rumble proves the opposite.
In some markets, especially digital and socially tense ones, it’s much more powerful to become the absolute point of reference only for a hyper-cohesive niche… rather than being an “acceptable” brand for everyone.
The model isn’t “generic market share.” It’s “vertical cultural share.”
Key principle:
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You don’t win over the masses.
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You win over an ideology.
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And then that ideology wins over the masses.
Strategic points that Rumble perfectly embodied:
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Identity > Mass Market → identity is an asset, volumes come later
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Intelligent Bias > Sterile Moderation → those who position themselves neutral become invisible
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Tribe > Indistinct Public → the tribe defends, speaks, amplifies, engages in spontaneous activism
Rumble didn’t try to convince everyone. It made a surgical, radical, vertical choice. It spoke to those who no longer had space on traditional platforms. And it got them all of them.
That’s the difference between marketing that seeks consensus… and marketing that seeks cultural power. Rumble didn’t win over those who were inside. It won over those who had been left out.
Conclusion: Rumble is the perfect example of a brand that grows “against” and not “thanks to” the system.
Rumble isn’t a case of social media. It’s a case of extreme cultural strategy.
Rumble demonstrates that today, competitive advantage isn’t created by copying the dominant leader, but by intercepting what the leader rejects, discards, or represses. This is where real, profound, unexpected opportunities arise.
The real strategic question isn’t: “How can we become the next YouTube?”
The real question is:
What identity, what battle, what ideology can we become?
The future of marketing isn’t about persuading everyone. It’s about having the courage to choose who you’re willing to alienate in order to become irremovable for a specific segment of the market. Rumble didn’t simply occupy a space. It built an alternative cultural territory. And in contemporary marketing, this is more important than any advertising campaign.
