Influencer marketing startup Tribe snaps up $7.5M

Dive Brief:

Tribe, an Australian influencer marketing startup founded in 2015, has raised $7.5 million in a Series A funding, according to a company press release. That brings its total funding to $15.35 million, according to data emailed to Retail Dive from Pitchbook.
The self-serve marketplace that helps brands acquire content from micro-influencers raised funding from several investors including Burch Creative Capital. That money will in part help the firm move into the U.S., where its operations will be headquartered at One World Trade Center in Manhattan and overseen by CEO Anthony Svirskis.
Tribe works with top brands like Unilever, L'Oréal and Marvel to generate more than $250,000 worth of branded content every day, according to the company, which also notes it has a network of more than 50,000 influencers, 20% of which hail from the U.S.

Dive Insight:

Influencer marketing has ratcheted up over the last few years as brands shift away from spending all of their budgets landing major celebrity partnerships. As opposed to stars, the lives and interests of micro-influencers and social media bloggers can appear more relatable to consumers and boost campaign reach. That's led to the creation of more companies like Tribe. But where it differs from competitors is that it allows brands to post their requests for influencer campaigns and then users submit their work and get paid if the brand ends up using the content.

"The U.S. market has been waiting for a tech platform like this for years and as soon as we heard they were launching stateside, we knew we needed to be a part of it," Chris Burch, founder and CEO of Burch Creative Capital, said in a statement.

Tribe is far from the only brand in the game. But there is an increasing need for these kinds of companies to make it easier on brands to find the most relevant influencers to their customers. According to research firm L2, 70% of brands now use Instagram influencers, especially luxury brands (91% of whom reported using influencers), activewear brands (84%) and beauty (83%).