Modash
SaaS + Fintech enabling E-commerce Stores to Scale Influencer Partnerships.
“Find, Audit, Contact, Monitor and Pay content creators”
🚨 Disclaimer
All research on startup and the whole investment memo has been done for personal use of Akim Arhipov.
Modash is revolutionizing the creator economy with its multi-phase business approach. Currently, it offers Creator Partnerships Software for Brands, positioning itself as the premier platform for brand-creator collaborations.
Modash is in the process of closing a Series A investment round, raising 11m€. As things stand they have received and signed a term-sheet from a from a Dutch VC (name not disclosed yet) for up to 7m€ and are currently undergoing the due diligence process. In addition the round is filled with pro-rata right of previous investors.
Since Avery, the founder, is also a member of the fff.vc community, we were lucky enough to receive a small allocation in the round. This is a unique possibility for smaller investors to participate in what is becoming a market leader company within the Influencer Market segment.
With the Series A round secured, Modash is targeting $30M in ARR within two years (3x growth YoY). This marks an important stepping stone towards Modash’s big vision of becoming the leading infrastructure hub for the creator economy.
Market is lacking a streamlined processes, convenience and transparency when it influencer marketing collaborations, leading to inefficiencies, miscommunication, and suboptimal results for brands and creators alike. In addition working with influencers causes a lot of inconvenient bureaucracy when it comes to payments.
A comprehensive, all in one solution to the challenges that arise within influencer marketing collaborations. It offers Creator Partnerships Software for Brands, Modash streamlines the process of connecting brands with creators, facilitating seamless collaboration and communication.
In the future, Modash aims to expand into SAAS and Fintech, envisioning itself as the "Intuit of the creator economy," providing comprehensive business management solutions for creators.
Notably, Modash's innovative payment model, where brands pay creators through the platform, ensures free distribution, addressing challenges that hindered previous creator economy startups.
Looking ahead, Modash aims to establish itself as the infrastructure of the creator economy, offering end-to-end services including fully-fledged banking and AI negotiations.
Discover
Modash allows its client to access the pool of 300k+ content creators and find the right fit, allowing to segment them by: topics, performance and audience demographics.
Users can:
- Find competitors creators
- Find creators who use your product
- Find clones of your top performers
- Reach local audiences abroad
- Or, anything else.
Audit
Not only can user pick the needed influencer but also receive an overview of critically important metrics to understand the efficiency and actual fit for the need.
Users can:
- Identify Fake followers
- Confirm Audience location
- View popular and sponsored content
- Determine performance by content type
- +100 More
Manage
Users can efficiently connect with more creators, maintain seamless relationship management, and monitor team progress effortlessly. The ultimate outcome is an easily filterable and automatically updated master database uniting all the connected creators.
Users can:
- Build lists of creators
- Track relationship status
- Add labels, notes, documents & more.
- Get contact information.
- Send emails.
- Compatible with all email marketing tools
Monitor
Users can effortlessly gather and evaluate all branded content automatically, regardless of scale, without the need to onboard creators.
Users can:
- Collect otherwise uncollectible content
- Track & review creator deliverables
- Measure and report success
- Identify top performers
- Enforce Ad compliance
Pay
Users can streamline their payment process by consolidating thousands of invoices into just one, allowing them to focus on forging new partnerships instead of dwelling on past transactions.
Users can:
- Top up your Modash balance (Modash takes 5%)
- Send a payment link to creators
- They get paid in 3 quick steps.
Overview
- The creator economy is experiencing a surge in growth, anticipated to reach a substantial $75 billion USD by 2024 with a robust compound annual growth rate of 15%. This trajectory outpaces digital ad spending, underlining the increasing importance of influencer marketing in advertising strategies.
- Brands across various sectors, including ecommerce, hospitality, gaming, and retail, are recognizing the potential of influencer partnerships, allocating up to 40% of their marketing budgets to this channel. Moreover, the rapid-increase of micro-influencers is fostering healthier market conditions, enabling smaller brands to compete for consumer attention.
- Video content, particularly on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, is driving deeper engagement and trust among audiences, enhancing the effectiveness of influencer marketing.
- As consumer brands continue to learn from past experiences and prioritize long-term, authentic partnerships with creators, the market is poised for sustained expansion.
- Despite current spending trends being predominantly focused on established platforms like Instagram and TikTok, there is a growing interest in emerging channels such as livestreaming and podcasting. This presents a significant opportunity for Modash to provide innovative solutions tailored to the evolving needs of brands and creators alike, tapping into multi-billion dollar markets across data, platform, payments, and creator business stack segments.
Go-to Market
Modash achieves 100% organic content growth, leveraging low-cost channels that scale effectively.
Their web traffic generates signups from leading companies. Notable recent additions include Montblanc, Nintendo, NBA, and Victoria's Secret, who discovered Modash while seeking advice or tools. Upon signup, they either self-serve or schedule a call with our sales team, comprising 2 Account Executives (AEs) meeting quota targets.
Top-priority companies transition to our customer success team, dedicated to expanding key accounts. Currently, Modash has have 1 full-time account manager who successfully grew more than $250,000 in ARR in 2023. Modash plans to further bolster their "land and expand strategy" by increasing headcount in this area throughout 2024.
In addition to inbound and "land and expand" strategies, Modash identified scalable paid opportunities to acquire customers with a sustainable CAC:LTV ratio, set to be implemented in 2024.
General snapshot
Historical data
Modash has been on a remarkable journey of 100% organic growth. Their creator partnerships and payments platform has reached $5M in subscription ARR, with a 101% NRR, serving over 1.2K paying customers, including Farfetch, Montblanc, and Victoria’s Secret.
To scale even faster, Modash launched a service that helps brands to pay creators for 5% fee.
Clients
- As things stand, 50% of the revenue is coming from top100 costumers of Modash. Remaining 50% being generated from the rest 1500+ customers.
- Taking into account the strong philosophy of “Land and Expand” strategy, the focus nowadays is being set on growing the later 50% of the customer base in scale.
“The rise of the creator economy is poised to reshape media, marketing, and commerce, with Goldman Sachs forecasting its value to double by 2027. Creators, who generate content for digital platforms, challenge traditional business models by fostering direct connections with their audiences. Brands are increasingly diverting ad budgets to creators, recognizing their potential as brand-builders and revenue generators. While AI will impact business, it's the creator economy that will have a more profound influence in 2024, emphasizing authenticity amid consumers' wariness of artificiality. As trust becomes paramount, creators with established rapport stand to wield significant power in this evolving landscape.” (Business Insider)
REFERENCE
Core Team
Nadim Taoubi - CFO
Willi Wiedregold - CPO
Organization
Overview
The influencer marketing space comprises various players, which we categorize into four main groups, covering 99% of the market:
- Agencies in Disguise: Many companies pose as software providers but operate as agencies, limiting scalability and margins. Often, these firms transition to Modash as customers.
- Local Marketplaces: Attempts at building local influencer marketplaces often fall short due to scalability issues. These platforms struggle to match demand with suitable creators, leading to limited growth potential.
- Data-dependent Software Companies: Companies relying on social APIs or purchasing data, perform tasks such as creator indexing, qualification, and contact information provision. However, building robust data infrastructure is challenging, leading many to avoid it.
- Combination of the Above: Some companies blend elements of the previous categories, such as running local marketplaces while leveraging first-party APIs or incorporating technology into agency services.
Notable competitors (1% of the Market)
- CreatorIQ: Focuses on enterprise clients but may compete more directly with Modash in the future. Modash holds a technological edge and boasts a robust base of SMB clients.
- Upfluence: A short-term competitor, with companies like Farfetch transitioning to Modash. Upfluence's focus remains on lifestyle, lacking aspirations for significant scalability.
- HypeAuditor: Another short-term competitor, commonly switched from along with Upfluence. Offers improved user experience and more comprehensive products but lacks a clear strategic focus.
- GRIN: Was once a significant competitor but has shifted towards professional services after being acquired by private equity. Not currently competitive on deals, with numerous companies switching away.
Unique features and benefits
- Free Trial: Introduced as the first in the industry.
- Modular Build: Integrates seamlessly with other tools until full adoption.
- Global Scale: Suitable for any geography, platform, or niche.
- Accurate Insights: Considered more accurate than alternatives.
- Onboarding Convenience: Works without requiring creator onboarding, unlike competitors.
- Depth of Value Proposition: Offers comprehensive features like unified vendor and relationship context.
Why Modash stands out
- Strong Opinions: Modash starts with strong assumptions about influencer partnerships, focusing on creator-centricity.
- Creator Understanding: Considers creators as critical stakeholders, ensuring frictionless interactions.
- Ambitious Vision: Aims for significant growth, distinguishing itself from lifestyle competitors by taking bold leaps forward.
Challenges for competitors
- No Incentive to Compete on Data: Building robust data infrastructure is costly and time-consuming, dissuading competitors.
- Trapped by Agency Model: Companies attempting to balance software aspirations with agency services often face limitations.
- Moat of Data Ownership: Modash's extensive data network provides unique insights and future product advantages, difficult for competitors to replicate.
Amount: 11m€
Valuation pre money: 54m€
Cap Table: ca.65% owned by founders to date, Unallocated ESOP stands at ca.11%
Investment type: Equity
Committed so far: 10m€
Raised until today: 2m€
fff Members
Total allocation: 500 000€
Minimum ticket: 10 000€ First come - first serve
Fee structure: 7% one off + 7% carry (from profit)
📞 For all the question, feel free to reach out to Tim Vaino, 56893204 / tim@fff.vc / WhatsApp