News

New York-based Popular Pays, an operating system for content creation, has raised $5.5 million in funding. Beringea led the round.

PRESS RELEASE

FARMINGTON HILLS, MICH. (August 7, 2018)— Beringea, a global private equity firm providing growth capital to high potential businesses, has led a $5.5 million investment in Popular Pays, an operating system for content creation. The new funding brings the total amount the company has raised since launch to $11.5 million. Popular Pays has found success in licensing its platform as a suite of creative collaboration tools for branded content and influencer posts. The new investment will be aimed at capitalizing on this momentum and scaling its sales and product development efforts.

Popular Pays’ goal is to change the way marketers create content. The new media landscape has drastically increased the content demands on brands, and marketers are seeking solutions. “Not too long ago brands only needed four commercials a year, and now they need 4,000 different pieces,” says Corbett Drummey, CEO. Creators have risen in popularity as a way to scale content quickly and cost-effectively and have also proven to be adept at figuring out how to excel at new formats like Stories or IGTV. Popular Pays software makes the collaboration between creator and brand easy.

Joe Grigsby, Managing Director at iCrossing Chicago talked about the value that Popular Pays adds to their agency: “Popular Pays gives us the ability to drive diversity and scale of creative that we wouldn’t be able to achieve otherwise. From direct communication with talent to managing final assets, their workflow tools let us maintain the creative and strategic leadership and control that we need and expect. Pop Pays is the only true platform we’ve seen – and using software like theirs allows us to shift more dollars into higher value activities, which we love.”

Michael Gross, Managing Director of Beringea, said: “Meeting the ever-increasing demand for content has become a daily struggle for marketing teams for global brands. We believe Popular Pays’ best-in-class workflow tools and platform integrations, coupled with an excellent community of high quality creators, position the company as the premier content solution for advertisers. Beringea is excited to welcome Popular Pays to our portfolio of companies innovating the digital marketing and advertising space.”

Earlier in the year, Popular Pays was added as a Pinterest Marketing Partner in the Creative Specialty group and recently was named a Facebook Marketing Partner in the Creative Platforms category. Drummey was also added to the 2018 Forbes 30 Under 30 list for Marketing & Advertising. Since their Series A in April 2017, the company has roughly doubled in size from 23 to 40 team members.

Key features and benefits of Popular Pays’ software:
Access to a community of expert content creators across all networks and formats
Automatic Brief Builder
Integrations with the social networks to use final content in paid media
Contracting and payment automation
Workflow tools that allow for strategic and creative control, including content review, direct communication, & revision tracking
Efficiently scale content and social posts for your brand

About Popular Pays
Popular Pays changes the way marketers create content. Their software solutions allow for an agile approach to content creation. Marketers can access a global community of content creators through Popular Pays or come with their own. From briefing to asset delivery, Popular Pays’ workflow tools allow for full creative and strategic control. Leading brands and agencies use Popular Pays’ software to create high performing diverse content at the scale of social. Popular Pays is based in Chicago, IL with offices in New York City. To learn more about Popular Pays, visit www.popularpays.com.

About Beringea
Beringea provides equity and/or mezzanine debt to growth-oriented companies in the U.S. and UK. The Firm, which includes Michigan-based Beringea, LLC and its London, UK office Beringea LLP, invests in exceptional companies operating in a range of sectors, including healthcare, information technology, advanced manufacturing, digital media and ecommerce, and specialized consumer products. With flexible capital solutions, extensive investing experience and an international footprint, Beringea’s team offers its portfolio companies the resources to grow their businesses and create value for stakeholders. www.beringea.com