This week, the company is launching “ShopMy Opportunities,” a new feature that will facilitate a different sort of paid partnership between brands and influencers. With Opportunities, brands will be able to offer creators a set monthly payment in exchange for a guaranteed number of mentions across their social channels.
Unlike a traditional influencer campaign, which usually includes a detailed brief with specific talking points to hit, sponsored posts born out of Opportunities will have no mandates on what must be included in a post. The only thing the influencer is required to do is hit the number of posts they’re contracted for per month, and include a trackable ShopMy link to the brand’s website. Through that link, brands will be able to track how the post performed in their ShopMy dashboard. They can also approach influencers within ShopMy’s network about potential Opportunities through the company’s messaging system.
The idea is essentially to allow brands to pay in advance in order to ensure the creators they know will convert for them are mentioning their brand and linking to their products on a regular basis. Influencers, meanwhile, get the creative control they’re looking for.
“When [creators] have to go back and forth with a brand six times on reviewing content, it gets to the point where their voice has been sucked out of it,” said Tiffany Lopinsky, the co-founder and COO of ShopMy. “They lose in that situation because they don’t like it, their audience doesn’t like it, and I don’t think it converts for brands either.”
Lopinsky added that for brands, an organic mention can lead to a major sales spike, but you can’t predict when they’ll come. This feature is meant to give brands a way to bake some certainty into that process.
“It’s almost like the brand is putting these creators on salary, and it’s up to them to create the content,” added Lopinsky.
Opportunities’ arrival is reflective of the changing tides in the influencer marketing sector. As consumers have grown savvier, they’re less receptive to blatant ads. Influencers, too, want to be given the freedom to make ads that will resonate with their audiences. And as the industry has grown, so have the pathways for influencers to make money online.
ShopMy, which was founded in 2020, has been gaining traction in the space for its updated approach to affiliate marketing meant to ease communication between brands and influencers. In addition to Opportunities, ShopMy also this year introduced a feature called “Lookbooks,” which allows brands to invite influencers to select products for gifting from a predetermined offering.
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