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Athletes, celebrities, and micro-influencers have profoundly impacted the commercial landscape, leveraging their influence across social media channels.
The ability to digitally connect with large audiences has revolutionized marketing strategies, enabling brands and restaurants to engage with potential consumers directly and personally.
Let's dive in.
Imagine this
You enjoy spending weekends dining out and having drinks with friends.
After checking your expenses, you see that this habit is having an impact on your savings.
You seek ways to reduce your spending without cutting down on your outings.
After talking with friends, you hear about an app that offers discounts in exchange for posting about the experience on social media.
Explain it like I'm five
The Covid-19 pandemic fueled influencer marketing. In 2020, the market was valued at $9.1 billion dollars and last year, it stood at $21.1 billion dollars.
Over 46 million people use Instagram in Mexico—about 30% of the country’s population. With businesses fighting for attention, companies are leveraging the power of micro-influencers and user-generated content to help brands and restaurants succeed.
Clix is a discount marketplace for micro-influencers focused on helping brands, restaurants, fitness studios, products, and services grow their local presence.
In exchange for discounts, Clix connects brands with micro-influencers to promote their experiences or products on social media.
Brands benefit from organic shares, mentions, and mouth-to-mouth recommendations.
Micro-influencers benefit from discounts and promotions for uploading an Instagram story or post of the experience.
The ABC
Industries: Adtech, Social Media
Headquarters: Monterrey, Mexico
Year Operations Started: 2020
Team Size: 14
Raised: Bootstrapped
Business Model: Package-based (Companies buy packages, which include visits and social media posts of their restaurant)
Background check
What we like:
Traction: Clix has helped more than 250 brands across Monterrey and Guadalajara, generating around 50 million social media impressions and over 16,000 users. They recently opened their doors to brands and influencers in Mexico City, which founders expect to be their biggest market.
Advertising: Approximately 60% of businesses’ marketing budgets are now spent on digital marketing, while 40% are spent on traditional marketing, and 2/3 of marketers plan to increase their influencer budget.
Value: The cost of advertising on social media platforms like Instagram is constantly increasing, leading brands to shift their strategies towards more organic content, which has shown to have a bigger impact. Nano and micro-influencers generate approximately 60% more engagement than macro-influencers.
App: Clix released their app last week, which founders believe will improve their user experience. They plan to expand nationally after solidifying Mexico’s three major cities (Monterrey, Guadalajara, and Mexico City).
Roadblocks:
Users: The founders told Whitepaper that when Clix started, they thought onboarding clients (restaurants, establishments, brands, etc) would be the tougher target market, but in reality, onboarding qualified users (micro-influencers) to their platform has been the bigger challenge.
Cut-offs: Currently, Clix's model heavily relies on restaurants offering discounts exclusively to their users as a means to attract customers. However, what if restaurants and brands decided to sidestep Clix altogether and instead offer discounts directly to customers in exchange for social media posts?
Marketing: The advertising landscape changes quickly. Their model has been proven to work, but as time passes, they have to adapt to new trends and consumer behaviors to remain effective.
The Architects
Carlos A. Garza, CEO & Co-Founder.
Paulina Rodriguez, CCO & Co-Founder.
Andres Quijano, CTO & Co-Founder.
Request intro with founders by sending an email to gabriel@readrunway.com
Headlines Corner
Prometeo, a Uruguayan startup focused on bringing open banking to Latin America, raised $13 million dollars in funding (Techcrunch).
Techreo, a Mexican fintech startup that offers financial services for the underbanked in Latin America, secured $3.4 million dollars in funding (Latamlist).
Cogtive, a Brazilian startup that uses IoT to improve manufacturing processes secured $2 million dollars in funding (Crunchbase).
Plataform, a Colombian fintech offering financing, secured $3 million dollars in funding (Contxto).
Founders Bookmarks
The best tools and resources we came across this week.
How to design a culture that’s right for your company.
Psychology of Human Misjudgment speech by Charlie Munger.
Understand the importance of network effects and how to apply them in your business.
Building in Latam? Send us your pitch deck for the opportunity to be featured in Runway.