Update: Wednesday, March 2 2016 – the Series B round has been extended by $8.2M, to a total of over $38M. Press release here.
Advocate marketing experts plan for accelerated growth, new products as B2B customers reap high returns from advocacy
TORONTO – Influitive, the advocate marketing experts, today announced it has closed $30.5M in a Series B round of funding led by Georgian Partners. Other investors in this round include OurCrowd, Atlas Venture, NTT Docomo Ventures Inc, BDC Capital IT Venture Fund, and previous investors Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Illuminate Ventures, Resolute Ventures, Relay Ventures, CommonAngels Ventures and First Round Capital. The company plans to use the funds to continue to expand the advocate marketing category and its market-leading platform, AdvocateHub, while fueling its rapid growth through new offerings and global expansion. In addition, Simon Chong of Georgian Partners will join Influitive’s Board of Directors.
“I’m gratified by the enthusiastic response we’ve received from investors that share our excitement for advocacy as the most authentic and effective way for marketers to reach buyers,” says Mark Organ, CEO and founder of Influitive. “The team leading this round offers Influitive enormous value beyond the financing. I’m looking forward to tapping into their broad operational and analytical expertise as we scale our business.”
“We share Influitive’s view of a massive market opportunity for business advocacy that is gaining traction every day,” says Simon Chong, Managing Partner for Georgian Partners. “For a company at this stage, this management team offers deep experience and operational sophistication. We are looking forward to helping the company grow by delivering exceptional value to their customers.”
Learn more about Influitive’s Series B:
The news comes as Influitive signs its 250th customer, hires its 100th employee, and engages more than 20,000 active advocates each month on its platform. This rapid growth is fueled by a number of industry trends. Buyers are increasingly influenced by peer to peer recommendations, reviews and references instead of marketing and sales pitches. In response, marketers are increasing their focus on the customer experience to cultivate satisfied clients into vocal advocates.
Influitive helps B2B companies identify, mobilize and recognize these advocates to accelerate business growth. Using Influitive’s AdvocateHub software, marketers quickly and easily build advocate communities in which members gain recognition and status in exchange for activities that help promote the brand’s interests and reputation. DocuSign’s advocates, for example, have influenced more than $3 million in sales pipeline through referrals and other advocacy activities. HP Software has engaged more than 1,000 IT service management customers in events, content creation and product feedback initiatives. In the first three months of using AdvocateHub, Blackbaud received a year’s worth of referrals from their advocates, while InsightSquared generated more than 100 genuine customer reviews on third-party websites like G2 Crowd, TrustRadius and GetApp. AdvocateHub is proven to significantly increase the number of lead referrals, sales references, product reviews, survey responses and participation in online communities and forums from customer, employee and partner advocates.
About Influitive
Influitive, the advocate marketing experts, is based in Toronto with offices in Boston, Palo Alto and San Francisco. Today’s buyers are increasingly leveraging their peers’ opinions and Influitive helps marketers tap into this force with its innovative AdvocateHub platform and Maven mobile app. By capturing the enthusiasm of their best customers, followers and evangelists, marketers gain direct support for their sales and marketing programs. From social media reviews and customer referrals to case studies and references, passionate advocate help support all stages of the buying cycle. Influitive’s customers include some of the most successful and fastest-growing firms in the world like Acquia, Atlassian, DocuSign, HireVue, Hootsuite, HP Software, Marketo and Oracle. To learn how to get your advocates working with you, please visit www.influitive.com.