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Influencer marketing firm Octoly raises $10m funding round

Influencer marketing firm Octoly raises $10m funding round

French influencer-marketint firm Octolyhas raised a $10m Series A funding round, with advertising industry giant Havas among the investors.

It was joined by investment firms Otium Venture and Twins Partners, as well as the European Union's SME Instrument program.

Octoly focuses on fashion, beauty and lifestyle, and has signed up a network of more than 10,000 influencers, for whom it sources free products from brands. Its client list for the latter includes Dior, Lancôme, Sephora, Clarins, Yves Saint Laurent and Estée Lauder.

"We decided to support Octoly as earned media is becoming more and more important in the marketing mix for our customers," said Havas boss Yannick Bolloré, according to MediaPost.

"We strongly believe that the value of Octoly is in its capacity to deliver unbiased reviews for brands. Authenticity is the cornerstone of influencer marketing which is now a billion-dollar industry."

The $10m funding round will partly be used to push Octoly's new e-commerce expansion, OctoPrime, which will help influencers create their own online stores to sell products, reported Tubefilter.


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Stuart is a freelance journalist and blogger who's been getting paid to write stuff since 1998. In that time, he's focused on topics ranging from Sega's Dreamcast console to robots. That's what you call versatility. (Or a short attention span.)