YouTube BrandConnect (formerly FameBit) is an interactive entertainment company founded in 2013 and headquartered in

Santa Monica, California Santa Monica (; Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 U.S. Census population was 93,076. Santa Monica is a popular resort town, owing t ...

. The company develops and maintains an

Influencer Marketing Influencer marketing (also known as influence marketing) is a form of social media marketing involving endorsements and product placement from influencers, people and organizations who have a purported expert level of knowledge or social i ...

link sharing platform. As of 2016 the company has been a subsidiary of

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

, grouped under their

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

division.

History

As independent company

FameBit was formed in 2013 by high school friends Agnes Kozera, and David Kierzkowski. Kierzkowski had previously co-founded the

digital marketing Digital marketing is the component of marketing that uses the Internet and online based digital technologies such as desktop computers, mobile phones and other digital media and platforms to promote products and services. Its development d ...

platform TapClicks. He was approached by Kozera who was the founder of SeasonsBox, a subscription based gift delivery service, which had used social media influencers for advertising. The two developed FameBit as a link sharing platform which allowed companies to post offers to influencers. In February 2014 FameBit was one of two Canadian based companies accepted into 500 Startups venture fund. By 2015 FameBit had signed up about 9,000 YouTubers, and had run about 1,600 campaigns for about 1200 brands. At the time the average subscriber count for a FameBit Influencer was 46,000. By the end of the 2015 that number had risen to 21,000 across 6 social media platforms (

Vine A vine (Latin ''vīnea'' "grapevine", "vineyard", from ''vīnum'' "wine") is any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent (that is, climbing) stems, lianas or runners. The word ''vine'' can also refer to such stems or runners themsel ...

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

Tumblr Tumblr (stylized as tumblr; pronounced "tumbler") is an American microblogging and social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and currently owned by Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content to a sho ...

, Instagram, &

) By 2016, FameBit had been used in the creation of about 25,000 branded videos, with and estimated 2 billion minutes of viewing time.

Acquisition by Google

On October 11, 2016,

acquired Famebit, for what was later disclosed to be $USD 36 million. At the time of purchase, FameBit claimed 50,000 registered users. Google planned to merge the platform within their YouTube division. Since being acquired by Google, FameBit has allowed marketers to retarget videos made on FameBit to viewers via Google's Ads. In 2020, FameBit shut down its self-service program which allowed creators to independently find brands to work with. On June 16, 2020 the company rebranded as YouTube BrandConnect.

Business Model

FameBit acts as a platform for companies to post requests for social media content creators to advertise products and services, for a negotiable fee. FameBit receives 10% of this fee.

Controversy

FameBit has been criticized by brands for allowing YouTubers to join without verifying their followers. FameBit has also been criticized by Content Creators for banning them from the platform due to brand disputes. Several employees have claimed that FameBit promotes a toxic work environment, with 3 out of 4 of their glass door reviews awarding the company 1 star.

References

External links

* {{YouTube navbox 2013 establishments in California YouTube Entertainment companies established in 2013 2016 mergers and acquisitions American companies established in 2013 Google acquisitions