SponSoar: The Data-Driven Influencer Marketing Tool

Abstract

SponSoar is an influencer marketing platform for small businesses looking to tap into the fast-growing marketing channel of sponsored content on YouTube. SponSoar’s bank of influencers is populated by a web scraping module which finds relevant influencers using YouTube search queries, collects detailed statistics on a sample of each influencer’s recent videos, and performs analysis on this data to predict a future sponsored video’s view count and engagement. The platform itself is a full-stack, Django web application allowing brand managers to sign in through Google, create YouTube-based sponsored video campaigns, source influencers using advanced search & personalized recommendations, negotiate deal terms with influencers directly, and manage campaigns of multiple influencers in an easy-to-understand dashboard. Influencers have the option to sign in through the platform and provide SponSoar with additional information. However, this is not a requirement for an influencer to be listed on the platform as most of the platform’s value comes from analysis done on publicly available information such as likes, views, comments, and upload frequency. The platform is self-service in nature and therefore caters to businesses which are operating on leaner budgets and interested in recruiting influencers directly rather than hiring an agency. The scraper and platform were designed to cater to the existing needs and behaviors of influencers and sponsors in the market today.