Daisy Pre‑Seed Investment Memo (Aug 2024)

Daisy is an advertising network powering micro‑collaboration between social media influencers.

By Escape Velocity

Introduction

  • Turning paid influence into a multiplayer game. Influencers earn for “boosting” other influencers’ sponsored posts via likes, comments, and reposts—creating an echo‑chamber effect that increases virality across overlapping social graphs.
  • Collaboration improves efficiency for both sides. Brands see 10–20× higher traffic and 25–50% lower CPAs on boosted content vs. single‑influencer posts. Influencers unlock steady income, earning $10–$100 per comment or repost with payouts in hours rather than months.
  • Team. Founded by experienced creator‑economy operators: Ray (CEO) and Vincent (CTO) previously built the product that scaled Pearpop to 200k+ influencers; Ian (CPO) led product growth at Whalar.

Stats

15 brands  |  1k monthly active influencers  |  $100k/mo gross revenue  |  25% take rate

Resources

Reasons We Have to Invest

  • Immediate product‑market fit. In month four of private beta (launched April 2024), Daisy processed >$100k in ad spend (+35% MoM) with a 25% net take rate. >30% of influencers boost at least twice a month. Brands that test Daisy have effectively no churn, increasing monthly budgets to $10k–$50k.
  • TAM‑unconstrained. Effective across ecommerce, entertainment, and crypto. Digital ad networks capture ~$740B/yr; influencers’ portion is ~$35B and growing. Internal plan: ~$3m annualized gross revenue by year‑end 2024 from inbound and referral‑only pipeline; larger scale by 2025.
  • Network effects (two‑ and three‑sided). More brands → more influencer earnings; more influencers → finer‑grained audience targeting. Emergent behavior: creators also boost their own organic posts to grow following and leverage, reinforcing the flywheel.

Cap Table

EV3 was Daisy’s first investor (Mar 2024) and doubled down in the pre‑seed round led by CMT Digital (Aug 2024). Daisy is among EV3’s largest ownership positions and top investments by capital.

Appendix

Revenue

Live (Aug 2024) and Pipeline (Dec 2024) snapshots referenced in memo.

Run‑rate: $2m/yr (with ~$1m/yr recurring), per memo notes.

Case Studies

Selected brand case studies referenced (names redacted in the PDF excerpt provided).

Key Questions

1. Platform risk

Daisy’s “echo‑chamber” value prop currently works on TikTok and Instagram, with additional networks planned. At large scale, platforms may attempt to dampen boost effects. Mitigations include rewarding diverse, thoughtful activity (LLM‑assisted scoring) and encouraging cross‑platform virality.

2. Attribution

To defend against copycats, Daisy needs best‑in‑class attribution so high‑intent audiences receive commensurate rewards. Today: static rewards (~$20/comment, ~$100/repost). Roadmap: affiliate links and/or zkTLS to prove engagement granularity; partnership with Opacity to verify cohort‑level engagement, with launches slated for Q4.

3. Does it need crypto?

  • Stablecoins → fast payouts. Real‑time on‑chain payments compress TTFP from months to hours/minutes, enabling Daisy to become creators’ top‑of‑funnel income stream (debit card in Q1 2025; lending to follow).
  • zkTLS → granular attribution. Private metrics (e.g., which profiles liked a post) can be verified without being publicly exposed, and posts in exclusive/paid groups can be proven.
  • Staking → retention & fee reductions. Planned 2025 token network where brands/creators stake to lower blended fees; may also support fee buybacks/burns—akin to mechanisms used by centralized exchanges.

Get a PDF version of the original investment memo:

Daisy Pre-seed (Aug '24) by Escape Velocity

📄 Download PDF