BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--With a string of major developments heralding its expansion beyond the college-aged community, CampusLIVE today announced that it has re-launched as Dailybreak. The company has closed $5 million in funding led by GSV Capital Corp. (NASDAQ: GSVC) and appointed John Federman as CEO. CampusLIVE Founder Boris Revsin will serve as Dailybreak’s EVP, Business Development and Strategy, where he will work closely with Federman and lead the development of the company’s syndicated advertising model.
Dailybreak is expanding the company’s proven digital social action programs well beyond college students, with new offerings targeting moms, young professionals and high school students. These programs feature “Challenges” and content that drive connections between consumers and brands much deeper than a simple “Like,” delivering measurable results for major clients such as Chevrolet, McDonald’s, Anheuser-Busch, Dunkin' Donuts, Microsoft and Ernst & Young.
Over the past several months, the company has expanded its partner network to provide marketers with access to a community of more than 10 million users. The new Dailybreak brand was established to more accurately reflect the broader reach and focus of its digital social action platform. To fuel its aggressive expansion and growth, Dailybreak has raised a new $5 million round of venture funding. GSV Capital Corp. led the round, with existing investors Highland Capital and Charles River Ventures also participating.
Dailybreak: Fun and Rewarding Break from the Ordinary
As brands have established presences on social media, the discussion has been framed around “engagement,” a vague metric loosely attached to the number of followers the company has on Facebook or Twitter. Brands and advertisers have learned that “likes” and “followers” don’t necessarily tie directly to actions. Dailybreak re-invents the model with custom “Challenges” that drive consumers to take action.
These Challenges—such as the recent “Stay Clutch” campaign for Chevrolet, where users simulated driving a Sonic with a stick shift and created videos about their own experiences with or wishes to own a Chevy Sonic—are uniquely-packaged experiences that bring bite-sized content to users and social action to brand sponsors. Challenges are entertaining social games and experiences that allow users to learn new things, create content, interact with friends and unlock exclusive prizes.
Challenges can take place on any website, a brand’s Facebook fan page or Dailybreak.com, and the company’s pay-for-performance business model guarantees that advertisers and brands achieve their desired campaign results. Registered Dailybreak users currently complete 20 challenges a month, finish more than 96 percent of the challenges they start, and spend 32 minutes a day actively engaging with branded digital events.
Top-Tier Backers See the Power of Digital Social Action
Dailybreak plans to use the proceeds of its newly closed $5 million round of funding to fuel the growth of its sales and development teams to add new clients and powerful capabilities to its pay-for-performance platform, as well as new mobile capabilities the company plans to launch later this summer.
“Marketers’ budgets are growing, and these budgets are increasingly being directed towards social media. This is because brands need to provide authentic engagement with customers while also generating demonstrable return on their advertising dollars,” said Michael Moe, founder and CEO of GSV Capital. “Dailybreak has already successfully proven its model among the most tech-savvy yet marketing-averse community – college students. We believe this is just the beginning for Dailybreak’s platform, and we expect it to yield significantly larger and more diverse audiences for brands. We are very excited to be partnering with the Dailybreak team.”
Executive Leadership Poised for Expansion
“I’m excited to lead Dailybreak’s digital social action programs as we expand into broader consumer markets and help move digital marketing beyond vague concepts of ‘engagement’ and ‘liking,’ to driving actions that deliver real results,” said John Federman, the company’s new CEO. “Any brand can stockpile followers. Dailybreak has created proven, measurable solutions for major clients that drive real results—and we’re building on our success with college students to bring these capabilities to the broadest range of clients and consumers.”
Federman has successfully built and sold multiple companies, and brings 25 years of experience with innovative digital marketing and media companies to Dailybreak. He most recently served as CEO of Searchandise Commerce, a high-growth company that was subsequently acquired by RichRelevance. He was previously the CEO of eStara, the leading provider of proactive conversion solutions for enhancing online sales and support initiatives, which was acquired by Art Technology Group (ATG) in 2006. As co-founder, president and CEO of Dotomi, an Internet advertising company, he was responsible for its successful rollout in the United States. And as president and CEO of AdSmart, a CMGI company, he grew the company tenfold and orchestrated its sale to Engage.
About GSV Capital Corp.
GSV Capital Corp. (NASDAQ: GSVC) is a publicly traded investment fund that seeks to invest in high-growth, venture-backed private companies. Led by industry veteran Michael Moe, the fund’s objective is to create a portfolio of high-growth emerging private companies via a repeatable and disciplined investment approach, as well as to provide investors with access to such companies through its publicly traded common stock. GSV Capital is headquartered in Woodside, CA.
About Dailybreak
Dailybreak delivers a new form of content that entertains, educates and challenges consumers while creating value and driving digital social action for brand advertisers. Dailybreak's innovative content advertising units, called Challenges, are consumer-initiated experiences that incent people to engage with and share a brand’s message. With a network of more than 10 million consumers, Dailybreak provides unique advertising solutions with highly relevant targeting, engaging content and guaranteed results to some of the world’s leading brands including McDonald’s, Anheuser-Busch, Dunkin’ Donuts, Microsoft and Chevrolet. Dailybreak is based in Boston, MA and is backed by Highland Capital, Charles River Ventures and GSV Capital. For more information, visit www.dailybreak.com/advertising.