Tiffany Lopinsky: Co-Founder & COO of ShopMy on Rapidly Scaling a VC-Backed Creator Marketing Platform

Tiffany Lopinsky, alongside fellow co-founders Harry Rein and Chris Tinsley, set out to change the influencer marketing space in 2020. Their vision: craft a revolutionary tool for the creator economy – ShopMy.

Already, they have grown its network to over 40,000 creators and 300 brand partners, signing on renowned beauty brands like Tatcha, Dior, and Elemis and retailers like Nordstrom, Nike, and Lululemon. Recently, they secured $18.5 million in funding, which they are now using to innovate product features, attract even more brands to the platform, and build the team to support its strategic investments.

On this episode of the Brilliant People Podcast, Linnea Jungnelius, Global Head of Marketing & Strategy at Acertitude, sat down with Tiffany to explore how ShopMy has evolved from an MIT research project to a comprehensive creator marketing tool – and the talent strategy that powered that growth.

Linnea is also joined by Kristin Wardour, Principal at TEG Consulting, an Acertitude company, who tells the insights and lessons learned from recruiting 20 team members for ShopMy, including the Head of People and Head of Brand Success, and from other strategic hires for scaling, VC-backed technology companies.

Because, as both Tiffany and Kristin attest, scaling, sustaining, and professionalizing operations all comes back to one thing: the right people.

Linnea: Tiffany, let's start with the founding story. What inspired you to launch ShopMy together with Harry and Chris in 2020 and what was the need you collectively saw in the market?

Tiffany: All three of us have a bit of a different version of the founding story because we came into it at different points. I had been working with Harry at another startup and we had worked on a storefront concept that was for consumers, but not content creators or influencers. Regardless, we always had this feeling that the storefront concept was something that influencers would love.

Harry had ended up meeting Chris through an MIT connection. Chris was at MIT Sloan, working on a business school project about social shopping, regarding how people are influenced to purchase items through social media. His research revealed something that's probably not surprising to a lot of us: that many people are taking recommendations from influencers on Instagram. At the time, there wasn't a good place for influencers to showcase those products, and that was the core need that everything about ShopMy was founded on.

So, Chris and Harry got connected, and Harry brought me into it because we were working together. He was the lead engineer at the startup that we were at. I was a product manager, so I was working with engineers on building the product. I'm sure you have seen Amazon storefronts, other tools like that. There was not a tool that allowed people to showcase all the products that they were talking about because they were gated. On the Amazon storefront, you can only showcase Amazon products. On the LTK storefront, you can only showcase LTK products. So, we wanted to build something, and the main value proposition of ShopMy was that it was a place where you can showcase all of your favorite products.

This was happening at a time when content creators were becoming prominent. We had the era of bloggers, where they had their own websites, and now the wave of content has come forward. They were sharing things on TikTok and Instagram and needed a place that was easier to build and navigate than their own website. That was the foundation of what we started with from a product perspective.

We interviewed and talked to hundreds of creators while Harry and I were still at our other company and started to do market research to understand what they were looking for and learned a lot about affiliate tools in general. For context, most content creators have two main revenue streams: flat fee (being paid by a brand), and affiliate earnings (clicking on commissionable links and they earn commission).

From our research, we learned that they disliked all the tools on the market for affiliates, so we incorporated that into a storefront concept. Not only were we going to give them a place to showcase everything, but we were also going to make this an affiliate tool to help build up that revenue stream. The concept has evolved so much, and a lot of times we're asked, what was the idea? It was so many things, and mostly learning from people along the way.

Linnea: It sounds like you did a lot of listening to the market and have continued to iterate and build from there, which I think a lot of entrepreneurs can resonate with.

Tiffany: Yes. We raised a seed, friends and family round. At that point, we felt that we had enough confidence that there was a real market need, and that we could do this full-time. The three of us started working on the concept during COVID for about two years. We then hired our first person, and eventually made it to Kristin a while later.

Linnea: You raised a Series A round in November 2022. What made this the right inflection point for the business to bring on outside investors? How did you go about it?

Tiffany: Fortunately, Harry and I had startup experience and learned many valuable and incredible lessons. The common thing that people think about Series A versus a seed round is that seed and family and friends is while you're finding product market fit, and Series A is when you start to scale.

So, the first couple of years we were careful about what we spent money on, focused on building the product, and maximized everything that we could do. Before raising Series A, we were at a point where we built a solid offering on the creator side. People were loving the product, they were having a great experience, we were getting rave reviews, and they were introducing us to brands to join the platform.

We had almost 200 brands when we were raising the Series A. We had brands paying for the service, and product market fit was there. It was clear that brands wanted to invest in this channel and appreciated the way that we were doing it. We felt that we were at a point where having additional funds would help us scale the business in a completely different way, and in a way that was going to be valuable to both sides of our platform.

Ultimately, our platform is a network. We built the creator side first, and then introduced the brand side. Having that creator community is extremely valuable to the brands, and having the brands is very valuable to the creators. At that point, we’d also established a process of acquiring brands and creators where we knew if we added more people, we could train them to grow at a faster rate.

We were at the point where raising capital made sense, and that's what we've done with it – we've used it to grow the team. The thing that creators want most from our platform isn't a specific feature. It's adding more brands that they care about, which we need team members to work on. The brands love what we’re doing. They want more content creators to gift to, to partner with, to work with in an affiliate capacity, and we need team members to work on that as well.

Linnea: Kristin, at TEG, you partner with VC and private equity investors across every software and SaaS segment. What are some of the traits that investors place high emphasis on when assessing the quality of a management team during due diligence?

Kristin: There are a few traits that these PE and venture firms are looking for, which dovetail into some of the same traits we look for in candidates later in the investment cycle too.

They value founders who have passion, tenacity, intuition, high EQ, and most importantly, agility. They need passion for the products they're producing and for its growth. Being an entrepreneur is not for the faint of heart. They are told “no” more times than “yes,” and probably more times than they can remember. So, they must have the fortitude to handle objections, have the EQ to read different scenarios, and intuitively spot gaps so they can pivot when necessary.

Tiffany: From talking to many VCs over past couple of years and ultimately being really happy with the firm that we just raised with, Inspired Capital, who have been incredible partners to us, it was interesting to realize how little other VCs wanted to get to know us and get to know our product.

One of the reasons I was excited about Inspired Capital, even from our initial conversations, is that they spent the time really getting to know the founding team as well as dig into the product. We had multiple sessions of learning about the product and the market. You do have to dig in. So many people have great ideas, but ultimately, it's about how you're reacting and implementing everything.

Linnea: I think, Kristin, this goes back to one of the things you touched on, right? Different profiles fit different types of companies. There are executives who are builders, others who are maintainers, and those who thrive as transformers and change-makers – which can work well in turnaround and restructuring situations. It's all about the fit.

Kristin: It truly is all about the fit, and it’s unique to each search, hiring manager, and the moment in time of that search. The fit doesn’t mean matching a resume to a job description. Instead, it’s about that substantive experience, culture match, and intuition. Candidates for entrepreneurial searches must have the requisite experience, match passion for the company’s product and mission, and intuitively pivot and pitch in when necessary.

I heard Alexa von Tobel, the founder and managing partner of Inspired Capital, mention this on a podcast. She learned early on in life: if you want to hang out, you’ve got to keep up. I think this truly exemplifies the type of candidates we are looking for in entrepreneurial searches.

Tiffany: One of the reasons I think she is good at what she does is because she has the experience of building a company herself, which a lot of VCs don't. Harry and I, especially, were excited about that, working with someone who has experience operating a business and growing it. Ultimately, she sold it, but she has incredible insight because of that, as well as the ability to evaluate potential investments.

Linnea: Tiffany, how did you put your growth capital to work? Could you map out your growth journey up until this point for us?

Tiffany: Our story of growing the company and the network was that we started, specifically, in one vertical: beauty. Not because any of us necessarily had any experience there – we now do and have learned so much about beauty brands and content creators – but there was a white space that existed, and those creators were underserved.

We initially built the network by getting great content creators that brands were going to be excited about, and using those content creators to get more brands that they were going to be excited to partner with. We had this “aha” moment when we worked with a brand that a lot of beauty content creators loved. They didn't set up a program on any other platform; we were the only platform that they were working with. So, we were able to go pitch content creators saying we have this brand, and they were like, "Whoa, you're the only platform where I can generate affiliate links to this brand." They were joining because of that, and we said, "Wow, we can use getting great brand partners to help us with the creator side as well."

Now, raising capital; the main thing we've used it on is expanding the team to replicate the exact process of acquiring brands to get creators, but in different verticals and different sub-segments of creators. After raising the Series A, we hired more engineering talent so that we could continue to level up the feature set. We released our mobile app, and we released a feature called Lookbooks. Basically, what it allows brands to do is seed products, so every consumer brand is gifting product to influencers. It allows them to do that easily and quickly by automatically placing orders on their site. We hired a team to help us build, and then more importantly, evangelize the concepts to brands and content creators across industries. After raising the Series A, we also started our expansion into lifestyle, fashion, and home, and growing the team to support that was key.

Linnea: Tiffany, what has been the value of partnering with a third-party search firm, and specifically TEG, in ramping up your hiring efforts?

Tiffany: It's been huge for us, mostly from a time-saving perspective. We're very hands-on as leaders of the company. It takes a lot of time, as you know, to find good people. Something I've learned from the process is that you can look at someone's resume or LinkedIn, but you don't know them until you talk to them. It takes time to get through all those candidates.

Working with a firm to help us do that has been essential for our growth. I feel like we got very lucky with TEG because we were on the same page about the types of people we were looking for. At a startup, things are changing all the time; roles are changing, teams are changing. You need people who know that it's their job to understand the goals of the company and figure out a way to help achieve those goals. It may not look exactly like what the job description says, but they're excited about contributing to it. Kristin and TEG really understood that and helped us find great people.

Linnea: Kristin, what were the talent needs you identified at ShopMy, and how did you go about finding the right people?

Kristin: It's always a collaboration. It's imperative to get in deep with the founders to understand their culture, their ethos, and what's going to make them successful. It's not a straight line, it has evolved, it's been a great journey, and I feel fortunate to have been on it, to see them go through this massive hockey stick growth.

The founders, Tiffany, Harry and Chris came to us with an exciting challenge. Like many of our clients, they were a high-growth, emerging company and in an emerging space. With a company like this, our first step is to do a deep dive – to really understand our clients' talent needs as well as their competitive landscape and value proposition.

It became clear how unique ShopMy's value prop was. There were some competitors that offered pieces of what their SaaS platform offered, however, I have yet to find someone who completely covers the full funnel of talent discovery, engagement, collaboration, and tracking/analytics that ShopMy offers. We needed to discover talent that understood the changing landscape of digital marketing and how creator marketing fit into that, and find people that were excited about that and no matter what we're doing, which SaaS software or startup we're working with, we want to know what makes them unique.

An important part of our job is sales; getting people about this new company, one they may have yet to hear of, and one whose SaaS products focused on all different stages. What we did was break it down and look at the different stages of that creator marketing journey and which competitors were the leaders in each of those stages.

No matter what the search is that we're doing, we want to find the best people, and we do find the best people from referrals. This is something I would suggest to every company: start with a deep dive, talk to thought leaders, talk to referrals, and then go back to the founders. What we do is a calibration call and we hone in on that ideal candidate profile for every search that we're doing. We determine the right competencies and plug those into the model for ShopMy, and constantly iterate to get better. As I say to candidates and clients, no phone call should be a wasted phone call. You should always learn something. That connection point points you in the right direction.

Linnea: Kristin, as SaaS startups go from early stage to growth stage, where do you see frequent talent gaps, and are there any takeaways from these projects or others that could help others staff up effectively?

Kristin: Absolutely. To your point, yes, I like to go deep and my biggest compliment is when I'm talking to candidates, and they think I actually work there. I do think for ShopMy, as well as any growing, scaling company, you need to be agile, and be invested as if you work there. That's what I want my clients to feel.

I want to be a partner and help my clients to see the talent gaps. I learn from conducting 30-60-90-day reviews with the candidates we place. We don’t just say “here you go” and walk away. Talent gaps arise as companies grow and scale, and they’re all unique. One general gap I’ve encountered during multiple searches is getting that time right – when to bring in people who aren’t only building the business, but people in operations who put processes in place to scale the business.

With our talent selection, we're always looking for people who have a record of success that can complement what there is and add to the tableau. Paramount, when we're filling those gaps, they must have that same passion and be a culture match. We want to make sure that when we're adding, that's the way we're adding. The gaps arise when there are people coming in who don't have that shared history and they need a roadmap and a process. That's where we find the gaps and together, we come up with, "You know what? I think this is what we need now."

Tiffany: Hearing Kristin describe that side of it just makes me think of how the challenge of filling a role and what that looks like is so different at the stage we're at now than when we started working with TEG, especially in the beginning.

Now that we're more “out there,” we have a bigger team, we're working with more creators and brands, and more people have heard of us. At the beginning, when we were just getting started, recruiting was such a sales thing. You must pitch the company, no one is interested simply in the name. So, it is about communicating that to them. It's a lot of work but we must find people who get excited by the mission. All our best teammates at the company are genuinely excited about what we're building, and the needs the product is solving. That’s something Kristin and TEG have understood and helped us find people like that.

Linnea: Tiffany, when we first started working together, you partnered with 200 brands and 7,500 influencers, and today you work with more than 300 brands and 40,000 influencers. Clearly, you are doing something right. What is unique about ShopMy and how your platform resonates with influencers and brands?

Tiffany: I think one of the most important things that differentiates us from other SaaS platforms that consumer companies might be using is that we started with the creator side first. We built, and continue to build, a tool set for creators. Part of our offering is both access to these content creators, and the ability to work with them and make it easier to work with them. That is a unique feature that makes it easier for brands because we already have 40,000 engaged content creators, so they're responding faster, and they're excited to work together.

There are also changes happening in the industry that are contributing to our growth. Brands, over the past couple of years, have been investing in the influencer channel. I think everyone agrees that these content creators are influencing purchases, but there hasn't been a good way to track what's going on. Many industry professionals have expressed concerns about navigating through what feels like a bubble, akin to flying blind. Due to the lack of effective tracking tools, we aim to address this challenge and educate brands on the importance of evaluating their influencer collaborations more strategically. While not every brand is currently adopting the approach offered by ShopMy, there is a growing trend towards this direction among more and more brands.

Most other marketing channels are systematic; you put money in and you get something out. With influencer marketing, it's different. What we're trying to bring to the market is creating more of a system, so that you can approach it in a way that is ROI focused. That factor is contributing a lot to our growth. As more brands are learning that they should be approaching marketing a bit differently than how they are, this tool set has resonated with them.

Linnea: Yes, influencer marketing and the omnichannel digital space has been transformative for marketing, particularly B2C, but increasingly B2B. Marketers are significantly increasing their spend in this category, and you have been on the forefront of this evolution. What are the key trends shaping this space, and what is the growing influence of AI?

Tiffany: Historically, if you're a consumer brand, you need to give gifts to content creators. Even if you're not a consumer brand, you need to be providing someone with a complimentary experience to review and talk about.

In the past, this tracking has looked like working with a PR firm and them simply coming back to you and reporting, "We got the product into the hands of these 100 people and their total following size is XYZ." It does not touch upon who actually posted about the product gifted, who's driving sales, or who's converting best so that you can optimize what you're doing. Many brands, especially luxury brands, are giving away hundreds of thousands of dollars of product and they truly don't know how it's impacting their business. I think people are starting to realize they can't do that anymore, and that there has to be a better way. That is part of the need that ShopMy is fulfilling, and what a lot of brands are trying to fix.

The AI piece is most importantly helping us do things better and faster and smarter. We use AI to help our brands generate recommendations on who they should gift to, considering who has converted for them. We use AI to facilitate recommendations of, "These 30 influencers look similar to the people who you gifted to and who promoted you. So, this is our suggested group of talent for you to gift to next." The smartest companies are taking advantage of this, and we incorporate it not just into the product, but into everything we do in terms of using ChatGPT to help us be more efficient about our day-to-day operations.

Linnea: Kristin, what are the talent implications? How should companies think about readying their teams for the future?

Kristin: Some of the things you need to do are almost counter intuitive to rapid growth. It's easy to get wrapped up in growth; it's exciting, there are so many things going on, it's a fun ride, or good chaos. In this fast-paced environment, it’s crucial for companies to pause and prioritize the employee experience alongside their rapid progress. Great employees are instrumental to their success, and it’s essential to nurture them through continuous growth initiatives, succession planning, and effective onboarding processes, among other considerations.

ShopMy did take that beat and they were smart to say, "This is the time to hire a head of people” last year. That person is focusing on that process; they came from the outside with both big and small company experience. The founders are busy growing and building the business and now they have an individual that can say, "You know what? I've seen this before and this could be helpful,” which brings back in the EQ that founders need.

Linnea: Tiffany, how do you keep your own leadership skills sharp?

Tiffany: A couple things. Most importantly, and it's very representative of the ShopMy culture, being on the front lines is probably the number one thing I do to keep my leadership skills sharp. I'm a strong believer in more of a lead-by-doing approach than by telling people what to do.

On a weekly basis, I’m still talking to brands and influencers, and responding to customer service chats. I still get the notifications on my phone. I genuinely believe that people are everything to building a company. How would I be able to help them do their jobs better, help us decide what we should focus on, if I'm not in touch with what people are doing every day? I think that means a lot to the team and the people we are working with that I'm willing to go deep, help them figure something out or figure out how we can do better, and they trust what I say more because I've also done it.

We have four main teams at ShopMy: brand growth, brand success, creator growth, and creator success, and I genuinely spend time functioning as one of those four competencies every week. That is what keeps me sharp. I also ask for feedback constantly. It keeps me developing as a person and leader. I try to ask people how I could do something better, how I could pitch a brand better, how I could help a creator in a certain way that would resonate more with them.

Kristin, you know Harry, he is not the kind of person you have to ask for feedback, he just gives it to you. He and I have had a great relationship, where we can work together and help each other improve, and ultimately, each of us co-founders bring a unique balance to the table, varying not only in our approaches, but also in our personalities and skill sets. That has been important in building the business and in helping the three of us stay sharp together.

Linnea: Are there any leaders that are inspiring you lately or any books, podcasts, quotes that you draw inspiration from?

Tiffany: I love the stories of Guy Raz’s podcast, “How I Built This.” Like what I was saying about VCs – one of the reasons we love working with Inspired is that they're a group of builders and every business is unique. Reading the help books that are very general doesn’t help me as much as hearing one full story for an hour. I love that podcast and I feel like I take insights from there all the time.

Linnea: In each episode we like to wrap up with a fun, lightning round of questions, Tiffany, so please fill in the blanks.

Tiffany:

Purpose is… the driving force behind what we're doing every day. It goes beyond the building a business aspect. It's about filling a void and creating value in the market.

Leadership is… the embodiment of the phrase “actions speak louder than words.”

Success is… creating genuine value and feeling proud of your work.

Brilliant leaders are… dedicated, resilient, and empathetic.

I perform at my best when… I'm surrounded by hardworking, smart, and excited people.

Thank you to Tiffany Lopinsky of ShopMy for joining today's episode. We hope all of you walk away inspired to scale your teams and leverage influencers to accelerate the growth of your companies. And thanks to you, our listeners, for tuning in.

That's it for this episode of the Brilliant People Podcast. If you found this conversation valuable, be sure to subscribe, rate and review the show.

Follow Acertitude and TEG Consulting on LinkedIn for the latest insights on how to perform at your best.

Until next time, stay brilliant at work.

Defining brilliance with Tiffany Lopinsky

	Purpose is:	the driving force behind what we're doing every day. It goes beyond the building a business aspect. It's about filling a void and creating value in the market.
	Leadership is:	the embodiment of the phrase “actions speak louder than words.”
	Success is:	creating genuine value and feeling proud of your work.
	Brilliant leaders are:	dedicated, resilient, and empathetic.
	I perform at my best when:	I'm surrounded by hardworking, smart, and excited people.

Acertitude is a bold executive search firm and leadership consultancy focused on Board, C-level, and senior executive search, executive assessment, and pre-deal services. Highly specialized in Private Equity, the firm's industry practices span Business Services, Consumer, Energy, Healthcare & Life Sciences, Industrial, Infrastructure, Private Equity, and Technology.

TEG Consulting, an Acertitude company, is a bold search firm and talent consultancy focused on upper and middle management search, leaders for statups, assessment, and project recruitment. Highly specialized in Private Equity, the firm's industry practices span Technology, Healthcare, and Professional & IT Services.