As the creator economy is growing rapidly, brand partnerships remain one of the prime ways creators can earn money. Other services like link-in-bio apps with affiliate links or Patreon-like subscriptions become secondary ways to increase creators’ income. For platforms and startups, the biggest challenge remains to match brands and creators for collaboration.

Berlin-based startup Passionfroot is building a toolkit and a marketplace for business, productivity, and thought leadership-focused creators for brand collaborations.

The company was founded by CEO Jen Phan, who had a career in early-stage investing, and Lorenzo De Nobili, who previously started a marketplace connecting users with different professionals for services. The startup has raised $3.8 million in a seed funding round led by VC Supernode Global, with other investors, including Miro CEO Andrey Khusid’s s16vc, Sequoia, Accel’s Scout Fund, and Creandum, also participating (Creandum previously invested in the company’s $3.4 million pre-seed round too). The seed round included angels such as former Zapier CMO Kieran Flanagan, ex-community and creator lead at Notion Ben Lang, Linktree CPO Jiaona Zhang, and Austin Lau, who looks after growth at Anthropic.

Before launching Passionfroot, Phan launched a tech newsletter in 2020 for tech professionals with immigration backgrounds. She thought about leaving her VC role and going full-time on the newsletter.

“Amid this evolution, a new breed of business-focused creators emerged, producing thought leadership content across platforms like LinkedIn, newsletters, and podcasts. However, after speaking with dozens of creators, I realized that while the creative freedom is appealing, the business side — especially brand partnerships, which serve as a primary revenue stream — remains fragmented and inefficient,” Phan told TechCrunch.

She added that the decision to build Passionfroot also stemmed from brands struggling to find relevant creators, managing the schedule of campaigns, and co-ordinating payouts.

Zain Kahn, who is the founder of AI-focused newsletter Superhuman, said one of the biggest challenges for creators is chasing pending payments from brands and partners.

“In our early days, we had this one $40K payment that didn’t show up for months. We had to chase banks for ages to track and resolve the issue. We were paying salaries out of our personal savings and came very close to going out of business,” he told TechCrunch over an email.

Passionfroot lets creators build a storefront for ad or brand partnership slots they have on their different channels, including newsletters, YouTube, LinkedIn, and TikTok. Creators can build a media kit for brands highlighting their brand collaboration rates, engagement rates of their channels, and schedules. Creators can also show examples of past sponsorships on their Passionfroot page.

The toolkit also makes it easy for brands to book a campaign with creators through automated scheduling. Creators can share their pages with brands — just like a link-in-bio page. The startup counts HubSpot, Notion, and Freshbook as some of their brand partners.

On the other side of the marketplace, the startup has also built a network where brands can discover relevant creators on the platform. Phan said that deals booked through the network are currently equivalent to deals booked through specific creators’ storefronts.

Passionfroot has a 15% take rate for any brand partnership that materializes through its network, including payment fees. The company takes 5% in payment fees if a brand books a partnership with a creator through their storefront.

The company is launching its revamped website with better creator search and matching functionality for marketers. The platform also shows a match score to marketers, helping them select the best creator suited for a particular campaign. In the coming months, the startup will build a dashboard with campaign insights and better support for marketing teams — rather than an individual — to use Passionfroot.

Sabina Wizander from Creandum believes that Passionfroot has a unique advantage with its focus on the B2B segment.

“The company is starting with the B2B market both from creators and such companies. In this market, there is nothing called being 50% relevant. So the startup has the right product-market fit from the get-go,” she told TechCrunch over a call.

According to an eMarketer report, U.S. influencer marketing spending in 2024 is set to be around $7.14 billion, with a 15.8% year-on-year growth, signaling that marketers are looking to reach consumers through different channels.

Gina King, a partner at Supernode Global, said Passionfroot is building its product at a very opportune time.

“Passionfroot is well-timed to capitalize on multiple market shifts. The company is not just riding a single trend but is well-positioned to benefit from several concurrent developments in the creator economy, B2B marketing, and technology,” she said.

King also added that 87% of Passionfroot partners are organically proving that the company has a strong network effect.

Startups like VSCO for photographers, Agentio for YouTubers, and Catch + Release for licensable assets have tried to formalize transactions and partnerships between brands and creators. Large-scale social networks like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok have also experimented with building platforms around matching brands and creators.