Payal Ladha
Sweepest is specialized marketplace for online contests where companies announce contests for their potential customers to visit and participate. It is an entertaining content sharing platform for mass-media channels (publishers).
Sweepest’s Sifting Industry and Competitors
Sweepest is in Advertising technology industry which is more and more competitive not only on the global end, but also on regional or national end. They operate in Lithuania and as such have no disquieting big competitors in the country. However there are a few competitors globally. Some are MyOffers.co.uk in UK, e-konkursy.info in Poland, JustPlay.co.za in South Africa
Now a days customers are not so fascinated by traditional discounts and banners. Moreover, a considerable section of audience are using ad-blocking and add-ons (30-40% of internet users) which means a rather lower reach for companies and lower income for publishers. Here is when Sweepest comes to the rescue.
Sweepest’s Swaying USP
One factor which differentiates Sweepest from all its competitors is that they charge the companies by CPA (unlike CPM or CPC as most of the cases) and they are not affected by ad-blocking software.
They focus on both technological solution for companies as well as the advertising option by way of the network of publishers in order to get participants on board.
Sweepest’s Swoshing Inspiration
As a marketing and business development agency, the company has worked with clients and very often they receive orders to buy media from the biggest Lithuanian publishers where prices vary between 5 and 20 € for CPM. Companies pay a great deal of money but end up getting some brand awareness and a little recognition. Only the biggest companies can afford to allocate a huge marketing budget.
So, to overcome this issue they have created a marketing tool/marketplace for companies to engross the attention of their potential customers by organizing online contest which is the part of gamification.
Sweepest’s Shovelful Journey
This startup has been Co-founded by three people. Marina Basagova (present CMO), Petras Petkevicius (Present COO) and Arturas Svirskis (Present CEO).
They are a 5 people team at the moment. The company has small revenues which is up to 1000 euro per month, but they plan to reach up to 5000 euros in the upcoming months as they intend to make some important integrations with big publishers and enjoy some global clients. A 5000 euro revenue will ensure a break-even on the monthly basis for the company.
Sweepest’s Seeping Challenges
One of the challenges the company faced was the blaše and criticizing reaction of the society . Initially everybody thought that the company was fraud. As time passed and they created their credibility in the market and people started accepting them with open hands. However they had to invest in education and PR activities.
Another challenge that they dealt with was the disturbing habit of companies to get results as quick as possible. Majority of the companies advertised by way of CPM method. So, some companies gets suspicious about CPA monetization.
Future Expectations and Funding
Sweepest expects the integration with major Lithuanian publishers which would boost their database up to 100‘000 unique users. They plan to be in the list of top 20 most visited websites in Lithuania until the end of this year.
Starting from the beginning of next year they are planning to expand organically either in Poland or Latvia.
They expect an investment of 500‘000 € which will be used in forming the core team (especially hiring in-house developers), marketing and expansion to Polish market.