Social media ‘big data’ company Likely secures £1m funding

Founded in 2011, Likely claim to be at the forefront of social media data collection and analysis, having helped companies such as Coca-Cola and the British Government develop a highly engaging, hyper-relevant presence on Facebook.

Likely has created a unique data set of more than five billion social interactions – such as follows, shares and comments – to better understand how people cluster around things they are passionate about. By looking at brands as a collection of “passion points”, Likely has found that it is significantly easier to discover the people that are most likely to engage with a brand’s content, understand what content will resonate most with them and attract them to a brand’s social media presence.

Daniel Shore, CEO of Likely: “Brands are currently getting social completely wrong. Their content is all ‘me, me, me’ and pays little attention to what their audience actually wants to hear. We are turning this model on its head by understanding what an audience already gets excited about and aligning the brand acquisition strategy and messaging with those topics. A brand is simply a collection of ideas that people are passionate about – we are using the vast amounts of data generated by social media to better understand and tap in to these passion points.”

The £1million investment enables Likely to expand their sales and marketing efforts internationally and to build the product development team in the UK. Stephen Altman from NWPE and Bo Pedersen from Charlotte Street Capital will both join the board of Likely.

Stephen Altman, co-founder and partner at New World Private Equity, says of the deal: “Likely’s founders have utilised their expertise and vision to spearhead the development of social data analytics at a time when big data is changing markets and businesses forever. Likely was brought to our attention as they enable early adopters of their techniques to steal an enormous advantage over their competitors. This was a key factor in generating significant levels of investor interest.”