We are delighted to let you know that we have invested in Helio, a next-generation advertising marketplace helping SMEs, brands and agencies access hard-to-find advertising placements across all media channels.
Ways to advertise have advanced, but the way we buy advertising has largely stood still, until now.
What does Helio do?
Helio is an advertising marketplace that connects buyers and sellers, making the complex process of booking ad space easy. Whatever the size of a business, Helio instantly connects buyers to a wide network of advertising options at a price and location that suits them.
Within minutes, Helio gives buyers everything they need to make an advertising purchase and, for sellers, wider market access than ever before.
The Helio marketplace brings much-needed transparency to the process of sourcing and securing bookings, simplifying the advertising buying journey for any business, anywhere, anytime.
Why did Scalare invest?
The Market
While creative advertising opportunities have innovated at great speed, the way to book advertising has not changed at the same pace.
The Helio marketplace is solving a two-pronged problem within the advertising market.
Firstly, sellers are operating within a highly competitive market with more advertising channels available than ever before resulting in sellers struggling to fill their inventory, leaving on average 20% of ad space unsold and unrecoverable once lost. Helio is solving this issue by creating more visibility of inventory.
Secondly, on the buyer side, it is historically cumbersome for any business that falls outside the established brands and media agencies to acquire advertising information. For SMEs and companies operating without big brand agencies, there is no dominant player catering for their needs creating an uneven playing field and an under-served marketspace.
In addition, the socio-economic impact of Covid indicates that sellers are motivated like never before to find new ways of filling inventory, while buyers are driven to explore new ways of reaching their customers.
The Product / Technology
The Helio marketplace is developed for greater transparency and convenience within a traditionally murky landscape. The platform is intuitively easy to use and can be compared to a browsing experience of Airbnb or booking.com. Using search variables such as cost, channel and location, the platform caters for novices through to experienced ad bookers.
Through integration with Canva, buyers can go on to design their ad using professional templates or opt to upload media from a variety of sources all while being guided on best practice campaign planning.
The Founder/Team
Founded by a proven business-building team with rich industry experience; Laura Hall and Peter Hall have an impressive background having previously co-founded an advertising sales agency. Together they bring a high degree of business acumen, sales, and operational expertise.
Teamed with experienced CTO Cian Moynihan, who has more than 15 years of experience in the software industry, and has built solutions for large scale e-commerce.
Scalare is confident in the team’s capabilities to execute on the technology roadmap and their deep industry knowledge and passion for solving its challenges.
In addition, Team Scalare is thrilled that Helio has formed an initiative called Helio Pledge, mobilising the media industry to give back. The pledge is a 1% donation of available ad space to the social sector to help eligible charities with fundraising and messaging campaigns across the country.
Momentum
Helio features a full suite of advertising channels such as Out-of-home, Transit, Health, Sport, Radio, Retail, Print and Sponsorship. The national media partners include brands such as Nova Entertainment, Tonic Media Network, Vicinity Centres and South Sydney Rabbitohs.
Find more information on how to list your media inventory.
Through a shared vision of helping SMEs create impactful ads, Helio has integrated with Canva, allowing buyers to design ads from professional templates matching the specs for the relevant ad.
Helio has appointed Paul Stevenson from Scalare’s business advisory community as NED. Paul has deep experience in B2B go-to-market strategies, and advanced marketing strategies, including customer experience, segmentation and customer loyalty from companies such as Airbnb, Lion and Qantas.
Paul will be working closely with Helio as NED and consultant on a marketing and customer insight project, while Scalare welcomes Helio into the Founder Community and delivers its Founder Support Plan.
On the appointment, Paul says, “I’m really excited to be joining Helio as Non-Exec. Laura and Peter have created a fantastic media buying solution allowing access to media inventory that is inaccessible for many businesses. I’m going to thoroughly enjoy supporting their growth.”
We encourage you to further explore the Helio marketplace.
About Scalare
At Scalare, we’re on a mission to create a greater impact by building a collaborative network that connects exceptional founders, advisors and investors in a unique and powerful partnership, because real transformation and growth takes more than money.
Our unique collaboration and partnership model provides clear pathways to global investors, experts and markets. We plug existing skills gaps in our portfolio companies from our best-of-breed advisor network – to bring, expert resources exactly when needed to facilitate growth and deliver exceptional returns to investors and founders alike. Find out more >
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