Tech entrepreneur connects brands with top fans
NEW YORK — When Amber Atherton hit celebrity status as the co-creator and star of of British reality TV show “Made in Chelsea” in 2012, companies making everything from cream cheese to leggings wanted to pay her big bucks to promote their products.
That happened despite the fact that she didn’t even use most of the stuff.
That experience ended up being a teaching moment for Atherton, now 28. She also struggled to figure out who her influential customers were at her online jewelry company called My Flash Trash, which she sold in 2016. That inspired her to start a software company called Zyper a year later that connects brands like Kellogg, Nestle and cosmetics maker Rituals with “super fans,” instead of paid professional influencers.
Zyper, which relocated to San Francisco from London in 2018, identifies the top 1% of a label’s fans by analyzing data from public social media.