Behind The Scenes: The Agency Behind Some Of India's Leading Influencers

IPLIX Media, an influencer marketing agency, was founded by Jag Chima and Neel Kamal Gogia in 2019. Both founders saw a need-gap in the Indian market for a strategic approach towards influencer marketing, and thus, they co-founded the company, which connects brands with influencers while also providing them with assistance and management tools.

Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash

IPLIX has a portfolio of 40+ brands and 200+ creators including comedian Saloni Gaur, Tech Burner aka Shlok Srivastava, Neha Doodles, and many more renowned creators from the influencer community.

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Clearly, to do something on such a scale is not an easy task, and one of the issues they face is in recruitment. "We are looking for individuals with a very versatile mind-set. Essentially they should be someone that can fire out 10 solutions for every obstacle. The issue complicates further when we consider the scale at which we are running our operations. Due to this, we are always in the process of recruiting team members. However, out of 100 applications, we may only shortlist 10 after the first round of interviews and potentially have only one or two suitable candidates for the role," says Jag, who is also a supporter of The Unique Home for Girls in Jalandhar, India, which is for unwanted, abandoned girls in Punjab, India.

SEE VIDEO: A candid chat with Tech Burner aka Shlok Srivastava about his journey

Neel agrees with him on this front and says that since the industry itself is new, hence, there is no base filter for their hiring process which makes the process of talent sourcing all the more difficult. The inclination towards a younger workforce is because they can easily mould their creativity in accordance with the social media dynamics. However, there are several cons to this preference as well. "We are essentially hiring freshers who are looking for experience and require a comparatively higher amount of investment from us in terms of training and guidance. Secondly, as there is no agency that has been working in this space for more than a decade, there is no benchmark that we can compare ourselves to. The onus falls on us to set the standards of innovating with our ideologies and working model in this constantly evolving industry which becomes an interesting challenge for us," explains Neel, who started his journey with IPLIX in 2019 when he was 21 years old and has been associated with the field since the age of 19. As a student, Neel established relationships with YouTubers and managed their channels ultimately being instrumental in growing them exponentially, from small platforms to large empires.

And what advice do these co-founders have for budding entrepreneurs? Jag says you need to believe in yourself and have to be bold and confident in your product if you want others to be. Neel gives an industry insight saying that from a distance, the influencer marketing space is highly lucrative, which is true. The space has money. However, in order to sustain the growth, you need to identify the gaps in the market and how you can add value to it. You need to solve a problem and make space for your identity. So, his advice is to 'solve a problem, create something of value and keep innovating.'