Enterprise advertising groups have spent years investing in social listening instruments constructed for a text-first web, even because the platforms their clients really use have moved virtually completely to video. The hole that creates is structural: roughly 80% of name mentions on TikTok and Instagram occur with no tag, a hashtag, or a caption – which means the overwhelming majority of natural client dialog a few product is invisible to the instruments manufacturers depend on to trace it. Plot was constructed to shut that hole, utilizing multimodal AI to research the audio, visuals, and on-screen textual content inside social video concurrently, surfacing model mentions whether or not or not a creator ever tags the model. The platform offers enterprise advertising groups the power to trace earned media, supply and vet creators, and run client analysis in minutes moderately than weeks and early outcomes present manufacturers discovering 2 to eight occasions extra content material that includes their merchandise than they captured earlier than. In 18 months since launch, Plot has grown ARR 3.8x year-over-year with a 132% web income retention fee, attracting enterprise clients together with Visa, Mastercard, PepsiCo, Fenty Magnificence, Profit Cosmetics, and CAVA virtually completely via inbound demand.
AlleyWatch sat down with Plot Co-founder and CEO Megan Duong to be taught extra in regards to the enterprise, its future plans, current funding spherical, and far, far more…
Who have been your traders and the way a lot did you elevate?
We raised $10M in a seed spherical co-led by XYZ Enterprise Capital and Mischief Ventures, with participation from Seven Seven Six, Alexis Ohanian’s fund, and Acme Capital. This brings our whole raised to $14M. What made this spherical particular to me is the caliber of operators and entrepreneurs across the desk. Camille Ricketts, who co-led from XYZ, was beforehand Head of Advertising at Notion and First Spherical Capital. She informed us this was her first funding at XYZ. She wasn’t simply writing a test, she felt the ache we’re fixing firsthand. Dustin Moring at Mischief Ventures brings a uncommon mixture of product intuition (Money App, Sq.) and operator expertise. The Mischief group contains founders and operators who’ve constructed a few of the defining corporations of the final decade, and that’s precisely the type of backing we wished.
Inform us in regards to the services or products that Plot affords.
Plot is a social video intelligence platform for enterprise manufacturers. In plain phrases: we analyze social video knowledge so manufacturers can see and perceive what’s really taking place in video with none tagging required.
Right here’s the issue we’re fixing. Roughly 80% of name mentions in social video are untagged. Somebody exhibits your product, speaks your model identify, holds your packaging and none of it will get picked up by conventional social listening instruments as a result of these instruments have been constructed for textual content, hashtags, and captions. Plot was constructed to see inside video. We use multimodal AI to research audio, visuals, and on-screen textual content concurrently, so if a creator is making dinner and your product is sitting on their counter, we catch it, even when they by no means point out you by identify.
From there, manufacturers use Plot for 4 core issues: monitoring earned media (tagged and untagged), sourcing and vetting creators for campaigns, working client analysis in minutes as a substitute of weeks, and measuring the affect of their group engagement efforts. On common, manufacturers uncover 2–8x extra content material that includes their merchandise than they have been capturing earlier than.
Toto Haba, SVP, International Advertising and Communications at Profit Cosmetics, put it nicely: “Since utilizing Plot, I’ve been seeing a 30 % to 50 % elevate in user-generated content material that options our merchandise however doesn’t tag us. This can be a large deal as a result of manufacturers like us depend on participating with our advocates instantly. I’m buzzing with the chances for participating in conversations which can be ‘hidden’ to us at the moment. Issues like ‘profit forehead providers experiences’ aren’t one thing that will get tagged. Plot allows you to get away of your For You Web page (FYP).” That’s the unlock, not simply seeing extra knowledge, however performing on it earlier than the second passes.
What impressed the beginning of Plot?
My whole profession has been in social media and branding. I’m what I name a first-generation social media marketer. I got here up studying find out how to write nice copy, constructed the social group at Apple, and understood the text-based world deeply.
Once I left Apple in 2020 and began a social media company, two issues occurred concurrently: the pandemic hit, and TikTok took over. In a single day, every little thing I knew about content material shifted from text-first to video-first. I used to be creating video content material for manufacturers and attempting to tug insights from it and I shortly realized no instruments existed to make sense of what was taking place inside video at scale.
I used to be watching creators discuss merchandise, maintain them up, point out them in passing, and types had no concept. The info was proper there, however invisible. I noticed an enormous untapped market, met my co-founder and CTO Ethan, who led product engineering at Formation Bio from Sequence A to C, beforehand at Microsoft, via a YC co-founder matching program, and we began constructing Plot in 2022. The technical timing was additionally proper. Multimodal AI had lastly matured to the purpose the place analyzing video at scale was each potential and reasonably priced. Eighteen months in the past this was technically out of attain for many startups. At this time it’s in manufacturing for Fortune 500 manufacturers.
How is Plot totally different?
The differentiation begins with what we are able to really see. Sprinklr and Brandwatch have been designed for a text-first period. They require tagging, hashtags, or captions to floor a point out, and have been actually constructed round customer support use instances. Plot analyzes the complete context of video: visuals, audio, objects, actions, on-screen textual content. We constructed a wealthy video intelligence layer and leverage that knowledge to supercharge agentic workflows throughout group, influencer, and analysis. If somebody holds up a Goldfish cracker whereas making dinner and talks for 2 minutes with out ever mentioning the model, we discover it. No different software out there does that at the moment.
Plot’s video intelligence layer allows you to see actual indicators, and our brokers allow you to act on them. Creator Sourcing lets advertising groups discover creators with a immediate: “Discover me 100 skate boarders in Brooklyn who’ve used our product within the final three months.” We floor actual matches from video knowledge, not bio key phrases. Deep Analysis compresses weeks of client analysis into minutes. And our group instruments assist manufacturers determine and have interaction their superfans at scale. Individuals who love the product however have by no means been tagged, by no means been reached.
It’s additionally price noting: for manufacturers that have already got Sprinklr or Meltwater for textual content protection, Plot is additive. We’re not asking anybody to tear and exchange. We fill the video hole these instruments actually can not see.
What market does Plot goal and the way large is it?
We serve enterprise client manufacturers with a robust presence on TikTok and Instagram. Our core consumers sit in social media, group, client insights, and influencer advertising. Our buyer base spans magnificence, CPG, meals and beverage, style, monetary providers, sports activities, and leisure, and contains manufacturers like Visa, Mastercard, PepsiCo, Fenty Magnificence, Profit Cosmetics, CAVA, Canva, Lululemon, and Warby Parker.
What’s stunned us is what number of “non-obvious” verticals want this. We’re working with insurance coverage corporations, fintech manufacturers, and even QSR chains as a result of any model attempting to succeed in a youthful era is attempting to know what’s taking place in video. That expands the market significantly.
When it comes to dimension: social intelligence and market analysis providers signify a $100B market, and influencer platforms and providers are one other $35B on high of that. As we construct deeper intelligence on each manufacturers and creators, we’re positioned to increase throughout each. The whole addressable market we’re going after is $135B and we’re beginning with the intelligence layer that makes the entire thing work.
What’s your online business mannequin?
SaaS. Enterprise manufacturers pay annual subscriptions to entry the Plot platform, and contracts increase as groups discover extra use instances: social, group, insights, influencer, analysis. Our 132% web income retention fee tells that story: clients keep and develop.
Traditionally, most of our progress has been virtually completely inbound. We haven’t had an outbound gross sales group. Manufacturers discover us as a result of they’re hitting the wall of what legacy instruments can do, and somebody on the group hears about Plot via a buyer, a convention, or a press story and involves us. We expect that may proceed, and the funding helps us construct the group and product to help that demand at scale.
For instance, when Profit Cosmetics’ SVP of International Advertising noticed her personal knowledge for the primary time that includes Profit merchandise that had by no means been tagged, whole classes of UGC her group didn’t know existed, she stated, “Plot allows you to get away of your For You Web page.” That second of recognition began repeating throughout buyer after buyer, and inside months Fortune 500 manufacturers like Visa and Mastercard have been discovering us via phrase of mouth — model groups telling different model groups, “it’s a must to see this.”
How are you getting ready for a possible financial slowdown?
We’re really able the place an financial slowdown tends to speed up demand for what we construct. When budgets tighten, manufacturers must show the ROI of each greenback, which suggests they want higher knowledge. They should know which creators are literally driving outcomes, which campaigns are slicing via, and the place genuine model love lives. Plot solutions all of these questions.
We’re additionally seeing manufacturers shift away from costly paid influencer offers towards community-led progress, participating superfans who already love the product. That’s a meaningfully cheaper technique, and it’s one Plot allows. When a model realizes they’ll discover and have interaction 10,000 genuine advocates who’ve by no means been tagged, at a fraction of the price of one mega-influencer deal, that’s a price range dialog that writes itself.
After which there’s the agentic piece: the work that used to require a group of analysts, coordinators, and company hours — sourcing creators, working analysis, monitoring campaigns — Plot’s brokers deal with mechanically. That’s actual headcount and company spend that manufacturers can reallocate. In a tighter atmosphere, that worth proposition turns into extra compelling, not much less.
We’re a 12-person group in New York and intentionally lean. The enterprise has scaled 3.8x year-over-year virtually completely on inbound demand. That basis holds up nicely in unsure environments.
What was the funding course of like?
Truthfully, we have been selective about who we wished within the room. The traders who perceive this market deeply are operators and entrepreneurs who’ve felt the issue firsthand. That was the filter.
Camille Ricketts at XYZ had lived this as Head of Advertising at Notion. She understood instantly why manufacturers have been flying blind in video. Dustin Moring at Mischief has a deep learn on the place media and the creator economic system are going. The Mischief group is constructed round product operators who’ve based and scaled defining corporations, together with Zach Perret, the co-founder and CEO of Plaid. That perspective on what it takes to construct foundational infrastructure was precisely what we wished. And Alexis Ohanian — Co-founder and Govt Chair of Reddit and Founding father of Seven Seven Six — has spent his profession on the intersection of group and the web. Everybody across the desk got here with real conviction in regards to the class, not simply the corporate.
What are the most important challenges that you just confronted whereas elevating capital?
The largest problem was serving to traders perceive that it is a new class, not only a characteristic on high of current social listening. Social listening is a well known area, and there’s a temptation to pattern-match us to current instruments. We’re not that. We constructed the video intelligence layer. When you personal the layer, we allow brokers to behave on it and supercharge difficult advertising roles.
The training piece was actual. We needed to present, not simply inform — demo the product, stroll via the way it finds untagged content material, present what it unlocks that nothing else out there can. As soon as traders noticed it, the response was constant: “Why doesn’t this exist already?” Getting there in a 30-minute pitch required constructing a transparent through-line from the technical infrastructure to the enterprise outcomes manufacturers care about.
What components about your online business led your traders to put in writing the test?
Three issues. First, the issue is simple. Video is now 76% of all cell knowledge visitors and the IAB estimates U.S. corporations are spending about $43.9 billion on influencer and creator advertising in 2025. This class is increasing quickly, rising 4 occasions as quick as the general conventional media promoting business. Shopper dialog has moved completely to video, and advertising measurement instruments haven’t. That hole is huge and structural.
Second, the traction and the velocity of it. 3.8x ARR progress year-over-year, 132% NRR, enterprise logos like Visa, Mastercard, and PepsiCo, and we had locked in all of those top-tier enterprise manufacturers inside our first yr of being reside, virtually completely inbound. That’s unprecedented. GTM is my background; I spent a decade in social and model advertising earlier than beginning Plot. Having a technical co-founder in Ethan and a GTM-focused founder in me meant we may construct the product and promote it on the similar time. Numerous nice merchandise stall as a result of the group can’t go to market. That wasn’t our drawback.
Third, timing. Eighteen months in the past, analyzing social video at this scale and worth level wasn’t technically possible. Multimodal AI crossed a threshold that made it potential. We have been positioned at precisely the best second to construct this, and we moved quick. The shopper roster we’ve in-built 18 months proved the market was ready.
What are the milestones you propose to realize within the subsequent six months?
Constructing the agentic layer to motion in opposition to these wealthy video indicators we constructed.
We shipped AI Creator Sourcing. That is one I’m actually enthusiastic about. Advertising groups can describe precisely the creator they wish to discover and let Plot floor actual matches from video knowledge. Not bio key phrases. Precise video proof of who they’re, what they use, what they discuss. If you happen to’re searching for curly hair creators, our AI seems at tens of millions of movies to seek out the very best match creator by analyzing their movies.
Deep Analysis follows carefully behind. We’re compressing what used to take client insights groups weeks, pulling themes, understanding sentiment, answering strategic questions, into one thing that takes minutes contained in the platform.
We’re additionally increasing our knowledge sources, together with Reddit, which supplies manufacturers a fair richer image of the place client dialog is going on. And we’ll proceed to scale the enterprise buyer base and increase contained in the accounts we have already got. The 132% NRR tells us there’s plenty of room to develop inside current clients as extra groups inside the identical firm uncover the platform.
What recommendation are you able to provide corporations in New York that should not have a contemporary injection of capital within the financial institution?
Keep near your clients and get clear in your GTM technique. Our whole progress has been inbound, pushed by clients who had an actual drawback and located that Plot solved it. That solely occurs while you’re fixing one thing that really issues. Not one thing you assume ought to matter, however one thing persons are actively fighting. You may have an important product, however in case you don’t know find out how to promote to your goal market that’s the most important hurdle.
And in New York particularly: use the community. This metropolis has an unimaginable density of entrepreneurs, operators, and founders. Each buyer we’ve landed has include some type of heat introduction or word-of-mouth connection. Relationships compound right here.
The place do you see the corporate going now over the close to time period?
We consider Plot because the social knowledge layer for the subsequent era of promoting AI. The near-term is about delivery the complete agentic OS on high of our video intelligence infrastructure, specialised brokers for each advertising operate, every powered by the identical underlying knowledge layer.
We have now 4 brokers in movement: the Group Agent, which identifies and prompts superfans to drive repeat income and scale back CAC; the Marketing campaign Agent, which supplies groups immediate marketing campaign insights to allow them to reallocate price range to what’s really working; the Analysis Agent, which surfaces product alternatives and whitespace from actual client indicators; and the Influencer Agent, which automates creator sourcing, vetting, and speaking at scale.
At this time, advertising groups are restricted by human capability, what number of movies somebody can watch, what number of creators somebody can vet, what number of feedback somebody can go away. The near-term is about eradicating that ceiling. We’re constructing in order that the work that used to require a group of analysts occurs mechanically, in actual time, daily. That’s what we imply after we say agentic OS for video intelligence.
What’s your favourite spring vacation spot in and across the metropolis?
Central Park is my favourite throughout the spring in NYC. It’s an important change of tempo from downtown the place I reside in SoHo.
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