1. POWERING GLOBAL
PARTNER PAYMENTS
CASE STUDY: BOOST MEDIA
Boost Media engages with marketers from leading global
brands like Orbitz, Zynga, and CafePress to source, test and
optimize creative ad copy. With the Boost platform,
companies optimize their creative messaging and increase
relevancy with their targeted audience. “We use search,
social and other mobile data to tweak the message, and
then test the results,” explained Rob Lenderman, Boost
Media co-founder and Chief Operating Officer.
To create and optimize messaging, Boost Media has recruited the
services of thousands of independent writers and graphic designers
from around the world. On a country-by-country basis, the contractors
develop text and image creative for online ads. For this work, they are
paid an average of $75 per contribution. This works out to a couple
hundred dollars here and there, and twenty bucks now and then. The
various payments add up to a tidy sum of income over the course of a
year.
Paying the contributors was no problem when Boost Media was a
startup with a small creative network of US contractors. “We used
PayPal for the micro payments, and for larger amounts since all the
writers were in the U.S., we simply paid them in dollars, with me
signing the paper checks,” Lenderman recalls.
As Boost Media extended its global reach and grew in size, this process
soon became a nagging problem stealing focus from more important
business aims. For example, to write ad copy in French for a brand
running ads in France, the company often needed to find a writer in the
local market. This created currency conversion problems. “The fees
were pretty high with PayPal and the process was time-consuming,”
Lenderman said.
“The fees were pretty high with PayPal and the process was
time-consuming… This wasn’t an issue when we were in a couple countries,
but once we were making payments in more than 30 global regions, it just
became too much to handle.”
Rob Lenderman, COO, Boost Media
1
How a Crowd-Based Ad Creative Optimization Platform
Streamlined Global Payments to Its Fast-Growing
Creative Writer and Designer Network
Automate Global Mass Partner Payments www.tipalti.com @tipalti
Company Type:
MarTech
Founded:
2009
Location:
San Francisco, California
Customers:
150+
Value Proposition:
Boost is the only cloud-based,
people-powered platform that helps
advertisers and agencies create,
refresh and manage compelling
adcreative at scale. The results are
improved campaign performance, a
richer customer experience and
unique insights on what works with
your audience.
2. Coping with the fast-growing number of payments was
anotherdistractingtask.NolongercouldLendermansimply
write a check and send it off. Thousands of payments
destined for dozens of countries were flying out of Boost
Media’s Accounts Payable department each month.
Many contributors expected to be paid in their own currency, not
U.S. dollars. And they wanted to receive their payments via the
specific method preferred in their country—wire transfer, ACH,
direct deposit, debit cards, credit cards, direct cash or paper
check, among others. The administrative burdens were severe.
On top of these encumbrances were complex and fast-changing
tax and regulatory reporting requirements in each geographic
market. When paying someone in the U.S. via direct deposit, the
payment needed to record the payee’s name, bank name,
account number and routing number. These four fields had to be
filled in correctly to ensure the payment went through properly.
The problem is that the same four fields generally do not apply in
most other foreign jurisdictions. In Germany, for instance,
instead of a routing number, the payer must enter the SWIFT
code on the payment. In India, it must enter the IFSC code. In both
cases, these codes involve a different assortment and quantity of
letters and digits.
If contributors wanted to be paid in a format different than a
direct deposit to a bank, other regulatory issues arose. As the
quantity of payments and global partners increased, the process
of determining which payment information to collect for each
partner was a huge burden. Also straining Boost Media’s
resources was manually processing this data, and dealing with
payment problems that surfaced.
“This wasn’t an issue when we were in a couple of countries, but
once we were making payments in more than 30 global regions,
it just became too much to handle,” Lenderman pointed out.
Added to this distress were constantly changing local and
national tax and labor laws. Businesses that make payments to
U.S.-based partners, for instance, are obligated by the Internal
Revenue Service to issue a Form 1099 to payees, and receive a
Form W-9 from them in return (not surprisingly, these
requirements are different outside the U.S.) Unfortunately, some
Boost Media contributors would forget to send the document to
the company.
The IRS further requires payers to provide the applicable tax code
with each payment to some but not all foreign-paid entities. In
Russia, for instance, companies must include the payee’s unique
tax code number with the payment, whereas in China the
payment must include both the tax code number and the
provider’s phone number—as arcane as that may sound.
Some payers sidestep these issues by requiring partners to
receive payments in the method and currency that the company
prefers to provide them, and to limit the countries with which
they do business. Lenderman demurred, believing this was no
way to cultivate and nurture close relations with Boost’s vital
creative network.
Manual Payment Processes Hold Back Boost Media’s Global Growth
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For More Information:
CASE STUDY: BOOST MEDIA POWERING GLOBAL
PARTNER PAYMENTS
Automate Global Mass Partner Payments www.tipalti.com @tipalti
3. Two other issues also made mass payments a Sisyphean
effort for the overwhelmed AP staff—compliance and
fraud. Like all companies, Boost Media had to validate the
accuracy of the numbers in its balance sheet and general
ledger to close the books, demonstrating that what it paid
contributors, and what contributors reported they were
paid, were one and the same.
Unfortunately, this was not always the case. “We do a fair
amount of business in India and hire a lot of writers in that
country,” Lenderman said. “When we would pay someone a
relatively substantial amount of money through PayPal, and this
person then failed to report the income, the government would
step in and shut down our business in the country. There was just
no way for us to use PayPal and be compliant. We’d want to pay
someone in Morocco, for instance, and we’d hear `good luck
figuring out how.’”
His colleague, Christine Moellenberndt, Boost Media senior
manager of community, provided another compliance hurdle.
“Middle Eastern and Eastern European areas seem to be more
hit-and-miss for PayPal to pay out to,” she explained.
All the while, Boost Media was expanding its geographic markets
at a blistering pace. Like many innovative startups with a
pioneering business model, it put all its energies into taking
advantage of its early mover status, capturing market share as
quickly as possible. The company didn’t want to slow the engines
simply to cope with something as mundane as back office
payment pressures.
Says Lenderman, “Growth was our mantra. We simply had to
have an automated resolution to a situation what was spiraling
out of control.”
“When we would pay someone a relatively
substantial amount of money through PayPal,
and this person then failed to report the
income, the government would step in and
shut down our business in the country. There
was just no way for us to use PayPal and be
compliant.”
Rob Lenderman, COO, Boost Media
3
For More Information:
CASE STUDY: BOOST MEDIA POWERING GLOBAL
PARTNER PAYMENTS
5 to 10 hours recovered each week by avoiding PayPal’s manual payment execution
Increased penetration into 30 regional markets served
Reduced OFAC compliance risk by validating payees during the registration process
Expanded payment method options to creative network from two to seven
Paid partners in their local currency and reduced transaction fees
Added 3,000 members to the worldwide creative network to expand services
Automate Global Mass Partner Payments www.tipalti.com @tipalti
