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Ryan Stern was having a cocktail at a dive bar in San Francisco when she came up with the idea for her business. She is the co-founder and CEO of Collectively, a startup that counts over 50 brand clients, and connects them to a network of more than 5,000 social media influencers (sometimes referred to as ‘web celebrities‘) across such platforms as Instagram, Vine, Pinterest, Snapchat and YouTube.

A food blogger by background, Stern had recently inked a deal with Picwick and Weller — a now-defunct shirt retailer that once counted Ashton Kutcher as an investor — to manage their social media marketing. “People will pay us to do this,” she recalls thinking. “Why not go see if a lot of people will pay us to do this?” …

How Social Media Influencers Are Changing the Way Startups Do Business