The notion that influence on social media might be measured by something other than the number of people who have clicked "follow" is not, strictly speaking, new. But the notion that an entire marketing company might be built on that premise — and staffed accordingly — suggests that at least some people on Madison Avenue (or its Venice Beach equivalent) believe the shift is real enough to bet on.

Devotion, a creator marketing firm founded earlier this year by Cami Tellez, the 29-year-old entrepreneur behind the underwear brand Parade, announced on Friday that it had hired Ed Victori as its first chief operating officer. Mr. Victori arrives from United Talent Agency, where he landed after the agency acquired JUV Consulting, a firm where he had served as chief operating officer.

The hire reflects what the company describes as rapid growth since its formal launch in March: more than 50,000 creators activated, more than 80,000 pieces of content produced, and a New York staff that has expanded from five employees to 25. The company raised $4 million in a funding round led by Basecase and Will Ventures.

The animating theory behind Devotion, according to Ms. Tellez, is that the algorithms at Instagram and TikTok have quietly restructured who gets seen. The platforms, she said, now serve users content based on topics rather than accounts they follow — a change that has shifted distribution toward smaller creators and away from the celebrity influencers who once commanded the bulk of brand budgets.

"There's a lot more distribution going to micro creators and mid-sized creators," Ms. Tellez said.

To capitalize on this, Devotion works with thousands of smaller creators rather than a handful of expensive larger ones, producing what Jon Kroopf, the company's chief executive, described as more "shots on goal." The company claims a cost-per-thousand-impressions rate below $10, compared with the $100 to $300 that conventional influencer programs typically run.

(Whether brands will find the economics of volume more appealing than the prestige of celebrity remains, of course, the question that every cost-per-thousand argument eventually has to answer.)

"If it's too in your face, it won't perform," Mr. Kroopf said, offering what may be the most succinct summary of algorithmic taste ever delivered by a marketing executive.

Original story published in Adweek: "Parade Founder Cami Tellez Taps UTA Exec to Scale Her 'Post-Follower' Agency"