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Google has acquired FameBit, a technology startup that helps marketers connect with digital influencers, in an effort to bolster branded content deals in online video, including on Google's video platform YouTube.

Terms of the deal weren't disclosed.

FameBit is one of a growing number of companies looking to help bring more automation and data science to the art of connecting brands with digital talent.

Digital creators can set up profiles using FameBit's software. Then, via a web-based marketplace, brands can search for potential matches among thousands of creators, based on various criteria such as an influencer's audience demographics. These marketers can then elect to hire these influencers to mention their brands in videos, or create videos on their behalf, for example.

While Google helps big TV brands connect with its top channels and talent through its three-year-old Google Preferred program, the social media influencer ecosystem is vast, and not limited to YouTube. FameBit can connect brands to talent on Instagram, Vine and other platforms.

In a blog post, Google's vice president of product management, Ariel Bardin, wrote that the deal will help broaden and accelerate the growth of influencer marketing.

"We believe that Google's relationship with brands and YouTube's partnerships with creators, combined with FameBit's technology and expertise, will help increase the number of branded content opportunities available, bringing even more revenue into the online video community," Mr. Bardin wrote.

Currently, Google doesn't take a revenue cut from branded content deals on YouTube. But, theoretically, the more advertisers paying influencers to feature their brands in videos, the more ad revenue that should flow to YouTube overall.

Of course, there are many other companies besides FameBit vying for a piece of the social-influencer-brokering pie, something Mr. Bardin noted in his blog post.

"Creators will always have the choice in how they work with brands, and there are many great companies who provide this service today," he wrote. Still, Google's purchase should provide a powerful endorsement to FameBit, and may not be welcome news to competitors.

Google says that FameBit will continue to operate independently for the foreseeable future.

FameBit founders David Kierzkowski and Agnes Kozera were celebratory in their own blog post about the sale of their three-year-old company.

"With Google's relationship with brands large and small, and YouTube's partnership with creators around the globe, we hope to connect even more brands to creators, engage more audiences, and make brand marketing more creative and authentic than ever," they wrote.

Write to Mike Shields at mike.shields@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 12, 2016 01:05 ET (05:05 GMT)

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