Dive Brief:

• In its second round of funding, brand advocacy startup Crowdtap has raised $5 million. 
• The startup secured $7 million in the first round, but since becoming profitable at the end of 2013, it decided not to pursue as much funding. 
• Crowdtap connects brands — like Verizon, P&G, Nestle, Kraft — with consumers to inspire the creation of promotional social media posts. 

Dive Insight: 

Crowdtap is attractive to brands and investors because of its approach to controlling consumer-created content, which typically happens organically. The content created by consumers is highly valuable, but difficult to inspire. Crowdtap has figured out a way to encourage the production of that content on a larger scale.