Introducing Onlure: The Platform Rewriting How Local Businesses and Creators Work Together

Onlure is an AI-powered, commission-free creator marketplace based in Toronto that connects local businesses with influencers. Businesses describe their needs, and our AI instantly recommends the best local creators by niche, location, budget, and engagement metrics. Creators keep 100% of their earnings with direct booking, messaging, and verified analytics from Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

We built Onlure because we saw a broken system. Local businesses spending thousands on ads that don't convert. Creators with real influence getting pennies from affiliate programs. And no easy way to connect the two. Onlure fixes that.

Why do small businesses struggle with influencer marketing?

The influencer marketing industry is projected to hit $21 billion in 2026. Yet small businesses—restaurants, salons, gyms, cafes—are almost entirely locked out. The tools are built for enterprise brands with six-figure budgets. Local businesses don't need a "campaign manager." They need real customers walking through their door.

At the same time, micro and nano creators (1K–50K followers) drive 60% higher engagement than mega-influencers, but earn a fraction of the revenue. The middlemen—agencies, platforms, networks—take 20–40% cuts and add weeks of friction.

We asked: what if you could just find a local creator, message them directly, and book a collaboration in minutes?

What does Onlure offer businesses and creators?

Onlure is a two-sided marketplace connecting local businesses and creators—with AI at the core. Here's what's live today:

AI-Powered Creator Matchmaking

Our AI assistant understands what your business needs. Tell it "I run a ramen shop in Queen West and need a foodie creator under $200" and it returns ranked, filtered results instantly—searching across niche, location, budget, availability, engagement rate, content type, and more.

Businesses can also paste their website URL and our AI analyzes their brand to recommend the perfect creator match.

Direct Messaging — No Middlemen

Every creator on Onlure has a public profile with rates, services, portfolio, and availability. Businesses message creators directly. No agencies. No gatekeepers. No 30% cuts. Conversations are persistent, searchable, and support read receipts.

Full Booking System

Our booking flow handles the entire collaboration lifecycle:

Creator Analytics Dashboard

Creators connect their Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube accounts via OAuth. Onlure syncs:

This gives businesses verified, real-time data to make informed decisions—not vanity metrics.

Smart Creator Discovery

Our homepage uses a Netflix-style discovery engine with curated rows:

Behind the scenes, our ranking algorithm scores creators across 10+ dimensions: profile completeness, social proof, engagement metrics, portfolio quality, synced content, tier level, and availability.

Creator Profiles That Convert

Every creator gets a public portfolio page with:

Ratings & Reviews

After every completed booking, businesses rate creators on a 5-star scale with optional written reviews. Ratings are verified (only businesses with completed bookings can rate) and displayed publicly on creator profiles.

Payments & Payouts

We support two payout methods for creators:

Businesses can pay via credit card or Interac. Creators keep 100% of their rates. Onlure charges a 1.5% insurance fee to fund our satisfaction guarantee.

Community Rooms (Alpha)

Creators can join community spaces with channels, real-time messaging, emoji reactions, @mentions, and role-based permissions. This is our bet on building creator-to-creator connections—not just transactional marketplace behavior.

The Numbers

Why is creator marketing growing in 2026?

Three trends are converging:

1. The shift to micro-influencers. Brands are moving away from celebrity endorsements toward authentic, niche creators. Onlure makes it easy for any local business to tap into this trend.

2. The death of third-party cookies. Traditional digital advertising is losing its targeting edge. Creator marketing with verified, real-time analytics is the new performance marketing.

3. The creator middle class. 50 million people identify as creators, but only 2 million make a living from it. Onlure gives the other 48 million a path to monetize their local influence with 0% commission and direct business relationships.

Is Onlure available outside Toronto?

We're currently focused on Toronto — and we're hyper-local by design:

Toronto is our proving ground. The playbook scales to any city with a dense local business ecosystem.

What's Next

We're building toward:

Try It

Onlure is live. Businesses can browse creators, message them directly, and book collaborations today. Creators can sign up, connect their socials, and start earning.