The Future of Brand Growth: Does it Belong to Communities, Not Ads?
The vision of Paul Archer, CEO and co-founder of Duel, is clear: the future of brand growth won’t be bought—it will be built through communities.
Archer, who has just led Duel through a $16 million Series A funding round, believes the next decade of marketing will be defined not by ad spend or algorithms, but by authentic advocacy—the kind that happens when real fans share what they love. Duel’s platform already powers that movement for leading retail brands such as Lush, ELEMIS, Victoria’s Secret, and Abercrombie & Fitch, and with new funding, Archer says the company is ready to bring its “advocacy engine” to a global stage.
From gaming virality to brand advocacy
Archer’s conviction that growth comes from people, not promotions, has roots in his early career. “My background was in free-to-play gaming and app development, where referrals and advocacy were the gold standard for growth,” he says. “That entire industry was built on the science of virality – every successful game scaled because players brought in their friends, not because of ad spend. Growth loops, referral mechanics, community incentives – they were engineered, measured, and optimised because nothing else drove scale as efficiently.”
That world of engineered virality shaped his thinking. What struck him later, when he turned his attention to retail, was how foreign that mindset seemed in an industry built on advertising. “When I looked at retail, I was shocked at how alien this thinking was,” Archer says. “Most brands were pouring budgets into ads, even though the reality is that most people buy things because someone they trust has told them about it. Not because they saw a paid post.”
The realisation was catalytic. “That disconnect was the lightbulb moment,” he recalls. “I realised we could take what was proven in gaming and apply it to every brand and build systems where advocacy is not just a byproduct, but the operating system for growth. I knew if we could build a platform that made advocacy as simple and measurable as buying a Meta ad, we could unlock a whole new growth engine for brands. And that’s exactly what we set out to do with the launch of Duel.”
Authenticity as design principle
Since its founding, Duel has positioned itself as the alternative for modern retail marketing—empowering fans, not paying influencers, to tell a brand’s story. Archer insists that authenticity isn’t a happy accident but a product of deliberate design.
“It comes down to two things: philosophy and design,” he explains. “First, we only work with people who already love the brand. That creates a baseline of authenticity that no amount of cash can buy. Second, our program design respects where a creator is in their journey. Emerging and amateur creators are incentivised with product and recognition, not forced into over-monetised deals. Semi-pros and pros are paid fairly, but always in a way that aligns with authenticity.”
The key, he says, is to treat advocacy not as a one-off campaign but as a sustainable system. “By structuring advocacy as a system – not as one-off campaigns – we preserve trust, scale it, and avoid the mercenary dynamic that undermines influencer marketing.”
That focus on long-term engagement over short-term exposure has made Duel a trusted partner for brands wary of the transactional influencer economy.
Building an ecosystem, not a campaign
Archer describes their offering not as a software product, but as an advocacy engine—a blend of technology, methodology, and strategy.
“Most platforms focus on influencers or one-off campaigns. Duel is different,” he says. “We’re built for advocacy at scale. We turn existing customers into long-term advocates, engage multiple layers of a brand’s ecosystem – employees, superfans, partners – and combine strategy with technology. Brands get both a proven methodology and a SaaS platform to automate, track, and measure advocacy efficiently.”
The results, according to Archer, speak for themselves. “Our clients – the likes of Lush, ELEMIS, Victoria’s Secret, Abercrombie & Fitch – see higher trust, stronger loyalty, and measurable growth that traditional influencer campaigns simply can’t deliver. Duel isn’t just software or consulting. It’s a full-scale advocacy engine, helping brands reduce reliance on ads and future-proof their marketing.”
This ecosystem thinking—uniting customers, staff, and partners into a shared advocacy network—is central to Duel’s model. It’s what makes advocacy scalable without sacrificing authenticity.
Making advocacy measurable
If Duel’s mission is to make advocacy a core growth channel, its secret weapon is measurement. As Archer tells MoveTheNeedle.news, “We measure advocacy in board-ready terms.”
That starts with a metric Duel pioneered: Gross Advocacy Value (GAV). “GAV captures the total brand AND commercial impact of advocacy,” he explains. “Beneath that, we track Gross Merchandising Value (the revenue driven through affiliate links and codes), the direct revenue attributed to advocates, and Earned Media Value (the value of the reach and the engagement of social posts compared to how much it would cost to buy it through advertising).”
These metrics are complemented by data on conversion lifts, content utilization, and efficiency gains. For smaller brands, advocacy often means faster community-driven growth and lower acquisition costs. For large retailers, it means scale—“managing tens of thousands of advocates with the same headcount,” Archer says, “while reducing reliance on fragmented tools and paid media.”
By reframing advocacy in financial terms, Duel gives marketing leaders something they’ve long struggled to prove: that authentic, community-based engagement drives measurable ROI.
Fueling growth with $16 million in new funding
The recent Series A round, led by London and U.S.-based investors, marks a turning point in Duel’s growth. “It allows us to supercharge our mission,” Archer says. “We’re expanding in the US, scaling our Advocate Relationship Management platform, and enhancing AI-driven capabilities. Essentially, it gives us the resources to make Brand Advocacy the default growth strategy for retail brands, and eventually across other sectors. More importantly, it validates that the market is ready for a new way of growing brands – through communities, not just ads.”
For Duel, “scaling” isn’t just about expanding headcount—it’s about making advocacy a predictable, enterprise-level discipline. Archer explains: “Brands will be able to manage tens of thousands of advocates efficiently, using automation for reward distribution, UGC tracking, and engagement analytics.”
The rise of advocacy as a growth channel
Looking ahead, he sees a fundamental shift in how brands will grow over the next five years. “Brand Advocacy will become the central channel for growth because consumers trust people, not ads,” he predicts. “The brands that thrive will be the ones investing in communities and authentic engagement.”
He envisions Duel’s role as the infrastructure behind that shift. “Duel’s role is to provide the systems, expertise, and technology to make advocacy scalable and measurable, turning everyday fans into a long-term growth engine. Over time, we want Brand Advocacy to be the default philosophy for growth not just in retail, but across B2B, entertainment, hospitality, and professional services.”
It’s an expansive vision—one that sees advocacy not as a marketing tactic but as a business philosophy.
A call to the hesitant
For brands still unsure whether to embrace this new model, Archer’s advice is straightforward. “Your best marketers aren’t on your payroll, they’re your customers,” he says. “Invest in them, empower them to share your story authentically, and growth will follow. Brands that cling too tightly to control risk falling behind; those that empower advocates will thrive in the decade ahead.”
If Archer’s vision plays out, the next great marketing revolution will begin not with a billboard or an ad campaign—but with a fan sharing what they love.