Obviously
Use cases
Team Efficiency
Tax Compliance
Reporting and Reconciliation
Company size
200+
no of vendors
1,000+
Industry
Marketing & Advertising
location
New York, NY
Before
Vendor Onboarding Challenges: Onboarding influencers and vendors through Tipalti was inconsistent—some vendors found it easy, while others struggled, causing delays and additional work.
Lengthy Funding Delays: With PayPal, Obviously had to fund their accounts five business days in advance, making it hard to manage last-minute payments or changes.
after
Streamlined Vendor Onboarding: Onboarding new creators is now a simple process, improving the overall experience for vendors and reducing friction.
(Almost) Instant Payments: With Lumanu, payments could be funded and processed the same day, offering much-needed flexibility and efficiency.
Justin Vatz
CFO
Overview
Can you tell us a little bit about Obviously and your role within the company?
Obviously was founded in 2014, and I’ve been with the company since 2018 as CFO. Initially, I worked as an outsourced CFO before joining full-time after WPP acquired the company in 2023. We work with many great brands, from Amazon to Unilever, managing influencer campaigns and content creation at scale.
What prompted the switch to Lumanu for managing influencer payments?
We relied heavily on PayPal for small payments, but it became clear that PayPal wasn’t scalable. It worked and it wasn’t a bad process, it was just very manual. PayPal is useful for smaller operations, but as we grew, cracks started to show—there was very little visibility into payments, it was very manual, and if something went wrong there was effectively no support. PayPal is not really designed for large businesses, even though I'm sure plenty of large businesses use it. We had a team member dedicated to managing payments, and when she left we had to rethink the whole process.
Then we switched over to Tipalti. And we still use Tipalti for some things, the volume of small dollar amount payments we were doing through Tipalti was very difficult, and we were still using PayPal on the side.
Tipalti is very self managed and it's also very flexible. So lots of different payment methods are supported. As a finance-person, enrollment seems straightforward, but this isn’t always the case when dealing with a large number of vendors. For us it really came down to a time spent by the team on support issues. For some vendors, signup in Tipalti was very easy, and for others, it was very difficult. And when there were issues we had to step in and troubleshoot.
Switching to Lumanu took a huge burden off our team. It’s more efficient and gives us much better visibility into outstanding payments and what’s paid - it’s better for sure. Lumanu also gives us the ability to add custom fields to improve reporting and reconciliation and the campaign and client level.
Justin Vatz
CFO
How did Lumanu improve your payment processes compared to PayPal or Tipalti?
The biggest improvement was the reduction in overall manual work. With PayPal, we had to input payments manually with no real way to track what was happening with each payment.
With Lumanu, not only is the process much smoother, but we also have real-time visibility into the status of payments.
One critical challenge I had with PayPal is we needed to fund our account the week before we needed to make payouts. There's no way to get money to PayPal faster than five business days.
We also saw a huge improvement in customer support.
With PayPal, if something went wrong, it was impossible to get quick help quickly, and difficult to get any level of support. You're on your own and I think that can be fine, but we were sending a very high volume of payments and with that comes more potential issues.
I can email Lumanu for any support needs and they’ll get back to me quickly. With Lumanu, the dedicated support means all issues are addressed quickly. That level of support has been invaluable to us.
Lumanu is set up with modern banking practices. We can send a wire and it's reflected in Lumanu the same day. And I see it in our Lumanu account minutes after I approve the wire from our bank. I have a dashboard that says these are all the payments that need to go out. It's really easy for me to figure out what we have to pay and everything ties back to all of our records. If there's ever a question I can easily answer it. I haven't found an issue yet that we haven't been able to easily trace.
Lumanu taking on all 1099 tax compliance and filings was a critical factor to making the switch.
Tipalti handles tax compliance decently well, although we still had to do the 1099 filings. Lumanu takes that off our plate entirely, simplifying the process even further, and they provide an easier experience when it comes to onboarding new creators.
What was the migration process like when switching from PayPal to Lumanu?
The migration process was smoother than we expected, but of course, there were challenges. The biggest issue was communicating the change to all the creators and ensuring they onboarded to Lumanu, which is a simple process; they just had to complete it. The technical switch itself went relatively smoothly, and Lumanu worked with us to ensure there were no double payments or errors.
The only ongoing challenge was managing the transition for campaigns that started before the switch. We had to keep using PayPal for older campaigns while moving new campaigns to Lumanu, which required clear communication and coordination.
How has the response from creators been since you started using Lumanu?
The feedback from creators has been overwhelmingly positive. We’ve had creators reach out to our team saying how much easier the payment process has become.
Lumanu is faster, there’s no confusion about the payment status, and everything is transparent.
Earlier in the year, I would occasionally get direct emails from creators complaining about not receiving their payment on time. This doesn’t happen anymore.
What advice would you give to other finance teams considering Lumanu for creator payments?
My advice would be to think about the time and resource savings you will get with Lumanu.
If you’re managing a large volume of payments to creators or freelancers, Lumanu makes it easy by handling tax compliance, onboarding, payments and reporting.
For us, it’s been a game-changer in terms of efficiency and visibility. Plus, the support we get from Lumanu’s team is top notch.
I am much more confident about sending payments now. We didn't have too many issues in the past but now there are additional safeguards which are definitely important for us.
Justin Vatz
CFO
What’s next for Obviously? How do you see Lumanu fitting into your future?
We’ve had a strong year, and I’m excited to continue scaling with Lumanu’s support. The payment process is now smoother and less stressful for our team, which means we can focus more on growing the business and supporting our clients. With Lumanu in place, I’m confident we can continue to support our clients at scale and execute faster without worrying about payment headaches.
From our CEO Mae Karwoski:
“Obviously’s Creator Quick Turn Content can deliver brand approved and published influencer content in as little as 48 hours. Jump on that trend, be part of that conversation. Can your agency do this?”
More about Obviously’s quick turn content and the results delivered.
+26.3%
boost in engagement on Instagram for trending (one week or less) content over industry standard 6 week campaign.
+20.4%
Increase in engagement on TikTok over industry standard 6 week campaign.
conclusion
For Obviously, switching to Lumanu wasn’t just about improving payment processing— it was about finding a scalable solution that saves time, increases visibility, and provides real-time support.
By simplifying payment workflows and handling tax compliance, Lumanu has allowed Obviously to focus on delivering high-quality influencer campaigns while ensuring creators get paid quickly and efficiently.
