So over the years, she鈥檚 learned a thing or two about storytelling.

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Now she鈥檚 taking that expertise to another level in the formation of a new startup called . The social media marketing platform鈥檚 aim is to help companies increase engagement, sales, audience and funding by helping them tell their stories in a more engaging and authentic way, according to Lapiduss. And the company just closed on a $2.5 million seed round to help in that goal.

Los Angeles-based venture funds and co-led the round, putting in $1.3 million. A number of angel investors from the media and entertainment world contributed the remaining $1.2 million, including , president of Jujamcyn Theatres (鈥淔rozen,鈥� 鈥淢ean Girls,鈥� 鈥淜inky Boots,鈥� 鈥淏ook of Mormon鈥�); Ron Simons, lead producer of 鈥淎in鈥檛 Too Proud the Temptations Musical,鈥� and , president of , an investment bank focused on the the internet space.

In conjunction with the financing, Storyblaster also is announcing it has inked a three-year partnership with L.A. Comic-Con to support its own expansion as well as that of their 575 exhibitors. It鈥檚 also signed on Sundance Co//ab, Outfest and as clients.

I interviewed Lapiduss on the phone this week to learn more about her new venture, which she co-founded with partner .

Authentic storytelling

Storyblaster claims it is 鈥渢he first-ever story-based social media marketing platform built on data from over 300,000 successful campaigns.鈥� Prior to Storyblaster, Lapiduss ran Lapiduss Creative, which specialized in branding and creating platforms for businesses and creatives. Over time, Lapiddus has scrapped 鈥渕assive amounts of material鈥� from different social media platforms to analyze what worked and what didn鈥檛.

Storyblaster鈥檚 initial focus was on helping people with crowdfunding campaigns. But the company has evolved and now, Lapiduss said, the goal is to help small and midsize businesses, creatives, online merchants and nonprofits gain exposure and followers and thus, increase sales and funding. It wants to do this by giving brands a way to custom-create their own narrative-driven social and video content, and advertising campaigns.

鈥淲e make it really easy for those who don鈥檛 know how to articulate what they鈥檙e doing and why they鈥檙e doing it to share their stories,鈥� Lapiduss told me. 鈥淏ecause until now, if you couldn鈥檛 afford to pay millions of dollars to a branding company or an ad agency, you were screwed.鈥�

Storyblaster, which is a SaaS operator, provides templated social media campaigns. It does things like give a story prompt so that someone can 鈥渁uthentically鈥� share what their product or service is.

鈥淢ost people just don鈥檛 know what they鈥檙e supposed to say,鈥� Lapiduss told me. 鈥淪o we help them with the where, how and why. We make it easy for people to be authentic, and share why something is their passion.鈥�

Storyblaster offers three different plans. One is free and offers five days of story prompts and guidance. Another is a three-day a week plan, which costs $39 a month. And then there鈥檚 a $79 a month plan that offers a broader suite of features.

Chris DeMoulin, CEO of L.A. Comic Con, said his organization was “so impressed with Storyblaster鈥檚 templates and the results from their built-in ad buying” that it has given all its exhibitors a free subscription and a $50 Facebook/Instagram ad credit.

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