On January 6, 2026, we celebrated the Bookinfluencers.com 5-year anniversary, marking half a decade of connecting authors, publishers, and book lovers around the world through innovative book marketing campaigns. CEO Antina van der Veen reflects on the journey, from the launch in 2021, through challenges, team growth, and personal hurdles, to the thriving book influencer community we have today. This milestone is not just about the company\u2019s success, but the stories, campaigns, and connections that make our community so special.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For many people, January 6, 2021 is the day they remember because of the riots in Washington DC. But for me, it was the day I launched Bookstagrammers.com<\/strong> (now Bookinfluencers.com<\/strong>), a platform I had been building for months with a project manager in Amsterdam and a team of developers in Asia. Little did I imagine that today I’d be celebrating Bookinfluencers.com 5-year anniversary! <\/p>\n\n\n\n I can still remember the feeling of utter happiness when I saw that on day 1 alone, hundreds of creators created a profile and joined this new community. But was it all hosanna<\/em> those first days? Certainly not! I learned a lot about the cultural differences within the community. Things that are very normal for a Dutch person turned out not to be for others. And of course, the community was eager to get started with campaigns but I still had to secure business. In hindsight, it might have been better to wait until we had a few campaigns ready before launching: but live and learn!<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2021 was a steep learning curve. I tried launching a YouTube channel, but it didn\u2019t take off. I reached out to major publishing houses, but initial interest often ended in silence. I even experimented with a webshop selling bookish products, which unfortunately wasn\u2019t successful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite these setbacks, there were bright spots. I came into contact with VIZ Media, a leading manga publisher in America. To this day, they are one of the company’s most important clients. By the end of summer 2021, more authors and publishers began discovering Bookstagrammers.com, and I started feeling confident about the company\u2019s future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2022, running everything single handed was taking a toll. I realized I needed support and decided to hire a freelance community manager. I posted a vacancy on LinkedIn<\/strong> and let the Bookinfluencers.com community know I was looking for support. My hope was to hire someone from within the community, and it worked! In May 2022, Paula<\/strong> joined the team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But I had spoken to someone else who I thought was also very suitable for a role within Bookstagrammers.com. That was Kristin, and I invited her to become our campaign manager. She accepted, and suddenly, I had a dedicated team to help grow the platform and support creators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n More and more fun campaigns and projects came our way. We collaborated with Tandem Collective on a campaign for Karin Slaughter’s latest thriller. Our French, Spanish, Scandinavian and Dutch creators took part in Nextory’s Booktok campaigns. We even organized a weekend away to promote a publisher\u2019s new releases with a group of booktokers.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBuilding the Bookinfluencer.com Community<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Connecting with Publishers and Early Clients<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
2022 \u2013 Building a Team<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Partnering with Tandem Collective<\/h3>\n\n\n\n