Clique Apps gives each artist a standalone superfan app in the App Store

Clique Apps launched July 29, giving artists and creators their own standalone mobile app rather than a profile inside an existing platform such as Patreon or FanFix. The Los Angeles company was founded by Cody Blake, Matthew Esposito and Peter Bunetta on the idea that a creator's fan base should belong to the creator, not the platform hosting it. "When someone searches for their favorite creator in the App Store, they shouldn't discover another platform. They should discover that creator," said Blake, the company's CEO. "We believe the creator should always be the brand," he added.

Co-founder and CMO Matthew Esposito framed the pitch around ownership: "Creators have spent years building audiences on platforms they don't own," he said. "We believe the strongest fan relationships should belong to creators, not platforms." When an artist signs on, Clique designs and builds a finished, branded app in about a week, running on a modular dashboard where artists can toggle features like content, community tools, direct fan messaging, monetization and ticketing on or off.

Clique's first partners are dancer GiaNina, Warner Records artist Alex Sampson and pop artist Leah Kate. GiaNina, known from the reality series "Dance Moms," used the app's ticketing tools to run a sold-out international dance tour; Sampson used his to livestream a headline Canadian show exclusively for subscribers; and Kate has used hers across a full headline tour, letting fans upload their own concert photos and videos and buy merchandise. Clique remains invite-only as it builds out apps for more artists.

Clique enters a superfan market that the industry is increasingly chasing. A Goldman Sachs "Music in the Air" report estimated better superfan monetization could unlock a $4.3 billion annual revenue opportunity, based on the idea that the roughly 20% of paying subscribers who are superfans spend twice as much as an average listener; separate Luminate data shows superfans spend 66% more on live music and twice as much on physical releases than typical fans. Luminate's Jaime Marconette has called superfans "the primary drivers of the modern music economy." The competition includes major labels themselves, with Warner Music Group building its own superfan app; WMG CEO Robert Kyncl has said the company is "focused on making sure that artists get data on these superfans," a superfan land grab also playing out in TREBEL buys the superfan platform Sesh to build out artist services.

The founders bring different backgrounds to the venture. Blake spent two decades building liquidfish, a technology and creative agency that has produced platforms for Fortune 500 companies and figures including Kevin Durant and Bryson DeChambeau. Esposito has worked in marketing and strategy across creator agencies, Warner Records and Sony Music, on campaigns for artists including Teddy Swims and Jessie Murph. Bunetta has five decades in the music industry, having written, produced and recorded with artists including Smokey Robinson, the Temptations and Donna Summer, and co-founded Family Affair Productions, part of Big Family Music, whose community has worked with Harry Styles, Sabrina Carpenter and Gracie Abrams.