The PennZone

NEW YORK - PennZone -- Today, Gugu Guru, the first and only personalized commerce website for parents, launches a scalable social marketplace where parent experts can help other parents shop the best products while monetizing their expertise in the process.

Using artificial intelligence (AI) in line with live human expertise, Gugu Guru delivers perfectly matched, expert product recommendations based on a parent's unique needs. On the site, new parents take a thoughtful lifestyle quiz and enter data about their parental values and desires and then receive personalized AI-driven recommendations. After completing their profile, parents are strategically value-matched with an expert shopping companion to help along the way. Shopping companions – called "Gugu Guides'' – earn commission via product recommendations on Gugu Guru's marketplace.

"Experienced parents want to help new parents and new parents simply trust the advice of their peers more than any other source. We knew that the Gugu Guru platform could serve to create a powerful and mutually beneficial experience for both these veteran and first time parents," says Monica Banks, founder & CEO of Gugu Guru. "Our new personalized, social marketplace allows new parents to benefit from the advice of their seasoned peers, while those peers can now monetize the advice they're giving. At the present time, with millions of moms displaced from the workforce due to the pandemic, additional income streams are needed more than ever."

In this new marketplace, any parent can be a "Gugu Guide" to earn money on their product recommendations by simply creating and curating their own unique shops filled with their favorite products.  Gugu Guru gives the community all of the tools needed to sell, create and operate a successful Gugu Guide account - there are no fees or inventory required to sign up, nor any requirements around social media following size. Gugu Guides simply share product recommendations using a special and unique link via a combination of social media platforms, email, SMS text message or WhatsApp. Then the Gugu Guides earn commission when any of their friends, family or followers make a purchase.

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Top performing, vetted Gugu Guides will benefit from their own dedicated page on the Gugu Guru website where they can curate their favorite products, showcase video content, host live shopping events and take shopping appointments set by new parents who want their specialized help.

Gugu Guru's new personalized marketplace has been in beta since December of 2020. Early shopping data shows conversion rates of over 50% - more than ten times the industry average. Since founding Gugu Guru in 2015, Monica Banks has identified a trifecta of challenges in the parent shopping experience, including:

• parents overwhelmed with the overall registry/ shopping experience;
• brands struggling to break through the noise in the market and;
• retailers' inability to personalize the shopping experience for parents in a way that scales.

Since then, Monica has been adamant about creating a no-nonsense platform to address those three problems.

"Though the demand for personalized digital experiences was rising long before COVID, the pandemic and respective shift in online behaviors have only accelerated the need," says Sarah Dorsett, CEO of Nanit. "As a brand that prides itself on staying at the forefront of digital innovation for parents and getting them closer to their child's development, Nanit has worked with Gugu Guru from its launch. Partnering on this new word of mouth  marketplace with Gugu Guru was an easy choice for us."

Nanit joins over 70 other juvenile industry leaders such as Baby K'tan, Babymoov, Belly Bandit, Bumbleride, Crane, Dockatot, Larktale, Nanobebe, WAYB, and more.

In addition to Banks, Gugu Guru is led by an all-female world-class team of retail experts that includes COO Krysta Harrick formerly of Toys R Us / Babies R Us, CRO Katie Shutters-Petrie formerly of buybuyBABY / Bed Bath Beyond, Head of eCommerce Michelle Hsiao formerly of Macy's, certified gear expert and Head of Education Abby Ludwig, VP of Marketing Megan Drye Harper formerly of Tinybeans and Red Tricycle and the company's Chief Advisor Meka Millstone-Shroff, who previously served as President of buybuy BABY and Chief Experience Officer of Bed Bath & Beyond.

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For more information on how to sign up for the waitlist, please visit:
https://shop.guguguru.com/pages/gugu-guide-sign-up

About Gugu Guru
Powered by AI and human intelligence, Gugu Guru makes highly tailored product recommendations for every parent's unique lifestyle. Founded by a mom and recognized baby industry expert, Monica Banks, Gugu Guru combines insider knowledge of buzzworthy brands, new & emerging products and safety, and fuses it seamlessly with its innovative shopping platform to create unparalleled services for parents. A celebrity and influencer favorite, Gugu Guru's personalized experience provides unbiased product recommendations that are tailored to unique lifestyle needs, budgets, style and more. Featured in Parents Magazine, Washington Post and Huffington Post, Gugu Guru has been recognized for its innovation and impact in the new mom market. Learn more at guguguru.com.