It’s been a year since Gloss48.com launched to the masses—with the ultimate goal of being a beauty brand incubator for indie companies needing a platform to reach potential consumers. And while some things have stayed the same (an on-target launch cycle, for one), many things reflect the start-up’s successful evolution and savvy online marketing.

On the list of what’s stayed the same is Gloss48’s aforementioned launch strategy for new brands, which includes pricing newbies promotionally for seven days, sometimes with a gift with purchase, then selling them at their regular price. The strategy encourages consumers to try brands they might not have be willing to take a chance on, said Laura Bronner, Chief Marketing Officer for Gloss48, who along with site co-founder, Jill Kravetz, CEO of Gloss48, oversee the site’s day-to-day operations and a staff of four.

What’s certainly changed at the site in the past 12 months is the number of brands it carries. Today, Gloss48 sells more than 220 brands and 2,800 products, up from 20 brands when they launched in Nov. 2013.

“We get a lot of comments from the brands themselves at how valuable it is to be on Gloss48 because they’re so small and typically don’t get the press or distribution of big brands. The fact that someone is giving them a stepping stone is big,” Laura said.

One example of Gloss48 living up to its brand incubator status is with anti-aging skin care brand, LiftLab, which it helped put on the map. LiftLab is now selling at Neiman Marcus stores and is sold on neimanmarcus.com.

Membership to the site remains free, but the number of members has increased significantly: they’ve surpassed their May 2014 goal of 50,000 members.

The site is currently raising a second round of funding, with a target of goal of $800,000. (In May 2013, Gloss48 raised $800,000 from angel investors.) Funds will be used towards operating costs in 2015, with resources also going to digital marketing, technology improvements, and two, key hires in marketing and technology.

All marketing is online, and social media has helped Gloss48 promote itself. As a whole, the site heavily uses Facebook to communicate with followers and Instagram to show in-office, behind-the-scenes and to give the company a face.

“But mostly it’s us trying on product and our day-to-day activities. Pinterest has also been great, as has Twitter. More importantly on social media are our partnerships with brands. For a launch, typically they’ll post content to their accounts while we partner with bloggers and vloggers. We’re incredibly lucky and grateful for our blogger partners – we really want them to grow, too, it’s not just about sending them product but it’s also about getting them exposure,” Laura said.

The site will be increasing spend in digital marketing in 2015, but in nontraditional ways.

“We tend to find that Google ads don’t work for us. All of our marketing is online but it’s driven by influencers and partnerships. We are looking to get deeper into our partnerships,” Laura said.

To see what’s working and what’s not, Gloss48 looks at Google Analytics every day, along with data by RJMetrics, an analytics tool for ecommerce companies.

“We are numbers nerds and somewhat atypical for a startup. We can track more on the member level and what’s working in terms of marketing – it’s really important to figure out where traffic is coming from. If we’re talking about straight Google Adwords or Facebook ads, the efforts need to be working, otherwise the cost doesn’t making sense. We cannot brand build on Facebook ads.”

Content is updated daily with Gloss48’s best marketing tool: their daily brand announcement, which is emailed to members. The fact that there is a new product to launch every day makes coming up with content much more organic.

“I can’t imagine having a static site and needing to manufacture something to say, or coming up with a message. We are usually launching a new brand so we have content that will go along with that. The site changes every day, and so does content on the blog and email newsletter, that daily dose of newness is important.”

Items that are trending right now on the site include indie nail polish.

“Our nail polish customers are amazing, they have such a strong emotional response to nail polish and the amount that one could own is endless.”

Another is natural deodorant.

“There seem to be many women who know they should not be using the old school antiperspirant and should switch to a natural product, but there aren’t that many options that are readily available (our fave is by Bristol Bliss). Also, at home lip waxing strips have been very popular (we love No Mo-Stache ), which if you think about totally makes sense. We struck this nerve with women where if you don’t have to go somewhere and you can do it at home, it’s a no brainer,” Laura said.

To build loyalty, Gloss48 makes sure everything offered on their site has been tested, re-tested and loved by the staff. While Laura tends to see no negative side to digital marketing, she does concede that with ecommerce there’s no secret to success.

“There is no silver bullet. There’s a perception that when you spend $1 on Facebook you’ll get $5 back and it’s just more complicated than that. It’s about building a community, giving a great experience. Even on Facebook something that works one day may not work the next. Ecommerce marketing will never be successful on autopilot.”

Outside of beauty Laura credits Refinery29 as a site that does a great job of listening to what their readers want and serving up content—a lot of content—on a daily basis. “Everything they do is so high quality, and they’re so thoughtful about their approach to content.”

The other is Rent The Runway.

“I love they that they have users post pictures of themselves in their dresses. I can look for someone (else) who is 6 feet tall and see how they look in something before I try it out. They do a lot of creative things.”

Also for 2015 Gloss48 is aiming to ramp up sales.

“Next year will be about moving from start up mode to a more established business and then in 2016 taking off. We are currently generating multiples of what we were last year with the same goal planned for 2015. We are hoping to launch more brands every day and we will look at launching brands seven days a week, up from five.”

On average, about 20-25 brands apply each week to be featured on the site.