2. Skimlinks
Making money from digital content can be difficult.
Every blogger's dream is to be 'location independent' (i.e. being able to work anywhere in the world with an internet connection). But OTT advertising can drive your readers away and things like affiliate marketing can take ages to get off the ground and to earn significant sums of money.
But monetising your content online isn't impossible – and it just got easier with London's Skimlinks.
With SkimLinks, we instantly convert any normal product or merchant link in your content into its equivalent affiliate link as a user clicks on it. With SkimWords, we'll automatically turn product references in your content into links to where the user can buy the item (and make it an affiliate link on the way).
Founded in 2007 by Alica Navarro and Joe Stepniewski, based in East London with offices in San Francisco, Skimlinks is one of the most impressive success stories you may never have heard of. Skimlinks' network generates roughly 1.5 billion monthly pageviews and has links to over 27,000 merchants in over 30 international networks.
To create an account with Skimlinks is free, but the startup takes 25% of the money generated from every transaction processed using their affiliate links. To date, Skimlinks have received just under £4.5m in funding from a variety of investors. Last summer, they also acquired NYC-based competitor Atma Links and integrated the technology into the Skimlinks product offering.
The company recently came to the technology industry's attention with their work with popular startup Pinterest – who are quietly generating revenue from users' links using Skimlinks' award winning technology.
You can apply for an account on the Skimlinks website; or simply follow the startup's progress on the company blog, Twitter or Facebook accounts.
Get skimlinking; it might just play a big part in the future of digital publishing.