Skimlinks: what it is, and how it makes us money
Business development
By
on February 06, 2012
5
I've mentioned before that the Empire uses a service called Skimlinks to help us monetize the sites. Skimlinks is one of those little revenue strategies that isn't going to keep most lower-traffic websites afloat, but the little cash can eventually add up.
First, some background: Skimlinks is a service that turns any product link in a blog post, comment, or forum post into an affiliate link. If a reader clicks through and buys something, both Skimlinks and the Empire get a cut of the sale. When we do straight-up shopping posts, we use our own affiliate links (no need to give Skimlinks a cut: it's easy for us to do product links in posts like my shoe posts). But Skimlinks provides a great way to monetize links posted by commenters or forum members, and it's also a nice way to make sure no product link goes un-cashed-in-upon.
Here's how it's performing, ranked by site:
Offbeat Mama never does very well, because as I know all-too-well from years of reader feedback, Mama readers are really broke. Offbeat Bride & Tribe of course are the leaders since they have the highest traffic and most product discussion, respectively. Offbeat Home is picking up some steam — especially after we do posts like the 3-in-1 breakfast station, where many of the comments are all about products.
Here's how Skimlinks is performing, ranked by which merchants readers are buying from:
Obviously, this is mostly about Amazon, although you can see a few others are in there too.
It's worth noting that I've not had success with Skimlinks' SkimWords product (which links from product names and phrases, instead of Skimlinks, which only links from product URLs). It's been known for doing weird things like linking the words "wedding dress" to weight loss products, and even when it links to less offensive products, ads randomly inserted into posts still rankles readers. One recent complaint said, "It was a little jarring to see a linked ad, especially in the middle of such a moving article." This in mind, I have SkimWords turned off on most of the sites.
As you can see, Skimlinks is only pulling in about $350/mo across the entire Empire, even though we have over 3,500,000 pageviews a month. In other words, even with large traffic, Skimlinks is hardly a core revenue driver. But it's part of how Mama and Home (which have lower operating expenses) are finally making a profit and almost breaking even, respectively. And that's awesome!
Updated to add
Looks like Pinterest is using Skimlinks, too! I think this is awesome, although apparently some people think it's controversial. Pshaw! How is this newsworthy!? As I said in my NYTimes comment, "Pinterest is a business. They're here to make money. Can you imagine if, instead of building an affiliate revenue model where they make revenue from retailers, they build a subscriber model where they asked USERS to pay? Now THAT would be news — their user base would abandon them completely." Thankfully, TechCrunch gets it. Oh, and what's really funny? This "news" isn't new — people have been talking about Pinterest and Skimlinks for a while. Slow tech news day, I guess.
About Ariel Meadow Stallings
Author of Offbeat Bride: Creative Alternatives for Independent Brides, Ariel acts as the publisher of all the Offbeat Empire websites. She lives, loves, and dorks out hard in Seattle, WA.
Heron said
Thanks, Ariel!! (That was my complaint about SkimWords.) I appreciate both the perspective AND the swift reaction. Luv!
dootsiebug said
You know how sometimes, you see an idea, and you really, really wish you'd thought of it?
…
Anyway, this is a great solution, pulling in a tiny bit of money that otherwise would've passed you right by. It's actually really nice that you (and subsequently, your communities) get to benefit from the retail recommendations that the sites generate. It's a real testament to the fact that there is some very real buying power in the Empire.
Sarah G said
This is fascinating! Thanks for continuing to share some of the logic behind the inner workings of the empire. It never ceases to amaze me how much you have going on behind the scenes to keep the blogs up and running.
Alyssa said
I adore this kind of disclosure, even though I'd be fine without it because more money for the site means more great content that I still get for free. But it's so great that you let us peek behind the curtain…
Liene Stevens said
I think it's great that Pinterest is monetizing this early on and I don't see what the fuss is about other than people really like to fuss. Plus it's different than straight advertising (I think it's interesting that so many social platform companies raise millions in VC only to say, several years into it, "I know! We'll monetize with ads only!" and leave so many other opportunities to really innovate on the table.)
And I do think if Pinterest implemented a subscriber model they would find great success with it, depending on how they set it up. A fee to use the site? No, that wouldn't work. But a freemium model (similar to Flickr) where users who pay a low subscription fee like $9.99-$19.99/year get extra perks (private boards, more photos, etc) would work really well for them. At this point in their popularity (even though they're still technically new), the price point would need to be in the no-guilt impulse buy range and the premium perks would need to be good enough to justify it (unlike Hulu's joke of a premium option Hulu Plus).