Skimlinks Poised to Displace Traditional Hyperlinks With World's First Intelligent Linking Technology

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM and SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwired - Apr 9, 2014) - Skimlinks, the leading content monetization platform for digital publishers, today unveiled a radically new version of Skimlinks Editor that brings intelligent linking to editor's fingertips. Unlike decades-old static hyperlinks that direct readers to a fixed destination, Skimlinks Editor's new intelligent linking technology allows publishers to create links that automatically update to reflect destination changes, reader geography, stock availability, price changes, and more. Skimlinks Editor, released last fall, is a Google Chrome extension that helps publishers create more monetizable content by providing them with an effortless way to view -- at a glance -- the information they need to make informed decisions as to what products and retailers they link to. The new version released today provides new advanced features that provide publishers with complete control over how their content is optimized and monetized.

Skimlinks, which powered more than $500M in e-commerce sales through its platform in 2013, developed editor-controlled intelligent linking technology to radically alter the way in which publishers create and optimize commerce-related content. The new Skimlinks Editor gives publishers unprecedented ability to control the quality and long-term relevance of their content as well as maximize the revenues they can generate from it, all while offering readers new and easy ways to make purchasing decisions.

The new Skimlinks Editor, available for download at no cost, allows digital publishers to:

• Add real-time pricing to product links and offer readers more merchant choices. With Skimlinks Editor's seamless integration with Skimlinks Plus, publishers can effortlessly add up-to-date merchant and pricing information (up to two alternative merchants) alongside existing product links right from their browser. These intelligent links offer readers a new and intuitive way to make purchasing decisions and save publishers from manually updating links over time.
• Achieve greater control of SkimWords and automatic intelligent linking. With the new Skimlinks Editor, publishers can easily control how SkimWords operates on their site. SkimWords is Skimlinks' natural language processing service that automatically finds accurate product references and turns them into intelligent links, and has been available to publishers since 2010. With the new Skimlinks Editor, publishers can easily toggle suggested product links on and off, edit a link's destination and even add new links with suggested product destinations.
• Automatically create new revenue-generating intelligent links. The new Skimlinks Editor lets publishers run SkimWords on a page-by-page basis, helping them create revenue-generating intelligent links from unlinked product references in content. With SkimWords, product references are turned into links that stay current over time while earning publishers valuable and yield-optimized commission revenue.

"Creating fresh, highly-quality content is core to our business and monetizing that content through affiliate links is a key part of our strategy," said Ray Pawulich, affiliate manager at Future Publishing. "Skimlinks Editor makes this easy. Seeing merchant participation and commission rates at-a-glance and being able to instantly create new commission-generating links right from the browser saves us significant time and effort. When used in conjunction with the suggested products from SkimWords, which helps us find and monetize product references, Skimlinks Editor provides a complete toolset for making content shoppable."

"Unlike disposable newspapers, digital content lives online for years and readers continue to consume old content over time -- particularly content that references products. Publishers want commerce-related digital content to stay current for readers, but until today the process of updating hyperlinks and product references has been painstakingly manual," said Alicia Navarro, cofounder and CEO of Skimlinks. "Skimlinks Editor's intelligent linking technology is groundbreaking because it offers publishers increased control over their content and an effortless way to keep content fresh while generating revenue over time. Simultaneously, intelligent links provide readers with real-time merchant and pricing information, promising an unparalleled experience as they consume commerce-related content by reducing the need to navigate away to do comparison shopping. We envision this tool as the ultimate content creation companion for editors."

About Skimlinks
Founded in 2007, Skimlinks is the leading content monetization platform that rewards publishers for the role their content plays in creating purchase intent. Skimlinks processes 300 million clicks a month on over 200,000 sites around the web, including Condé Nast, Gawker, AOL, WordPress, Hearst Digital, Haymarket Consumer Media, Telegraph Media Group, and many more. Last year, the company drove $500M worth of e-commerce through its platform. Skimlinks is a team of 65 with offices in London, San Francisco, and Tokyo. Learn more at www.skimlinks.com.