Simple, link-centric user profiles don’t seem like a particularly ambitious idea, but they were big enough for Linktree.
According to the Melbourne startup, 8 million users – whether celebrities like Selena Gomez and Dua Lipa or brands like HBO and Red Bull – have created profiles on the platform, with those profiles receiving more than 1 billion visitors in September.
Plus, more than 28,000 new users sign up every month.
“This category didn’t exist at the beginning,” CEO Alex Zaccaria told me. “We created this category. ”
Zaccaria said he and his co-founders Anthony Zaccaria and Nick Humphreys founded Linktree to solve an issue they faced at their digital marketing agency Neck roll. On Instagram, users cannot add links to posts. All you get is a single link on your profile that constantly reminds you that someone is trying to promote something.
Most of Bolster’s customers now come from the music and entertainment sectors, where a single link cannot support what Zaccaria describes as a “fairly fragmented” business model. After all, an artist may want to alert fans to their current streaming album, upcoming concert dates, an online store for merchandise, and more. A website could theoretically do the job, but it can be clunky or slow on mobile, with users likely to give up before they finally get to the page they want.
Linktree founders Anthony Zaccaria, Alex Zaccaria and Nick Humphreys
Instead of constantly exchanging links on Instagram and other social media profiles, a Linktree user includes an evergreen link to their Linktree profile that they can update if necessary. Selena GomezFor example links to her latest songs and videos, but also to her cosmetics brand Rare Beauty, her official shop and articles about her charitable work.
Zaccaria said that after launching the product in 2016, the team quickly realized that “a lot more people were experiencing the same problem,” which led them to completely separate Linktree and Bolster two years ago. The company has not raised any external funding since then – to date with a Series A of $ 10.7 million, led by Insight partner and AirTree Ventures. (To update: The round’s strategic investors include Harry Stebbings of Twenty Minute VC, Sam Yam, CTO of Patreon, and Doug English, CTO of Culture Amp.)
“We had the opportunity to just keep growing sustainably, but we wanted to put some fuel on the fire,” said Zaccaria.
In fact, Linktree has already grown from 10 to 50 employees this year. While the company initially solved a problem for Instagram users, Zaccaria described it as a much broader platform that can “unify your entire digital ecosystem” and “democratize digital presence.” He said while some customers continue to have “one huge branded website,” Linktree is completely replacing the idea of a standalone website.
Zaccaria added that Instagram represents only a small fraction of Linktree’s current traffic, while nearly 25% of that traffic is now from direct visitors.
Credit: Linktree
Black Lives Matter has also been an important part of Linktree’s recent growth. Activists and other users who want to support the movement use their profiles to direct visitors to websites where they can donate, learn more, and get involved. Linktree, in fact introduced a Black Lives Matter banner about the summer that anyone can add to their profile.
Linktree is free to use, but you have to pay $ 6 a month for pro features like video links, link thumbnails, and social media icons.
Zaccaria said the new funding will allow the startup to add more “functionality and analysis”. He is particularly keen to expand the data science and analytics team, but emphasized that Linktree doesn’t collect personal data or monetize visitor data in any way – he just wants to provide more data for Linktree users.
In a statement, Insight CEO Jeff Lieberman said:
As the internet becomes increasingly fragmented, brands, publishers, and influencers need a solution to streamline content exchanges and connect their social media followers to their entire online ecosystem, ultimately increasing brand awareness and sales. Linktree has successfully created this new microsite category that enables companies to monetize the next generation of the internet economy through a single interactive hub. The impressive traction and growing number of customers Linktree has gained over the past few months shows its proven market viability, and we couldn’t be more excited to work with the Linktree team as we transition into the ScaleUp growth phase.