Skimlinks

Skimlinks solves a specific problem for content publishers: rather than applying separately to CJ, Awin, Amazon, and dozens of other networks and waiting on individual approvals, you place ordinary unmodified links on your site and Skimlinks automatically detects and converts eligible outbound links into affiliate links behind the scenes, drawing on its existing relationships with 48,500+ merchants across 50-plus underlying networks.

This means new or smaller publishers can start earning immediately without going through per-merchant approval, and some merchants work exclusively with Skimlinks rather than any traditional network, giving publishers access to programs they couldn't otherwise reach.

The tradeoff is cost: Skimlinks takes a share of the commission, reported around 25% on non-Preferred Partner merchants, though Preferred Partners have pre-negotiated higher rates specifically to offset that cut.

Because commissions are pooled across all underlying networks into a single Skimlinks balance, payouts happen more predictably than waiting on several separate networks to individually clear their own thresholds.

Publishers are paid monthly once their account balance clears the regional threshold, $65 in the US, €55 in the EU, or £50 in the UK, with payment following the standard delay while retailers and the underlying networks approve and remit each transaction.