My Skimlinks Review After Using it for 5 Months: Is it Worth Paying Skimlinks 25% of My Commissions for Their Service?

Las Vegas skyline at night
Las Vegas skyline at night.

Millions of people flock to Las Vegas and other gambling centers to hand over their money.  I’ve been there. I lost $40 in minutes.  Good thing I quit at that point.

I’m told casinos are pretty much guaranteed 20%.  Hence the saying “20% goes to the house”.  Maybe it’s more, maybe less.  Probably more.  Just look at those buildings.

The whole thing is rigged, but then us plebs get to be entertained for a few days.  Vegas offers an escape from regular life.

The gambling system is akin to a skim.  Billions flows through the casinos and the casino has a big ladle skimming 20 percent 24/7.

You gotta admire the model in any form.

Which leads me to Skimlinks.

Skimlinks business model is kinda like a casino.  A river of money flows through its coffers and it ladles 25% of the gross.  I wish I came up with it.

And yet, like the millions of people who hand over money to casinos every year, I happily hand over 25% of my hard earned affiliate commissions to Skimlinks.

What is Skimlinks?

Skimlinks is a platform that turns regular links to 20,000 online merchants into affiliate links.  For this convenience, Skimlinks skims 25% off the top.  You keep the balance.  Merchants do not pay you.  Instead, you receive revenue from all merchant commissions from Skimlinks.

To get Skimlinks on your site, you apply.  Once approved, you add a snippet of code onto your site and voila – all links to merchants in the Skimlinks network become affiliate links.

My Skimlinks Revenue 

I do okay with Skimlinks.  It isn’t millions, but it’s been a good chunk of incremental revenue.  Here’s a screenshot for the last 30 days.

Skimlinks revenue for 30 days in October 2018 - Fat Stacks Blog
Skimlinks revenue for 30 days in October 2018. Click to enlarge.

Based on the above screenshot, I paid about $195 in fees to Skimlinks.

4 Ways Skimlinks Earns Me More Money?

Jungle of Seychelles island
Lush jungle on Seychelles island.

Yes, Skimlinks skims off 25% of my commissions.  Despite that, there are 4 reasons I think I make more using Skimlinks.  They are:

1. Higher commission rates for some merchants

For VIP merchants in Skimlinks, the commission rates are higher than I’d receive if I used the affiliate links in the other affiliate networks such as ShareASale and CJ.com.

For example, two merchants I promote typcially have a 5% commission, howeve, through Skimlinks I earn 6.75% and 9%.

2. I save a lot of money by not having to pay VAs to create affiliate links

Creating affiliate links takes a long time, especially when there are mutliple links in a piece of content.

Because Skimlinks turns regular links to merchants into affiliate links, I don’t have to pay anyone to create affiliate links.

It also saves me time when I work on content.

3. More links to more merchants are affiliate links

I link out to hundreds of merchants across my sites.  I don’t feel like to applying to every merchant’s affiliate program.

By using Skimlinks, I’m maximizing my affiliate revenue because more links to more merchants are affiliate links.

4. Amazing data

Skimlinks offers really great reports and data that makes it easy to see what kinds of content earns the most.

Skimlinks reports tell me:

  • which URLs generate the most affiliate revenue,
  • which merchants perform best,
  • which products I sell,
  • affiliate revenue by device, country and link,
  • website RPM from affiliate commissions, and
  • breaks all this information down by websites (another very nice feature … if you plan on selling one site down the road, you can easily track that site’s affiliate revenue).

Plus much more data.. but that’s the key data I look at.

This information is pure gold.  Unless you set up tracking links with affiliate networks, you’re flying blind.  And I’m not exactly patient enough to set up affiliate tracking links on the 30 to 100 affiliate links I have to create each week.  It’s so much easier to automate it with Skimlinks.

I’ve ordered specific types of affiliate content based on Skimlinks reporting.  When I see a particular type of article generating a lot of commissions, I order more of that type of article.

3 Ways Skimlinks Saves me Time?

  1. Automates affiliate links to a lot of merchants
  2. I don’t have to apply to any merchants
  3. Great reports with a click of the mouse

The one merchant I still link directly to is Amazon (for the most part)

Skimlinks offers an option to turn all Amazon links into Skimlinks.  I’m not sure why you’d do that.  I don’t.

In fact, Amazon is the one merchant in Skimlinks that I still link to directly… usually.  Sometimes I don’t bother hence I have some Amazon revenue via Skimlinks.

Other than Amazon, Skimlinks is an amazing affiliate tool that increases my revenue and saves me a ton of time.

Why?

Because Amazon makes it ridiculously easy to link to products with an affiliate link.

I use the toolbar.  I also use Spencer Haws’ Amazon Images plugin as well as his Amazon Tables plugin (both are great).

My Skimlinks Complaints

No real-time reporting on commissions

I wish commissions were tallied in real time.  They aren’t.  There’s a day or two delay.

Customer support can take forever

I’ve submitted a few support tickets and it can take days to get a response.  I suspect Skimlinks does really well so I don’t know why they can’t have faster turn-around with customer support.

FAQ

Why don’t I use Viglinks?

I have a Viglinks account, but once in the Viglinks network you still have to apply to merchants.  I don’t like applying to merchants, so I go with Skimlinks.

Is Skimlinks good if you’re just starting out?

Yes.  In fact, it’s great because when you’re starting out it’s not as easy to get approved with affiliate networks and merchants.  Once you’re in with Skimlink, you’re in with 20,000 merchants.

Does Skimlinks pay via Paypal?

Yes.  This is another great benefit.  I like receiving revenue to my Paypal account because it’s fast and saves me time from having to go to the bank or dealing with a check (not that checks are bad, but if given a choice, I prefer Paypal).

Do you have to apply or is it automatic access?

You have to apply.  I don’t know how picky they are.  It takes a few days to find out.

Does Skimlinks work with WordPress websites?

Yes.  All my sites are built with WordPress.  I can’t comment on whether it works on other website platforms.  I suspect it works, but you should check first.

When does Skimlinks pay?

They pay on the last day of the month.  At least that’s when the invoice for payment is issued. Payment clears into my Paypal account shortly after that.

Does it cost money to use Skimlinks?

No.  Their fee is 25% of your commissions.

How do you stop using Skimlinks?

When you remove the Skimlinks snippet of code from your site, Skimlinks will stop operating on your site.

Does Skimlinks override existing affiliate links?

It can if you want it to.  I did not do this because there was no point.  I just turned Skimlinks on for new links.

How much is the Amazon commission on Skimlinks platform?

I suspect it varies publisher to publisher depending on what you promote.  My Amazon affiliate commission rate for the last 30 days is 3.47%.  Here’s a screenshot:

Amazon affiliate commission rate on Skimlinks platform last 30 days in October 2018
Amazon affiliate commission rate on Skimlinks platform last 30 days in October 2018. Click to enlarge.

Can you create individual affiliate links for specific URLs or for social media and/or email newsletters?

Yes, you can.  There’s a link creation tool.  You just insert the URL you want to refer traffic to and it converts it into a custom affiliate link.

Should you use Skimlinks?

If you have just a few affiliate links focusing on a few merchants, I wouldn’t use it because there isn’t much time-savings.

That said, if the merchant you promote pays a higher commission in Skimlinks, and that higher rate overcompensates for Skimlinks percentage, then it’s worth using.

Also, if you create lots of links to many merchants like I do, it’s definitely worth using.

Visit Skimlinks

32 thoughts on “My Skimlinks Review After Using it for 5 Months: Is it Worth Paying Skimlinks 25% of My Commissions for Their Service?”

  1. I use Skimlinks with some success. A couple of points:

    Keep an eye on merchants you get a lot of clicks for but no revenue. Merchants don’t always pay Skimlinks for certain actions such as signing up for a free trial. I found I was paid for these commissions when signing up directly to the affiliate network.

    Skimlinks seems to drop a lot of cookies with no explanation as to what they are for (they don’t all appear on the Skimlinks cookie list page – https://skimlinks.com/user-cookies/). This makes writing a cookie/privacy policy difficult. I emailed customer support regarding this a few months ago. They referred it to their technical team and still no response.

      1. Hmmm.
        Never heard of Skimlinks before. Things are always changing. Putting up my new affiliate site and you say it can work for a new site too. Will keep this in mind as I hopefully grow. 2nd thing I learned is Spencer Haws newer software for images and tables is highly recommended by an expert. Thank you Jon!

        1. Hi Daniel,

          I really like Spencer Haws’ Amazon tools. They’re super simple and fast to use which I appreciate. The image one is brilliant. I use it daily. I can insert images in seconds.

    1. Hi Scott! Thanks for being a Skimlinks Publisher and for your feedback! If you find there are Merchants paying lower rates via Skimlinks, you can always reach out to our Support team to look into this. Tariq from our Support team also responded to you on July 12th last year about cookies with the following: 3rd party cookies are related to user syncing. Please visit this page (https://skimlinks.com/aboutdata), if you would like a list of the partners we share data with. We can also confirm that we set the following cookie names `skimGUID` and `skimORIGIN` on our end.

  2. Jon, I don’t think you need to apply for accounts with merchants in Viglink. I make money from dozens of merchants every month and I definitely did not sign up for them independently.

    In fact, that’s my main motivation for using Viglink – I don’t have the attention span required to sign up and then maintain the various affiliations tos, updated etc.

    1. Hey Anne,

      that’s great to hear. I have a Viglink account and while I was in with some merchants, there were some merchants they told me to apply to. At that point I bailed and resumed with Skimlinks. It seems Viglinks has some nice features though, especially with optimizing affiliate links to go to the merchants that earn the most. I like that idea. However, I”m now ensconced with Skimlinks and will stick with them.

    1. That’s a great question Troy. As far as I can tell, no, it doesn’t make a difference but then I can’t say for sure. I suppose it depends on the number of links in an article (maybe) and other factors.

  3. I was an Amazon Affiliate but I live in a state where they no longer allow me to be an affiliate.

    Would joining Skimlinks allow me to to start using the Amazon Affiliate program again?

  4. Hey Jon,

    Thanks for this amazing review. I just signed up for Skimlinks, loved the fact that I don’t need to apply for specific merchants’ affiliate links. Saves a lot of time! Now, let’s see how it goes.

  5. HI Jon!
    I just read ur review . I have signed up for Skimlink , for a month now and I am just learning I am looking forward for good merchants those pay good revinue. Can u guide me .

  6. It seems to be great. I signed up and got approved within 2 weeks there about. Started using it today really. So I’m hoping for the best over the next couple of weeks.

    1. Hey Rana, I believe the merchants set the cookie durations within Skimlinks so it varies. Amazon’s is 24 hours on Skimlinks just as it is with Amazon Associates directly.

  7. We started using Skimlinks recently but on Twitter as deals. We weren’t really getting the clicks on the generated ‘fave’ link so I changed them using Bitly. The clicks are much higher perhaps because it’s more recognisable. No sales though. Then on Wordpress since August In articles ( and some You Tube) we are using Amazon Associates and hope to make revenue. It’s all new. Skimlinks never seems to have much on offer from merchants for the U.K. We add US too on twitter but don’t really know the popular stores. Most seem to be CPA . We are still building things up. Did it take you a while to understand the best platform to present your links? On the web we will eventually include ads to the Sidebar but not flashing up across the middle of the screen as we always leave a web when that happens as annoying. Great blog! Thankyou Lesley

  8. Thanks so much this is really helpful. I am new to affiliate marketing & have a question about image rights.

    If i am signed up to Skimlinks and thus automatically affiliated with merchants through them do I have to make separate relationships directly with brands to use their images on my site (as click through) or can I use them?

  9. Thanks for the review Jon, I am always wary of adding code but I have heard that you can also use a Chrome Extension to generate the links you want to use. Flipside is, you don’t get the auto-generation of affiliate links for older, non-monetized content. I’ll give it a try and see how I get on.

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