The Annoyance
It’s no surprise that social media and mainstream influencers need constant engagement to thrive. This could be a link on their Instagram profile to their Twitter page, their Patreon account, or their YouTube channel. But many platforms have only one link per user policy. This can limit the engagements received by the influencer and can reduce their chances of growing.
Linktree was founded in 2016 by brothers Alex Zaccaria and Anthony Zaccaria along with their business partner Nick Humphreys in Sydney, Australia. The main aim of Linktree was to provide a “landing page” for individuals or companies.
When running their digital agency, Bolster, and maintaining social media accounts for their clients in 2016, Alex, Anthony, and Nick Humphreys discovered a frequent drawback. Continuously updating single bio links felt like a waste of time, and even worse, they were frequently forgotten. The first version of Linktree went live overnight and took just 6 hours to build.
Overnight, they reported over 3000 users which caused the server to crash. Linktree assists businesses, artists, publishers, agencies, and influencers in better governing their online presence with over 18 million people worldwide.
Later Days
Linktree currently has a reported user base of 16 million users worldwide. They use a freemium pricing model, offering features such as a video link, headers, links to social media profiles, icons, and link statistics for free. Linktree partnered with Amazon in 2020 to allow users to upload Amazon store affiliate links.
Linktree has raised around $55.7 million in two rounds of funding. In Series A funding held in October 2020, they raised $10.7 million in a round led by Insight Partners and AirTree Ventures. In March of 2021, in a round led by Index Ventures and Coatue, they raised $45 million.
Instagram banned Linktree in 2018 as they were reportedly breaking community standards as a spam site. Soon, Instagram lifted the ban and issued an apology. But there are still rumors that another ban might be imminent.
What users like about Linktree
Linktree has been praised for being the one place for a go-to link repository for influencers, allowing users to upload multiple links and information. Adding photos, backgrounds, headers are all icing on the cake. Linktree also has a drag and drop feature which can be essential to cut down time spent customizing and adding content.
What users hate about Linktree
While Linktree does offer a ton of features with its free plan, its pro plan has been criticized for not providing detailed enough statistics. They also have a Linktree branding on the landing page which can be a turn-off for many professionals who would rather choose a professional look for their links. The site also goes through a lot of changes of optimizations which can sometimes be hard to adapt.
Pricing
Linktree offers three plans, a free, a pro, and an enterprise plan, thus making it easier to compare if their pros outweigh the cons and choose the one that works best for you.
- Free: Unlimited links, QR codes, Video links.
- Pro: $6/mo, unlimited links, leap links, link scheduling, priority links, e-mail and SMS links, RSS feed link, and a lot of customization options.
To wrap it up…
Linktree is probably most beneficial for organizations that don't update fresh content on a regular basis but need a mechanism to link to different services or filter searches quickly. If you manage a restaurant, for example, you may have a link to your menu, a connection to a Google maps page, and a link to online ordering. If you're a musician, you may use Linktree to share a link to your most recent single on a variety of streaming sites or your Patreon support page. Be sure to try the free plan and check if Linktree works for you.
