Link in bio: Linktree service raises $45M in Series B financing

The development of social media has given bloggers of all sizes and audience reach the opportunity to realize and become full-fledged Influencers. According to Insider Intelligence estimates, based on Mediakit data, brands intend to spend up to $15B on working with opinion leaders by 2022. This includes advertising integrations, collaborative projects, payment for ambassadors, and other formats.

One tool for management and simplified interaction between bloggers, audiences and advertisers is link services. You’ve probably seen on Instagram, one of the main blogger platforms, the phrase “link in bio.” This assumes that the address bar contains a link to a site that combines several sources that are important to the author. This is a forced decision, since you can’t place active links inside the site’s posts.

One such service, Linktree, raises $45M in Series B two days ago. Index Ventures and Coatue jointly led the round, with last year’s series investors AirTree Ventures and Insight Partners also participating. Round A in October 2020 brought the company $10.7 million, bringing the project’s total funding to $55.7 million.

To date, 12 million users of the service are claimed, 4M of whom have joined in the past three months. This is partly explained by the growth of people’s interest in social networks and online shopping (some brands use Instagram as a promotion platform) due to a new wave of lockdowns in some countries.

The project competes with other big players, but the startup’s founder and CEO, Alex Zaccaria, notes that they were the first and currently cover 88% of the market. “We may have started out as a link-to-bio tool, but over time Linktree has evolved and the platform has become a whole layer of social identity online. We boldly think the project will be at the intersection of digital expression and action, and that’s at the core of our roadmap,” he says of the startup’s growth prospects.