IDA - June 22 - Mauricio Botero was COO at Global Personals for 14 years. Now he's taken the helm of Prelinker.com, which is a leading European-centric dating affiliate program.
What is Prelinker.com?
Prelinker is the premier online dating platform for affiliates, publishers and entrepreneurs to monetize their traffic. We manage some of the largest brands in Europe and are considered the largest casual dating program in Europe. We focus on dating products that offer a superior user experience with 100% real profiles.
How does the affiliate network stand out from the likes of FriendFinder and other affiliate programs?
Established in 2001, we have a mature team and technology platform with a wide range of offers and sophisticated optimization tools to maximize profitability for our partners. We have an advanced whitelabel platform allowing rapid deployment in every vertical and niche. Smartlink Technology allows our dedicated optimization team to maximize conversions in real-time for our partners.
You spent 14 years at Global Personals. What attracted you to Prelinker?
There are many reasons that attracted me to join Prelinker, but the people and the TEAM Culture are by far #1. I found a team of dedicated, intelligent and hungry professionals that put the company, their co-workers and our users first.
Secondly, the company is well positioned for growth, and it is here where I can add the most value. Previously as COO of one of the largest dating programs in the world, I was involved in every aspect of the business. My knowledge and experience can help set the vision and guide the operations teams to execute where it counts the most.
How big is the company, revenue-wise, approximately?
We are a private company and do not disclose revenue figures, but I can say that, over the past few years, we have experienced tremendous growth. In 2018, we achieved a 30% Year Over Year growth, and so far in 2019, we are almost at 35%.
We have put together an aggressive expansion strategy, which will accelerate our growth and will drive exponential growth over the next 3-5 years.
Our model to scale depends on developing strategic relationships with industry professionals and country-specific partners.
How many employees does the company have?
Prelinker, together with our globally exclusive partnerships with digital marketing professionals, web design and software development teams as well as support staff, has nearly 50 team members and growing rapidly.
What will you be focusing on?
In general, I see myself adding the most value being "The Bridge". By helping connect the dots to develop new partnerships, strategic alliances and opening new markets.
More specifically, I will be focused on executing our expansion strategy, which focuses primarily in three areas:
First, modernize Prelinker.com, by improving our stats and data intelligence, updating our promotional tools, optimizing payment models, expanding into new markets, developing new products, and reducing customer acquisition costs through long-term media buys and affiliate partnerships.
Second, we will focus on the user facing product by modernizing the user experience, prioritizing the female experience, and adding features that cultivate an active community.
Third, we will focus on Increasing our Life Time Value (LTV) by: optimizing each touch point of the conversion funnel, developing partnerships to create additional sales opportunities, and user focused product improvements to reduce turnover.
What are some key Prelinker properties?
Our longest standing brand which we are most known for is EasyFlirt.com, but we power 1,000's of brands through our whitelabel platform in almost every niche and vertical in online dating.
For example, we power one of the most popular brands in France, Jacquie & Michel, with Jacquieetmichel-contact.com. We also have brands across multiple niches, like: CheekyFlirt.com, SoCougar.com, Rencontre.com and Chat.co.uk; as well as strong gay brands, like: Gay.be, Gay.fr and Gay.co.uk.
What kind of partnerships and acquisitions are you pursuing?
For Partnerships, we are looking to establish long-term partnerships with industry leaders in their respective market and/or niche that compliment our strengths and share our vision of a superior user experience.
These include other online dating programs, entrepreneurs or investors interested in opening new markets, super affiliates, ad networks and upsell partners so we can expand our product offering to our users.
As far as acquisitions, we are currently developing our acquisition strategy, but in general, we would like to target established online dating sites, apps or programs; and new dating concepts that are past the start-up phase and well into the growth phase, so we can leverage our platform to accelerate their growth.
We are also interested in Strategic Alliances with Key Industry players where we can combine our strengths and grow together.
Will you be attending any Shows this year?
YES! I will be attending ALL the Shows this year. I will be attending: The AWE Show in Barcelona in July, Affiliate Summit East in New York in August, and in September, The European Summit in Prague, Webmaster Access in Amsterdam, and the GDI London Dating Conference in London where I will be a speaker.
