Everyone is pivoting to video, and LTK is no exception.
Amber Venz Box started as a creator on Wordpress, and founded the platform formerly known as LiketoKnow.it and RewardStyle in 2011 as an affiliate platform for bloggers, which is now often cited as one of the original social commerce platforms. Today, the affiliate space is booming, but LTK has diversified beyond its original purpose as an affiliate marketing channel, and Venz Box, who is also LTK’s president, said it now drives less than half of the platform’s revenue. (Last year, LTK reportedly generated more than $5 billion in sales from creators.)
Instead of doubling down on commissionable links, LTK is working on a bigger transformation into a publishing platform, the groundwork of which was first laid around eight years ago. Last year, Venz Box said that 7 million pieces of content were created on the platform.
Why compete in the crowded social space? The short answer is volatility, from TikTok’s still-foggy future to Instagram’s changing algorithms and link-out rules. Venz Box’s goal is for LTK to be a stable platform for creators, not just a host for links in bios.
“We are definitely playing the long game as a platform,” Venz Box told us. “We have to future-proof for our creators and their businesses.”
Post-social platforming
Internal data shows that most LTK affiliate transactions now happen through or within the LTK platform (as opposed to, say, a link from a social post)and around 38% of millennial and Gen Z women in the US are using LTK, Venz Box said. With TikTok on thin ice (again), Venz Box said creators are facing the fact that social platforms are unpredictable and perhaps unreliable as their business hub.
“I think that the mindset has really shifted,” she said. “You see people realizing that social media cannot be the core home for their business.”
For Venz Box, it feels like a prophecy coming true. In the 2010s, she observed bloggers’ and creators’ audiences fragment across platforms like Pinterest, Instagram, and TikTok, presenting challenges for creators’ commercial viability and social platforms’ bottom lines, and she expected it could happen again.
“We made a prediction pretty early that ultimately these platforms, over time, would shift to try to write creators out of the story and not be a safe home base for them,” she said.
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LTK officially became a publishing platform when it released its app in 2017, and today, the latest version of the app features a video-first feed with a “Near You” tab that displays local content. The platform also recently unveiled a music feature on the app to add to its content-creation abilities.
When TikTok briefly went dark in January, Venz Box said LTK saw a lift in downloads, and in the year since the TikTok divest-or-ban law was signed, the number of videos posted directly to LTK has more than doubled, with many of them coming from TikTokers. Creators like Kit Keenan and Vanessa Ferraiolo, who have more than 300,000 and more than 100,000 TikTok followers, respectively, frequently cross-post videos on LTK, where products are featured directly next to the content.
Venz Box said creators’ move toward diversification isn’t just benefitting LTK. As more people look for stability and niche community-building, some creators are eyeing other nonsocial platforms, too, including the running app Strava.
Uncharted territories
Based on her experience, Venz Box said platforms often evolve or disappear by “evolution,” as with Instagram’s transformation from a photo-sharing app for friends to a video-first entertainment platform, or by “revolution,” as with the potential TikTok ban.
Ultimately, she said, she doesn’t want to see TikTok go away, particularly due to the platform’s power in democratizing who can become a creator. Last year, LTK partnered with TikTok to integrate commissionable links into the comments section on the TikTok app. While losing TikTok wouldn’t be “overly damaging” to LTK as a business, it could be “damaging overall for the creator economy because it really consolidates power into two core businesses,” she said, referencing Meta and Google.
Beyond a potential TikTok ban, there are other economic questions that could affect creator marketing. As tariffs become a reality for brands and creators alike, Venz Box said she anticipates that more brands will embrace performance marketing as a way of asking creators to demonstrate their worth.
A 2024 study conducted by LTK and Northwestern University found that 93% of brands expected to increase creator marketing budgets this year, and so far, she said, she’s seen no changes to that despite those looming uncertainties. For now, she remains optimistic about the industry’s ability to adapt.
“Creator skills are transferable,” she said. “Brand dollars are not going anywhere.”