In 2024, French media brand L’Express launched its first fully integrated shopping guide in partnership with Skimlinks, marking a new chapter in its affiliate strategy. By combining editorial expertise with data-driven SEO, the team created high-quality shopping content that aligned seamlessly with its journalism. A close collaboration with Skimlinks, including weekly optimisation and the use of its Editorial Network, has delivered millions of impressions, strong merchant relationships, and month-on-month revenue growth, proving that commerce and editorial can thrive together.
Interested in learning more? Read our interview with L’Express to discover how they turned editorial excellence into commerce success with Skimlinks.
The challenge
L’Express has been active in affiliate marketing for over two decades, continually adapting to new consumer practices. But by 2024, the team wanted to go further: to fully integrate commerce content into the DNA of the publication without compromising on editorial quality. The challenge was to build a shopping section that delivered meaningful recommendations to readers, met high editorial standards, and generated incremental revenue in a highly competitive marketplace.
The solution
To achieve this, L’Express partnered with Skimlinks, launching its first dedicated shopping guide in August 2024. The collaboration was supported by a dedicated project manager at L’Express who worked closely with Skimlinks’ teams on a weekly basis to validate content, track performance, and optimise integration across the site. Together, they built a strategy that leveraged SEO data to identify topics, select merchants, and shape buying guides around both reader demand and commercial opportunity.
Through the Skimlinks Editorial Network, L’Express was able to secure placements and partnerships that aligned with its editorial standards, while also benefiting from Skimlinks’ expertise in affiliate marketing and content monetisation. The flat-fee operations proved particularly successful, generating strong visibility and helping establish new relationships with top-tier merchants. Importantly, the collaboration also preserved the voice and authority of L’Express, ensuring that commerce content felt consistent with the publication’s trusted editorial brand.
Business outcome
The results have been immediate and encouraging. In its first year, L’Express recorded a 60% increase in publisher commissions in Q2 compared with Q1, creating a strong foundation for long-term growth. Affiliate revenues have grown consistently month after month, with fixed-fee campaigns delivering particularly strong ROI. Reader engagement has also been positive, demonstrating that high-quality editorial content and affiliate partnerships can successfully coexist.
Looking ahead, L’Express plans to build on this momentum by expanding evergreen guides, optimising for peak retail moments such as Q4, and continuing to explore new verticals. With Skimlinks’ reporting tools and advisory support, the brand has the insight and flexibility to scale further, strengthening both its editorial and commercial performance.
“The Skimlinks team is truly invested alongside us to optimise content, its positioning, and its performance. They understand our editorial challenges and know how to adapt to them, which creates a high-value collaboration.” – L’Express
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