Oliver Roup is an

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...

and

computer scientist A computer scientist is a person who is trained in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation, as opposed to the hardware side on which computer engineers mainly focus (al ...

originally from Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Roup is the founder and CEO of the content monetization service

VigLink VigLink is a San Francisco-based, outbound-traffic monetization service for publishers, forums, and bloggers. VigLink specializes in in-text advertising and marketing. VigLink CEO Oliver Roup founded the company in March 2009. In 2012, Oliver Rou ...

Professional and educational background

Before founding VigLink, Roup worked at

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

where he was responsible for directing products for media properties like

Xbox Live Marketplace Xbox Games Store (formerly Xbox Live Marketplace) is a digital distribution platform used by Microsoft's Xbox Series X, S, Xbox One and Xbox 360 video game consoles. The service allows users to download or purchase video games (including both ...

Zune Marketplace Zune is a discontinued media management software for Microsoft Windows that functions as a full media player application with a library, an interface to the Zune Marketplace, and as a media streaming server. The software is used to sync with all ...

, and

MSN Entertainment MSN (meaning Microsoft Network) is a web portal and related collection of Internet services and apps for Windows and mobile devices, provided by Microsoft and launched on August 24, 1995, alongside the release of Windows 95. The Microsoft Net ...

. He has also served in roles at Echo networks, Paul Allen’s

Vulcan Inc. Vulcan LLC is a privately held company founded by the Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and his sister Jody Allen in 1986 to establish and oversee the family's diverse business activities and philanthropic endeavors. It includes Vulcan Real Estate ...

, the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

’s

iPlayer BBC iPlayer (stylised as iPLAYER or BBC iPLAYER) is a video on demand service from the BBC. The service is available on a wide range of devices, including mobile phones and tablets, personal computers and smart televisions. iPlayer services del ...

, and the

Founders Fund Founders Fund is a San Francisco-based venture capital firm. Formed in 2005, Founders Fund had more than $11 billion in aggregate capital under management as of 2022. The firm invests across all stages and sectors, including aerospace, artificia ...

. Some of his patents cover

micro-transactions Microtransactions, often abbreviated as mtx, are a business model where users can purchase virtual goods with micropayments. Microtransactions are often used in free-to-play games to provide a revenue source for the developers. While microtransact ...

, media, and

metadata Metadata is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive metadata – the descriptive ...

. Roup founded VigLink, a service that connects web publishers and

bloggers A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...

with affiliate advertising solutions, in 2009 and is the company’s current CEO. In a January 2012 interview with Idea Mensch, he was quoted as saying that the inspiration for VigLink came when he “wrote a crawler to count links to Amazon on the web and found that less than 50% were enrolled in the affiliate program (meaning the publisher would be compensated if a purchase resulted from the click)” and that he viewed the discovery as “an indicator that there was room for improvement in the space. Publishers either weren’t aware that affiliate programs existed or found them too time consuming and difficult to use.”

Education

Roup holds a bachelor's and master's degree in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

from

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the mo ...

as well as a

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

from the

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...

Leadership positions

In addition to being the founder and CEO of VigLink, Roup is on the board of directors for the Performance Marketing Association and chairs the Council on Content Monetization.

Early attempts at fundraising

Roup began to raise

seed funding Seed money, sometimes known as seed funding or seed capital, is a form of securities offering in which an investor invests capital in a startup company in exchange for an equity stake or convertible note stake in the company. The term ''seed'' su ...

for his business ideas in 2009 during his final semester at Harvard Business School. After 95 pitches,

Josh Kopelman Joshua Kopelman is an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and philanthropist. Kopelman is best known as a founder of First Round Capital, a pioneering seed-stage venture fund that led the seed round in Uber. Josh has consistently been ran ...

First Round Capital First Round is a venture capital firm that specializes in providing seed-stage funding to technology companies. Founded by Josh Kopelman Joshua Kopelman is an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and philanthropist. Kopelman is best k ...

offered to invest in the business. He eventually decided to buy Driving Revenue, a competitor with strong sales, and was able to raise $1.1 million from investors.

Views on affiliate marketing

Roup has commented that he believes the area of affiliate marketing has become more mainstream. He cites the transition to mainstream practices as a reason for the term “affiliate marketing” being replaced by “content monetization” or “content-driven commerce.” He has charted the growth of the industry from websites offering coupons to media service providers like

Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

providing affiliate marketing-oriented content.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roup, Oliver Canadian chief executives Canadian computer scientists Businesspeople from Toronto Living people Harvard Business School alumni MIT School of Engineering alumni Year of birth missing (living people)