xrefer.com, the web's reference engine, today announced a wide-ranging partnership with leading e-commerce service Bol.com. The partnership will encompass advertising, content licensing, sales based revenue sharing and collaborative marketing ventures.

As a launch partner, Bol.com will have a three-month advertising tenancy on the xrefer.com site. xrefer.com will also receive a share of revenues generated directly through the site, and are working closely with Bol.com to develop novel and innovative means of targeting their products to xrefer.com's educated and intelligent ABC1 audience.

Discussions are also underway with regards to Bol.com licensing a subset of xrefer.com content, to provide customers with an information-rich platform for purchasing. This content, with its network of cross-referenced links, will also provide Bol.com with an integrated and seamless means of targeting related products. To maximise the benefits of the partnership to both parties, xrefer.com and Bol.com will also collaborate on a range of marketing opportunities.

BOL (Bertelsmann Online) is the world's most international Internet media and entertainment store, serving its customers in thirteen countries. An independent study from Forrester Research rated BOL as one of the top three e-commerce services in Europe. BOL customers have access to more than 4.5 million book titles and approximately 500,000 music CD's in the company's databases.

Jane Stanbury, sales director, xrefer.com, said: "We are delighted that a company of the calibre of Bol.com are one of our launch partners. The range of rich media and interactive advertising options that we're looking into are particularly exciting."

Catrin Hughes, head of PR, Bol.com, added: "Bol.com are constantly looking for innovative ways of targeting our products. xrefer.com provides us with an ideal environment where we can integrate opportunities to purchase Bol.com products with the xrefer.com user's experience."