Stock photo database Unsplash has launched a digital advertising business to enable brands to reach its audience of 300m monthly users with branded images.

Through Unsplash for Brands, the platform will work with companies to publish and link these images to relevant search terms, making them available to all of Unsplash’s users. Should the images be appealing to users, there’s potential for the photos to reach many more people as they are in news articles, blog posts, social media posts, and more.

“The number one issue we saw with today’s digital marketing methods is that every ad feels like a punishment. People hate them and they get in the way of what consumers came to learn, see, or do,” commented Mikael Cho, co-founder and CEO of Unsplash. “People want to connect with brands in a way that doesn’t feel fake or forced, and we knew that with Unsplash dominating the visuals being used across the internet, we could offer brands a positive and authentic opportunity to engage with people at scale, in a way that doesn’t feel like any of the traditional ad products.”

Unsplash has already been working with the likes of Google, Harley Davidson, Square, The Honest Company, and Boxed Water to launch campaigns, but the function is still only available to invited brands.