APRIL/MAY 2012
EMERGING MARKETS: ASIA AND THE US INTERNET ENTREPRENEUR: NEIL PATEL THE SECOND COMING OF ONLINE POKER THE AFFILIATE GUIDE TO PINTEREST
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APRIL/MAY 2012
THE SEARCH FOR TOMORROW’S WORLD Experts Discuss the Future of SEO
INFORMATION, INSIGHT AND ANALYSIS FOR THE BUSINESS OF INTERACTIVE GAMING
CONTENTS 06 Affiliate Events Calendar 10 Webmaster News 14 Affiliate Coaching Case Study 17 Social Media Crisis Management 18 The Pitfalls Behind SEO Agencies 20 Searchmetrics International SEO Research 22 Frank Watson on Preparing for the US Gold Rush While you are reading this, I will be at a gaming conference in San Francisco trying to figure out where affiliates fit into tomorrow’s world of regulated US iGaming. While experts are divided as to the position of affiliate marketing once the big US brands enter the market, I have to agree with the affiliate optimists, and take the view that iGaming affiliates will be summoned to fill the virtual card rooms of, eventually, even the most well known US gaming brands. Why do I think that the future of affiliate marketing is bright? Because as soon the first licensed online operator launches an affiliate program, and unleashes the collective power of the most effective group of gaming marketers in the history of the gambling industry, even the historical giants of the business will realise that they can not hope to compete without engaging the Internet’s most abundant and experienced sources of traffic.
24 The Search for Tomorrow’s World: The Future of SEO 28 Interview: Neil Patel, Serial Entrepreneur 30 Emerging Markets Feature: Asia and the US 45 The Original Poker Boomer: Chris Moneymaker 48 Pinterest: the New Social Wave 50 Affiliates and Social Media: the Missing Link 52 Spinning Around: a Brief History of Roulette 54 What Affiliates can Learn from ‘Linsanity’ 56 The Early Bird Catches the Worm: Binary Options 61 Advanced WordPress Optimisation 62 The Second Coming of Online Poker 71 How Operators Identify their Affiliates 74 Ten Things Your Players Care About Online 75 The Importance of Affiliate Reviews 76 Data Centre: US, Singapore and Hong Kong Demographics 78 Data Centre: UK Keyword Report 80 Market Place 82 iGB Affiliate Blog
Whether US licensed gaming operators like it or not, affiliates will be essential if they are to compete effectively in a digital arena. Michael Caselli, Editor in Chief
Editor in Chief: Michael Caselli michaelc@igamingbusiness.com Editor: James McKeown james@igamingbusiness.com Publisher: Alex Pratt alex.pratt@igamingbusiness.com
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iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
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affiliate events calendar Due to their popularity and wealth of information, analysis and discussion, conferences have become an integral part of the affiliate industry and a key communications bridge between affiliates and affiliate managers. Whether used for networking, education or just an excuse to meet up with friends, the affiliate conferences listed below provide all the tools you need to improve your business.
Canadian Gaming Summit Ontario, Canada June 11 – 13, 2012
iGaming Super Show Dublin, Ireland May 22 – 25, 2012
The Canadian Gaming Summit, set in Niagara Falls, Ontario, attracts attendees from all gaming sectors, disciplines and regions within Canada and is the leading provider of information, education and interaction to the Canadian gaming community. The Summit’s educational program, expansive exhibition and enjoyable social events provide an invaluable and memorable learning and networking experience. This year’s program includes seminars on charitable gaming, finance, gaming operations, human resources, iGaming, law and regulation, marketing, security and surveillance, sportsbetting, technology and much more.
The iGaming Super Show is the industry’s largest iGaming specific conference and expo, uniquely bringing together the vast B2B and affiliate sectors of the business. Now in its third year, the Super Show returns to Dublin after a hugely successful 2011 event and promises a comprehensive conference schedule that caters for regulation, finance and business development, as well as a detailed affiliate track encompassing SEO, affiliate marketing and social and mobile strategies. www.igamingsupershow.com
www.canadiangamingsummit.com
Online Gambling Seminar London, England June 14, 2012 With the European Commission set to publish its next-step recommendations next year emanating from 2011’s Green Paper on online gambling, the Westminster eForum Keynote Seminar will offer a timely opportunity for policymakers, the gambling industry and other interested parties to discuss the future for gambling regulation in the UK and Europe. The event features a keynote presentation from Pamela Brumter-Coret, Head of Unit, DirectorateGeneral for the Internal Market and Services, European Commission, while planned sessions examine options for the
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harmonisation of policy across Member States. Discussion will focus on the creation of a minimum pan-European standard, the next steps for dealing with the prevalence of cross-border illegal online gaming sites, the development of EU-wide consumer protection against fraud and for the prevention of ‘problem’ gambling, and the relationship of the gambling industry with societal groups, sports governing bodies and sports rights-holders. www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk
The betting & gaming affiliate programme by
is event gives you the th e, nc rie pe ex tic as nt “It was a fa ople in the business, pe y an m ith w ise al ci chance to so sful.” and to the very succes from those just starting om, Affiliate Alba, Degetreemidia.c
“It was a pleasure to at tend to the iGaming Su per Show in Dublin. Two da ys of conference were too short for so many netw orking opportunities.” Pedro Schirmer, Eigh troom.com, Affiliate
IS BACK ! IN L B U D IN
FREE for all delegates 22nd – 25th May 2012
“A great way to build in valuable contacts in the industry. Revenu e will soar high.� Jonas Warrer Petersen , Livegoals.com, Affilia te
is the biggest B2B ow Sh r pe Su g in am The iG o the industry. With tw and affiliate event in this is the meeting events under one roof mbling market. place for the online ga
Why you mu
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iGaming indu stry Join over 2,5 00 delegates from across operators to the industry, affiliates, leg from is lators to soft and everyon ware provide e in between rs Entry is FRE E for all iGam ing delegate s In-depth con ference sess ions coverin facing the in g the key iss dustry ues Insightful de bate and lea rning from le figures ading industr y Free one-to-o ne consultati on at the iGB Clinics; from Learning PPC, to SEO , to Wordpre ss and more Meet 150+e xhibitors in tw o distinct zo nes Unrivalled ne tworking opp ortunities wit events from h 6 planned the 22nd to th e 25th
To register today and for conference highlights go to www.iGamingSuperShow.com
webmaster news
Illinois Lottery Goes Online The Midwestern state of Illinois has become the first in the US to authorise the selling of individual lottery tickets online with officials revealing that the first day of retailing brought in business of over $15,000. The Illinois Lottery is operated by Northstar Lottery Group, which is a joint venture from American lottery firm Scientific Games Corporation and gaming technologies and services provider GTECH Corporation, and revealed that it launched
an online pilot programme at seven o’clock in the morning on Sunday March 25 with the first ticket purchased only three minutes later. “Yesterday the lottery began a new era, one in which we mirror how many people buy a wide range of products in 2012,” said Michael Jones, Superintendent for the Illinois Lottery. “Hopefully, people will find our interface to be intuitive, easy-to-use and that it will allow them to participate in Mega Millions and Lotto drawings within minutes.”
Jones stated that the pilot programme will assist the Illinois Lottery in raising more funds with up to one million new players expected. The new domain at IllinoisLottery. com allows adult users to purchase tickets for Mega Millions and Lotto games after registering by entering their Social Security Numbers, dates of birth, names and addresses along with valid credit card details while total purchases per user are limited to $100 a day.
bwin.party Nets Revenue Increase The world’s largest listed online gambling operator, bwin.party Digital Entertainment, has released its financial results for 2011 showing an over 93 percent year-on-year increase in net revenues to €674.5 million. Total revenues for the twelve-month period grew similarly to €691.1 million when compared with 2010 despite the closure of its French casino. 2011 pro forma earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation rose by three percent yearon-year to €199.3 million due to synergies “coming through more quickly than expected” and “offsetting increased gaming duties from regulated markets” while actual clean earnings from continuing operations improved by 79 percent when compared to 2010 to €168.3 million.
The firm declared that it had realised synergies of €23.3 million in 2011 including €5 million related to discontinued operations and was “ahead of target” with plans to deliver €40 million in savings this year and €65 million by 2013. “We made excellent progress in 2011,” read a statement from Jim Ryan and Norbert Teufelberger, Co-Chief Executive Officers for bwin.party. “We expect to gain competitive advantage this year from additional scale and improved flexibility that will flow from the integration and migration of our main products to a single technology platform. As integration projects are completed, we are channelling more resources into driving innovation across the business and through new channels
including our proprietary mobile gaming platform. We are also extending our reach into new areas of digital entertainment such as social gaming where we see significant potential. “The proposed regulatory changes in Europe, particularly those in Germany, which were announced shortly after completion of the merger last year and that had a significant adverse impact on our share price one week later, have resulted in an impairment of some of the goodwill acquired as part of the merger. Had the merger completed one week later, no such impairment would have been required. This is a non-cash charge and the business has continued to deliver an impressive operational and financial performance, generating strong cashflow.”
European Commission Criticises German Proposals The European Commission has issued a ‘detailed opinion’ criticising a revised proposal from 15 of Germany’s states on legislation to regulate Internet gambling and has called on its language to be changed. According to a report from the Reuters news agency, the European Commission declared that it needed additional evidence that the draft German legislation is justified. The warning could see the German states subjected to formal infringement procedures if the language in the proposed legislation is not changed and this could then be followed by a referral to the European Court of Justice and, ultimately, financial penalties.
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“The proposals contravene fundamental European Union free market principles and it is only right that the European Commission acts to prevent member states from enacting legislation designed to keep local monopolies in and the competition out,” said Martin Cruddace, Chief Legal and Regulatory Affairs Officer for London-based Betfair. A report from the European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) trade group asserted that the proposed German legislation on Internet gambling was put forward after preliminary rulings from the European Union found the nation’s current set of regulations to be incompatible with its laws.
“The draft German treaty has many provisions which are in conflict with European Union law,” said Sigrid Ligne, Secretary General for the EGBA. “But worse, it is clear that, taken together and especially including a prohibitive tax on wagers from which the incumbent state monopoly is exempt, these provisions effectively slam the door in the face of European Union operators from other member states and will in fact extend the monopoly for offline to online games. “The European Commission must act quickly to stop this test case for its stated aim of a common European Union framework for this sector.”
webmaster news
Delaware Joins Race for Intra-state Regulation Delaware could be the latest US state to consider introducing online gaming, according to local reports. Officials from Democrat Governor Jack Markell’s administration briefed lawmakers last week about the Gaming Competitiveness Act of 2012, which is believed to include provisions that would allow the Delaware Lottery to sell tickets for games such as Pick 3 and Powerball over the Internet as well as introducing intra-state online casino gambling. Other possible proposals include an expansion of the sports lottery to a minimum of 20 additional venues in 2013 and the legalisation of keno at approximately 100 sites. Sports wagering and casino-style games and slots are currently only permitted at Delaware’s
three racetrack casinos at Dover Downs, Delaware Park and Harrington Raceway. According to a report from the local Newark Post newspaper, the Governor’s proposals will now be considered by lawmakers with a bill likely to be introduced for consideration before the General Assembly’s two week break in May. Gaming revenues in Delaware amounted to $248.8 million in 2011 and Markell estimates that the new proposals would generate an additional $8 million dollars a year. As part of his plan, casinos in the state would no longer have to pay a video lottery fee while the table game charge would be reduced with these monies instead set to be reinvested into marketing, capital expenditures and debt reduction programmes.
888 Appoints New CEO Online gaming operator 888 Holdings has appointed Brian Mattingley to serve as its Chief Executive Officer, filling a post that has been vacant for almost a year following the sudden departure of Gigi Levy last April. Mattingley has been the company’s Deputy Chairman since March 2006 and was appointed to its board of directors in August of 2005. Prior to this, Mattingley was CEO of Gala Regional Developments Limited while he served as Group Finance and Strategy Director for Gala Group from 1997 to 2003, which followed his tenure as Chief Executive of Ritz Bingo Limited. He has also held senior executive positions with Kingfisher and Dee Corporation and has now relinquished his previous positions as its Deputy Chairman
and Senior Independent Non-Executive Director, which it will hope to fill in time. “We are delighted that Brian has agreed to take the Chief Executive Officer position on a permanent basis,” said Richard Kilsby, Chairman for 888. “Brian has been a member of the 888 board since the initial public offering and has an excellent knowledge of both the business and the wider industry. The exceptional results reported today are a testament to Brian and his team and the renewed focus on core competencies that he has instilled throughout the business. “888 is in an excellent position and, as the industry moves towards a greater emphasis on regulation, notably in the United States, his experience will enable 888 to capitalise on the opportunities ahead.”
Former Ladbrokes Veteran Joins LVS Sportsbook software provider LVS has announced the appointment of Nick Dutton as its new Programme Director. The former Ladbrokes man will have responsibility for overseeing and directing significant development and delivery programmes at LVS which is owned by French lottery operator la Francaise des Jeux. Simon Ordish, LVS CEO, said, “LVS are expanding at a rapid rate as we continue to win new clients and we needed an industry heavyweight who could operate at a very senior level and also manage all aspects of
our development. Nick’s played a major part in defining and implementing Ladbrokes IT strategy in retail, e-gaming and Internationally. His experience speaks for itself and I am delighted to have him on board.” Nick Dutton, the former Director of Information Systems for Ladbrokes added, “After 20 years with Ladbrokes I am delighted to be joining LVS. One of my key reasons for joining is the superior technology stack they are able to offer their customers. This is a very exciting time to be joining LVS and I look forward to being a major part of their future development.”
Alderney Praised for its Handling of Full Tilt Saga
An independent report released in April has praised the Alderney Gambling Control Commission for its “appropriate, timely and fair” handling of the situation surrounding the online poker site, FullTiltPoker.com. The author of the report, Peter Dean, stated that the episode had been “an example of regulation working as it should” and that the Alderney Gambling Control Commission had “conducted the ‘fit and proper’ tests with appropriate rigour”. FullTiltPoker.com, which is owned by Dublin-based Pocket Kings Limited, had its licence from the Alderney Gambling Control Commission suspended in late-June following the ‘Black Friday’ indictments issued by the US Department of Justice. “An investigation was instituted, findings made, a hearing held, judgment delivered and sanctions imposed. Due process was followed,” read Dean’s report. “A regulatory inspection is not designed to uncover fraud, but is an operational process review. It will not necessarily be proof against deliberate concealment or deception, any more than will the regular annual audit of a company’s financial accounts.” Dean recommended that “external solicitors familiar with gambling regulation” should be employed in the future to “supplement the assistance available from the Law Officers of the Crown in Guernsey”. “Our focus now is to assist other authorities to recover as much of the players’ funds as possible,” said Andre Wilsenach, Executive Director for the Alderney Gambling Control Commission. “In addition, the Commission is already in advanced stages of implementing a new approach towards the protection of player funds on a risk-assessed basis.”
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webmaster news
iGaming Super Show to Feature BeTS track
The third annual iGaming Super Show conference and expo is to feature a special track concentrating on the betting segment of the online gambling industry entitled Betting Trends and Strategies (BeTS). The Super Show will take place from May 22 to 25 at the Royal Dublin Showground with BeTS, which will be free to attend, scheduled for May 24. “The online betting industry is one of the most important and largest sectors in iGaming so adding the BeTS track ensures the iGaming Super Show is as comprehensive as possible for the online gambling industry,” said Warwick Bartlett, Chief Executive Officer of Global Betting and Gaming Consultants (GBGC) and Chair for the conference. “The conference content reflects the most topical issues affecting betting and will focus strongly on the rising trends in this sector.” The iGaming Super Show will now feature five conference streams and referred to BeTS as “a logical addition to an event that aims to unite every sector of the online gambling industry”. Those attending the Dublin event will also have access to the Online Marketing and Acquisition, Trends, Regulation and Finance, Professional iGaming Management Education (PRiME) and Financial Betting tracks. Topics due to be covered at BeTS include the rising mobile marketplace and its strategic implications and player demographics alongside new technologies in live (in-play) betting and the most profitable verticals and logistical issues. There will also be a debate on what the future holds for horseracing and how to create a profitable strategy in addition to discussions on the risks of illegal betting activities at Euro 2012 and the London Olympics and how to capture the interest The New iGB Affiliate of a global audience. website is now online, visit www.iGBAffiliate.com
The New iGB Affiliate website is now online, visit www.iGBAffiliate.com
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Interwetten TO sponsor Five Serie A Clubs After being granted an Italian licence by the Autonoma dei Monopoli di Stato (AAMS) regulator on March 1, online sportsbook operator Interwetten Group has now announced that it has agreed sponsorship deals with five topflight soccer clubs. Vienna-based Interwetten was established in 1990 and stated that it will sponsor Serie A teams Udinese Calcio, FC Parma, Novara Calcio, AC Siena and US Lecce as part of an effort to promote its new Interwetten.it domain “via comprehensive visibility within the scope of television coverage and an online presence on the official club websites. “We are delighted and proud of the milestone we have reached in securing an official license for Italy, taking a further
step in the dynamic development of Interwetten,” said Birgit Bosch, Managing Director for Interwetten. “Italy is one of the most traditional and expansive betting markets in Europe. It is, therefore, a logical and significant step for Interwetten as a leading provider to conquer the Italian market by means of obtaining an official state licence. “Alongside our attractive sportsbetting offer, we will soon present the Italian customer with Interwetten’s comprehensive online casino and many further exciting online games. “Combining these endeavours with our state-of-the-art high-quality products, we aim to reach customers in Italy who value the security, top odds, reliability and the customer service of a provider.”
Rank and Gala Coral Cease Acquisition Talks British gambling giant Rank Group has announced that it has terminated discussions with Gala Coral Group regarding a deal to purchase its rival’s land-based casino operation for up to £250 million. The talks, which had been ongoing since January, were regarding an agreement that could have seen Rank create the UK’s largest land-based casino estate by merging its 35-strong Grosvenor Casino chain with the 24 outlets owned by Gala Coral.
However, Rank stated that the discussions had now ended after it became clear that the proposed terms of the acquisition “would not serve the best interests” of its shareholders. “Rank remains committed to delivering sustainable growth in shareholder value,” read a brief statement from Ian Burke, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer for Rank. “The proposed terms of the potential acquisition did not achieve this objective. We will now concentrate on delivering our organic growth plans including the delivery of twelve more G casinos by 2015.”
Sportingbet Makes Final DoJ payment Sportingbet has made a final payment of $6 million to the US Department of Justice (DoJ) as part of the terms of a non-prosecution agreement it signed in 2010. Sportingbet had been charged by the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York in 2010 with alleged illegal online gambling offences but soon agreed to pay a total of $33 million in instalments in order to avoid prosecution. The deal finalised in September of 2010 followed similar arrangements prosecutors reached with others in the industry including PartyGaming, Neovia Financial and Canada’s ESI Entertainment Systems Incorporated and excused Sportingbet from any repercussions
tied to proceeds it may have received from an online gambling facility that it had made available to US-based players from 1998 until the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) in October of 2006. “This final payment formally closes any risk which the company may have faced from its former activities in the United States,” said Andrew McIver, Chief Executive Officer for Sportingbet. Sportingbet, which has more than two million customers in 30 markets, is currently reviewing opportunities to re-enter the US market following an opinion from the DoJ late last year that altered the standing of the Wire Act of 1961.
TRAFFIC
Affiliate Coaching Case Study This issue, Affiliate Coach and seasoned iGB Affiliate regular, John Wright, provides a site critique for The Players’ Online Gambling Guide, ThePogg.com. At the London Affiliate Conference, Gaffg.com hosted an affiliate coaching panel along with two SEO specialists, Frank Hohenleitner from Searchmetrics.com and Kay Schaefer from ksom.es. I focused on the design, marketing and conversion rate aspects of the submitted affiliate sites. Frank and Kay both focused on the on-page SEO issues as well as analysing their rankings and link building efforts using the Searchmetrics tools. That said, we did have a few affiliates ask us about our coaching services and one of them happened to be from ThePogg. com. They were looking for suggestions to take their site to the next level in terms of branding as well as SEO and profitability. The current site as it is now is off to a good start with lots of unique content and detailed reviews. In addition to that, they already have their Unique Selling Points (USPs) established which are statistical analysis of casino games and player complaint resolution. The player complaints service has been done before but there is definitely a shortage of this type of service for casino players when they encounter a problem. The other is software testing; I can’t think of a service that offers this to players or to the industry in general. Perhaps the only website to come close to this is Wizard of Odds, who have been known to prove when games have been rigged by the operator, but this is not a core service as they focus on game analysis and strategies. That said, the USP alone should help this affiliate stand out from the thousands of casino portals and achieve decent rankings, but we still think this process can be accelerated and we want to ensure that they are getting more search traffic – and that for all traffic that arrives at this site that the conversion is being optimised.
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from having to try to build links. Just doing stats analysis alone on all casino software providers and having public reports; this is stuff people can link and refer to.
SEO and sitemap
Redesign of ThePogg.com
The on-page SEO of the current site is more than adequate but the site still needs the right structure; first for the users and second for the search engines. Kay Schaefer from ksom.es spent some time on the sitemap to help provide a well organised structure that was also slightly more unique compared to what everyone else is doing with their casino portals. The new sitemap will be rolled out with the new designs implemented. The current menu is more or less the structure of the website for pages. That is it features many items like casino reviews, US casino reviews, slots reviews but some of these could be better organised. The proposed sitemap has some slight changes to the main menu: ●●Promotions ●●Online Casino Guidelines ●●News (blog) ●●Player Training ●●Game Guides ●●Dispute Mediation ●●Responsible Gaming ●●Forums
ThePogg.com is not a bad looking site. It uses WordPress and has a simple structure and theme. The downside of this current design and template is that there is room for improvement when it comes to conversion, aside from incremental on-page SEO improvements. One direct example is the casino review page in Figure 1. The content on the second column appears on all pages of the website. If I’m ‘Googling’ ‘virgin casino review’ then all the stuff appearing on the right isn’t so important to me and, if anything, a bit distracting. On the homepage, this sidebar widget can be acceptable but even there it is still a bit distracting and it can come at the expense of more important features of the website, such as casino complaints. In the redesign process (Figure 2), all pages have a purpose and focus. Maybe that sounds obvious but the truth is that everyone loves to stuff all sorts of distracting elements, content and banners in there hoping that users just click away. A redesign can help improve conversion rates and keep visitors on your site a bit longer which does have an effect on your rankings. Google knows your bounce rate and this is something more affiliates should be paying attention to. The redesign process includes mapping out the important pages; this step was addressed in the sitemap structures. After completing this, we were able to start creating some of the more important wireframes of the site which helps the affiliate understand how each page is constructed and, just as importantly, doesn’t waste the time of a designer. Sometimes, you can be less specific and if you have a talented designer they can make something amazing
The current menu has 14 items in there and although some people love to crowd everything, users aren’t always big fans of this. On top of that, having fewer links on the homepage allows you to pass more link juice to specific pages. ThePogg.com currently has over 100 links and the goal is to get this number down below 100. Many people think that you need more than 500 homepage links because that’s how many LatestCasinoBonuses.com has, but if you are going to copy someone, at least have a good reason for it. When it comes to link building, this type of site has the potential to get away
TRAFFIC
Current homepage
Redesigned template the site to retain these visitors and another for player complaints as one of the main features of the website.
Casino review page
Figure 1
Figure 2
The old design (Figure 1) doesn’t have a sufficient amount of space to properly review the casino since the side bar takes up nearly 50 percent of the page width. If you scroll down, there are tons of text which is great to have for content and for Google to give credit for but it is still a giant wall of text that when you scroll down, just keeps going. Conversion-wise, this will make it easier for people to leave the page; a higher bounce rate isn’t good. For the new casino page above the fold, we decided to put the video review as one of the first things the user sees. Videos can keep users on your page longer and people can be lazy and not want to read, so the goal will be to let the video do all of the work. For the text, we have grouped parts of the review and given them titles and headers like Customer Service, Trustworthiness, Payout Speed, and Bonuses. We have also added calls-to-action in the middle and bottom sections of the page. Overall, we think this newly structured page will outperform the old page on conversion as well as reducing the bounce rate. Figure 3
for you. When it comes to organising pages and focusing on conversion, this isn’t often something you want to leave in the hands of your designer. Thankfully, we have Desigui. com working on the design – they not only produce quality designs that look great but they care just as much about conversion. There are times when your handwritten notes or sketches are just not enough to give to your designers and it is why we highly recommend people create wireframes for their websites. We recommend a program called Pencil Project which is available on all platforms using Firefox or Windows download.
The pages that required custom designs were: ●●Homepage ●●Blog Post ●●Listing of Blog Posts ●●Page (generic) ●●Casino Review ●●Slots Review
The designers from Desigui.com are currently working on the wireframes and converting them into the new website. We only have the new logo to show you now (Figure 3) but in the next issue of iGB Affiliate magazine, we will explain more of the pages in detail and expect to be able to showcase the new and improved ThePogg.com.
header design The old header featured two menu levels plus a header banner. The new header makes better use of space and we have added a search bar, social media icons and two modules: one to get sign-ups to
JOHN WRIGHT is an Affiliate Coach. He can be reached at john@gamingaffiliatesguide.com.
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TRAFFIC
Social Media Crisis Management With companies fearing the loss of control of their brands in the social media environment, how can online marketers prepare for disaster recovery should their social strategies backfire? Sarah Carling, Director of Operations at Obsidian Edge, explores crisis management in social media. So you want to do social media, and why not; with a little time and imaginative content, social media can give you a great ROI in a short time frame. But there’s a darker side that you may not have considered; what happens when good social media strategies go bad?
1. Decide on your impartial strategy maker If you are the one on the social media frontline, chances are you may not be the best person to respond in a social media crisis. The investment and personality you have put into social media means that you are likely to respond in an overly emotional way and may not see the woods for the trees. Instead, assign someone the role of ‘social media overseer’ and make sure they are aware that they may be called upon in a crisis. This person should be aware of the general social media strategy, and be familiar enough with all areas of your business that when you need to call on them, they can make an informed yet unemotional decision on how to proceed.
“ You have to be prepared, you have to know when to fight and when to back down and you have to accept that sometimes you’re just not going to win.”
Here’s how: ●●Always respond as if the complainant is the only person you care about. ●●Try and take the complaint offline and get it resolved. ●●Ultimately, no matter how wrong they are, fix it, because the cost of shutting them up is almost always lower than the cost of letting them tell more potential customers how wrong you were.
3. Just how bad can it get? No seriously, make a list now of every potentially disastrous thing that could go wrong. Look back over previous issues you have had, both online and offline, and think about what would happen if that were to take place on Twitter or Facebook. Read through case studies of brands who have had major social media crises in the past (Habitat, Paperchase, Vodafone and Chrysler have all had major social crises). Think of every worst case scenario you can think of.
Are you depressed yet? It can happen to the best of us; a tweet sent through a company account that should have been personal, a direct message that wasn’t so direct, misjudging popular reactions to what should have been a funny comment, or just coming up against your biggest hater. You have to be prepared, you have to know when to fight and when to back down and you have to accept that sometimes you’re just not going to win. So what is a brand to do? Well, don’t let the risks scare you off. Develop a robust social media crisis plan before you start, and you’ll be able to keep your head in any kind of crisis. Here are three things you can prepare now to help you manage any potential social crisis.
2. Understand the difference between social media and customer service Just as you don’t want to have that argument that has been brewing with your ‘significant other’ during a party with all of your friends, you don’t want every customer service issue aired in front of the entire social media community. Sometimes, however, customers just don’t want to back off and, in many cases, they want to make an example of your company to help them feel vindicated in their bad feelings. Accept now that there may be nothing you can do to prevent this, but that you can ensure that everyone watching sees you for the customer-centric business you wish to be perceived as.
Well relax; take the most likely scenarios and develop plans for them, and make sure that everyone in your social media team is aware of them. Now you can breathe easy, because the truth of a social media crisis is unlikely to be as bad as your worst fears and if one comes along, you will have a plan prepared to deal with it quickly, calmly and effectively. Sarah Carling is Director of Operations at ObsidianEdge. Sarah has been creating and implementing integrated SEO and PPC strategies for some of the most competitive industries, including finance, travel and gaming for over seven years. She was also an early adopter of social media, and has been speaking on and training businesses in its use for over five years.
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SEVEN REASONS WHY SEO AGENCIES ARE DEAD
(PART 2)
SEO specialist, Paul Reilly, returns to deliver the concluding part of his insight into the inherent weaknesses in online marketing agencies. TO SuMMARiSe FROM my first article, these pitfalls are vendor lock-in, talent retention, faking full service and a lack of joined-up thinking. To put it another way, in part one we looked at how you can get trapped by an agency, lose your daily point of contact or SEO talent, be cross-sold ancillary services under the disguise of ‘account management’ and why you shouldn’t expect your campaign to be fully integrated. While all this may sound quite negative or, worse still, a bash at agencies, I feel it’s only fair to temper this second part
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with some of the positive aspects of large agencies. I guess from my former standpoint as Head of Search at an SEO agency, one of the fantastic up-sides of being part of a team of like minded SEO practitioners is the ongoing daily observation, interpretation and testing of ideas. SEOs enjoy nothing better than to spend time with other SEOs and I was
blessed with the opportunity to work alongside some of the smartest and hardest working SEOs I’ve ever known. So let’s continue with the next three reasons why the agency model is dead (there are actually four more reasons, but the final nail in the agency coffin I can only share with fully Non-disclusured members of the ‘Boy’s Club’ [Media Skunk Works]).
“Even when managed well, profitability can be a struggle to attain with small clients, especially as the agency scales in manpower, physical space and infrastructure.”
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5) Agency margin: you spend more as we grow! When your monthly face-to-face meeting takes place and you’re joined by the client-facing Senior SEO, PPC and ‘Account Manager’ for two hours plus travelling time, or when you arrive at a swanky city centre office with 50 to 100 staff, it’s easy to see how overheads dictate the number of pennies in every pound which are spent on your external budgets (think links). Even when managed well, profitability can be a struggle to attain with small clients, especially as the agency scales in manpower, physical space and infrastructure. Unlike affiliates, agencies enjoy nowhere near the luxurious revenue per capita. Once overheads come into play, the costs ramp up proportionally to the scale of operation. Additionally, UK agencies operate onshore under the watchful eye of the HMRC, where their Companies House data is visible to organisations such as the NMA (New Media Age) top list. This results in huge corporation tax; another cost which is passed onto the client. Many of the affiliates I know leverage ingenious offshore structures which deal with corporation tax effectively. It was this thinking which led to one of the key differences in how Media Skunk Works was to function. You will probably know when your agency’s fees are about to increase. One indicator will be the appearance of senior client services personnel or perhaps a Search Director/Head of Search at your monthly meeting. Given the cost for a day
6) Smaller fishes in a growing pond In a former life, taking a £2,000 a month client and growing them into a £20,000 a month client was something I relished. The problem appears to occur when an agency makes the transition from a small specialist agency which acquires new business based on the success of current clients, to one which gains new clients as a result of the gravitational force exerted by the presence of other large corporate clients. The most painful example of this occurs when a large corporate client begins to throw their weight around by demanding exclusivity. “We’ve just signed a deal with XXXX Plc, they insisted on exclusivity so we’re sorry but we have to drop you as you’re no longer a big enough spender to warrant our attention… Bye!” I’ve seen this happen on a number of occasions, and it’s a problem which continues to repeat as the agency grows. This highlights yet another major issue with agencies: conflict of interests.
7) Conflict of interests: the new bid war (might as well do paid search) I would like to highlight that this next part does not apply to all agencies, as there are many who follow the old school way of SEO exclusivity. Personally, I come from the other end of the spectrum where previously, at one former agency we held, there was a general perception that we controlled UK insurance SERPs while with another agency, we built a perception that we controlled the UK iGaming SERPs. While I stressed the word ‘perception’, I would like to add that in both instances (in my personal and honest opinion) we did!
“ It is my view that full disclosure should be provided where conflicts of interest exist or that a standard policy for exclusivity per objective should be offered as part of any SEO service provision.” out of the office, the appearance of such senior personnel usually means one of two things: 1) The account is in crisis and the agency is worried about losing you, or 2) You’re about to be told “you’re going to need a bigger boat”. You need to spend more money because your competition has just increased their spend – this is likely to be backed up with proprietary data which clearly shows how your competitor has increased their link aggression.
It is still my view that full disclosure should be provided where conflicts of interest exist or that a standard policy for exclusivity per objective should be offered as part of any SEO service provision. Please note there are some fantastic agencies out there (full disclosure: I am in no way affiliated with these agencies) that observe this fundamental, I would name Bronco and Ayima as two shining examples of respectful exclusivity policy.
To spell it out, let’s say you’re a bingo affiliate, and you are one of seven bingo affiliate clients who all want to rank number one on Google.co.uk for the phrase ‘Best Bingo Bonus’. Who will be placed number one? Simple… whoever’s paying the most. The flip side of this is that it takes greater SEO skills to be able to place brands in order of client profitability and hold those positions – nothing inspires a team of SEOs more than ‘owning an entire SERP sector’ – particularly a sector which is perceived (albeit via dogma) to have one of the most competitive SERPs in the world. Despite all these other dynamics, client centricity cannot be achieved without respectful exclusivity in SEO. Note: Demand respectful exclusivity in SEO. And remember… if you have any questions, catch me on a local communication technology near you… you know the drill! If you have any specific questions email me directly at paul@mediaskunkworks.com or follow me on http://twitter.com/paulreilly or stalk me on http://foursquare.com/user/paulreilly Disclaimer: the views contained in this article are not those of the publisher.
With over 12 years’ experience in Search Engine Optimisation, Paul Reilly is one of the most experienced and influential professionals in the industry. With a wealth of experience in highlycompetitive sectors, Paul has worked on many of the UK’s largest brands in the toughest spaces, both in-house and at large reputable search marketing agencies. In most recent years, Paul has focused and specialised in online gaming, delivering consistent results that matter, time after time. Paul is the founder of MediaSkunkWorks, a new and pioneering service provider which dissects the traditional agency model, building world-class, hand-picked specialist teams either in-house or as outsourced think tank and creative problem solving service. MediaSkunkWorks which has built its reputation on innovation and optimised methodologies that really do deliver results.
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RANKING FACTORS FOR INTERNATIONAL SEO: 2012 RESEARCH Marcus Tober, CTO at Searchmetrics, provides an insight into his company’s experiment to uncover just what is driving Google rankings. To identify these contributing factors, Searchmetrics designed a purpose-built integrated suite of search analytics tools that access the largest and freshest databases of 100 million keywords and 75 million domains. EArLIEr THIS YEAr, we undertook a project to analyse 10,000 hand-picked top keywords, 300,000 domains and several million backlinks, shares and tweets to see what is driving Google rankings. Since its inception, Google has always tended to release new features, signals and filters for Google.com (and to some extent Google. co.uk) first. International search markets follow suit after a number of months, leading some SEOs to assume outdated tactics still work in these markets. To show how challenging the international search game has become, we conducted a thorough analysis of Germany’s Google.de rankings – one of Europe’s toughest SEO markets. We believe these factors to be Google (international)-specific and that smart SEOs will see them as the minimum threshold of international SEO in 2012 and beyond. Many of the factors that we suspected, based on recent Google updates, do impact rankings but there are some surprising results. In order to determine the relationship between various factors and rankings, we computed Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient for each of the 16 factors, as displayed in Figure 1. Factors ranged from social (Facebook shares, Facebook likes, and Tweets) to links (number of links, percentage of backlinks rel=no follow,
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1. Social has arrived in international markets
percentage of backlinks with a stop word, and backlink count) to keywords (keyword in domain name, keyword in URL, keyword in description, keyword in title) to position of keyword in title to AdSense, image count and word count. The x-axis represents the size of the correlation coefficient; the longer the bar, the higher the correlation. Higher figures on the x-axis (e.g. Facebook shares) have a positive correlation (the more the better) while lower numbers (e.g. the length of the linktexts) have a negative correlation. We can see that the biggest correlation exists between Facebook shares whilst the lowest correlation occurs with the position of the keyword in the title. With negative figures, we see the correlation between the length of the title in characters and the amount of text on the page: the less, the better the ranking. So, what can we aggregate from this information? Here is what we see as the most important findings.
Social networking site activity correlates very well with good rankings, just like they have been doing in the US for the past year. The various Facebook metrics have the highest values; shares seem to have the strongest connection – even higher than the aggregate value of shares, likes and comments. Twitter is much lower correlated, but is still the sixth most powerful metric in our analysis behind Facebook and the number of backlinks. Note to those interested in Google Plus: Not enough data was available to do any meaningful analysis. Although Facebook shares, tweets, etc, are not necessarily definitively ranking factors, it appears that as a sort of user feedback, they are very important and they should take part in SEO strategy. We believe knowing this information is crucial. The likes, tweets and posts from Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest are
Figure 1
Ranking Factors Google 2012 Facebook shares
0,31
Facebook likes
0,24 0,23
Back link count Tweets
0,18
% Backlinks rel=nofollow
0,12 0,12
Keyword in domain name % Backlinks with stopword
0,07
% Backlinks with keyword
0,07 0,05 0,05
Image count Keyword in URL Keyword in description
0,04
-0,03
Title length Adsense
-0,04 -0,04 -0,06
Keyword in title Word count
-0,06 -0,1
Position of keyword in title -0,05
0
0,05
0,1
0,15
0,2
0,25
0,3
Spearman Corellation – Study of Google Germany search results Social
Backlinks
Onpage (technical)
Onpage (content)
0,35
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new, but might already be very important ranking factors for search engines. With last year’s Google Freshness and Panda updates, companies learnt quickly that content was ‘king’. The more quality, relevant content you provide, the more it will drive search engine results. Customers sharing and liking your content seem to improve results as well – without significant investment on your part, besides time and knowledge about what your users really like about you and your competitors.
2. Ads could be a handicap In January 2012, Google publicly stated that too many commercials above the fold can have a negative impact on a site’s ranking, and the negative correlation between ad integrations and good rankings could be evidence of that. Interestingly enough, this negative correlation only persists for AdSense ads. Pages with ads from other networks, such as CJ and local powerhouses Affilinet and Zanox, did not have a negative correlation. In addition, these results only seem to be relevant for the top ten rankings, below which we find many more AdSense implementations ranking well.
3. Backlinks are still a key factor for SEO, but with caveats
5. Keywords in domains remain a huge factor
Backlinks are still very important for rankings, but must vary between keyword links, no follow links, and ‘organic’ links with stopwords (e.g. ‘as’, ‘the’) in them. Links from reputable sites pointing to yours will always be an important indicator to both search engines and to visitors, of the value of your site.
Although Google has often said that keyword domains today are not as important as in the past, we found many domains in top positions that have keywords in them. Of course, your results will vary; our analysis is a very broad assessment of the effect of complicated, unknown algorithms across hundreds of thousands of domains in one country. In order to make the data useful for any particular domain or client, the reader will need to determine which of the elements apply to their particular sites and markets for your affiliate gaming business.
4. If you’re a well-known brand, lighten up on the keywords Search and social heighten the importance of a well-recognised and trusted brand name. Somewhat unexpectedly, for these brands there were slightly negative correlations with having a keyword in the title and in the content, which perhaps can be explained by the good ranking of brand names on long-tail keywords. Apparently, some of the classic ranking factors such as having keywords in the title and more keywords in the content don’t apply to well-known brands. Of course, if you are building your brand, by all means continue to rely on keywords in both areas, but always in a way that is not forced or unreadable.
Marcus Tober brings pioneering experience in SEO to Searchmetrics. As Chief Technology Officer, Marcus is responsible for advanced technology research, product development, and SEO consulting programmes. You can reach him at: m.tober@searchmetrics.com.
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Outside the Gaming Affiliate Marketing Box The gaming space could become very interesting again soon if the United States starts to allow online gambling in a more open fashion. Frank Watson, CEO of Kangamurra Media, suggests that affiliate marketers should be getting prepped, building their pipelines and readying for this potential ‘gold rush’. I have always been a proponent of taking advantage of co-op affiliate marketing. I understand the fear of losing that tenuous connection to your down-the-line versus short-term profits, however the two do not have to be mutually exclusive. If you develop relationships with products and services vendors that your audience want yet do not directly compete with your own services, you have the chance to broaden your revenue streams. This is real added money in your pocket. Here are some examples:
1. The direct related products Poker, roulette and other casino games have items like chips and cards; bingo has those big markers and they all have odds charts and handicapping and tip sources. You know your space (or should to be truly successful), so find the ones that apply to your people and add them to the confirmation emails of deposits or other converted response letters or landing pages. Test them this way first; those that prove really profitable can then be added to your website pages and developed into a solid secondary income stream. Don’t forget to add them to a separate list and include your main product offering in that ‘thank you’ email.
2. Start affiliate programs When you look around for those complimentary industries and do not find any with affiliate programs, you can approach one or two of them and offer to start and run an affiliate program for them. The advantages here are that they will cover the expenses and many of the cost points that you would pick up if you tried starting a business like theirs by yourself. Just make sure you are paid to develop the network and then take commissions on the sales; if they want a ‘no compete’ you want an equitable contract given the specialised knowledge that you bring to the joint venture. Affiliate marketing is undergoing a resurgence, so many industries would love to start a program but neither have the requisite understanding nor the in-
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house people to implement it. Ask… the worse you can be told is ‘no’. Some maybe building a program and you could beta test and work a better commission for being there at the start.
3. Profiting from offline versions Online gaming has offline equivalents and unless you are one of the taxi drivers getting commissions for delivering drunks (players), you need to look at little broader. Have you written reviews of all the casinos you have visited, or information pages of every land-based venue in your niche? You can join programs with airlines to sell travel. You can join one of the hotel affiliate programs to add accommodation bookings. You can also go through your email lists and group by geography and offer trips – package together and go along and provide tutorials as part of your add-ons. Books and signed collectibles can also act as incentives (or related products available online from an offline source).
4. Build your own PR list The de-indexing of blog networks, that many people were using to improve their rankings, has most scurrying to find new sources for links. Press releases have always been a solid way to get links, especially if members of the press refer to them online. But the press is inundated with them and unless you have a personal relationship, you are usually overlooked. So how to overcome this? Build relationships. There is a great resource for that called HARO1. HARO allows you the opportunity to become a source and get quoted and linked to in news stories. Here, you can build your own direct contact press sources – help them and you make a friend (one who can come to you when they research stories in your niche). The other way to use this resource is to reach out to the sources and use them to help build original content in your space. When the US passes online gaming laws, you will be in a good place to get press and feature in new content.
5. Become much more social No doubt you are working the social media, but how much and what are you measuring? Do you have Pinterest in the mix? Have you asked what are the best online and offline casinos on Quora? Have you started a LinkedIn group, or a local Meetup group offering gambling tips? Twitter has been driving successful affiliate marketing programs for quite some time; do you have one? Have you built followers to a recurring feed of specials being offered by your programs? Do you get ‘retweets’ and referral traffic from your use of Twitter? Building ‘real’ followers is the name of this game, not just numbers. Engagement is what you need to succeed with social networking. I have seen a cute poker player use Facebook to get people to join online tournaments with her followers… smart use of flirting! If you want an alternative, how about Google Hangouts? Offer lessons in real-time to develop that connection and record the event and add to your YouTube channel. Good content and smart placement can help build longevity.
6. Forums and guest blogging True, these are old-school methods used in the early days of affiliate marketing, yet they are coming back; those who have been there from the outset may be dreading the fact their source is coming under scrutiny again. With the loss of other methods of link building, these old-school ways have that as an added benefit. Do not look at this as a link building exercise. Forums that have an active community offer you the opportunity to add to the conversations and build your personal brand. Once established, you will start to notice people visiting your site and joining through you as a ‘thank you’ for the information. Similarly, guest blogging gives you the chance to develop as an information source. Just as people like to read my marketing tips and try new products I write about, you can do the same with new features of products you offer. With the ups and downs of the affiliate gaming space, having multiple streams of income from your efforts is crucial to long-term success. I hope this article gives you a few ideas.
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THE SEARCH FOR TOMORROW’S WORLD In the company of some of the industry’s most trusted authorities on digital search marketing, we take a look at the potential future of search engine optimisation, how it will change and what gaming affiliates and webmasters need to do to adapt to the search environment of the future. Dave Snyder, CEO, Steelcast At this point I sound like a broken record, but the future of search will largely be based on the past; content and content marketing will reign supreme in strategic process and thought. The more I extol on this fact the more changes Google makes to prove my theories. Recently, Google announced about 40+ updates to the algorithm, with one being a tweak to a historically used link metric. Links to your site aren’t becoming less valuable; their value is simply shifting. Following this announcement, Google began an assault on artificial blog networks. Again, the concept seems to be that Google is beefing up its arsenal against link gaming, which also means it is likely
making prohibitive changes in its algorithm. If we look at what Caffeine and Panda have allowed for Google to do, we see that it can much more accurately understand the information on a page of text. This makes anchor text almost useless. If I can understand what a page is about and, furthermore, how high or low quality the content is on that page, then why do I need signals like anchor text to help me classify or value web documents? And so, while technical SEO remains a huge piece of the pie, SEOs must start thinking more like classic marketers, even in the gaming space, where excuses concern why content marketing ‘can’t’ work. Bodog and others have disproved this for years, and have reaped the results.
Strong technical SEO understanding, content, and content marketing is the past, present, and future of SEO.
Frank Watson, CEO, Kangamurra Media SEO will move to be more of a total online marketing job (as the better ones know and are acting on already). We will need to know how to optimise for the search engines inside Facebook and other social networking sites, video search and all the new technology that is just starting to emerge now. Obviously, the percentages of searchers coming in through mobile devices will be a major factor in the near future and location-based optimisation will become an
Facebook Statistics by Continent North America Users 220 207 280 Penetration 41.66%
Europe Users 231 338 260 Penetration 28.51%
Asia Users 217 718 960 Penetration 5.63%
South America Users 115 071 720 Penetration 29.01% Africa Users 40 522 140 Penetration 4.35% Source: socialbakers.com
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Oceana Users 13 613 520 Penetration 39.28%
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Global Search Engine Market Share
Google Search
69.9%
Baidu.com Inc.
Yahoo! Search
Bing
Naver.com Search
10.1%
Ask Network
6.0%
Yandex Web Search
1.1%
Taobao Search
2.9%
SOGOU.COM
2.6%
SOSO.COM
1.7%
1.1%
0.8%
0.8%
Source: comScore
important way to gain traffic. Add to that the use of behavioural targeting and SEOs will need to build true persona types on which to concentrate their ‘spend’ for the best conversion numbers. Meanwhile, as Yandex and Baidu grow their percentage of global traffic, the ability to market to Asian, Russian and other non-English speaking customers will become an integral part of any successful marketer’s skill set. We are moving away from simple html and basic search results. Look beyond the crowded SERPs where Google now offers movies for sale at the top of some results or maps and/or news; you will need to learn how HTML5 can be optimised, how to work keyword and object density in videos in order to rank well. We could drop the engine part of it completely and be just search optimisers, even to the point of finding the right potential client from their previous behaviour and current GPS location. For the short-term future, we need to be able to address Google’s move to fight ‘over-optimisation’ and the continuation of Panda updates like the de-indexing of blog networks. Contrary to ill-informed prophets, SEO is not dead. It is a game that will always be around, as long as there are sites aggregating information in whatever form.
John Wright, Affiliate Coach, Gaffg.com Search engines will always be important, but the future of SEO is with social media. What is more important: a list
of local mechanics from Google or a list of local mechanics that are recommended by your friends, family and neighbours? Now replace ‘mechanic’ with other things you might be searching for like doctors, dentists, online poker rooms, a new phone or restaurants. Now, these recommendations will be coming more from people. There is a good reason why Google is trying to compete with Facebook and integrate social media into its results pages. Can’t decide to buy an iPhone or Android?
“ Contrary to ill-informed prophets, SEO is not dead. It is a game that will always be around, as long as there are sites aggregating information in whatever form.” Ask your friends on Facebook and find out the features they like and which friends even has one of these phones. Looking for a good restaurant in a new city? Ask on Twitter and let restaurants fight for your business. The best part of all of this for the future of SEO is that these companies need to be accountable. Negative reviews and customer complaints finally have a voice that used to be reserved for newspapers alone. Hotels now can’t afford to give poor service because negative reviews have too much of an impact on sales. The same goes for
restaurants; if you have bad food and service you just won’t get recommended. So the real question is: in the future, will Facebook or Twitter be worth more than Google?
Marcus Tober, CTO, Searchmetrics Online marketers should expect social media’s impact on search engine results to continue to increase in 2012 and beyond. Here are some of the ways we see social media continuing its influence on the SEO landscape: ●●Buyers will rely more on recommendations from ‘friends’ As search engines increase their consideration of social media, they will begin to send their users to websites that are also shared and visible on Twitter and Facebook. This means that, more than ever, buyers will rely on the recommendations of friends and contacts within these sites and engage with brands based on friends’ ‘likes’ and fan page followings. ●●Businesses will begin to track their true social ‘visibility’ The ability to analyse the number of Facebook ‘likes’ Vs ‘shares’ Vs ‘comments’ for a website, combined with detailed analyses of LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, Delicious, and StumbleUpon to arrive at a picture of their companies’ social visibility has finally become a reality. This analysis will play an ever-greater role in helping companies personalise their marketing campaigns and have high-touch interactions with their customers.
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Content will continue to be a strategic SEO asset Looking back at the game-changing Google Farmer, Panda and Freshness updates from 2011, Searchmetrics notes that it expects Google will continue its focus on ensuring only the newest, most relevant content makes it up its search rankings. We expect that Google will continue to refine its algorithms to drive out poor quality, massproduced content from its search results and, therefore, organisations will need to pay close attention to how Panda continues to evolve if they want their sites to maintain high search rankings.
Nichola Stott, Founder, The Media Flow Without doubt, if you haven’t already embraced Schema, now is the time to do so as the semantic web is more and more the future of SEO. Many affiliates will already be benefitting from using structured mark-up on their pages; since Google relaxed the approval process in November 2011, now all pages correctly marked-up
“The real question is: in the future, will Facebook or Twitter be worth more than Google?”
using Schema present rich snippets in the SERPs (providing they rank, of course). Our own research on click-through-rate for ecommerce clients that have implemented Schema for product reviews show increases of up to 200 percent (on CTR) with no change to position in rank and, of course, significantly higher percentages where rank increased at the same time. Increased click-through-rate isn’t the only reason to implement Schema; logically, the more that search engines can ‘understand’ your content, the better the scope for interpretation of content and reduction in the contribution of link signals
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Paul Reilly, Founder, Media Skunk Works I guess the future of search is what we make it. Naturally, we will have to adapt to battlefield conditions. The way we organise ourselves as an industry will be interesting. We’re seeing massive agency structures fragmenting, which is always good for innovation and competition.
“Strong technical SEO understanding, content, and content marketing is the past, present, and future of SEO.” which often comes down to who has the biggest budget. All the signs are there that Google is getting much better, and more aggressive, at detecting and de-valuing clumsy link building practices; therefore, having great content and your mark-up locked down is essential in today’s climate. Structured mark-up like Schema really comes into its own with search on mobile devices, as often it’s the qualifying data marked up with Schema and displayed in snippets (location, number of stars, event times, price, cost per head) that helps sway
231 338 260 Penetration 28.51% Users
a decision due to the more intentional nature of mobile search. You can find out more about Schema protocol at www.schema.org or come speak to me at the iGaming Super Show.
I would expect search to continue to be a battle won by the agile rather than whoever has the deepest pockets. But I also see search having reached the end of its era. Social discovery will render fundamental search behaviour defunct and will, literally without the requirement for question, provide the solution before the query has been thought (let alone submitted). I would guess we’re as close as 15 to 18 months from this becoming a reality, based on Kurzweil’s Accelerating Change. As ever, the future is just a natural evolution of the present.
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220 207 280 Penetration 41.66% Users
Kay Schaefer, Founder, KSOM.es SEO is dead… long live SEO! Recently, there has been an outcry over Google’s announcement that it can detect link networks and is actually in the process of de-indexing them. Indeed, the warning signs were there for all to see in the Google Webmasters Tool: “Google Webmaster Tools notice of detected unnatural links to http://example.com/” with Google stating, “… turning off a method of link analysis that we used for several years.” So the question is: ‘is everything now changing?’ When Google started the revolution in its ranking algorithm, it was using links as recommendation signals for the webmasters and, therefore, as the main ranking criteria. That approach still exists today. In my opinion, the future of SEO will remain rooted in the concept of recommendation or voting (the most recommended site for a topic should be number one), alongside factors such as accurately providing the up-to-date information the user is searching for. What might change with time is the data used for the recommendation. Instead of, or in addition to a link, it might be a G+ ‘like’ or the number of Twitter mentions or any number of other so-called social signals. The Internet landscape has changed drastically over the years and will change even more in the future. By being consistantly online, merely entering a restaurant for more than half an hour might be considered
“I would expect search to continue to be a battle won by the agile rather than whoever has the deepest pockets. But I also see search having reached the end of its era. Social discovery will render fundamental search behaviour defunct.” a ‘vote’. The question is, can this still be optimised or influenced? Can votes still be bought?
Neil Patel, Serial Entrepreneur (SEO and SMO) is all going to be merged into one marketing form. These days, it is all about digital marketing, as you can’t rely on one effort. Whether it is SEO or SMO, it’s all about driving traffic that converts. Marketers are going to have to focus on creating and testing out different forms of marketing, as these days there is a ton of potential from devices like the iPad and iPhone.
Christoph Cemper, Founder, Cemper.com Recent weeks have shivered a ton of people. Big cheap link networks are being burnt down by Google and they deserve to be. It’s too easy to identify them, especially with advanced link building tools like LinkResearchTools.com – and Google has had similar and better tools at hand for years. Also, exact match anchor text (‘Play Poker’) is something Google could have used to differentiate between optimised and naturally grown link profiles for a while. It’s only now that it has tightened the screws and all those that tried the ‘quick route’ are taking a hit. This doesn’t mean that SEO is dead. In fact, we have seen similar network
burn downs back in 2006; it’s just another strike by Google to remind us who our daddy is. For most, this means taking a deep breath, cleaning up poor link profiles (we recommend to do a thorough link profile evaluation – now or never) and thinking about the golden rules of link building. The rules haven’t changed too much; it’s just that mistakes and disobedience are punished. Developing a truly natural footprint for your sites should have been your goal for years, and if you thought you didn’t need to do it ‘right’, now you do. SEO and link building has always been something artificial and Google’s stance against us SEOs has never been clearer. Nice videos telling webmasters how to fix their robots.txt are just teasers; don’t forget, they never tell us how to do SEO and link building in them, and they never will. In summary, SEO has advanced a step further, and you better research your playing field in detail, as you should have done in the past. The truth is, there is so much gold and opportunity out there especially after recent hits, that you should get your stuff done ‘right’. If you would like to get the Link Research Tools to help you, here’s a quick link where we still give away free accounts. http://cemper.co/trial
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INTERVIEW
In the Business OF Development Despite his humility on the subject, Neil Patel has developed a reputation as one of the most successful young entrepreneurs in today’s digital marketplace. The founder of two Internet businesses, Crazy Egg and KISSmetrics, Patel has been recognised for both his influence on the web (Wall Street Journal) and also for his work in the non-profit sector by the US House of Representatives. Here, Patel talks to iGB Affiliate about his career, the changing SEO landscape and identifying a market demand for your start-up business. Have you always been an entrepreneur at heart? I have. Since I was a kid I’ve always wanted to work for myself. From selling CDs to car parts, I did whatever I could to be an entrepreneur as a kid and it continued as I grew older. I think it started with my mum as she has always been an entrepreneur and it rubbed off on me as I grew up. When did you first discover that your business acumen would take you places? It was when I was around 20 years old. I started to get press inquires from the likes of the Wall Street Journal and Entrepreneur Magazine to cover my story which helped take my career to the next level. Do you think you would have trodden a different path if you were starting again in today’s environment? Yes I would. I’ve realised over the years that I suck at creating companies, but I am great at growing them. Instead of starting a company I would have bought one and developed it; that is what I shine at. What do you think are the fundamentals of starting a business in today’s digital, but economically burdened marketplace? You need to create a good product or service that solves a problem. And not just something everyone else is doing, but something unique. If you can’t solve problems you won’t be able to create a big business. It doesn’t matter if we are in a digital revolution or a bad economy, solving problems is the best way to create a thriving business.
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How did you get from sweeping trash and selling vacuum cleaners to being considered as one of today’s most successful young businesspeople? I appreciate the kind words, but I feel that I still have a lot to learn. I got to where I am today because I never gave up and I always hustled. I just did whatever it took to succeed and every time I failed, I picked myself back up, learned from my mistakes, and pushed forward.
“ Don’t worry about making money. Worry about solving a unique problem that people are experiencing today. If you do that, you’ll increase your odds of succeeding.” To what would attribute the majority of your success? Hard work. Sure, a lot of it was luck, but without the hard work I wouldn’t be where I am today. When people see what I and other successful entrepreneurs have done, they just look at the success. They don’t see what’s behind the scenes and the struggles that took place… things that all entrepreneurs experience. Has the success you’ve achieved and the investment of time and money you’ve made changed your perspective on life? It has. When I first started out, all I cared about were fancy luxury items. Over time, I realised that they don’t make people
happy. Know I work hard because I love solving problems, employing others, and hopefully one day I can help change the world through non-profit efforts. If you look at everything we have, we waste so much, while there are people in third world countries who don’t even have clean water or food. From when you started out as a businessman to the present day, is there a role model that you have looked up to as a source of inspiration? There is. Elon Musk is my favourite entrepreneur and I have always looked up to him. He is constantly changing the world with his big vision companies and he is able to create more than one at a time… which is very rare. OK, so to SEO… Has its definition changed somewhat given the mobilisation of search engines and the consumers using them? It has changed a lot. SEO is starting to become very localised as more and more people are using search on their phone. This has caused search results to become very personalised over the last year or two. Are there key components of optimisation that will always remain important, regardless of the digital channel it is being optimised for? Links! The more links you have coming to your site the more search engine traffic you will get. Plus, the more sites liking to you, the more sites that will be driving you traffic. And the more traffic you get, the more sales you will get.
INTERVIEW
We’ve heard of ‘keyword stuffing’, ‘link building overkill’ and other examples of excess in the SEO world. Is there ever a danger of over-optimising your site(s)? Yes there is. Google has released an overoptimisation penalty for people who are a bit too aggressive with their SEO efforts. Due to this, you have to take the slow and steady approach to building up your links or trying to improve your rankings. Anything unnatural-looking can incur a penalty. Where is SEO/SMO headed in the future – how will it change and how will marketers have to adapt? It’s all going to be merged into one marketing form. These days it is all about digital marketing, as you can’t rely on one effort. Whether it is SEO or SMO, it’s all about driving traffic that converts. Marketers are going to have to focus on creating and testing out different forms of marketing, as these days there is a ton of potential from devices like the iPad and iPhone.
And what does the future hold for you as an entrepreneur? Do you still have business ambitions that you are aiming to fulfil? I’ll probably continue to start a few more companies. I don’t know how many more, but at least a few more. After that I will probably focus my time on the non-profit sector. And finally, what would be your advice for anyone starting-up a business in today’s market? Don’t worry about making money. Worry about solving a unique problem that people are experiencing today. If you do that, you’ll increase your odds of succeeding.
“ I got to where I am today because I never gave up and I always hustled. I just did whatever it took to succeed and every time I failed, I picked myself back up, learned from my mistakes, and pushed forward.”
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The Rise of the Emerging Market Forces For operators and affiliates resident in the relatively safe harbour of the regulating European market, the search for emerging markets has been pulling industry focus both East and West as both Asia and Latin America continue to develop as potential markets for forms of regulated online gaming. In 2012, the reemergence of the US market has all but dominated the sector’s appetite for new territories, but business focus is far from isolated to North America. This issue, we take a look at the latest from the emerging markets of Asia and the US, and attempt to gauge the opportunities and challenges that lie in wait for marketing affiliates. The re-emergence of a major market force It is perhaps inaccurate to refer to the United States as a ‘re-emerging’ market. The one thing that the various state regulatory frameworks currently being assembled will not permit is a return to the good old days when America was the biggest and greyest cash cow around. Regulation and legalisation will not play catalyst to the re-emergence of anything; this is very much the emergence of a new marketplace. The landscape in the US will emerge much like it has in Europe, with states engaging their own formulas in the legalisation of state-wide Internet gaming, be it poker, lottery or other. In time, we may see some forms of inter-state alliances, where neighbouring states partner up to pool liquidity on networked customers; much like the operation of Euro Millions. But for now, the states of America will be united in their attempts to set-up iGaming systems on an intra-state basis and to this end, we’ve provided a graphical breakdown of current state-level progress in the ‘New West’. Additional information courtesy of Frank Catania (Catania Gaming Consultants, New Jersey), Matt Eide (Eide & Heisinger, Iowa), Rachel Hirsch (Ifrah PLLC, Washington DC), Karl Rutledge (Lewis and Roca LLP, Nevada), Marc Dunbar (Pennington, Moore, Wilkinson, Bell and Dunbar Attorneys at Law, Florida) and Martin Owens (Trade Attorney, California).
California A new bill, co-authored by Senator Roderick Wright and Senator Darrell Steinberg, has come into play. Much is being made of the influence of Senator Steinberg, with some citing that his involvement will ensure the bill is given a fair hearing. However, doubters will point to the 2012 elections as a likely stumbling block for any further progress. Active poker bill SB1463: Poker Only “Authorizes the operation of legal and regulated play (wagering) of Intrastate Internet Poker (I-poker), a Class II non-banked game, within the physical boundaries of the State of California that is consistent and compliant with federal Internet gambling laws. “For the purpose of getting this process “off the ground”, initially, the law will authorize “poker-only” and all derivations thereof (including tournaments) as the games legally allowed to be played via the Internet in California.” Chances of Regulation in 2012: Possible
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Iowa
District of Columbia
Iowa has been ‘to-ing and fro-ing’ over the passage of iGaming legislation in recent sessions but underwent significant progress in March, when its Senate approved a bill, via a bipartisan 29-20 vote, that would permit online poker. There is also a bill active in the House that would now, according to reports, stand a better chance of passing thanks to Senate approval.
If ever there was an example of politics’ influence on the progress of iGaming in the US, then it came via the District of Columbia Council’s decision to overturn a law that would have seen the DC Lottery offer iGaming services to district residents. The 10-2 vote has halted progress on what would have been the US’ pioneering regulatory programme, and has dampened any possible progress for the remainder of the year.
• Likelihood of progress for intra-state iGaming in 2012: Better chance in the Senate than the House. Possible in the Senate; unlikely in the House. Should the Senate pass a bill, House chances move from unlikely to fair. • Governor’s stance on iGaming: Neutral. Staff has said he will keep an open mind and review the bill when it reaches his desk. • Political supporters: House bill is supported by the IGA, the association for Iowa’s 18 land-based casinos. Prairie Meadows has also registered ‘for’ the bill. The Senate bill is being supported US Digital Gaming, Caesars, Prairie Meadows, and two other Iowa casinos. • Lottery’s stance on iGaming: Will remain neutral and will not be involved in managing any iGaming program. • Status and Influence of Tribal Gaming: Tribes have been involved in Senate process. Have not indicated opposition. • Number of iGaming bills currently active: One in House; one in Senate. • Number of iGaming Bills died in past sessions: Bill authorising an iGaming study passed in 2011.
• Likelihood of progress for intra-state iGaming in 2012: Certainly possible • Governor’s stance on iGaming: The Mayor was initially in favour of iGaming, but decided the bill as it stood was not workable. A spokesperson has said he “is not necessarily opposed” to new legislation • Political supporters: City Council Member Michael Brown is the strongest supporter. Support has been shown by other members of the City Council and the Mayor has said that he is not necessarily opposed to new legislation authorising Internet gaming. • Lottery’s stance on iGaming: The DC Lottery was going to run the city’s online poker program • Status and Influence of Tribal Gaming: Not a factor in DC • Number of iGaming bills currently active: 0 • Number of iGaming Bills died in past sessions: 1, repealed in February
Florida Often seen as one of the likeliest states to build regulation for online gaming, Florida has now taken a back seat on the matter having seen various attempts, more recently by Rep Joe Abruzzo, fail to garner sufficient support and die in session. There remains political support, from Abruzzo and from Senator Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, but with the Governor generally uncomfortable with increasing the state’s reliance on gaming revenues in the budget and the lottery opposed to iGaming, there is no room for manoeuvre in 2012. • Likelihood of progress for intra-state iGaming in 2012: Nil • Governor’s stance on iGaming: No position, but generally opposes increasing the state’s reliance on gaming revenues in the state budget • Political supporters: Rep. Joe Abruzzo, Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla • Lottery’s stance on iGaming: Opposed • Status and Influence of Tribal Gaming: Seminole Tribe of Florida gaming compact contains a contingency in the event that Internet gaming is authorised. The contingency potentially reduces payments to the State of Florida depending on the impact of legalised Internet gaming on the gross gaming revenues of the tribe • Number of iGaming bills currently active: 0 • Number of iGaming Bills died in past sessions: 2
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The Rise of the Emerging Market Forces (Continued) Nevada According to Nevada Gaming Control Board Chairman, Mark Lipparelli, licensees in Nevada could be online by this autumn. The legislation covers intra-state online poker only, but is also built to regulate inter-state gaming should federal law permit it. This is the state with the most advanced regulatory platform having already passed legislation in the last session, and has witnessed a raft of joint ventures and partnerships between landbased and online assets (MGM, Boyd and bwin.party, for example). In fact, the regulation is so advanced, we even have advice for affiliate participation and licensing, courtesy of David Gzesh, Legal Counsel at Gzesh Law Offices.
Illinois Illinois has become the first state in the US to sell lottery tickets online. The Governor, Pat Quinn, has been relatively tight lipped on the matter of expansion but hasn’t ruled it out.
“Affiliates have an opportunity to strike early deals with Nevada licensees, provided they get a class 3 gaming licence, or work through someone who gets a class 3 licence. No licence means that a Nevada online poker operator expressly cannot use your services.1 “Affiliates are required to be licensed, as they clearly are ‘a type of interactive gaming service provider… who provides information regarding persons to an operator of interactive gaming via a database or customer list’”2. Regulation 5.240(4) (A licensee may only use a service provider that is licensed as such by the commission.)
1
Regulation 5.240(2)(c).
2
Utah In a complete break from the growing trend across America, Utah’s regulatory progress has come in the form of House Bill 108, which seeks to ban state residents from all forms of online gambling. Governor Gary Herbert signed the bill into law in March, which could see it stand alone as the sole US state prohibiting any forms of gambling (Hawaii, the only other state, is considering iGaming legalisation).
Mississippi House Bill 1373 (Mississippi Lawful Internet Gaming Act of 2012), introduced by Rep Bobby Moak, that would have legalised and regulated online gaming within the state, died in session in March. It is unclear whether Moak will re-gather a revised version of the bill in the future.
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New Jersey Having been just a Governor’s signature away from being the ‘Silicon Valley’ of US iGaming regulation, New Jersey is again pressing to get back in the race it once spearheaded. A revised version of the bill co-authored by Senator Ray Lesniak and vetoed by Governor Chris Christie has found approval with the state Senate committee and will now (at the time of press) progress to a full Senate and Assembly vote. Despite having vetoed the original bill, Governor Christie has emphasised his support for New Jersey to be an ‘epicentre’ of online gaming, his concerns lying with ‘how’ any legislation is brought to fruition. • Number of iGaming bills currently active: Senator Lesniak’s legislation is only serious contender. • Governor’s stance on iGaming: In favour, however, he may require voter approval in the form of a referendum • Political supporters: Senator Ray Lesniak plus a number of legislators from both sides of the aisle • Lottery’s stance on iGaming: None
In their own words... Iowa Senator, Jeff Danielson “Theoretically, it would be best for everybody if there was a federal law. That way, there would be a clear standard and the states could then begin to implement whatever that would be. So, theoretically, I would support a federal law relative to online gaming. However, I don’t think we’re going to get one. At present, Congress is in gridlock – they are unable to do some of the most basic functions, such as focusing on their budget. “I believe the states have the right to regulate gaming and I believe the history of gaming in the United States bears that out – virtually no bill has originated in Congress related to gaming. It has always started at the state level and grown across the country. So, I’m not holding my breath waiting for Congress to act on this and I don’t think anybody else should either.”
Mark Lipparelli, Chairman, Nevada Gaming Control Commission
Delaware Delaware Governor, Jack Markell, has unveiled an “Expansion Plan” that calls for the state to follow Illinois’ lead and sell lottery tickets over the Internet and also to consider allowing the state’s three racetrack casinos to offer online casino games such as poker, blackjack and slots.
“The process from here will be that licence applications will start appearing on our public agendas in May or June. For the successful applicants, when those licences are issued, the last step in the process will be the technical evaluation of the systems, which we can expect to take place in late spring/early summer. “If someone (an applicant) was thoughtful about their approach and had their systems reviewed by test labs in the past it’s plausible, even likely, that you’ll see the first set of systems approved for operation by the fall. So there are Nevada licensees that would be potentially in operation by late fall and certainly by the late winter or early part of 2013.”
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AFFILIATE MARKETING AND LEGALISED iGAMING IN THE USA “The future belongs to those who show up for it.” Mark Steyn The shape of things to come You have to hand it to the opponents of expanded Internet gambling in the United States. Like the Russians at Stalingrad, they held out longer than anybody thought was possible. Unlike the Red Army, however, they’re not going to win this one. By the way, the correct word is ‘expand’: Internet gambling has been a fact of life in the USA for over a decade now. No less than 32 of the 50 states licence Internet services to help with their horserace betting. Therefore, it is not correct to speak of ‘legalising’ Internet gambling as though this were a brand-new thing. The immediate question is how soon the states will move to expand an existing reality. After years of false starts, the trend is underway at last. Illinois has just begun selling its state lottery tickets online, with Indiana soon to follow. Be sure that other states will soon join the queue. It is inevitable – online and mobile is the new ‘normal’ for marketing; if you want to sell a product, you have to go where the customers are. The same scenario will be played out again on the day that other online gambling, such as Internet poker, is also licensed and legalised.
Affiliates in a new arena Such a course of events, obviously, will bring many and varied issues in its train. What we concentrate on here is what opportunities and obstacles the new turn of events will present to affiliate marketers. First, the good news. The principal legal problem for affiliates – that of illegality – automatically disappears. The biggest single worry of the affiliate marketing community is that if a given jurisdiction holds Internet gambling to be illegal, then it will also hold advertising that activity to be equally illegal. And so, the affiliates for such operations
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harbour a constant anxiety that they might get grabbed by the authorities. As a practical matter, the possibility is very remote, unless the affiliate in question goes out of his/her way to attract official attention. The decision to prosecute in relation to gambling activities is most often politically influenced. And as a practical matter, somebody who is simply advertising and providing a link to a site which may or may not be legally taboo (especially in the USA, gambling law is all over the road) is just not a worthwhile target. Nevertheless, the worry remains.
gambling tends to be quite tight. The state lottery authorities, in particular, are known for controlling every aspect, including advertising. Affiliates developed to service a need; many of the mainstream advertising and marketing companies would not touch Internet gambling. And that’s where the news turns bad. Removal of the old taboos and caution against advertising iGaming means the pool of competitors increases exponentially. And not many affiliates have the resources to compete in an arena, say, the size of the state of Kansas.
“It might be no bad thing for an ambitious affiliate to investigate the possibility of becoming a licensed vendor of gambling-associated services in the key states now considering Internet gambling.” When it becomes legal, of course, then you’re in the clear. It’s no violation of the law to advertise a service which is perfectly legal, all else being equal. ‘Wait a minute’, I hear you say: ‘suppose advertising for Internet gambling in a state where it’s legal, reaches into a neighbouring state where it isn’t?’ As a general proposition (i.e. this is not direct legal advice) this is not a problem. As long ago as 1999, the Supreme Court, in the case of Greater New Orleans Broadcasting Vs US ruled that broadcasts advertising legal gambling in Louisiana did not violate federal laws against advertising gambling, even if the advertisement could be picked up by receivers in nearby states where gambling was against the law. If it works for broadcast TV, then obviously ads on the Internet, which is much more closely focused, are in no particular danger. However, that leads to further issues. Especially with regards to lotteries, government control over legalised
But all is not lost. Law and regulation always lagged behind technology and innovation. After all, there could be no laws regarding airlines until there were aeroplanes. In many of the statehouses considering expansion of Internet gambling, particularly into games such as live poker and blackjack, there is little understanding of how online marketing actually works. Also, an important choice has been left blank; while the state lotteries have dedicated departments for advertising and marketing, the plan to legalise Internet poker, now being considered in about half a dozen US states, will leave the marketing up to the individual operators who become licensed. California, for example, is an especially abundant pool of opportunity for would-be advertisers. The legalisation bill now under consideration confines the possibility of the California Internet gambling licence to those parties who already hold a California land-based
EMERGING MARKETS FEATURE
gambling licence, but this includes 91 licensed card rooms, 68 Indian tribes who have signed gambling compacts with Sacramento (and more applying all the time) about four racetracks and three ADW operations. But none of these, or their opposite numbers in other states, have very much experience with what an affiliate actually does. Sure, many of them have their own web and Facebook pages, but actually using them to service paying customers online is something that, up to now, they haven’t been permitted to undertake. Just as with the actual operating platforms, many of the prospective licensees would welcome somebody who has been there, done that, and actually knows how to keep the show running. This is particularly important
because one of the primary grounds for the award of a state iGaming licence (again taking California as an example) is for the prospective licensee to demonstrate that they can in fact ‘make a go of it’, and the ability to bring in new customers is certainly a vital part of that. Consequently, it might be no bad thing for an ambitious affiliate looking to expand business, to investigate the possibility of becoming a licensed vendor of gamblingassociated services in the key states now considering Internet gambling. This could be a very big marketing advantage; even if a particular bill does not pass this year, or even next, it puts that affiliate on the state legislators’ books as someone who has been vetted, and someone who is known and trusted.
The social media – more than just showing up Thus far the immediate question. There is a follow-on question, too: what will the current reality change into? The gaming world is no longer what it used to be. The first big change is that ‘gaming’ and ‘gambling’ are no longer interchangeable. Up to now, they were nuanced descriptions of the same thing – ‘gambling’ when we wish to describe something illegal or attractively ‘noddy’, like Vegas. We use ‘gaming’ when we wanted to give the same thing an aura of respectability, as in applying for a licence someplace. There were other ‘games’ but they didn’t really count. Today, however, video interactive gaming online (VIGO) is on track to become an $80 billion a year industry, as compared to a global online gambling market of $30 billion. Hosted in servers, and clouds, as well as within individual computers and consoles, video online games cover the spectrum from first person online shooters right through to completely interactive persistent artificial worlds (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games,
MMORPGs for short) such as ‘World of Warcraft’ and ‘Star Wars: the Old Republic’. And none of them are gambling. From the other side of the spectrum, we see the ongoing phenomenon of ‘gamification’ – that is, the use of game attributes to drive game-like behaviour in a non-gaming context. Turning mundane functions into contests with rankings and prizes is a venerable institution. The supermarkets are full of such contests, and any sales organisation uses some variant to spur the efforts of the troops. But ‘gamification’ really found its legs with Smartphones. Apple just sold its 25 billionth app for its iPhone array, and something like 850,000 Android devices are activated every day, and at need to be quick, simple, and effectively engage the attention of the person using it. So in many marketing applications, the closer the app process resembles a casual game, the more popular and usable it will be. ‘Right’, I hear you ask, ‘how does this affect an affiliate and affiliate marketing?’ It means, simply put, that the sky is now the limit. In addition to the good oldfashioned click throughs and headcounts, an affiliate in the coming American market will be able to use such apps and games to generate an independent following, which can then be marketed, or monetised in other suitable ways. It’s not out of the question, in fact, that a given Internet gambling operator may reach out to ‘gamblify’ an app-style casual game. (The terms of gambling and gaming are not so interchangeable anymore but, on the other hand, the formats and components – the ones and zeroes – increasingly are.) Or, it may simply be grafted onto an existing website as an amusement to keep the customers hanging around. State lottery authorities, perennially in need of a new angle, may become a promising field for such experiments. ‘Mobile’, they say, ‘is the new normal’. So is the flexibility and creativity that feeds and runs it. It will be interesting to see who are the first and fastest to adapt. MARTIN OWENS is a California attorney specializing in the law of Internet and interactive gaming since 1998. Co-author of INTERNET GAMING LAW with Professor Nelson Rose, (Mary Ann Liebert Publishers 2005); Editorial board, Gaming Law Review. Comments/inquiries welcome at mowens@trade-attorney.com.
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Preparing for the Re-Emerging America The re-emergence of the US as a market force in iGaming provides some interesting challenges for affiliates keen on accessing the various intra-state markets. Jeremy Enke, Founder of Poker Affiliate Listings, takes the affiliate line on preparing for a new American marketplace. As we look back at the landscape of the US online gambling industry over the last twelve months, it has been one filled with pitfalls and uncertainty. There have been countless speculations and forecasts from both affiliates and operators on what the future may hold for this battered market.
uncertainty. In 2006, after the UIGEA was passed, many poker affiliates experienced a significant reduction in their incomes when operators such as PartyPoker, 888, and Paradise Poker left the US market. Then again in 2011 after the notorious ‘Black Friday’, which left us with the
“ It is anyone’s guess as to what the new (regulated) landscape will look like. While this is frustrating for gambling enthusiasts and players in the US, it is equally frustrating for poker affiliates.” The reality, however, is that no one truly knows exactly when a newly regulated US market will emerge. Likewise, when there is regulation, it is anyone’s guess as to what the new landscape will look like. While this is frustrating for gambling enthusiasts and players in the US, it is equally frustrating for poker affiliates. Unfortunately, this is not the first time that poker affiliates have faced this type of
abrupt closures of FullTiltPoker.com, AbsolutePoker.com, and UltimateBet.com. Both these setbacks decimated many affiliates’ incomes whose main focus was the US. Regardless of what a regulated market will look like, most poker affiliates are ready for some sort of consistency where the American online poker market is concerned. Given the dismal state of the US economy and the enormous tax revenue potential, I think most in the industry would agree that we should indeed see regulation and legal US poker at
some point in the near future. When this regulation finally does transpire, the affiliates that will reap the greatest rewards will be the ones who prepared for this new market ahead of time. With so much uncertainty and possible scenarios, preparing for the re-emerging American market is no easy task. With this in mind, I’ve assembled a few simple things that affiliates can be doing right now to prepare regardless of how the market actually re-emerges.
Stay up-to-date and report on new industry developments This will not only be beneficial for your business, but will also help you with your future planning. Likewise, you can leverage the changing news and events to establish your site as an authority on the latest developments regarding online gambling regulation in the US. Never in history has there been so much news surrounding US gambling regulations. You can also leverage the constant stream of industry news to email your lists with pertinent information on a more regular basis. Take advantage of it.
Continue to diversify Whether an operator or affiliate, it has never been more important to diversify your overall business. With the unpredictable future outlook of the online gambling sector in the US, it is extremely prudent to diversify both within and outside of gambling. While everyone is hoping that the US market will re-emerge and bring with it the type of ‘poker boom’ we witnessed in 2003, there are no guarantees. Currently, there are some other great emerging industries that are very easy for poker affiliates to cross over into. For example, penny auctions, binary trading, sports picks, and even precious metals.
Adjust your expectations Many in the industry believe that a re-emerging US market will be
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Be the first mover One of the most important keys to success when approaching any emerging, or in this case, re-emerging market, is to be the first in. Should the US market reopen under one of the aforementioned scenarios, it will be important to embrace the new market and fully immerse yourself into it. That said, you will want to establish early relationships with new providers and learn the best approach to take in order to capitalise from the buzz that
will surely ensue. In the same way the market may change, so could the fundamental way affiliates and operators do business together.
Get back to the basics While regulation may be a giant leap forward for the industry in respect to legality, it may also be a step backwards in terms of technology, player liquidity, enormous prize pools, and the other great advancements the non-regulated markets brought us over the last decade. When promoting in this type of market, affiliates may not have the luxury of attracting new players with rakeback, added prize pools, or terrific deposit bonuses. As a new online poker market emerges in the US, there will more than likely be a great deal of interest not only from current poker players, but also potential new players. Just like in the early days of online poker, it will become a numbers game for affiliates. The more traffic you can generate
to your site and introduce this new market to, the greater your conversions and overall income will be. As mentioned at the beginning of this article, nobody truly knows how the re-emergence of the online poker market in the US will play out. Likewise, it is doubtful that we will ever see another online poker boom as we did in 2003. However, the potential for affiliates and operators who understand this new market and are prepared from the onset could be tremendous. Between the existing operators and the land-based casinos with significant amounts of money, the current state of the market can easily be compared to a giant game of chess. Both sides are positioning themselves and all are thinking three moves ahead. At some point, the online poker industry as a whole is going to be able to remove the proverbial US government boot off the industries throat and happily exclaim ‘Check Mate!’
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driven and perhaps operated by the large Las Vegas casinos. Additionally, there is a fairly good chance that individual states may join forces to offer inter-state poker. If either of these takes place, affiliates should not expect to earn the level of commission that is currently standard in the industry. In fact, in an inter-state scenario similar to how Powerball or lotteries are operated, affiliates should keep their fingers crossed that there would even be an affiliate program.
BEST AFFILIATE NETWORK
2011
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EMERGING MARKETS
Eastern Promise Tom Hall, Business Development Director at sportsbook software supplier, ONEworks, provides his first-hand insight into the market for iGaming in the largely unregulated Asian region. The growth of online gaming in Asia is primarily driven by ever increasing (and reliable) Internet penetration, coupled with expanding Internet access via the ubiquitous mobile phone. In terms of product adoption, online sportsbetting would be the largest segment, followed by online live stream video casino, RNG casino, keno/numbers games and then poker and other Asian P2P games. Currently, most Asian countries seem to be some way from creating a regulated framework for online gaming; however, in the long-term I would expect it to follow in the footsteps of Europe with individual countries taxing and regulating the sector.
Hong Kong already offers online horseracing and football betting via the Hong Kong Jockey Club. It’s the only legal form of online gaming there, with everything else strictly prohibited. Indeed, it’s difficult to argue with this approach, as the products generate a huge amount of tax for the Hong Kong government, and the company’s residual profits are invested back into the community. Singapore and Macau also have licensed online sportsbetting. The take up of poker in Asia has been slower than many industry observers, me included, initially expected. Historically, global online poker has grown due to
“ From many perspectives – whether macro-economic, operator, software provider or affiliate – I think the Asian marketplace offers the best opportunities in the world right now.” powerful TV exposure, but this has been limited in Asia as gambling content for television is usually very restricted. It’s interesting to note that where it was allowed to be shown on TV within Asia, online poker jumped in popularity. The best example is the Philippines, a region where poker is shown regularly
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on TV, where PAGCOR (the Philippines’ government gaming regulator) has licensed over 20 poker rooms in the country and where there is now a large grass-roots, land-based poker community. Although online poker is yet to be formally licensed in the Philippines, the amount of people playing online at international sites could feasibly persuade PAGCOR to adapt its regime to suit the existing demand.
Room for growth Today, online gaming represents between five to eight percent of the total global gaming market. I would estimate that the comparative figure for Asia is still less than one percent of all gaming in the region, as you need to take into consideration the huge casino industry, the considerable horseracing markets of Hong Kong and Japan, plus the pachinko industry of Japan and Asian-wide lotteries. Clearly, in online penetration terms, Asia has substantial room for growth and that explains why many Western operators are setting up shop in the region. Asia has long enjoyed online games and I also expect to see growing popularity in variants of social poker/P2P games, with in-game revenue generation as opposed to ‘full on’ gambling adopted by the next generation of players in Asia. As far as the current market size in Asia is concerned, detailed and accurate market statistics are difficult to come by, but my best-estimate would indicate that the online gaming ‘pie’ would split up as follows: 50 percent sportsbetting, 35 percent casino (of which 65 percent is video-stream and 35 percent RNG), ten percent for keno/ numbers games/lottery, four percent for poker and one percent for other online games. Games such as online bingo have yet to be adopted and even popular Asian
EMERGING MARKETS feature
Asian Market Share by Product (author estimate)
Sportsbetting (50%) Casino (35%) Keno/numbers/games/lottery (10%) Poker (4%) Online games (1%)
land-based games such as mahjong and Do Di Zhu haven’t proved popular online, primarily due to concerns regarding collusion. There are three or four online gaming operators in Asia that dwarf their comparable Western operators, but these are all privately held and the owners keep a low profile. Another indication for the potential that Asia offers is to see how the land-based gaming industry has developed, particularly in recent years. As far as the casino market is concerned, I think most people know that Macau has now grown to be far larger in handle than Las Vegas1, and that Singapore, with just two casinos, has already overtaken the Vegas strip. The Genting Resorts World Casino in Manila, Philippines has done fantastically well since launch and
exciting new products being delivered by a large selection of providers, both big and small. I’ve been in the industry for some years, but I’ve never seen as much innovation in sports/casino/side games/ numbers games, with a particular emphasis on the mobile phone channel, than I am seeing right now. ONEworks provides its sportsbook platform to most of Asia’s major sportsbooks and we are very busy right now dealing with both Asian customers and Western operators looking to do business in Asia. From a player’s perspective, it’s easy to see why there is such growing interest in the region. For example, in the sportsbetting sector, Asian punters have preferred in-running betting for some years and have typically been offered far
“ Any affiliate operation would do well to ensure that they have Asia as a key part of their strategy for the rest of this decade, and beyond.” has shown that you can generate growth in both domestic traffic and international visitors if you offer a quality product. This has led to other major groups reviewing the Philippines with the second major casino due to open early next year. Vietnam has an integrated resort project underway, Japan is again further reviewing its public policy on casinos, and locations like Cambodia, Malaysia and Laos have had a casino industry for some years.
Future opportunities From many perspectives – whether macro-economic, operator, software provider or affiliate – I think the Asian marketplace currently offers the best opportunities in the world. The market is fast-growing and is strongly based on an inherent and ‘cultural’ connection with gambling. Through access to high-quality software programming resource in the region, there is a raft of http://www.gluckman.com/VivaMacau!.html http://ceza.gov.ph/message-from-the-ceo
more in-play events and more competitive pricing than their European counterparts. In addition, many of the leading Asian operators (like 12BET.com, bodog88.com and SBOBET.com) have been sponsoring Premiership football teams, and have become far better known in Europe, as players have found their sites. They have seen the more competitive pricing available and range of markets, and many have permanently switched to these sites. Price competition in the betting market is always of benefit to the player – perhaps similar to the way in which Betfair’s exchange model ‘disturbed’ the status quo in the UK some ten years ago – and we’ve seen plenty of evidence of this ‘new wave’ at ONEworks, witnessing the effect that better prices and more markets can have on player behaviour, customer demand and operator profitability. From an operator’s perspective, regulation is always going to be a challenge and,
generally, the privately-held firms have done better as they are more flexible and can adapt quicker. Bet365 is an excellent example of being extremely successful in Asia (as well as the rest of the world), as it has seen the opportunity, developed a great product mix, and delivered through its reputation and excellent customer support. Asia has also had a very stable licensing regime for nearly ten years through the CEZA Philippines regulatory environment2 which has provided operators with an efficient and effective base. Some 50 licensees now have their headquarters in the Philippines and have invested significantly to base their businesses there.
Conclusion With Asia’s ‘cultural connection’ with gambling, proven demand for online gambling in the region, the potential for growth, and increasing interest in the region from European operators, any affiliate operation would do well to ensure that they have Asia as a key part of their strategy for the rest of this decade, and beyond.
Tom Hall is Business Development Director at ONEworks™. Tom is recognised as one of the world’s leading experts in the field of interactive gaming. A regular keynote speaker at gaming conferences and investor forums around the world, he has been actively involved in the gaming sector since 2002. He founded AsianLogic in 2002, one of the pioneers of online gaming and betting in Asia and he remains as non-exec Chairman of one the largest and most established operators in the region. In parallel to AsianLogic, Hall was instrumental in the development of Playtech and joined the Board in 2002. He subsequently became the CEO and was responsible for overseeing global customer growth. He became Global Business Development Director shortly before the 2006 floatation on the London Stock Exchange and remained as a Director until 2010. Tom commenced his new executive role at ONEworks™ in 2010, one of the world’s largest sportsbetting platform providers. Tom joined as Global Business Development Director. www.oneworks.com
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EMERGING MARKETS
Who’s Doing What in Asia To replicate our graphic look at the US market, we profile some of the sportsbooks serving the Asian market to gauge the type of products they offer as well as gaining insight from the Isle of Man’s Acting Head of e-Gaming Development, Ray Davies, as to why a number of Asian-facing sportsbooks are licensing on the island’s shores. The Asian love affair with the Isle of Man Gambling is a normal part of life among many Asian communities, so much so that it is considered to be a part of their culture. It is so deeply ingrained that it has become an accepted form of social intercourse. There is a saying in China that “a little gambling is good for the health, but too much can drive you mad.”
Asian operators have long been attracted to the West, lured by the lucrative customer base and by the natural fit with the propensity for the Asian market to gamble on the English Premier League. Football, it would seem, and the ability for real-time, in-play betting is increasingly popular and starting to rival some of the more traditional Asian games. Asian businesses are constantly innovating and seeking ways and means
to bring their existing gaming portfolios to an increasingly global audience and the Isle of Man has been identified as the country of choice by a growing number of Asian operators. SBOBET, Cube (188BET), ONEworks, 12BET and Sports Market Manx have all established themselves on the island, not to mention the latest Isle of Man Licence Holder, Xela, who sees the island as an ideal location from which to realise its ambitions to expand its businesses.
Search Engine Market Share China
Baidu: 76% Google China 17% Others 7%
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Japan
Google Search Yahoo! Search Bing Nifty Search Biglobe Search
South Korea
58.9% 38.4% 0.9 % 0.4% 0.3%
Naver.com Search Daum.net Search Google Search Nate.com Search Yahoo! Search
70.5% 12.5% 8.5% 4.2% 1.9%
Source: comScore
eMerGING MarKetS feature
Isle of Man Licensees Serving the Asian Market ONEworks Licensed in December 2011 Has a Network Services Licence on the Isle of Man, offering its platform to licensees looking to target International, European or Asian markets.
Xela Gained its licence in February 2012 but is yet to go live with a website.
Products: • Sportsbetting platform.
Sport Market Manx
12BET
Licensed in August 2009
Licensed in August 2010
Products:
Products:
• Asian Handicap Soccer
• Sportsbook • Casino • Live Casino • Slots • Mobile
Celton Manx (SBOBET)
Licensed in August 2008 Products:
Fun88
• Sportsbook • Casino
Licensed in September 2009
• Live casino
Products:
• Games (keno and scratchies)
• Sportsbook Products licensed under the jurisdiction of First Cagayan • Casino • Live Casino • Slots
Cube
(188BET)
Licensed in August 2007 Products: • Sportsbook • Casino • Live Casino • Mobile
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EMERGING MARKETS feature
Online Gambling in Asia: the Two Sides of the Coin For affiliates and marketers, accessing the Asian market will have its unique challenges so it is important to understand how the demographic engages with the Internet. Jonathan Murphy, Account Director at OBAN Multilingual, explores the search engines leading the markets in the Asian region. “If you must play, decide upon three things at the start: The rules of the game, the stakes and the quitting time.” Chinese Proverb In Asia, online gambling is quickly attracting an ever increasing amount of fans, and the majority of industry experts believe that two trends will continue to grow in the continent over the next few years: (i) the growing number of people interested in online gambling and (ii) that Japan will become the second largest market in Asia. Today, Macau is seen as the ‘Asian Las Vegas’ and while some would expect Macau to represent the hub of Asia’s online gambling industry, specialists instead point to Japan, particularly as it is considered the continent’s most technologically up-to-date nation. On the other hand, an important factor that shouldn’t be ignored is the differing quality of Internet services that exist from country to country. For example, China’s Internet usage is growing but the country has a low penetration rate (40 percent) compared with other countries in the region (Japan at 78 percent and South Korea at 81 percent). When discussing Internet usage, we should also consider the Asian markets from an international online marketing perspective.
Search market share Today, Google boasts a dominant share of the international market, but Asia is dominated by local search engines. In China, Baidu owns 76 percent of the search market while Google Hong Kong (now acting as Google China) accounts for just 17 percent. The defining reason Baidu enjoys such domestic dominance is the simple fact that it handles the Chinese language better than Google, offering more accurate results and also the ability to perform multi-platform search. In Japan, Yahoo! Japan holds 56 percent of the search market, but the situation is slightly
confused by the mix between the global search engine and the local presence. At the same time, Yahoo! Japan is not just a search engine but also an important portal and the country’s most visited web page. In South Korea, Naver dominates the market with 70 percent, while search engines such as Google and Yahoo! own just ten percent combined. Naver has build up a trustworthy presence, supported by its high online shopping presence and, more importantly, it accurately deals with the language
“ According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the online gambling industry in the Asia Pacific area is expected to grow from $34.4 billion to $79.3 billion over the next few years.” difficulties and the search trends of the South Korean demographic. In terms of PPC and organic search, Baidu utilises both in order to provide search results determined by specific keywords. In Japan, although organic search is powered by Google, PPC is provided by Yahoo! Japan. As for Naver, PPC ads are dominant and powered by Overture and PowerLink, while the organic ads are placed in a small area low down on the page. It is also worth bearing in mind that in Asia, social media is rife. In the UK, for example, social media is enormously popular but only accounts for around three percent of traffic that is driven to sites; in China, the average is 14 percent. Also, platforms such as Facebook and Twitter have much lower penetration in this region – RenRen being China’s version of Facebook and QQ it’s version of twitter. In addition, search is much more ‘social’
in Asia, where users are often keen to read reviews and articles about their search query rather than just ‘Google’ it and pick the top option. Advertisers should be aware that news portal sites such as Siena and Sohu in China drive more traffic than Google does in total in some Western markets. Last year, Google allowed AdSense publishers to display certain types of gambling ads in different geographic locations and for the last 12 months, the search giant has also been allowing the advertising of online scratch games run by state, national or Indian reservations and national or state lotteries, bricks-and-mortar gambling locations and fantasy sport contests. Regarding Google’s gamblingrelated restrictions, they cover practices that are deemed illegal in the jurisdictions that ads are targeted to. In contrast with 2007, when Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! paid substantial fines (Microsoft $21 million, Google $3 million and Yahoo! $7.5 million) for accepting and displaying online gambling ads, today, Google is more confident in its abilities to police the types of ads it displays.
Conclusion Today, the online gambling industry in the Asia Pacific area is expected to grow from $34.4 billion to $79.3 billion over the next few years, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers’ recent Global Gaming Outlook study. So, when assessing this burgeoning market for opportunities to market iGaming, there are several parameters that one should consider to more accurately tailor campaigns through the right channels. In the age of localisation, the Asia-Pacific region is a timely reminder that blanket marketing and/or operating strategies are not effective models for multi-jurisdiction presence, and are more likely to be of detrimental value to your business. Each market has its own unique nuances of language, Internet penetration and search engine preferences that make access to this emerging marketplace a challenge that will require deep market knowledge and perseverance to overcome.
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INTERVIEW
THE ORIGINAL POKER BOOMER With some predicting the onset of a second poker boom with the anticipated return of the US market, regular iGB Affiliate columnist, Jeremy Enke, caught up with the man whose 2003 World Series of Poker triumph turned poker into an Internet phenomenon: Chris Moneymaker. Aside from promoting the new film ‘All-In – The Poker Movie’, what other ventures have been keeping you occupied? I’ve been trying to keep busy. My friend and I are developing a poker/Scrabble iPhone game that is taking up a bit of my time. I also signed a new deal to sponsor a poker room in Erie, Pennsylvania called Prescott Downs, I’m working with a casino in Tunica and I’ve just signed on to be one of the lead instructors at the WPT Boot Camp. I’m still travelling around playing for PokerStars in poker tournaments internationally. So, some of it is lower profile, off the radar stuff but still fun, nonetheless. How did you get involved in the film? They came to me five or six years ago. To be honest, when I got the phone call I was happy to have them come out despite the fact I’d already been interviewed for three or four documentaries, but this was the first one I actually saw come to fruition. When I heard back from them and they asked for an interview I said “no problem”. Last year, I got a phone call telling me the premiere was coming up and they wanted me to come out for an interview. At that time I was ‘slam’ busy. April 15th (Black Friday) had just happened and I didn’t really know what was going on. After April 15th, they realised they had to include it in the film so they took the original version of the movie off the shelf, added this part to the story, and re-released it.
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INTERVIEW
In the movie, there is a lot of discussion about underground poker clubs before the online poker boom. Did you play many home games before the online boom? Honestly, I played with my friends and that was it. We played around a kitchen table and played a lot of dealer’s choice games, but never Texas Hold’em. We had a buddy
That’s my guess, but I do think 100 percent that it will come back. There’s just too much money for the US government to make taxing it for it not to. And when it does come back, the taxes are going to make it really difficult for a lot of people to make money just because the sites will be taxed at a higher rate. So the games
“ (Poker legislation) is either going to happen in this year’s lame duck Congress before the elections in November, or not for a while yet. A new Congress isn’t going to address online poker right away.” that played down at Tunica quite a bit and every time it was his turn we would have to play Hold’em. We all hated the game. Back then, there was no such thing as ‘No Limit Texas Hold’em’. All we were used to playing was ‘Limit’. And then the movie Rounders came out and online poker started up and after that, we started playing 1/2 No Limit Texas Hold’em all the time. I started going down to the casino and playing Limit and while there, someone told me you could play online poker. So I started playing online. I quickly realised that No Limit poker is so far superior to Limit. So, I started playing tournaments online and from there I was hooked.
And what they’re doing now on TV is better than it was in the past. The new coverage of the World Series of Poker is the most compelling they have ever had where they show you the hole cards after the hand is over so you can actually play along, rather than showing the hole cards throughout the hand. Eventually, I could see a US poker channel that shows nothing but poker for 24 hours of the day. It will probably be sponsored by the poker rooms and you might even see some of the bigger online poker rooms broadcasting their tournaments on the channel.
are going to be softer because there will be a ton of players in there, but it will also be tougher because of the high rake. However, there will be a lot
Everyone can remember the first online poker site they played at; what was yours? I think the first place I ever played was Paradise Poker, then PartyPoker, and then PokerStars. Naturally, you have great insight into the US online poker scene; how likely is legislation in the US, and if online poker does become regulated, what do you think that looks like? In my opinion, I think it is 100 percent going to come back but I don’t know if it will come back this year. To me, it’s either going to be in this year’s lame duck Congress before the elections in November and if it’s not before that, then it’s going to be a while yet. A new Congress isn’t going to address online poker right away. But I do think the outgoing people could definitely get something done and I think there’s a big push to do that. It doesn’t mean online poker will be back this year, but there might be some new laws passed, though it might take some time to get these new regulations enacted. By the end of the year, I can definitely see US players being able to play again in certain states.
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of different opportunities as the choice of rooms will expand. I think there is going to be a big poker boom when online poker does return. Will that boom be anything like we saw in 2003? I truly believe that once regulation passes that the poker boom will be bigger than it was before. If you look around the world, poker is booming all over the place. I have a lot of friends that thought online poker pre-April 15th last year was illegal and they stopped playing because they couldn’t get money on top sites. When it comes back in the US, you are going to have a flood of advertising on TV, you’re going to have poker shows popping out of nowhere because people like watching poker on TV.
You can listen to the full interview with Chris Moneymaker at http://www.igbaffiliate.com/ blog/interview-chris-moneymaker-podcast.
“ I truly believe that once regulation passes that the poker boom will be bigger than it was before.”
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INSIGHT
Pin your Hopes on the New Social Wave Pinterest is the latest darling of the social media world. It has grown from a niche network to a behemoth in a matter of months, being the fastest standalone site in history to reach more than ten million monthly unique visitors. In fact, it is now so popular that agencies such as Experian Hitwise and Visual.ly have reported measurements to the effect that only Facebook and Tumblr have more social media time on site per user (420 minutes and 150 minutes respectively to Pinterest’s 98 minutes). It has grown over 40 times in the six months to the end of December 2011 and in February 2012, the site’s unique registrations were close to 18 million. What is Pinterest? Pinterest’s success is based on the simplicity and popularity of ‘sharing’, and in particular sharing images and photos. Sites are becoming increasingly visual over time, timelines and newsfeeds in Facebook are dominated by imagery, Instagram and Tumblr have created an entire generation of amateur photographers and even Flipboard turns news into an illustrative experience on the iPad. Alongside this is the fact that as social networking grows, the concept of sharing has become increasingly simplified and requiring of less effort. At the outset, social networks were blogs which involved a commitment to regular blog writing and posting. Twitter and Facebook emerged allowing short, frequent status updates and micro-blogging. These sites went even further with the ‘Like’ and ‘Retweet’ buttons and this concept is widely used among networks such as Tumblr, now one of the biggest blogging platforms, which is predominantly used for sharing photos and images, but ‘reblogging’ other posts is a key activity. Finally, we see emerging topic-centric (as opposed to people-centric) sites and networks. Facebook and Twitter are based on personal profiles, news and recommendations, but newer networks are focusing on topics as the centre of the site’s universe. In the industry, this is becoming widely known as the ‘interest graph’ to complement the phenomenon of the ‘social
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graph’ which is the global mapping of all users and how they’re related. Pinterest essentially adheres to all these trends: it is a visual network, organised by topic, with a one-click sharing feature.
Who is Pinning? For the most part, the assumption is that Pinterest users consist of middle-aged American women whose posts centre around recipes, crafts and home décor. This assumption is correct of the US audience who currently form the significant core of the user base, but the situation couldn’t be more different in the UK, which is a small but fast growing base currently consisting of approximately two percent of total global users. Over 50 percent of UK users are male, versus 83 percent female in the US. Of the UK base, the largest group (42 percent) are aged between 25 and 34. More importantly, from a gambling/affiliate perspective, the UK audience is much wealthier than its US counterparts, with 29 percent in the highest income bracket as opposed to three percent. In fact, more than 50 percent of UK Pinterest users earn more than $100,000 per year.
From personal to business The optimum business process for companies and brands using Pinterest is to post images of products and link them back to their website. While this typically works best for retailers who can, in effect,
create a Pinterest store catalogue, this is a medium that gambling affiliates cannot afford to ignore given its fast growing reach and correlation to gambling demographics in the UK. While home décor and recipes dominate the site from the US perspective, the UK users favour a wider range of topics including technology, pictures/ photography, business, venture capitalism and, of course, humour. As with other social networks like Facebook and Twitter, affiliates should decide what topics they and their audience are most interested in, and then commit to those spaces.
Revenue generation According to Shareaholic’s January 2012 report, which tracks data from more than 200,000 publishers reaching 260 million unique visitors per month, Pinterest now drives more referral traffic on the web than Google+, YouTube, Reddit and LinkedIn combined, and the site is fast gaining ground on Twitter. While gambling and the affiliate business are not necessarily visual in a retail sense, there is definitely an opportunity to generate business by creating a ‘personality’ and social hub which subsequently drives traffic to core sites. That said, Pinterest is recognised as being the latest victim of spam-bots and black hat scripts which are being used to generate significant daily revenues
INSIGHT
in affiliate commissions. This is against Pinterest’s Terms and Conditions and is possibly reaching the point of being addressed and stopped.
8. Similar to both Facebook and Twitter, mention users you follow by typing ‘@’ in front of their user names. The user will receive a notification.
“For many people, Facebook is social media. While there is no denying its reach and influence, smaller niche networks often convert a higher percentage of traffic and allow for excellent targeting.”
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Ten best practices 1. Don’t broadcast to your target audience; engage with them. This includes contributing a range of content and sharing other users’ ‘pins’. Pinterest is not a forum for sales pitches. 2. Create relationships and build loyalty by treating Pinterest as a user not a brand/seller. 3. Find ideas for trend stories by using the ‘Popular’ button or to narrow down the focus, search by topic (e.g. casino, gambling, bingo, etc). 4. Capitalise on the widespread trend and interest in photography by pinning and re-pinning Instagram and other photos. 5. Use Pinterest’s Chrome browser extension and once you see an appropriate or suitable image on the web, you can click ‘Pin It’. 6. Connect Pinterest to your Twitter and Facebook accounts, along with your personal/brand website. The widgets appear below your profile bio, and you can also choose to share your pins across the networks and/or embed them onto your website. 7. Add contributors (who you are following/ monitoring) to your board by editing a selected board and then adding a Pinterest account. This is a good way to generate further interest, acknowledge key clients and inspire loyalty.
9. Maintain your account simplicity by following a ‘Pinner’s’ specific boards, instead of their entire content output. Target Pinners with similar tastes and interests by checking out the users behind your favourite/relevant pins. Pinterest doesn’t have a suggested users tool, so this has to be done manually, but you can then follow and target your follower’s followers. 10. Add new Pins as often as possible. ‘Recency’ and frequency are key in Pinterest. While the likes of Starbucks and Coca-Cola are the heroes of Facebook, one of the well regarded brands in the Pinterest sphere is the retailer Whole Foods. The key to Whole Foods is that it uses Pinterest like a user, not a brand. The company’s pins acknowledge its core values – natural, organic and sustainable, amongst others – but the content isn’t promotional; it is often collated from third-party blogs and other Pinners. The end result is that Whole Foods Pinterest is a lifestyle, food and homemaking resource – people need no other incentive to follow the brand.
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‘PinReach’ measures influence. It yields an overall score, and outlines your most popular pins and boards using charts and tables. ‘Pin A Quote’ will convert any highlighted block of text into a goodlooking ‘quote’ to pin to a board. ‘Pinstamatic’ lets you add Twitter profile links, ‘Sticky Notes’ and websites to your boards. ‘Snapito’ and ‘url2pin’ both enable users to pin a screen grab of a website (rather than just one image from that site) to a board so that you can push your entire core/home site to your Pinterest board. ‘Pinpuff’ tracks reach, activity and ‘virality’ of your pins. ‘Pinerly’ measures click throughs, ‘likes’ and ‘repins’ for campaigns created through the service, making it a very interesting tool for brands and businesses.
For many people, Facebook is social media. While there is no denying its reach and influence, smaller niche networks often convert a higher percentage of traffic and allow for excellent targeting. Pinterest, given its obvious success in driving referral traffic, might just be one of those sites. And as with all social networks, though it might be free, it will only work as part of an overall activity mix, and requires commitment. It isn’t easy, but it is free, and it can be successful.
Tools of the trade Pinterest doesn’t offer business features and the search function prioritises pins over people (or in this case brands); however, there are many tools of the trade:
AIDEEN SHORTT is an industry expert and advisor for Foreshore – an Internet hosting provider. aideen.shortt@gmail.com
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INSIGHT
Affiliates and Social Media: The Missing Link Social Media specialist, Brandie Blackler, explains how ‘Emotional Engagement’ is a powerful driver of success for social media strategies. Keywords, exclusive offers and link building: these are often terms you will hear when speaking to an affiliate marketer about how they build and sustain their online business. Other prevalent terms you may not be told include Black Hat SEO, (spam-like) email marketing and link farming. However, when it comes to ‘social media,’ it seems that gaming affiliates have only just started to explore this avenue, if
‘Emotional Regulation’; the ability to regulate one’s emotions by initiating and adjusting the emotional feelings and reactions experienced by an individual. This is key to social media success because social media is heavily reliant on emotions. Focusing your content, whether it be video or text, to spark an emotional connection between you (your content) and the visitor will make a dramatic difference to your results. The key is to tap the emotional field within your visitors to have them react the way you want them to when viewing your content and making a buying decision. Based on the idea that we can extract feelings that cause action, we can manipulate basic social traffic to become valuable.
“ Focusing your content, whether it be video or text, to spark an emotional connection between you (your content) and the visitor will make a dramatic difference to your results.” at all. Social media is alive and well. We see this walking through any number of stores, with the constant reminder to ‘follow’ the brand on Twitter or ‘Like’ their Facebook page. We unknowingly participate by reading reviews, usually on our favourite social network, about the next product or service we purchase. It is fair to say, social media is here to stay. So what does this mean to a gaming affiliate? Well, I believe there are many opportunities to be had. With the social shift, Google has adjusted it’s algorithm to suit. Social proof (or social relevance) is now accounted for. Consumer behaviour is also heavily influenced by the online sales model, meaning buying behaviours have completely evolved. There is a golden term that, if executed properly, will make all the difference to a new or existing social media campaign:
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Let’s break down the main strategy: ‘Social retargeting’ is very effective when using Emotional Regulation, or social media strategies. By creating a highly emotional piece of content to share, and pairing that with retargeting pixels and banners, it is possible to influence the user into responsive action.
“ Emotional Regulation – the ability to regulate one’s emotions by initiating and adjusting the emotional feelings and reactions experienced by an individual – is key to social media success.” than connecting to target customers on an emotional basis and improving results. By way of example: ●●An AdSense campaign could provide huge savings in having the power of emotional control, as the targeting is more specific, retrieving a higher return. ●●Effective branding plays a significant role as a direct result of the emotional connection (and the brand is visually present). These are only a few examples, but enough to get the affiliate thinking in the direction of social media as being a notable advantage to their marketing strategy. The time is now, the tools are here, and applying these strategies will kick-start results because as said, most affiliates are simply stuck in old methods! Be the innovator, not the pioneer!
Here is a basic strategy: Add an infographic (being the content) to a social-ready website. Add the retargeting pixel to the infographic and lastly, add a banner with the same emotional vibe as the infographic as a follow up to the user. This strategy generally proves effective and social retargeting should be explored as much as possible in modern affiliate marketing. Other advantages of Emotional Regulation are crucial, as nothing is more effective
Brandie Blackler is a Social Media Specialist at Brand-e Media Ltd. Brandie is a leader and advocate of the social media landscape. She studies the opportunities for social in a variety of industries, including online gaming, and is able to take a general top-notch strategy, which she developed, and apply it to any company or industry, in-sync with their goals.
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INSIGHT – COLUMN
Spinning Around A brief history of roulette, by Pierrick Leveque, Head of Acquisition at Virgin Games. Among online gambling affiliates, those who specifically target roulette players are known for taking marginally more risks than their slots counterparts. Why? Because roulette, as most table games, is found in the operator’s low house-edge cupboard, and, as such, tends to attract the savviest punters. It’s a game of superlatives: wins can be large, losses even larger, but its popularity with players and affiliates alike never disappoints. With no other ambition but to celebrate the launch of Mobile Roulette at Virgin Games’ mobile casino, let’s unravel the startling story behind the game’s unique volatility and unwavering prestige.
Animals, numbers, centurions and gambling bans Roulette, meaning “little wheel” in French, is generally accepted to be a hybrid version
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of a number of 18th Century European games combined with ancient and long forgotten recreations. Like many games, it has been tied to ancient China. A spinning game of chance featuring animal iconography is said to have been played on top of a stone bearing the number 666, one of the luckiest numbers in Chinese culture. Dominican Monks are credited with replacing the animal symbols by numbers – improving the game’s global appeal, and spreading its fortune, along with traders, through their missionary travels. One hint makes the Chinese connection plausible: add up all numbers found on a roulette wheel and the total is 666. A mathematics divergent series calculation imposes 36 numbered slots to preserve the mystical stone number. Reference to a spinning game can also be found during the Roman Empire. As
“ Roulette as we know it today is likely a hybrid of ancient spinning games combined with more traditional table entertainment found in 18th Century Europe.” Western European and pan-Mediterranean territories were invaded by the unstoppable Roman legions, centurions might have inadvertently sowed the seeds of roulette by leaving the distribution of war loot to the randomness of a spinning chariot wheel. As such, roulette as we know it today is likely a hybrid of such ancient spinning games combined with more traditional table entertainment found in 18th Century Europe. The main suspects from that period are the “English E-O” and the Italian “Hoca”.
INSIGHT – COLUMN
“ While single zero roulette enjoyed the favours of European aristocracy, double zero roulette, originally brought to US shores by French settlers, quickly became the staple of American gambling.” Both games involved a set of 40 slots/ cups on a table and a rolling ball whose destination decided the outcome of the bet. E-O slots were labelled Even and Odd, while Hoca cups were numbered. Interestingly, both games featured special slots (two for E-O, three ‘zeros’ at Hoca). If the ball rolled into one of these, the house kept all wagers. House-edge sorted. With wheel, ball and house edge now in a cosy mood, it was just a matter of time before references to their inevitable offspring – christened differently depending on which side of the channel you were on – turned up in literary accounts. It was first described in England and France around 1720. In 1740 – 250-plus years before UIGEA – games of chance were banned in England. Roulette evolves in French territories until the end of the 18th Century, by which time the game has more or less settled to its current American roulette form (single and double zero slots). In 1758, a New France (Quebec) regulation document mentions roulette in a list of games banned in the jurisdiction. In 1796, “La Roulette, Ou le Jour” a French novel from Jacques Lablée, includes a detailed description of the game and gambling apparatus, including “two betting spaces containing the bank’s two numbers, zero and double zero.”
Pascal and the Blancs Not the name of a French pop band, but that of the three individuals most closely associated with the game and its success. Blaise Pascal (1624-1662), a French mathematician and scientist, is credited with accidentally inventing the modern roulette wheel on his quest for perpetual motion. Ironically, the wheel’s invariably finite spin spawned a failed experiment into an outcome-based gambling device.
Enlightenment Age recycling at its finest. Fast forward to 1842, and gambling has just become ‘hobby non grata’ in France. Two French brothers, Francois and Louis Blanc, migrate to the German spa city of Homburg to open a casino there. To remedy roulette’s shrinking popularity – mainly because of its high house edge – they take a drastic step and remove the double zero from their wheels. With only one zero left and odds against them slashed from 5.26 percent to 2.7 percent, players flock to the new style wheels. European roulette is born. Charles III of Monaco, ruler of a rock not yet graced by Formula 1 proceeds and tax exiles, is inspired by the success of casinos in Germanic spa towns. He commissions Louis Blanc to replicate the feat in MonteCarlo. The Société des Bains de Mers (SBM) is created, the first modern casino resort is built, mostly on the back of the European roulette craze. In hindsight, wise move from Charlie: SBM today operates in 50 locations in Monaco, including five of its oldest and most prestigious casinos and hotels. It’s mainly owned by Prince Albert (35 percent) and the government of Monaco (35 percent). Closer to home, SBM also owns 50 percent of Mangas Gaming, BetClic Everest’s parent company. One urban myth endures about Francois Blanc. Some say he sealed a pact with the devil to unlock the secrets of roulette, hence the 666 number permeating the game. Rubbish. If someone tells you the story, don’t get angry. Point them to this article and walk away like a Dominican Monk.
Spread of the spin The rest, as they say, is history. While single zero roulette enjoyed the favours of European aristocracy, double zero roulette,
originally brought to US shores by French settlers, sailed on its merry way up the Mississippi, spread from Louisiana, and quickly became the staple of American gambling known as American Roulette. One variation of American Roulette even featured 28 numbers, a double zero, and an Eagle slot – a convenient third house slot. I’m no maths expert but that sounds like a rip-off, and probably was, except if you bought one: they fetch thousands of dollars at auctions these days. The split remains to this day, with double zero roulette played mainly in North/Central/South America and the Caribbean, while single zero roulette is popular pretty much everywhere else.
To conclude… The history of roulette is a river of a tale, springing to life in ancient times, carving its path through 18th Century European legislation, flowing through Quebec down to Louisiana’s floating dens, through the Vegas strip via Monte-Carlo, through the web to the Smartphone in your pocket. So next time you play roulette on your mobile, take some time to reflect and wonder: it’s likely a Chinese artefact you’re holding in your hand. And I’m not talking about your handset.
Pierrick Leveque is Head of Acquisition at Virgin Games, managing the home grown affiliate program as part of the overall customer acquisition strategy. “Affiliate Program of the Year” EGR Awards 2010 and 2009 “Best Casino/Gaming Affiliate Program” A4U Awards 2008 “Best Bingo Affiliate Manager” CAP/IGB Awards 2009 W: www.virgingames.com/affiliates E: affiliates@virgingames.com B: www.pierrickprk.wordpress.com T: (+44) 208 237 1563
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INSIGHT
What Affiliates Can Learn from “Linsanity” Everyone always enjoys a true underdog story and in February 2012, the world of sports witnessed just that. Jeremy Lin, the first player of Taiwanese descent to enter the National Basketball Association (NBA) in the US, went from being in and out of the NBA Development League, the NBA’s official minor league organisation, to being a back-up point-guard, to now being in the starting line-up for the New York Knicks (as well as a worldwide sensation). At the beginning of February, the Harvard graduate got the opportunity to fill in for one of his teammates. The Knicks were working their way to yet another loss and, out of desperation, their head coach decided to put Lin in the game. Little did he know he would be starting what is now described as “Linmania”. Lin surprisingly led his team to victory and broke an 11 out of 13 game losing streak. Following this, Lin found himself in six consecutive starting line-ups, and led his team to as many straight wins. And with this, “Linsanity” was created. Jeremy Lin’s tale is more than just a personal interest sports piece; there are plenty of marketing lessons to be learnt from the 23-year-old’s rise to prominence.
who analyses sports stats as a hobby, chose Lin as one of his top point guard prospects. Operators who offer top commissions to super affiliates will be evaluating the numbers: volume of traffic referred, conversion rates, revenue generating players, and overall ROI. Thus, as an affiliate, it is important that you do the
“ The effect of ‘Linsanity’ has been felt worldwide and illustrates how geo-targeting can help you can maximise your ROI by knowing where the interest in your product is located.”
Success is in the stats Jeremy Lin had a difficult time proving himself to NBA scouts. Few had any faith that the undrafted Lin would ever amount to much as a basketball player; however, one man believed in him and held the notion that Lin would become something special. Through objective statistical analysis, a truck driver
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same to demonstrate your numbers and build a strong case for being considered for top compensation packages. Similarly, via thorough analysis of your stats, you can determine your personal areas of strength. The underestimation of Lin has shown us that we sometimes bet on a gut feeling
instead of true data analysis, and that this can lead to oversights. By utilising metrics when going forward with your marketing campaigns, you can easily analyse and compare the different marketing channels you use and assess which are most effective. When you know this, you are able to foresee the more profitable channels and use these statistics to allocate your efforts in a way that maximises ROI.
Know your crowd Although he was born and raised in the United States, Jeremy Shu-How Lin is of Asian descent. He is the first ever NBA player of Taiwanese heritage and due to this has seen his largest fan bases develop in New York and in his parents’ homeland of Taiwan. Linsanity has brought a wealth of attention towards the Taiwanese market and a large amount of marketers are trying to cash in on this new frenzy. Depending on the market you are targeting on your site or with your campaigns, it is important to take into consideration that cultures can react differently to certain aspects of promotions, such as a text, colour, size, placement, or dimension. More often than not, A/B testing will prove to be most beneficial; so experiment with languages, decide on a Key Performance Indicator whether it is ‘desired action taken’ or ‘time spent on site’, and make your visitors’ experience easy and simple.
INSIGHT
“ By utilising metrics when going forward with your marketing campaigns, you can easily analyse and compare the different marketing channels you use and assess which are most effective.” Do your research and make sure you are aware of the visitors coming to your site, as well as their cultural make-up. If they are within your target group, be conscious of the messages you are displaying to them. Geo-targeting is a great way to target your campaigns appropriately towards various audiences and increase your conversions.
Oops! Did I do that? When it comes to strengthening your brand, bad press can make or break you. Throughout this initial stage of the Linsanity craze, there has been some cultural miscommunication, such as a prominent ice cream company creating a new frozen yogurt flavour in honour of Lin with a fortune cookie as a main ingredient, which did not go down well with the Asian community. The lesson from this is that when creating promotional campaigns, it is important to conduct the right amount
of research regarding the content being used. What may sound witty or humorous to one person may be insulting to another. It is important to show your audience that you have made an effort to understand their culture and language (dialect) in order to gain their interest and respect. Additionally, when you show that you care about your potential customers enough to properly research their culture, you also show that you pay attention to detail. Social media is a great marketing tool since it can help you engage with different audiences directly and learn their needs first hand; however, if used incorrectly, social media can be detrimental to your affiliate business. Online marketing stumbles go viral even faster than online marketing successes and the repercussions may last forever. As an affiliate, your marketing perspective can strongly benefit from
Linsanity. Just as Ed Weiland successfully predicted outcomes through statistical analysis, you too can utilise business intelligence to guide your decisions rather than mere instinct. Second, the effect of Linsanity has been felt worldwide and illustrates how geo-targeting can help you can maximise your ROI by knowing where the interest in your product is located. Lastly, with this great opportunity of expansion in a new market, it is imperative that you know your audience and your potential target market. Linsanity has showcased the importance in paying extra attention to your audience and keying in on the differences of language and culture and how it can give you a competitive advantage.
Allan Petrilli is an Affiliate Marketing Coordinator at Income Access. A graduate in marketing from the John Molson School of Business at Concordia in Montreal, Allan is a huge sports buff and when he is not hard at work, he is either playing or watching one of his favourite sports. www.incomeaccess.com.
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INSIGHT
The Early Bird Catches the Worm What you need to know about promoting binary options, by Nicky Senyard, CEO of Income Access. Whether you’ve heard of them as all-or-nothing options, digital options, or fixed return options, it’s clear that binary options are an extremely hot topic in the world of iGaming, and rightfully so. Although the vertical is still in a relative nascent stage, binary options are already one of the fastest growing markets. Since the inception of the first binary options
case of live casino a random process, binary options depend on outside asset markets. This means that, like forex, users (who in binary options terminology are traders) win or lose based on their assessment of outside markets. There are hundreds of available markets for binary options, which include financial stock indices like the Dow Jones,
“ There are hundreds of available markets for binary options, which include financial stock indices like the Dow Jones, commodities markets covering gold and silver, currencies, and even specific stocks like Google.” brand in 2007, the industry has expanded to now include over 100 brands and four separate platform providers. Additionally, the amount of search traffic for binary options has steadily grown in both the English and French demographics. This is indicative of both the current strength of binary options trading and predictive future growth for the vertical. A situation like this presents affiliates with an exciting opportunity to get on board early and reap maximal benefits. In this article, we will outline important background information that will help you understand the world of binary options and explain the traits which make the vertical a lucrative opportunity for affiliates.
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commodities markets covering gold and silver, currencies, and even specific stocks like Google. The breadth of possibilities for traders to test both their luck and skill is what makes binary options particularly engaging and wide-reaching. Due to the extensive market coverage, there is never an overlapping downtime between markets, and traders have roundthe-clock opportunities to earn money.
“ The relative simplicity of binary options appeals to newcomers and also gamblers, but remains of interest to traders who can use existing strategies and risk management in their decisions.”
Background
How binary options work
In a nutshell, binary options are a hybrid of casino game play and forex trading. Binary options trading possesses the simplicity of casino gaming combined with the independent outcomes of forex. While a casino game’s outcome is the result of computed number generation, or in the
While binary options are similar to forex in their reliance on outside market data for final outcome, they present the trader with a much simpler format for wagering. As the name implies, a binary option presents the trader with only two possible outcomes. These outcomes are either correct or
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
incorrect, winning or losing, or at an extremely base level, 1 or 0. A binary option trade has a fixed time limit on it, and at the end of this period the trader’s decision is deemed as either winning or losing. Due to this inherent simplicity, binary options are engaging since traders do not need to familiarise themselves with procedural intricacies to venture into asset markets. In a binary options deal, traders are given two simple, plausible outcomes and using whichever means they want, decide which outcome they find most probable. Since a binary option doesn’t rely on random number generation the way casino games do, traders can base their decision on outside research. Simultaneously, the limited range of options presented by the binary structures means that traders can also opt to test their luck and wager without any outside research. In general, there are three types of binary options, all of which function in very similar ways. A digital option is one where the trader attempts to predict if the asset price will be above or below its current price at the end of the specified time period. An example would be a trader
predicting if Google’s stock (GOOG) will rise or fall within an hour. In turn, a range option involves the trader predicting if the asset will be within or outside of a specified range at its expiration period. Lastly, in a touch option the trader predicts if the price of an asset will touch or not touch a specified price prior to its expiry period.
INSIGHT
“Although the vertical is still in a relative nascent stage, binary options are already one of the fastest growing markets.” For instance, a trader might predict that gold will decrease in value at some point within the options period to reach a lower specified price, whether gold remains above or below that price is irrelevant in the end.
Binary options and you Now that you have the basic insight on binary options and how they work, you may be wondering just why they present a lucrative prospect for you as an affiliate. One of the most important reasons for getting onboard the binary option train is the old aphorism, “The
audiences. The relative simplicity of binary options appeals to newcomers and also gamblers, but remains of interest to traders who can use existing strategies and risk management in their decisions. In addition, as binary options are not categorised in the same way as traditional gambling due to being seen as speculative
“Currently, binary options are reminiscent of the early online casino, poker, bingo, and sportsbook verticals.” early bird gets the worm”. As an affiliate, you always strive for that all-important ‘super affiliate’ status. As a super affiliate, your reputation as an industry expert is well-known and the amount of traffic you generate puts you in especially esteemed standing with operators partnered with you. A great way to become a super affiliate is to be able to provide quality content and information for your target audience. The ability to do so is honed organically by long-term involvement in a vertical. Thus, by having an early start, you can profit from the expected growth in binary options. Another advantage for promoting this vertical is the wide audience that can be effectively targeted. Since binary options are conceptually a hybrid of casino and forex, the demographics of both verticals would be well suited target
trading, it is not regulated in the same manner as online gaming. This means that as an affiliate, you have access to otherwise restricted markets, thereby, elevating your chances of achieving a strong ROI for your efforts. Finally, the underlying asset markets used in binary options trading are spread out geographically so that users are able to find a market in which to trade at any time during the day. Therefore, as an affiliate, you can generate traffic and conversions spread throughout the day and night.
Lessons from the past Currently, binary options are reminiscent of the early online casino, poker, bingo, and sportsbook verticals. As a gaming affiliate, you probably remember how well those verticals performed throughout the years. By promoting binary options early on, you can gain an invaluable advantage to establishing your presence early in the game.
NICKY SENYARD is CEO of Income Access, overseeing their independent iGaming affiliate network, market-leading affiliate software and expert affiliate management services.
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INSIGHT – OPINION
Can Gambling be a Transferable Skill? Professor Mark Griffiths of the International Gaming Research Unit at Nottingham Trent University, explores. A few years ago, following some work I had done for a very well known online gambling company, I was quoted in a number of newspapers commenting on how skills learnt in poker can be applied in the workplace. I claimed that playing poker could offer lessons for success, even in non-mathematical lines of work. For instance, being given an assignment or a particular team to manage might be akin to playing with the cards that you have been dealt with. Playing with the cards you have is a winning strategy in poker. And top poker players are insatiable in their desire to win. Being this focused is an important leadership skill in the workplace. Then there’s the art of deception, not normally seen as a desirable skill, but in poker it’s all part of the game. In many workplace situations, the ability to get away with white lies, to save face or be diplomatic, or to smooth over or disguise mistakes and errors, is a big advantage. Whether it is an act of problem solving in a work meeting or a major corporate decision, we act in the hope that we will achieve the desired result, even if it is unknown before we start. To some extent, this sounds like gambling. A book by Harvard academics Howard Stevenson and Eileen Shapiro called ‘Make Your Own Luck’ argues that the best gamblers serve as an ideal role model in how to get on in the workplace. They argue that the best gamblers are those that use ‘predictive intelligence’ in their day-today lives. These are the types of gamblers who in the face of uncertainty know how to bring about the desired outcome by assessing the decisions they make on the basis of relative impact and uncertainty. Using these two variables, Stevenson and Shapiro created a ‘gambler’s prediction map’ of four zones based on two factors – the degree of certainty and the impact. These four zones were called the ‘wallpaper zone’, the ‘wild card zone’, the ‘ant colony zone’ and the ‘strategic rat zone’.
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●●The
‘wallpaper zone’ is where decisionmaking has high certainty and high impact and is (the authors argue) like wallpaper because it is often ignored but can be very powerful. This is the classic low risk, high return gamble. ●●The ‘wild card zone’ is where decision-making has high uncertainty but high impact and is the classic high-risk gamble with huge rewards if it comes off. ●●The ‘ant colony zone’ is where decisionmaking has high certainty but low impact and is so-called because when ants act together they can still have a positive effect. This is the low risk but moderate pay back gamble. ●●The ‘strategic rat zone’ is the worst scenario for decision-making because there is both high uncertainty and low impact that in effect is putting all your money on an absolute no-hoper.
Figure 1: The Gambler’s Prediction Map Low Certainty
High Certainty
Low Impact
Strategic Rat Zone
Ant Colony Zone
High Impact
Wild Card Zone
Wallpaper Zone
It is claimed that by using various strategies in the right zones, gamblers with good predictive intelligence will come out winners in all walks of life. So what are these winning strategies? In a nutshell, winning gamblers: ●●Identify big goals: winners imagine the future they want to create and formulate a strategy that will help them achieve their goals. ●●Weigh the upside/downside: winners calculate the possible upsides and downsides to decide if the risk is worth taking in the first place. They know all
the rules of the venture they are getting themselves into. ●●Jump bets: winners are able to change plans at the appropriate moment. They may have to decide very quickly whether to stay or shift from their chosen path. Gamblers with high ‘predictive intelligence’ jump before all the available information is to hand so that they can grab the opportunities that they think will not be there later down the line. ●●Have an implicit strategy: winners make sure that it is their actions (and not just words) that get them to where they want to go. They focus on the micro-details as well as the macro-goal. ●●Create a real alternative: winners make sure they have a back-up plan in case their main strategic decision-making plan goes wrong. ●●Use prediction maps: winners are able to forecast all the major potential influences in their chosen strategy by assessing the relative impact and uncertainty of the situation. ●●Risk splits: where possible, winners calculate how to reduce or spread risk to others and consider all possible outcome scenarios. ●●Know what they’re betting on: winners know in advance what they are going to do, why and what the expected outcome is likely to be. This helps clarify whether the decision is the right one in the first place. ●●Assess possible domino effects: winners know what actions they will take in the future based on the ones they are making now. They can assess very quickly if they will be locked into a series of follow-on bets as a result of their decision. ●●Know when it’s game over: at the simplest level, winners know when to call it quits. The message here is simple. Good gamblers with high predictive intelligence possess many life skills that in the right circumstances can be transferred to the workplace environment.
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iGB Affiliate is the biggest provider of information, insight and analysis for the iGaming affiliate market. So if you enjoy the magazine, we know you’ll love our website, with how-to videos, informative blog pieces, event updates, jobs, affiliate program overviews and much needed resources for any online gambling affiliates.
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SUPER SHOW PREVIEW
INSIGHT
ADVANCED WORDPRESS OPTIMISATION STRATEGIES At this year’s iGaming Business Super Show, I shall again be talking about WordPress but this time, not on how to build and scale up a network, but on a holistic approach on how to fully optimise WordPress for best possible results.
“WordPress installations are a very, very popular target for automated hacking attempts and if you’re not protecting your properties, recovery is a huge amount of work.”
SO, YOU’RE ALREADY rolling with WordPress but want to take your site to the next level by massively improving traffic? Good, then don’t miss this session – I’ll bring you the latest tips and advanced strategies to outrank your competition as well as constantly increase your search engine traffic.
WordPress SEO as a foundation At its core, WordPress is pretty welloptimised, however, that’s not enough if you’re working in highly competitive markets. That being said, we’re having an in-depth look at WordPress SEO by Yoast (which definitely is my favourite SEO plug-in as of now) and I’ll talk you through settings for maximum SEO value. We’ll be touching on issues such
as indexation controlling (do you really need categories and tags? What about author-profiles?) as well as areas such as redirects and canonical tags, XML sitemaps and much more.
Performance is key This is true, especially since Google started evaluating page-speed as well as CTR and bounce-rates. If your site does not respond fast enough, you’re done. You’ll get outranked because of losing directly against other results shown at that same search result page. We’re talking about stuff like caching, using content delivery networks (CDNs) but also how to optimise your WordPress theme (including all those JavaScripts and CSS files) for maximum performance.
WordPress on autopilot
“At its core, WordPress is pretty well-optimised, however, that’s not enough if you’re working in highly competitive markets.”
Maintenance is crucial. WordPress installations are a very, very popular target for automated hacking attempts. And results are not pretty: if you’re not protecting your properties, recovery is a huge amount of work. We’re talking about
automated back-ups and recovery – and also how to keep your WordPress installations updated and secured by using the appropriate plug-ins, tweaks and settings.
Improving tracking and engagement The number of marketing channels and especially the methods within those channels are constantly growing. You’ll be getting traffic from a broad range of sources – but do you really know which traffic works best? Which converts, which does not? We’ll be talking about a proper tracking set-up – but also on how to increase engagement: social sharing, printer-friendly stuff (for guides, etc), welcome boxes based on referrers, properly setting up RSS feeds – just to name a few topics. But please, definitely make sure you know how to set-up and use WordPress – we’ll be touching on some advanced topics at the Super Show and without this basic knowledge, it might be difficult to follow.
BASTIAN GRIMM is founder and CEO of Grimm Digital. Starting his online career back in 2001 and having a background in software development, nowadays, he specialises in SEO strategy consulting, trainings and workshops, website assessments as well as large scale link building campaigns for national and international clients. If you want to get in touch, you’ll find Bastian’s contact details at www.grimm-digital.com.
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Online Poker: Dead or Alive? With online poker traffic and revenues on the slide, is it premature to be sounding the game’s death knell? Julian Rogers assesses the hand strengths of the industry’s major players and asks whether we are, in fact, on the verge of a second poker boom. Back in the mid-‘noughties’, online poker’s rocketing appeal seemed unstoppable. Everyone from inveterate gamblers to betting virgins were loggingon in their droves to go mano-a-mano across the virtual felt. Suddenly, this old cowboy card game had become an office ‘water cooler conversation’, and gaming operators scrambled for a piece of the big juicy poker pie. A gold rush had arrived. Of course, any boom is usually superseded by a bust. Whilst opinion is divided as to whether online poker is on a downward trajectory or merely stalling on a plateau, the fact remains that 2011 could be classed as the game’s annus horribilis.
Mitigating factors The harbinger of impending doom was April’s ‘Black Friday’, which saw the US Department of Justice (DoJ) seize the domains of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker – the three largest USfacing sites – under the Unlawful Internet Gambling and Enforcement Act (UIGEA). Soon after followed the shock collapse of Full Tilt, along with $390 million of players’ funds. Accusations that Alderney-licensed Full Tilt was one big house of cards propped up by a Ponzi scheme whereby withdrawals were, in fact, funds deposited by other players was a hammer blow to the industry’s credibility. Poker traffic has tumbled around 30 percent globally due to Black Friday, the game’s popularity stagnating, and the global economic downturn. Once a leading European poker site, bookmaking giant Ladbrokes posted a 24.5 percent slump in poker revenues in 2011, describing the poker landscape as “challenging”. Likewise, Playtech,
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owner of the iPoker network, saw poker revenues drop 20 percent last year, hard on the heels of a 19 percent slide in 2010. The turbulence has left many to question whether the game has become a busted flush. “The explosion in interest in online poker was so spectacular that it was inevitable that growth rates would slow,” suggests Simon Prodger, PKR’s Marketing Director. “It’s also hardly a surprise that the wider macroeconomic situation has acted as a further drag on growth – poker’s core demographic of young men has been hit hard by the recession.”
“ Many see the US as poker’s saviour and are keeping their fingers crossed that legalised and regulated poker is rubber-stamped as soon as late 2012, possibly creating a second boom.” PKR, the first site to feature lifelike and customisable avatars seated at realistic poker tables in slick 3D environments, recently celebrated its fifth birthday, proving it to be no flash in the pan. PKR has 4.6 million registered users. But are fancy graphics enough for customers once the novelty of a 3D poker room has worn off? “Our unique and advanced game play certainly helps to acquire, engage and retain players,” Prodger responds. “That said, we think that there’s more to the PKR experience than just our graphics and we have invested a great deal of time and effort into developing a brand community that enhances the player experience. We also invest a lot
in player promotions and our loyalty programme to encourage and reward long-term repeat play.” Like PKR, Sky Poker has just turned five years old. As well as its proprietary software, the site boasts its own satellite TV channel. Richard Milner, Head of Sky Poker, labels 2011 as a “very turbulent year for the poker market overall”. He adds, “It’s clear from the reports in the media and coming out of competitor results that many sites are struggling with their poker growth. The general consensus seems to be that the market is relatively flat or declining slightly overall.” He suggests that although some sites are seeing big declines in their business, that “there are companies like Sky Poker who are thriving”. Indeed, Milner says that attracting customers from rival sites is now key. “Whereas a few years ago many of our customers were new to poker and learning the game, more recently, we have attracted customers away from other sites. In order to do that, we have to give them compelling reasons to come to Sky Poker and deliver a great experience for them.” Although PKR and Sky Poker remain buoyant about their performances, they are hanging on the coat tails of the run-away leader of the pack, PokerStars. Launched in 2001, the site is six times the size of its closest rival. On a Thursday evening in late February, 171,000 players were logged onto PokerStars, according to traffic tracking site PokerScout. Another 95,000 and 90,000 were playing at PokerStars.it and PokerStars.fr respectively. Poker network iPoker (excluding the Italian and French versions) could only muster 18,500 while a former giant of the industry, PartyPoker attracted 21,500 players. Moreover, upwards of 350,000 players flock to the main PokerStars site at peak periods on Sundays, primarily attracted by the bumper guaranteed tournaments. The Isle of Man-based site recently broke the world record for the number of entrants for
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a single tournament, although the servers visibly struggled, at times, to cope with the 200,000 players. “They’ve just had a sounder strategy [than rival sites] and executed it supremely,” says Kim Lund, editor of infiniteedgegaming.com. “The recipe of their success is an early devotion to tournaments, customer support and software stability; being careful not to get caught up in the affiliate bog hole, recognising the power of live tournament tours and their ability to paint a consistent picture of who they and their customers are throughout their product and their marketing.” Lund suggests other poker sites have been complacent with regards to retaining players and had an over-reliance on affiliates, which has hurt margins and fuelled price wars.
Smart, casual To gain an edge, operators are increasingly focusing their efforts on enticing more recreational or casual players to deposit funds and keep playing, rather than appealing to the semi-pro and full-time pro grinders multi-tabling with tracking software. “The grinder boom may be over, but the game is certainly not dead,” Lund confidently states. Sites are simplifying lobbies, removing off-putting waiting lists, making the software more intuitive and embracing social media. Ladbrokes was the first to roll out anonymous tables, followed by Bodog, while 888 Poker launched webcam poker. “The PokerCam approach was to bring reality to playing with friends,” explains Gareth Edwards, Director of Marketing and Strategy at 888. “The more casual poker player enjoys playing with friends, and we brought this experience to the online environment.” PokerCam contributed to the Gibraltarbased firm recording an industry-bucking 58 percent upsurge in poker revenue last year. “888.com has always had a strong brand but in the last year or two, we refocused a lot of our attention to our core poker product,” Edwards explains. “Simultaneously, we launched a new, unique product, cool new marketing campaigns, and a whole new approach in the way we communicate with customers. All these elements together helped us get better control of the market.” 888 is striving to stand out from the crowd; a conscious approach taken by Sky Poker, too, according to Milner. “From day
one, Sky Poker has set out to be unique. Many of the things that Sky Poker offers on our independent site cannot be found anywhere else.” As well as the TV channel, this includes the popular live Sky Poker Tour, allowing play in sterling and a strong community atmosphere, he says. On top of this, mobile poker offers enormous potential for the industry to attract new players. PokerStars has launched an iOS and Android real money mobile client for the UK and Italian market. 888 Poker and bwin also have real
market will eventually be legally open for business. “The big question is when and what form regulation will take. The timing is uncertain, and there are a number of barriers to full federal regulation that could see regulation come in at a state level, particularly in the short-term.” He adds: “If the US did regulate online poker, it could herald a second boom.” Lund, though, is sceptical about the US being the ‘silver bullet’. “A legalised US market may resuscitate the current form of the industry for a while, but
“ Poker traffic has tumbled around 30 percent globally due to Black Friday, the game’s popularity stagnating, and the global economic downturn.” money sites optimised for mobile devices and other operators are expected to follow suit this year. Indeed, the proliferation of Smartphones and tablets has made a few hands of No-Limit Texas Hold’em on the bus a reality, as well as a welcome boost to the operators’ coffers. But rather than innovate and invest in new technologies, some sportsbooks have reigned in poker spending and redirected efforts on their raison d’être: betting. Pure poker operators are not afforded that luxury, not unless they diversify. PKR has branched out from poker and now boasts a sportsbook and casino. So is this move an admission that the core product is struggling? Prodger quickly dismisses this assertion. “While PKR is – and will always be – primarily a poker company, a number of our customers also enjoy playing casino games and betting on sports. We felt that it was important that our customers could enjoy playing and betting with PKR, while it also opens up valuable incremental revenue streams for us as an operator.”
Stars and stripes Many see the US as poker’s saviour and are keeping their fingers crossed that legalised and regulated poker is rubber-stamped as soon as late 2012, possibly creating a second boom. A study in 2009 by Poker Players Research found that ten million Americans played online poker, which underlines just how hard their absence after Black Friday hit the US-facing sites. However, PwC says in its recent Global Gaming Outlook that it believes “online poker providers will be allowed to operate on an interstate basis in the US in the next few years”. Likewise, Prodger is “very confident” the world’s largest
it will not automatically lead to the changes needed for long-term industry stability and growth.” The other game-changer could be Facebook. Social games development giant Zynga, which operates on the social networking site, currently has around 30 million active players a month on its poker game, being dealt a colossal 44 million hands a day, which equates to 650 a second. These are eye-popping stats when you consider Zynga Poker doesn’t (yet) offer real money games. However, Facebook is thought to be considering teaming up with poker operators this year to offer real money games in the UK. Zynga Poker, too, is exploring the possibility of real money games. For now, though, nothing is concrete. “I’ve said for over a year that Zynga turning to real money play does not make sense,” says Lund. “So I don’t think it will happen.” Whether or not the US legalises the game or Facebook allows players to anteup for real money, it’s clear that poker operators need to stay ahead of the curve with new technologies, embracing social media and being on the front foot when new territories regulate online poker. But the most pertinent point has to be the casual player – they cannot be ignored. “The vast majority of people play poker as a hobby and for the fun and excitement this brings,” explains Milner. “We want to help keep it exciting, fresh and different and not rest on our laurels.”
Julian Rogers is a freelance journalist with 10 years’ experience specialising in business, sportsbetting, poker and news reporting.
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WHAT’S NEXT FOR ONLINE POKER? In an extract from the new iGaming Business Report, The Global Business of Poker (4th Edition), Rachael ChurchSanders poses the following question to industry experts: “With some analysts claiming the demand for online poker has peaked, where do you see new growth coming from?” Jim Ryan, Co-CEO, bwin.party We are taking a longer-term approach, a business decision that reflects the structural changes taking place in the poker market. From the dominance of PokerStars in the ‘.com’ and ‘.national’ markets in Europe through to the potential rewards that would arise from the opening of the US market, there is no doubt that the online poker game is changing. Poker is still an important part of our business and we have great brands – in fact world leading brands in PartyPoker and World Poker Tour. However, a reality check about the changing regulatory landscape and the market influence exerted by PokerStars tells us that it will be challenging for us to grow our poker business this year. Regulated markets do have the potential to grow. The freedom to advertise once a regulated market opens will, over time, lead to greater consumer awareness and participation. But this growth takes time to come through, probably in the mediumterm range of three to five years. A few thousand miles further West and we’re looking at something very different – the opening of the US market. Various state and federal bills are working their way
“Regulated markets do have the potential to grow. The freedom to advertise once a regulated market opens will, over time, lead to greater consumer awareness and participation. But this growth takes time to come through, probably in the medium-term range of three to five years.” through the legislative process, which gives rise to our view and many others in the industry that it’s a matter of ‘when’ not ‘if’ the US will open its market to online poker. Let’s put the US prospect into financial context. Various estimates put the size of the US online poker market at around $1.6 billion before ‘Black Friday’. Some will say that the US was more mature than many other markets around the world; however, the introduction of a regulatory regime that enables the efficient movement of money in and out and, again, freedom to advertise, will fuel growth. We’ve positioned ourselves for the opening of the US through our agreements with MGM and Boyd and the removal of PokerStars and Full Tilt provided a useful fillip for our PartyPoker and WPT brands.
Simon Prodger, Marketing Director, PKR We’re confident that there are still opportunities for growth within the online poker market. Regulation is gathering pace across Europe that should provide legitimate, long-term access to a number of new markets and potential customer bases. Regulation opens up numerous new marketing channels that can help operators achieve growth. We also believe there are still opportunities for growth in existing markets, and are not convinced that the demand for online poker has peaked. The
game of poker is more popular now than at any time in its history, with tens of millions of people playing the game in some form either live, online, through Facebook or via a mobile device. The mass market is now exposed to poker in a way that it has never been before, and the key challenge facing online poker operators is how best to develop their products to appeal to this potential audience.
Lydia Melton, Head of Network Games, Microgaming Online poker growth has stagnated in recent months due to various causes. Black Friday, regulating markets, market saturation and reduced marketing budgets have each played a part in the slowed growth. New growth will come, however, and it will come from at least three places. As markets regulate, new players come to the tables. We have seen this happen in Italy and France, and it will undoubtedly happen in other markets as well. Networks such as Prima Networks Limited’s Spanish Poker Network have poker managers with their fingers poised over the ‘ON’ switch, awaiting the news that licences have been granted. Until the licences are issued, growth in Spain is unlikely, but afterwards, growth is inevitable. A second area of growth will be from social and computer gamers in
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existing markets. The networks and operators who succeed in acquiring these players will do so using intelligent achievements engines (reward systems based on players striving for small, attainable goals rather than cash) and clients designed for beginner players. This is a very interesting demographic. Untapped markets in the East and in South America also offer huge opportunities for growth, but these players may be markedly different from the players the industry is used to. Whilst traditionally the industry has grown up around Western mentality and gaming tendencies, will new markets, with different cultures and gambling histories, adapt to our game or the game adapt to them?
Nick Berry, President, DataGenetics I don’t subscribe to the belief that online poker has peaked. Take a look at Facebook gaming, for instance. For the last five years, Zynga’s Texas Hold’em has consistently been one of the top performing games on the Internet. Other games come and go; they launch with initial supernova boosts of interest then just as quickly become stale, but poker has enjoyed evergreen success. The traffic for Texas Hold’em glides along with the inertia of a super tanker. At the time of writing this article, Zynga’s poker game boasts over 33 million active monthly users worldwide. That’s equivalent to the entire population of Canada playing every month! Poker is, without question, one of
“ The mass market is now exposed to poker in a way that it has never been before, and the key challenge facing online poker operators is how best to develop their products to appeal to this potential audience.” In China, for example, an estimated 100,000 ‘gold farmers’ play repetitive battles and quests in MMORPGs (Massively Multi-Player Online Role Playing Games) in order to amass virtual money and goods to trade for real money. The equivalent in online poker is the rakeback grinder. If online poker ever takes off in China – and analysts have been claiming for years that it will – and the Chinese approach online poker as they have MMORPGs, the result may be more harmful than beneficial.
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Zynga’s most profitable titles, and with its recent IPO the stock market valuing it at approximately $9 billion, online poker is a huge business! And it’s not just Zynga. Just a couple of months ago, IGT paid $500 million for DoubleDown Interactive, a small studio in Seattle developing online/mobile casino software. The traditional bricks-and-mortar casino companies are investing big in online gaming. People are spending more and more of their time online, contributing more and more of their lives to social network sites,
and broadcasting their lives with mobile status updates. The audience is already there; checking with Nielsen figures, people already play more casino games online than watch prime-time TV. I know it’s an overused cliché, but I think we’re just at the tip of the iceberg. The number of mobile phones in the world is measured in the billions, and that’s an awful lot of miniature casinos. It will only take a relaxation of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act to open the floodgates on this opportunity here in the USA.
Mark Irvine, Director, Global eGaming Limited In terms of where new players and growth might come from – it’s all about the ‘Mocial’/Social spaces. Social communities, like Facebook and Netlog, are the places that the next generation of poker players live and spend most of their time. So poker platforms need to reach them in their own environment. Zynga Poker has proved that there is a business model for virtual currency poker – without ever really having a ‘killer app’. Zynga Poker does not have the product functionality and appeal of the regular poker platforms, like PokerStars or PKR. But it has engaged its audience inside the space they are most comfortable in. I suspect that more and more poker brands and products will try and invade the social space looking for a share of market and they will do it with better platforms. What does poker need to have to be successful? Well in my opinion, it’s no longer just about the actual product.
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“ Zynga Poker does not have the product functionality and appeal of the regular poker platforms, like PokerStars or PKR. But it has engaged its audience inside the space they are most comfortable in.” It’s all about the positioning and engagement by the brand. It’s about building communities of players and finding them willing to advocate your product to their friends and associates. Engagement without ‘commercial threat’ – the ability to talk to your audience without them feeling that it’s all about the money. Poker needs to engage its audience and let them enjoy the experience as much as anything else. Then that engagement will turn into advocacy, which will in turn lead to growth. In the mobile sector, it’s all about product delivery and connectivity. Can the platforms deliver a reliable product across a wide range of connectivity access points – 3G, Edge, Wi-Fi, Public Wi-Fi? Players will not easily engage with a product that constantly disconnects or where there is no liquidity of players. So the challenge is to deliver a playing experience that is reliable and entertaining – at the time and via a method a player demands.
Ben Fried, Partner, Gaming Edge Associates It is difficult to say that online poker demand has peaked given the current economic climate. Whilst it is true that
online poker does not continue to yield the huge returns it did during the mid-2000s, it is unfair to suggest that online poker is an industry in decline. UK poker enjoyed a four percent CAGR increase in yield between 2009 and 2011, and poker in Italy enjoyed a six percent rise across the same period. On top of this, 888 Poker enjoyed a 58 percent rise in revenue for 2011. Clearly, there is still strong demand for poker even when consumer demand as a whole appears to be faltering. Looking forward, and assessing the future of online poker, it is quite apparent that there is a lot opportunity out there. Harnessing that potential is the main challenge facing incumbent online poker companies, and exactly how to do that is highly dependent on the regulation processes that will no doubt take place across poker markets. With the population sizes, the interest in poker and gambling that already exists, a rapidly rising GDP growth rate and the increase in individual disposable income, countries like India and China promise to deliver high levels of profit for companies involved with online poker. Regulation, however, is a lengthy process and the opportunities for growth, despite their magnitude, are a long way
down the line. Poker demand is still strong and evidently robust in challenging market conditions. There is potential for firms to succeed but it is important that they have a sound understanding of what customers want and expect from their service. There are still opportunities for growth in new markets as regulation takes place, and new product innovation, including mobile poker, will continue to fuel the demand for online poker. In the same way the Internet revolution changed the face of poker as we know it, the ability to play online and on the move is where the future of poker is heading. The rise of tablet and mobile gaming provides a greater reach to potential and current online players and, as such, will form a large part of the future growth in online poker. Already, social integration is becoming critical when creating and maintaining a successful online poker offering. For more information on the latest iGaming Business Poker Report, 4th edition including a copy of the executive summary please email reports@iGamingBusiness.com and quote Issue 74.
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Live Poker: the Unlikely Vertical in Online Traffic Daniela Lanzolla, Chief Operations Officer at eGaming Consulting, explores the opportunity for affiliates in marketing around live poker tournaments. I was recently re-reading a piece of editorial concerning live poker that I’d written for this magazine’s sister publication, iGaming Business, and I must admit that I may have made a slight misrepresentation in declaring “Online poker players dream about taking on poker pros, at a real poker game, at a real poker table in a casino”. I must apologise to all the poker players out there and will use this platform to rectify my statement: most poker players actually see themselves as pros, or at least experienced players and they will take to live action as ducks to water, to play other pros. Of course, I am being flippant but, many a true word…
Live value One of my online clients recently tasked me with the organisation of a live poker tournament, to increase... you guessed it, their online presence. Part of the marketing strategy concerns ‘involving’ affiliates in the promotion of the live poker tournament as much as the online satellites. Hence, after a few meetings with the pillars of this industry (that’s you guys, the affiliates), I realised two things. Firstly, the number of live poker tournaments makes it affordable for the average Joe to play a few tournaments per year without the need to fly off to Vegas every time. Secondly, every poker player that makes a placement (the size and prestige of it is largely irrelevant, what matters is to be in-the-money) thinks of himself/herself as a pro. Once that has been achieved, they are hooked to the game and the ‘fame’ that comes with it. Live poker becomes a hobby and in some cases a part-time job. We now find an interesting phenomenon around this new generation of semi-pros – an entourage of friends, affiliates, coaches, etc, all whole-heartedly supporting their
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guy’s poker career and defending and debating the performance as if it were their own. Therefore, when it comes to the online side of things, bad beats are no longer bad beats, but rather something conjured from above, anomalies worth a public enquiry or the involvement of scientists from the CERN laboratory (there is only so much particle acceleration you can do), or perhaps even the whispered rumour that the software is just not right leading to the assertion that “this would never happen on a live table”. I have heard this statement hundreds of times and, although it totally ignores the different pace of both games (which makes it very unlikely to recreate an online situation in an offline game), it does, without any shadow of a doubt, add more value to live poker and clearly demonstrates where it stands in the public eye.
Capitalisation If we now agree our poker pro tendencies to seek offline adrenaline go hand in hand with online poker and operators’ prolific live tournament commitments, so affiliates can and should capitalise on this live action as well. It is not uncommon for land-based casinos and online operators to pay CPA on live tournaments. The CPA is usually based on the event fee and it could range from £10 to the full fee in some cases. The key for negotiation in these situations is the numbers of players an affiliate can bring. Land-based casinos are willing to invest part of the full fee as they know that their real mark-up is not built on revenues from poker tournaments but from the traffic around the roulette and blackjack tables that those same players can generate. Recently, e-commerce has seen a trend to return to content in order to generate
online traffic. The classic online approach to drive traffic to affiliate sites could pay off even on live events. It would be criminal not to capitalise on the fact that live poker is content rich. Whether through articles and blogs or video interviews, poker players are a keen bunch when it comes to talking about their winning/losing hand and their tournament performance. Also, the list of events taking place in Europe on a monthly basis makes for a rich calendar for any website so dedicating space to them would be a good long-term investment. With such a content rich environment, investing in SEO that targets live poker events could pay off even for affiliates wanting to target exclusively online traffic. We hardly need to remind ourselves that recent statistics revealed that 93 percent of all Internet traffic is generated from search engines. Now, if percentage values aren’t really painting a vivid picture in your brain of how huge that amount really is, then maybe the following real and round number will: every single month, there are 88 billion searches on Google alone and nine out of every ten online searchers do not look past the first page of results. What is more, a nice little chunk of this search action is concerning online poker. So, keep your pages filled with good content to please Google, as well as your users, and bare in mind that whilst it may be too much to ask to get on the first page for key phrases like ‘poker’ or ‘online poker’, it is easier to focus on the long-tail keywords, for example ‘Texas Hold’em poker’. And as a last consideration, all live events run online satellites and the monopoly is not exclusive to the big operators. Sponsoring a live event is, at some point, part of any decent sized operation’s marketing plans; hence, an opportunity to generate (or better, regenerate) your affiliate traffic towards new or less renowned operators.
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INSIGHT
HOW OPERATORS IDENTIFY AFFILIATE PARTNERS Approaching the creation of affiliate partnerships from the other side of the coin, Karolina Filip, looks at how start-up affiliate programs find good affiliates. IN ASSESSING THIS, there are a few questions that come to mind: where to look for the affiliates, on which websites to recruit them, whether it’s worth spending marketing budget on attending affiliate conferences and if there is an automated way of recruiting affiliates. All of these parameters point to a single question: how does a merchant effectively recruit affiliates into its partner program in order to increase revenues? To offer affiliates an insight into the other side of the coin, here are five effective ways I would specifically highlight that operators look for when identifying affiliate partners:
1. Use of social media Spend some time daily on social media when searching for affiliates; choosing the right social media channel is particularly important here. Pay special attention to the geographical area of the affiliates you target. Recent studies indicate that the use of social media channels varies from country to country heavily depending on the nuances of language and culture, thus, it’s worth researching the social media specifics of the market of interest to you. There are many forums, groups and blogs in social networks that your potential partners might participate in. Join the most adequate groups and start communicating and don’t forget when speaking in a forum
to abide by its rules. Avoid spamming, as this can damage your reputation and can adversely affect your presence in the space. Always try to offer value from your side; in return, this can help to develop positive communication with many users. It’s also worth bearing in mind that direct advertising of your affiliate program or spamming comments in social networks would almost certainly lead to you being banned from most forums. The secret to utilising social networks successfully is simple: you cannot gain more value than what you contribute yourself. Thus, if you bring any realistic value to the spaces in which you have a presence, you will be most welcome. In the hierarchy of social media, it is worth paying special attention to Twitter; it would be unwise not to lean on its popularity. Most webmasters have a Twitter account and are actively tweeting about their respective activities. Identify them through specific industry keywords and offer and initiate communication.
2. Search engines Every affiliate manager would naturally want to automate most of the work involved in searching for affiliate partners. Nevertheless, spend some time studying search engine results for your keywords. To help yourself, make a list of the top 50 websites appearing for your keywords and
get in touch with the webmasters who rank for them offering to collaborate with them. Most of the affiliate websites have a partner section which mainly serves as a links exchange tool. Checking this section affords you direct access to a network of other industry affiliates with thematically similar websites. This search method guarantees limitless access to other related partner sources which you can endlessly dig down into. Most of the affiliate partners that you will find using the aforementioned method would have already been engaged in promoting other affiliate programs; thus, they will be familiar with various rewarding options mostly commonly used in the industry making your negotiation process more streamlined.
3. Referrals When running an affiliate program, you should aim to pay the maximum possible affiliate commission to your partners to ensure that your partnership is mutually lucrative. A good way of growing your affiliate numbers is through referrals or sub-affiliation. If you decide on using this method of recruiting new partners, you should carefully review your current commission structure, considering the fact that you will need to pay out a percentage of the affiliate earnings to the master affiliate who brought them into the program. There
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INSIGHT
are various referral commission structures that you may consider offering. The most common in the iGaming industry are percentage from referral’s net revenue, percentage from referral’s reward, or fixed fee on referral. Whichever commission structure you choose, keep a close eye on the revenues brought in from subaffiliation to ensure that this structure brings you positive results.
4. Conferences and meetings There are a great number of regular industry events and conferences. Because the choice is vast, it is best to focus on those which best suit your company’s profile. With the increasing numbers of countries regulating iGaming, it’s becoming more common to hold regionspecific conferences aimed at merchants and affiliates operating in that specific market. In return, this ensures effective and productive networking. Amongst the biggest regional events recently held were iGB Espana and iGaming France. These were market-specific conferences dedicated to the Spanish and French sectors gathering merchants and affiliates operating in these major European markets. Special attention is worth paying to global events that gather a great number of operators and affiliates from various markets and industry verticals under one roof. The London Affiliate Conference (LAC) is a major event held in the last days
72
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
of January, and the iGaming Super Show takes place in various European cities at the end of May (the 2012 show is held in Dublin, May 22-25). These events are free for affiliates to attend and always attract an impressive number of attendees. Whether your marketing budget allows you to exhibit at these events or not, they are definitely worth attending. Major conferences generally attract thousands of affiliates; this creates a unique networking opportunity. Establishing direct personal contact significantly increases your chances of recruiting affiliates into promoting your brand.
5. Direct recruitment via media channels Direct affiliate recruitment is something that shouldn’t be taken lightly. If you pay attention and apply good SEO strategy to your affiliate page, there is a good chance that potential partners will land on your page, whether referred from the search engines or other Internet resources. Direct traffic is valuable, therefore, your affiliate program’s professional look and feel should be one of your top priorities. A partner program’s homepage has to be striking and must clearly show to an affiliate what you are offering in terms of commission plans, products, marketing tools and payments. Once a visitor is ready to become your partner, the key element to ensuring they convert into an affiliate is a streamlined
sign-up process. Ideally, the sign-up page should only consist of key questions laid out on a single page, making the process as fast and painless as possible. Having news subscriptions on your website or blog allows you to sustain regular communication with your affiliates, keeping them periodically updated with the latest news, promotions or recent innovations concerning your affiliate program. Inform your affiliates, treat them as a valuable part of your business, keep communication flowing and the results will certainly come. Regardless of the ways you choose to find affiliates, one important thing to remember is that quality of the partners that you recruit depends on the reputation of your partner program. It’s always worth keeping this in mind; the more trust your affiliate program projects, the better your chance of attracting valuable affiliates who will generate higher revenues and more profit.
Karolina Filip is a professional in the affiliate marketing field with over five years experience and solid knowledge of the iGaming industry. For more information feel free to contact me on k.filip22@yahoo.com.
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webmaster world
Ten Things Your Players Care About When Gambling Online Bonuses and easy deposits are a given, but did you know that customer support, trust and technology also go a long way with online players? Michaela McNamara, Editor at Affiliate Media, Inc, explains. Online players are much more discerning than you might think. Sure, they love the thrill of gambling and making cash from a smoking poker hand, but they do have specific wants and needs from the online gaming experience that you can help to provide. This article looks at ten things that your players care about; you might be surprised at what you find.
1. Trustworthiness Online gamers love the risk of playing games where they may or may not make a profit – that’s the whole excitement of gambling. However, the casino needs to be trustworthy. If a casino offers deals that sound too good to be true, or payouts that are abnormally large, a player is likely to leave the site.
2. Customer support The quality of customer support offered by an online casino speaks volumes. A casino that offers poor customer support is either in bad financial shape or doesn’t value its customers – both of which will turn players away.
3. Bonuses Online casinos are all competing with each other and offer bonuses to new and existing players to keep them on their site. Gamers know all about these bonuses, and tend to frequent the casinos that are consistently offering good (but believable) deals.
have a proven record of easy deposits and withdrawals. Some casinos make player accounts very difficult to get money in and out of. Make sure the casinos you work with offer different methods that are easy and effective to use.
etc, that address gaming strategies and how your players can improve their technique. This will not only benefit your players but if the information you provide is of good quality, it’s likely to be shared – increasing traffic back to your site.
5. High-tech
8. Ways to save money
There is nothing more boring to an online gamer than playing last year’s games. Players love casinos that stay on the cutting edge of gaming and offer things such as live dealers, virtual chat rooms where they can converse in real-time with dealers and other players and advanced graphics on slot games.
A gambler looking for ways to save money on gambling may sound like an oxymoron, but it’s not. Gamers love strategies that help them set aside a portion of their winnings to keep playing – leading to the possibility of more wins. Again, provide information on your website, blog, social networks, about money-saving strategies, and you will keep your users informed and returning.
“ A casino that offers poor customer support is either in bad financial shape or doesn’t value its customers – both of which will turn players away.” 6. Popularity of casino Who likes to play alone? Gamers love playing on casinos that have thousands of players logged in at any given time. A large customer base means the casino is trusted by users, offers high-tech games that players are looking for, and indicates that the casino is in good financial standing.
7. Learning gaming strategies 4. Easy deposits and withdrawals Gamers are ultimately in it for the cash, and are likely only to play at casinos that
74
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
Gamers who want to stay on top of their game love learning new ways to do so. Provide newsletters, blogs, tweets, articles,
9. Trust in your research Your users put a lot of faith in the casinos you recommend, and you need to make sure that every casino you are directing them to is trustworthy, competent and provides the best gaming experience. Just as you would recommend a reputable casino, let your players also know which casinos have come under the radar and are questionable. This will build further trust.
10. Gratitude If repeat players are coming to your site and are following your blog, tweets, YouTube videos, etc, be sure to show your gratitude. Provide updated content (preferably daily) to educate and entertain, offer bonuses and holiday promotions, and give your users a reason to keep returning to – and recommending – your site.
WEBMASTER WORLD
THE IMPORTANCE OF AFFILIATE REVIEWS Affiliate reviews can boost sales, as users are likely to frequent your top rated sites – putting more money in your pocket. So why aren’t you writing them? Asks Arjun Jolly, VP of Product at Affiliate Media, Inc. WRITING REVIEWS OF online casino programs is highly effective for affiliates. Regular users of your site will come to trust the opinions and advice that you give and will be receptive to recommendations. These reviews can, in turn, boost sales as users are likely to frequent your top rated sites putting more money in your pocket with each click. Here is a breakdown of how to write good program reviews as an affiliate, and other tricks you should know.
“When a player sees nothing but stellar reviews for a gaming site, this usually indicates that the writer (you) is trying to sell them something…you should always be honest in your review.” that can keep them in the loop with tips and tricks that an outsider wouldn’t know. Other tips can include the best time of day to visit the site, the loosest slot games and the best live dealers based on user feedback.
Be informative
Be comparative
Gamblers interested in a casino that they’ve never played at want to know if the site is ultimately worth it – good payouts, trustworthy operation, good deals, offers a variety of games and options, etc. This is where your review can help. Breakdown the casino and what it offers, and also what it doesn’t. Discuss the usability of the site, payout stats and what other users are saying.
Casinos are all competing with each other, but not all offer the same options and perks. Write reviews that compare top sites based on a particular platform; i.e. the best (and worst) poker sites, blackjack sites, sites for slots, etc. Compare payout rates, ease of payout, deals and bonuses for new and frequent players. Your users should be able to quickly and easily cross-compare sites based on your review. Offering comparisons can also help in your promotion efforts.
Offer inside tips If a casino offers a game or games that had have smoking hot results, or provides the most exciting user experience, put this in your review. Your users will appreciate having someone with inside knowledge
Be honest When a player sees nothing but stellar reviews for a gaming site, this usually indicates that the writer (you) is trying
to sell them something. Even if the casino is fantastic, it’s not perfect, and you should always be honest in your review. Also, don’t go into promotion blindly. If you have little experience with the casino, say so, rather than trying to provide information that you’ve only derived from the site’s own marketing materials.
CASINOAFFILIATEPROGRAMS.COM (CAP) is the world’s largest online gaming affiliate marketing community. With more than 14,000 members, CAP is the Internet’s primary location for online gaming brands and affiliate marketers to come together and do business. Our experts gather, create, and publish information about affiliate marketing in the form of webinars, video interviews and original articles and share it with the larger worldwide community to help affiliates better promote leading Internet brands (and profit by doing so).
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
75
webmaster world
DATA CENTRE
US Market Snapshot The market data reports from Experian Hitwise give us a structured breakdown of the target audiences within some of the major international markets. This issue, in tandem with our feature on emerging markets, we look at the latest from the US, Singapore and Hong Kong.
TOP TEN GAMBLING SITES IN THE US, FEB 2012
TOP TEN GAMBLING SITES IN HONG KONG, FEB 2012
Rank..............................................Name Domain 1 Lottery Post.............................www.lotterypost.com 4.15% 2 FreeSlots.................................www.freeslots.com 3.94% 3 NY Lottery................................nylottery.ny.gov 3.90% 4 Florida Lottery..........................www.flalottery.com 3.75% 5 Pennsylvania Lottery.................www.palottery.state.pa.us 3.42% 6 Texas Lottery Commission.........www.txlottery.org 3.18% 7 slots.pchlotto.com....................slots.pch.com 3.09% 8 Powerball.................................www.powerball.com 2.96% 9 Georgia Lottery........................www.galottery.com 2.62% 10 WorldWinner............................www.worldwinner.com 2.45%
Rank...................................................... Name Domain 1 Hong Kong Jockey Club - Bets.......... bet.hkjc.com 34.27% 2 HKJC Football Betting Limited........... bet.hkjc.com/football 25.97% 3 The Hong Kong Jockey Club.............. www.hkjc.com 19.63% 4 The Hong Kong Jockey Club Football......... football.hkjc.com 7.98% 5 The Hong Kong Jockey Club Horse Racing.. racing.hkjc.com 2.48% 6 Football.orisun.com.......................... football.on.cc 1.45% 7 Macau Slot...................................... www.macauslot.com 1.42% 8 Orisun Racing.................................. racing.on.cc 0.65% 9 bet365............................................ www.bet365.com 0.56% 10 ft.funtown.com.hk............................ ft.funtown.com.hk 0.39%
TOP TEN GAMBLING SITES IN SINGAPORE, FEB 2012 FEMALE 47.98%
US demographics by age
40% 32.74
32% 24% 16%
12.53
14.78
17.04
22.91
8% 0%
MALE 52.02%
Rank.............................................. Name Domain 1 Singapore Pools....................... www.singaporepools.com.sg 35.60% 2 AsianBookie Forums................. forum.asianbookie.com 7.47% 3 IBC bet.................................... www.ibcbet.com 6.74% 4 AsianBookie.com...................... www.asianbookie.com 6.64% 5 bet365.................................... www.bet365.com 6.16% 6 PoolzConnect - Singapore Pools....... poolzconnect.singaporepools.com.sg 3.74% 7 Singapore Turf Club.................. www.turfclub.com.sg 3.70% 8 Sport Bookie Online.................. www.sbobet.com 3.62% 9 Resorts World Sentosa.............. www.rwsentosa.com 1.75% 10 Marina Bay Sands Singapore.... www.marinabaysands.com 1.63%
18-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55+
Visitors to gambling sites by state
<1% 1-5% 5-10% 10-20% 20-50% >50%
76
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
data provided by
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DATA CENTRE
webmaster world
Data Feed Search Marketing Agency, Greenlight, has released its latest report into search traffic trends within the gaming sector for the month of February. Here, we can see the latest from the UK market in relation to search queries for the traditional iGaming verticals: casino, poker, bingo and sportsbetting. The most recent monthly report from search marketing agency, Greenlight, details a continuation of the plateau in search activity as reported in its quarterly report in June 2011. February’s figures have reported another decrease in overall search volumes having fallen from 798,000 searches (as detailed in our October/ November issue) to 736,470, which replaces July’s total as the second lowest monthly figure we’ve reported since July 2010, when over 2.5 million searches were accounted for. February’s data set shows that bingo (288,883) has reclaimed its position as the
most searched keyword, or at least, the term with the most cumulative searches with regards to variations (online bingo/ free bingo/bingo, etc). Poker slips back into second place and is significantly down on the previous report, driving a mere 193,411 searches in comparison to July’s 277,120, with sportsbetting (131,457) and casino (122,719) making up the remainder of the combined total. As we have discussed in the past, we can attribute the decrease in search volumes to any number of factors, one of the likeliest being the changing search patterns of the UK betting demographic.
As consumers become more aware of how they navigate between the sites they use to bet or play at, their reliance on search engines decreases for short-tail terms such as those detailed here, but may increase for more specific, longer-tail keywords for which is it almost impossible to monitor and chart successfully. Many of the searches recorded for these core keywords such as ‘bingo’, ‘casino’ and ‘poker’ are more likely to be the reserve of those new to betting online, or those seeking information rather than ‘action’, hence the constant presence of Wikipedia in the Greenlight results. The results for sportsbetting are also slightly muddied by the presence of short-tail terms such as ‘bet’ and ‘betting’ which although are grouped into the sports results, don’t necessarily represent accurate sports betting traffic.
The most visible websites for gambling-related keywords in natural search (February 2012)
78
NO
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
NO
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
1
cheekybingo.com
169,540
566,930
23%
26
pokerstars.com
34,053
702,417
5%
2
wikipedia.org
155,470
581,000
21%
27
imdb.com
33,110
703,360
4%
3
888.com
146,509
589,961
20%
28
spinpalace.co.uk
32,518
703,952
4%
4
costabingo.com
135,684
600,786
18%
29
onlinebingofinder.co.uk
31,280
705,190
4%
5
ladbrokes.com
135,062
601,408
18%
30
betfred.com
30,100
706,370
4%
6
jackpotjoy.com
126,637
609,833
17%
31
bet770.com
29,722
706,748
4%
7
foxybingo.com
109,691
626,779
15%
32
casino770.com
28,073
708,397
4%
8
partybingo.com
98,268
638,202
13%
33
bet.com
27,100
709,370
4%
9
tombola.co.uk
92,996
643,474
13%
34
redbusbingo.com
26,079
710,391
4%
10
sunlight-bingo.co.uk
80,284
656,186
11%
35
freebingo.net
25,511
710,959
3%
11
888ladies.com
75,057
661,413
10%
36
madaboutbingo.co.uk
25,240
711,230
3%
12
bingoport.co.uk
63,902
672,568
9%
37
boylesports.com
23,674
712,796
3%
13
pokerlistings.com
61,413
675,057
8%
38
meccabingo.com
23,005
713,465
3%
14
intercasino.co.uk
59,171
677,299
8%
39
miniclip.com
22,896
713,574
3%
15
betfair.com
58,226
678,244
8%
40
bingonodeposit.net
22,230
714,240
3%
16
32red.com
54,606
681,864
7%
41
wtgbingo.com
22,200
714,270
3%
17
pkr.com
53,580
682,890
7%
42
galacasino.co.uk
22,011
714,459
3%
18
skypoker.com
47,508
688,962
6%
43
skybet.com
21,355
715,115
3%
19
comparebingosites.com
46,548
689,922
6%
44
bestoffersbingo.co.uk
20,639
715,831
3%
20
paddypower.com
43,916
692,554
6%
45
tjpoker.com
20,500
715,970
3%
21
bet365.com
40,810
695,660
6%
46
888sport.com
20,460
716,010
3%
22
fulltiltpoker.com
40,399
696,071
5%
47
partypoker.com
19,775
716,695
3%
23
freebingo.co.uk
40,236
696,234
5%
48
mypokerbasics.com
18,450
718,020
3%
24
pacificpoker.com
40,029
696,441
5%
49
williamhill.com
18,056
718,414
2%
25
galabingo.co.uk
36,177
700,293
5%
50
coral.co.uk
17,924
718,546
2%
iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
DATA CENTRE
webmaster world
Summary of data
●● CheekyBingo maintained its lead as
●● Searches for gaming-related keywords
the most visible website for bingo-related search terms albeit at a slightly decreased share of voice of 59% (compared to 61% in July). ●● 888.com was the most visible website for all casino-related keywords, achieving a 49% share of voice. ●● For poker-related queries, Wikipedia was the most visible website, attaining a 43% share of voice down from 49% in July. ●● Betfair was the most visible website for sportsbetting related terms, although it has a markedly smaller share of voice at 38% compared to 56% in the last reporting period.
in February 2012 totalled 736,470, down roughly 61,000 on the previous reporting period (798,000). ●● In February, bingo-related terms (288,883) accounted for the significant majority share of searches made. Pokerrelated terms (193,411) although notably decreased, still accounted for the second highest search group. ●● Overall, in February, CheekyBingo.com, Wikipedia.org and 888.com were the three most visible websites in natural search achieving 23%, 21% and 20% share of voice, respectively.
The most visible websites for bingo-related keywords in natural search (February 2012) NO.
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
Total number of searches for February 2012: 736,470
Casino 122,719 Bingo 288,883 Sports betting 131,457
Poker 193,411
The most visible websites for online casino-related keywords in natural search (February 2012) NO.
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
1
cheekybingo.com
169,540
119,343
59%
1
888.com
60,011
62,708
49%
2
costabingo.com
135,684
153,199
47%
2
intercasino.co.uk
59,133
63,586
48%
3
jackpotjoy.com
120,868
168,015
42%
3
32red.com
54,606
68,113
44%
4
foxybingo.com
109,691
179,192
38%
4
wikipedia.org
44,121
78,598
36%
5
partybingo.com
98,268
190,615
34%
5
ladbrokes.com
42,646
80,073
35%
6
tombola.co.uk
92,996
195,887
32%
6
imdb.com
33,110
89,609
27%
7
sunlight-bingo.co.uk
80,284
208,599
28%
7
spinpalace.co.uk
32,518
90,201
26%
8
888ladies.com
75,057
213,826
26%
8
casino770.com
28,073
94,646
23%
9
ladbrokes.com
73,490
215,394
25%
9
galacasino.co.uk
22,011
100,708
18%
10
bingoport.co.uk
63,902
224,981
22%
10
onlinecasino.co.uk
13,554
109,165
11%
11
comparebingosites.com
46,548
242,335
16%
11
paddypower.com
13,240
109,479
11%
12
freebingo.co.uk
40,236
248,647
14%
12
onlinecasinoking.com
12,164
110,555
10%
13
888.com
39,096
249,787
14%
13
mansioncasino.com
11,890
110,829
10%
14
galabingo.co.uk
36,177
252,706
13%
14
gambling.com
11,690
111,029
10%
15
onlinebingofinder.co.uk
31,280
257,603
11%
15
casino.com
6,160
116,559
5%
16
redbusbingo.com
26,079
262,804
9%
16
jackpotjoy.com
5,750
116,969
5%
17
freebingo.net
25,511
263,372
9%
17
casinogamesslots.com
4,137
118,582
3%
18
madaboutbingo.co.uk
25,240
263,643
9%
18
casinogames.org
3,960
118,759
3%
19
meccabingo.com
23,005
265,878
8%
19
coolcat-casino.com
3,933
118,786
3%
20
bingonodeposit.net
22,230
266,653
8%
20
casinobonus.net
3,600
119,119
3%
The most visible websites for online poker-related keywords in natural search (February 2012) NO.
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
The most visible websites for online sportsbetting-related keywords in natural search (February 2012) NO.
Domain
Monthly Reached Volume
Monthly Missed Volume
Percentage Reached
1
wikipedia.org
83,092
110,319
43%
1
betfair.com
49,890
81,567
38%
2
pokerlistings.com
61,413
131,998
32%
2
bet365.com
40,810
90,647
31%
3
pkr.com
53,580
139,831
28%
3
betfred.com
30,100
101,357
23%
4
skypoker.com
47,508
145,903
25%
4
bet770.com
29,722
101,735
23%
5
888.com
45,016
148,395
23%
5
paddypower.com
28,155
103,302
21%
6
fulltiltpoker.com
40,399
153,012
21%
6
bet.com
27,100
104,357
21%
7
pacificpoker.com
40,029
153,382
21%
7
wikipedia.org
25,152
106,305
19%
8
pokerstars.com
34,053
159,358
18%
8
boylesports.com
23,674
107,783
18%
9
miniclip.com
22,896
170,515
12%
9
skybet.com
21,355
110,102
16%
10
tjpoker.com
20,500
172,911
11%
10
888sport.com
20,460
110,997
16%
11
partypoker.com
19,775
173,636
10%
11
coral.co.uk
17,924
113,533
14%
12
mypokerbasics.com
18,450
174,961
10%
12
williamhill.com
10,080
121,377
8%
13
wsop.com
17,003
176,408
9%
13
twitter.com
8,130
123,327
6%
14
youtube.com
16,773
176,638
9%
14
oddschecker.com
8,080
123,377
6%
15
poker770.com
14,551
178,860
8%
15
bluesq.com
7,673
123,784
6%
16
gamble.co.uk
13,630
179,781
7%
16
totesport.com
6,250
125,207
5%
17
ladbrokes.com
13,627
179,784
7%
17
ladbrokes.com
5,299
126,158
4%
18
texasholdem-poker.com
13,550
179,861
7%
18
soccerbase.com
4,320
127,137
3%
19
pokerhands.com
11,840
181,571
6%
19
football-data.co.uk
3,780
127,677
3%
20
thepokerforum.com
10,360
183,051
5%
20
titanbet.com
3,260
128,197
2%
Source: Greenlight iGB Affiliate APRIL/MAY 2012
79
marketplace 7314 bet365 affiliates (148x52+3mm). 24/11/2011 15:38 Page 1
Welcome to the Market Place listings section of iGB Affiliate magazine. All listings are taken from the 2012 version of our iGB Affiliate Directory; a 150 page guide to the affiliate programs and service providers who are currently active within the iGaming sector. To request a free copy of this publication or to have your company listed please contact Richard W on E: Richard@iGamingBusiness.com or T: +44 (0) 207 954 3437 advertising & PR
Market Ace
Game On
www.market-ace.com
www.gameon-marketing.com
Star Games
Global Gaming Events
www.stargames.com
www.globalgamingevents.com
Virgin
Media Skunk Works
www.virgingaming.com
www.mediaskunkworks.com
Casino Affiliate Programs
Omni-lInx
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How to Avoid Getting Ripped off by an SEO Affiliate Coach and esteemed iGB Affiliate columnist, John Wright, has started a blog at iGBAffiliate.com. In his latest post, he walks through how affiliates can avoid being scammed into spending vast amounts of money on ‘cowboy’ optimisers. Sales pitch Let’s start first with the common sense approach of why people get ripped off and why really good SEOs don’t get recommended as much. Some of the most successful SEOs are best at sales and not so much at SEO. It is too bad that their SEO skills or services are not as good as their salesmanship. So if these people are getting ripped off, why are they not being called out in public or in the forums? Fear is probably one factor but most people like to quietly move on and are usually embarrassed to admit they paid a huge amount of money and didn’t make any efforts to ensure they were getting their money’s worth. So, they feel like an idiot and will probably keep quiet but another reason for wanting to keep quiet is maybe the fear that the SEO in question would seek revenge and get their site banned because they possess black (hat) magic. They will, however, tell a small number of people, so if you ask around for references they do exist, both positive and negative. So why aren’t the really good SEOs being recommended all the time? People are greedy. Imagine you hire a SEO and that person does great work for your site and you start to outrank other casino portals that you are competing with. Are
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you going to be telling people how great this person is? You’ll tell the SEO they did a great job but you secretly wouldn’t want other affiliates getting a hold of this person. The only time you would refer this SEO to anyone else is to close friends or family that work in other industries that you don’t have to compete with. The best part of SEO is that most of the information and knowledge base is available online and for free. There are some great guides and books on the subject but the truth is that everything can be free if you want it to be. Of course, learning SEO and implementing it takes time so there will always be a need to hire an SEO or to learn the trade.
the guaranteed get-rich-quick theme then this is the over promising part; don’t buy and experience the under delivering. If an optimiser can guarantee top listing or instant results then this is, in my strong opinion, a warning sign, and more so if you haven’t even told them your website yet.
Tips to avoid getting ripped off by an SEO
The full version of John’s blog, which includes the one SEO he’d choose over any other, can be found at www.igbaffiliate.com/blog.
3. Ask around for references If the SEO doesn’t want to share any references at all (which I think is a bad sign) then ask around until you get someone you know or trust who can clarify their credibility. Often, when someone does get ripped off, they then ask around only to find other people who confirm that the SEO is bad news. Just ask!
1. Trust your gut instinct If your stomach starts to feel funny it is probably your natural instinct kicking in telling you that you are being deceived and that this person just wants to take your wallet for a joyride.
2. Over promising and under delivering Most of the time, if it is too good to be true, then it probably is. If anything seems like
John Wright is an affiliate coach and is the senior editor at http://gaffg.com and can be reached at john@gaffg.com.
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