iGB Affiliate 27 Jun/Jul 2011 by iGaming Business

JUNE/JULY 2011

The Art of SEO The Working Fundamentals

BLACK FRIDAY’S IMPACT ON AFFILIATES

POKER SCOUT PLAYER DATA

ZYNGA POKER

AFFILIATE WEBSITE CRITIQUES

INFORMATION, INSIGHT AND ANALYSIS FOR THE BUSINESS OF INTERACTIVE GAMING

Regulated arkets Achieve more with powerful online gaming solutions. To find out how you can profit from our experience, contact: sales@microgaming.com

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CONTENTS 04 Events Calendar 06 Webmaster News 10 The Art of War (iGaming SEO Edition) 14 Affiliate Website Critique 18 Implementing SEO in your Website Creation Process 21 Top SEO Tips Post-Panda 24 Global SEO Strategies 27 Keyword Research Revisited I hope you are picking up this edition of iGaming Business Affiliate at the iGaming Super Show in Dublin. If you are, then you are really getting the full experience we have to offer. Not only are you reading about affiliate marketing from the best in the business, you’re in Dublin attending lectures from the very guys who have mastered the art of affiliate business. If you are in Dublin, your experience shouldn’t stop at the conference room. Visit the trade show and meet the best affiliate programs in the industry. In fact, your homework is to 1) go and cement your relationships with the companies you work with and 2) go and meet at least one affiliate program that you have yet to do business with. If you do it right, you will foster great returns, and it’s been my experience that I do more business at a show than I could in six months of emailing opportunities to potential partners. I hope you are all psyched up about SEO this month, because we went SEO-heavy and brought you everything from ancient Chinese advice on SEO to critical analysis of some of your peers’ sites.

29 Sportsbetting Supplement 42 Black Friday: Where Does it Leave Affiliates? 44 Black Friday: Affiliate Feedback 46 Black Friday: Legal Opinion 48 Black Friday: Commentary and Reaction 51 Black Friday: PokerScout.com Analysis 54 Interview: Rhonda Garvey, Director of eBusiness, BCLC 56 Interview: Zynga Poker and the US Market 58 Ireland: the Regulatory Landscape 61 Maximising Return on Investment 62 Excerpt from Global Business of Affiliate Marketing Report 64 Optimising for Mobile App Stores 66 Diversifying your Affiliate Offering 68 The Future is Now: Breaking with Tradition 69 Endangered Species? The Google Panda Effect 70 Cost Considerations for Affiliates 73 The Social Gamer Conundrum 74 A/B Testing for Higher Conversions 76 Getting Huge Payoffs with Landing Page Optimisation 78 Considering Mobile in your PPC Strategy 80 Market Place 82 Black Friday Opinion: The Future for Poker Affiliates

May the wind be at your back and the road rise to meet your feet – see you in Dublin! Michael Caselli, Editor in Chief

http://tinyurl.com/igbaffiliate @igbaffiliate

Editor in Chief: Michael Caselli

FREE SUBSCRIPTION email: alex.pratt@igamingbusiness.com

michaelc@igamingbusiness.com

Published by: iGaming Business,

Printed in the UK by: Pensord Press, www.pensord.co.uk

Editor: James McKeown

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Publisher: Alex Pratt

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the publishers. Full acknowledgement of author, publisher and

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published by iGaming Business Limited of 33-41Dallington Street,

to reproduce extracts in other published works shall be made to source must be given. iGaming Business Affiliate Magazine is

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correspondents are their own. Editorial opinions expressed in this The Publisher does not accept responsibility for advertising content. Cover image: istockphoto.com ISSN: 2041-6954

Richard Wanigasekera richard@igamingbusiness.com

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

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.

iGaming Super Show RDS, Dublin, Ireland May 24 – 27, 2011 The second annual instalment of the iGaming Super Show brings the affiliate and B2B industries together in Dublin for what is touted to be the must-attend event in the online gaming calendar. This year’s show combines both affiliate and B2B expos in one space with many of the sector’s leading operators and programs already booked into Dublin’s RDS venue. The two-day conference schedule will provide delegates with a unique insight into the inner workings of the affiliate marketing and B2B space, with two dedicated rooms exploring both themes individually. www.igamingsupershow.com

a4u Expo Munich, Germany June 7 – 8, 2011 Barcelona Affiliate Conference Barcelona, Spain September 8 – 11, 2011 After two years in Budapest, we are moving our autumn conference back to Barcelona, the original home for this leading European affiliate event for the online gambling industry. In addition to the location move, we have also rolled the dates back to September 8 – 11 which means perfect weather for outdoor networking, plus with a huge majority of our database voting for Barcelona, expect this event to be our biggest and best event to date with over 1,600 delegates in attendance. www.igbaffiliate.com

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

a4uexpo is Europe’s largest Performance Marketing Conference with over 1,000 delegates, 36 conference sessions an all inclusive middle evening party, a pre and post-event networking bash and an expo hall all being shared with the leading entrepreneurs and players within the dynamic £10 billion Affiliate and Performance Marketing industries. www.a4uexpo.com

webmaster news

Absolute Poker Reaches Agreement with US DoJ The latest in the fallout from ‘Black Friday’ has seen Absolute Poker follow in the wake of PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker in reaching an agreement with the United States Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY), although the agreement will not facilitate the return of any domain names. An official statement from Absolute Poker said that it had “reached an agreement with the United States Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. Under the agreement, the US Attorney’s Office has agreed to provide all necessary assurances that third-parties may work with Absolute Poker to facilitate the return of funds to players located in the US. This provision is an important first step

to returning US player funds.” The news follows an announcement from Blanca Games, operator of Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet, that confirmed the cessation of all US-facing operations as the company undergoes a restructuring process that will see the liquidation of its workforce, and the rehiring of around a fifth of staff in key positions. The company stated that it had notified the SDNY of the closure of its US businesses and, as such, had “not requested the return of its worldwide domain names, www. AbsolutePoker.com, www.UltimateBet.com and www.UB.com, and today’s agreement does not provide for their return.” Accompanying the statement declaring the closure of US operations, a company

spokesperson said: “We regret that we have been compelled to take these actions. We have worked tirelessly to create a truly amazing company that is filled with extraordinary people. We have always been and still remain fully committed to our employees and players. At the same time, we are confident that this restructuring will strengthen the company and its future.” However, because the company still faces several legal issues unsealed in the indictments, player funds will not actually become available for immediate withdrawal, the company asserting that the agreement with the DoJ had allowed them to “move as expeditiously as possible to establish proper mechanisms for the return of funds to our US players.”

Blanca Responds to Costa Rica Raids Away from the agreement with the DoJ and the announcement of the cessation of its US-facing operations, Blanca Games was also busy in early May, dealing with and responding to raids on its offices by Costa Rica’s version of the FBI. However, the company moved quickly to clarify the situation to ward off rumours that senior Absolute Poker figures were the target of the raids. The company stated: “Blanca can confirm that Costa Rican officials visited the office of Innovative Data Solutions (IDS), the former customer service centre of Absolute Poker

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

and UB in Costa Rica. The Organismo de Investigaciones Judiciales (OIJ) took action yesterday to further their investigation of Olman Rimola, the owner of IDS, Scott Tom, who was also recently named in the indictment list issued by the Department of Justice on April 15, and a third lesser known party, Oldemar Vargas. The reported OIJ ‘raids’ of IDS and various associated private residential addresses were in relation to their search for Rimola, Tom and Vargas, and do not involve Blanca or the operations of Absolute Poker or UB.” The company also moved to distance the

raids from the Black Friday indictments as well as declaring that it had terminated its supplier contract with IDS “after discovering that Rimola has misappropriated millions in IDS severance payments.” The company has also announced the termination of all 11 of its pro poker player contracts as part of its downsizing operation. Team UB consisted of Joe Sebok, Prahlad Friedman, Eric ‘Basebaldy’ Baldwin, Maria Ho, Brandon Cantu, Tiffany Michelle, Scott Ian, ‘Hollywood’ Dave Stann, Adam ‘Roothlus’ Levy, Bryan Devonshire and Trishelle Cannatella.

Fourth Black Friday Defendant Arrested Ira Rubin has joined Bradley Franzen, John Campos and Chad Elie in being arrested under the indictments issued in connection with online poker sites PokerStars.com, AbsolutePoker.com and FullTiltPoker.com. According to the Bloomberg news service, Rubin was detained in Guatemala on April 25 before being extradited to Miami, Florida, and appearing before US Magistrate Judge Andrea Simonton. Preet Bharara, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Janice Fedarcyk, Assistant Director

in Charge for the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation claim that Rubin assisted the online poker firms in disguising payments from USbased players as transactions with “phony Internet merchants”. He is charged on nine counts including conspiracy to violate UIGEA and three counts of violating UIGEA in connection with PokerStars.com, FullTiltPoker.com and AbsolutePoker.com in addition to three counts of operating an illegal gambling business, conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

EC Paves way for German State Gaming Law Germany’s northern state of

contrast to Germany’s proposed licensing

Schleswig-Holstein has had its draft gambling

regime, which would see a 16.6 percent

law declared compliant with EU law by the

turnover tax on in-play betting only with

European Commission, opening the way for

licences for casino and poker only available

the state to pass a bill later this year.

to land-based casinos – which, according

The bill will now sit with the SchleswigHolstein parliament for final vote, which if voted on before lawmakers head for their

to Numis Securities, “appears inconsistent with ECJ rulings”. Numis’ company update for bwin.party

summer recess at the end of June, could see

following the German proposals in April

a licensing regime in place by the autumn.

also suggested that “it seems unlikely that

If no action is taken, the bill will have to wait

Germany will end up with a system where

until lawmakers return in September.

online gaming is regulated in one state

The state’s law would see operators

and operated nationally”, referring to bwin.

pay a 20 percent gross profits tax with no

party’s intention to apply for a license in

limitations on products, which is in stark

Schleswig-Holstein.

Online Bingo in Community Service VirginGames.com has released the findings of a survey that it conducted investigating how online bingo has affected the social lives and friendships of its players. The study found that 44 percent of the 647 players questioned had made ‘genuine friendships’ through its site with 18 percent having met up in person. In addition, 22 percent of the respondents stated that they had shared ‘personal problems and family issues’ with friends made through playing online bingo while 34 percent believed that participating in online bingo had improved their social life. Interestingly, 69 percent of those questioned declared that playing bingo online had ‘replaced going to land-based

bingo halls’ while four players have started romantic relationships with someone they met via VirginGames.com. “When we put out this survey we really had no idea what to expect,” said Alan Thomas from VirginGames.com. “We are genuinely thrilled that our customers get more than a bit of fun out of playing online bingo at VirginGames.com. It seems a number of them have truly enriched their social lives through new friendships and in one case a wedding. “There is a lot of focus on the negative impacts of online gaming but I think this demonstrates that, for a lot of people, it provides a point of common interest and can bring something to people’s lives.”

bwin.party Releases First Financial Results The world’s largest listed online gambling operator, bwin.party Digital Entertainment, has released its first financial results as a unified entity showing that its net revenues for the first quarter of 2011 rose two percent year-on-year to hit €217.8 million. “We are pleased to announce our first results following the merger with our announcement today showing what we would have achieved had the merger between PartyGaming and Bwin occurred on January 1, 2010,” read a statement from Jim Ryan and Norbert Teufelberger, Co-Chief Executive Officer’s for bwin.party. “Overall pro forma revenue in the first quarter was two percent ahead versus the prior year despite the closure of our casino business in France. In respect of current trading, average daily gross revenues are down seven percent versus the average for the first quarter reflecting the normal seasonal pattern seen in previous years.” With regards to the fallout from Black Friday and the closure of the US-facing operations of PokerStars, Full Tilt and Absolute Poker, the joint CEOs pointed to encouraging shortterm feedback and a positive, yet realistic future outlook. “Following steps taken by the US government to enforce its laws, we have seen uplift in new player signups on our poker sites despite the impact of seasonality. For the period from April 15 to 30, we have experienced a 33 percent increase in average daily new player sign-ups for poker when compared with the previous two-week period. While this represents only a short trading period, it is nonetheless encouraging. “[The recent action in the US] may signal an appetite to regulate and there are bills currently being contemplated at both state and Federal levels. We are hopeful that the momentum we have seen in recent weeks may result in further positive developments both in Europe and the US. While it is difficult to predict the short-term impact of any of these regulatory changes, we remain on-track to deliver our merger synergies as previously communicated and remain confident about the group’s prospects.”

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

webmaster news

Sportingbet to Acquire Centrebet It has been revealed that Sportingbet is in advanced talks with Australian sportsbook, Centrebet International Ltd, for a A$175 million ($189.6 million) acquisition of the company. The cash purchase would expand Sportingbet’s presence in Australia as the company looks to further its foothold in markets away from its European business. Sportingbet CEO, Andrew McIver, said in a statement that, “An acquisition would accelerate Sportingbet’s strategy of increasing its exposure to regulated markets and of geographic diversification.” The company expected the acquisition to add to its earnings in the first full year, post-integration. Sportingbet shares rose 3.3 percent to 47.5 pence, while Centrebet shares closed up 12.6 percent at A$1.79 on the Australian Stock Exchange. Ladbrokes and 888 Deal Scrapped Takeover talks between Ladbrokes and 888 have been terminated, it has been revealed. After months of negotiations it appears that the two sides couldn’t agree on a price with both parties releasing statements confirming that discussions have ended. Ladbrokes’ chief executive Richard Glynn said he “simply decided it was not in the interests of shareholders”. Ladbrokes also released a trading update following the news, revealing that net revenues (excluding high roller customers) were up 2.3 percent in the first quarter despite a poor Cheltenham Festival that saw revenues down £10.7m after a run of winning favourites. Ladbrokes also announced that Greene King finance director, Ian Bull, will be its new chief financial officer, starting from July.

The New iGB Affiliate website is now online, visit www.iGBAffiliate.com

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

IGT bids for Entraction International Game Technology (IGT) has launched a cash offer to purchase all of the outstanding A and B shares in online gaming software developer Entraction Holding AB. The firm revealed that its proposal, if subsequently accepted by Entraction’s shareholders, would see it acquire 90 percent of the Stockholm-based firm for $115 million (SEK700 million), which equates to $11.11 per share. “This transaction represents a fantastic opportunity for our employees, customers

and shareholders alike,” said Peter Astrom, President and Chief Executive Officer for Entraction. “Entraction will be able to utilise IGT’s global scale and distribution to advance our short and long-term objectives in exciting and new ways and we look forward to joining the IGT team.” In a separate announcement, Entraction’s board of directors unanimously recommended that its shareholders accept the offer from IGT. The shareholders now have until June 7 to accept.

William Hill Acquires US Bookmaker William Hill has signed a binding agreement to acquire Brandywine Bookmaking LLC, a land-based sportsbetting firm that operates in the American states of Nevada and Delaware, for $14.25 million. The UK bookmaker has approximately 2,350 shops domestically and this Brandywine acquisition follows the company’s recent agreements to purchase land-based sportsbook operators American Wagering Incorporated and the Club Cal Neva Satellite Race and Sportsbook Division in America for approximately $39 million. Nevada, which alongside Delaware, Montana and Oregon allows legalised sportsbetting, was the largest market last year with estimated turnover of $2.7 billion

and gross win of $151 million generated from approximately 190 locations. Brandywine, which employs around 90 people, operates 16 sportsbooks in Nevada under the Lucky’s brand, alongside one on the Caribbean island of St Kitts. In addition, it is the exclusive odds-maker for the Delaware State Sports Lottery, which it operates in partnership with Scientific Games. “We are excited by the opportunity to bring together three highly respected leaders in sportsbetting in Nevada and Delaware,” said Ralph Topping, Chief Executive Officer for William Hill. “Brandywine is a good strategic fit for American Wagering Incorporated’s and Club Cal Neva’s sportsbook operations and will give William Hill a leading position in the US land-based sportsbetting market.”

Scientific Games to Purchase Barcrest American lottery firm Scientific Games Corporation has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Barcrest Group Limited subsidiary from International Game Technology (IGT) for approximately £33 million. Barcrest is a leading supplier of gaming content and machines in Europe with Scientific Games stating that the deal is subject to “certain post-closing adjustments” and includes up to £2 million in deferred consideration, the payment of which is dependent upon “the satisfaction of certain conditions relating to a third-party contract”. The purchase is anticipated to have been completed over the course of the third quarter

when Barcrest will be integrated into Scientific Games’ Global Draw and Games Media gaming divisions and is conditional upon obtaining UK competition approvals and “certain third-party consents”. “This transaction represents a major step forward in strengthening and expanding our server-based gaming content,” said Ian Timmis, Chief Executive Officer for Global Draw and Games Media. “In addition, it will provide the opportunity for us to bring the advanced capabilities of our state-of-the-art gaming systems and operational expertise to new wide area gaming venues such as UK-based gaming centres and bingo halls along with venues in Italy and the Czech Republic.”

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(iGaming SEO Edition)

This article contains excerpts from the forthcoming book: The Art of War (iGaming SEO Edition) which is currently being co-authoring by myself and some of the finest practitioners of SEO in the iGaming space. This interpretation is based closely on the original texts written in the 6th Century BC by Chinese military commander, Sun Tzu. These ancient military teachings not only form the basis of all modern warfare but Sun Tzu’s principals are often applied in business and marketing and have led to this ancient book becoming a global bestseller and compulsory reading for many Japanese corporate executives. For almost all online businesses, victory or defeat often rests on the success or failure of SEO. I can think of no business where these principals apply more closely than in a space where battles are fought more fiercely than in any other field of business. A single position short of your target may cost tens of thousands and may, ultimately, cost you not only your job, but also the jobs of your entire team. This article explores the fundamental principles laid out in the first three chapters of the Art of War, these are: Laying Plans, Waging War and Attack by Stratagem. (A free downloadable version of all 13 chapters of the Art of War (iGaming SEO editions) will be made available at: http://artofwar.biz.) These ancient military methods make up the basis of my own personal approach to SEO and I advise taking time to understand

iGB Affiliate June/july 2011

and apply Sun Tzu’s principals in the context of your business. I have purposefully remained as close to the original text as possible; in many instances, the original translation required no alteration as the principals conveyed are universal.

Chapter 1: Laying Plans Sun Tzu said: “The Art of War is of vital importance to the state. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence, it is a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.” The art of war, then, is governed by five constant factors, to be applied to one’s deliberations, when seeking to determine the conditions in the field. These are: ●● The Moral Law ●● Heaven ●● Earth ●● The Commander ●● Method and Discipline The Moral Law or business culture driven from the top down is a state of mind and appears intangible, but this drives the rest of the business to be in complete alignment

with the CEO and his vision, so that they will follow him without question. Heaven signifies the changing environmental conditions, originally referring to weather and seasons, day and night. In the context of doing battle in SEO, they refer to quality signals, ranking factors, filters, algorithms, infrastructure updates such as ‘caffeine’ and, for instance, how this will impact the size of the search engine’s index or average crawl rates. While at any single point in time any one of these factors remains constant and inescapable, they are also subject to change without notice or prior warning. Earth originally referred to distances, great and small; danger and security; open ground and narrow passes; the chances of life and death. However, in the context of ‘Laying SEO Plans’ they may be considered as follows: your current rankings (in SERPs) in relation to your objectives, the norms and tolerances within your target query and SERP, even the quality of the traffic driven by your chosen keyword. Since this impacts the battlefield, lucrative keywords often cause the ground to become heavy and difficult

to either cross or fight upon without depleting budget or resource. The Commander: your Head of SEO/SEO Manager, whether in-house or external, their skill, experience, courage and strictness. Methods of Discipline originally referenced the marshalling of the army in its proper divisions. This refers to your business processes, budgetary control, team structure and potential for internal career progression as well as external relationships with link brokers and webmasters or, indeed, anyone who assists in the supply of battle ordinance in whatever form that may be. These five factors should be familiar to every SEO: if you know them, you’ll win; if you don’t, then you’ll lose. Therefore, when you are deliberating the competitive landscape, use these questions as the basis of comparison: ●● Which of the competing CEOs would have their entire team follow fearlessly, if only just to experience the outcome? ●● Between two competing businesses, which of the SEO Heads has the most ability? ●● With whom lie the advantages derived from Heaven and Earth? ●● On which side is discipline most rigorously enforced? ●● Which team is stronger? ●● On which side are managers and executives more highly trained? ●● In which team is there greater constancy both in reward and punishment? It is from these seven considerations that you will be able to accurately forecast victory or defeat in your SEO efforts. The SEO who takes this on-board and acts on it will win; you should hire such an SEO. The SEO who does not act upon it will be defeated; you should fire such an SEO. Additionally, you should be mindful and take advantage of any helpful circumstances which present themselves and modify your plans where appropriate. These include the renegotiation of commercial deals where changes in circumstances occur. All SEO is based on deception. Hence, when you practice black hat, let it be known you are a practitioner of the purest white hat; when you are buying sponsored posts, make it appear that you are guest blogging; when you buy premium placed links, make it appear that you earned the links; when you have a big budget, make it appear that your budget is small; if you are a fat old guy approaching webmasters for links via email or chat, make them believe you are a hot young blonde. De-optimise your on-page SEO and create the illusion that you are no longer

a threat; once the link agreement with the competitor is formalised, re-optimise and crush him. ●● If your competitor’s link equity, budget or domain network is superior to yours, don’t compete directly. ●● If your opponent is easy irritated, wind him right up! ●● Pretend to be weak, so that he grows arrogant and prone to mistakes. Mistakes lead to penalties. ●● If your opponent is resting, don’t let him. Instead, invite him out for tequila shots. ●● If his team is united, separate it. ●● Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected. If you are going to win using these methods, ensure that all your plans are held in the strictest confidence, starting with yourself and your team and finishing with all your suppliers and associates. Non-disclosure agreements (where possible) are crucial. Now, the SEO who wins the battle makes many calculations before the battle is fought; competitor intelligence, required link volumes, cost per link, cost of deploying a link, margin of error, estimated traffic, average lifetime value, estimated payback period of a player, annual link cost, inflation of link costs, cumulative cost of renewals, team salaries and annual pay review expectations and anticipated performance bonus pay outs. The SEO who loses a battle doesn’t do their calculations beforehand. Doing your calculations leads to victory and not doing them leads to defeat. Attention to detail at these planning stages gives the best indication of whether or not you will succeed.

Chapter 2: Waging War Sun Tzu said: “In the operations of war, there are in the field a thousand swift chariots, as many heavy chariots and a hundred thousand mail-clad soldiers.” The business expenditure including staff salaries, agency fees, office space, computers, content, tracking software, accounting and payroll, competitor intelligence as well as link budgets, placement and administrative costs will reach as much as tens of thousands of pounds per month. Such is the cost of delivering above-the-fold rankings for a sought after primary iGaming keyword. When you engage in actual link building, if page one rankings are long in coming, then your budgets will be depleted and your team’s enthusiasm will be dampened. Whether you are laying siege to page one or position one, you will exhaust your strength. Again, if the campaign

is protracted, your budget will not be sufficient to equal the strain. Now, when your link tenancies require renewal, your passion and enthusiasm dampened and your link budget depleted, other affiliates and operators will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. No SEO, however skilled, will be able to avoid the disaster which must ensue. Thus, though we have heard of stupid haste in SEO, cleverness has never been associated with long delays. There is no instance of a business having benefited from an overly prolonged campaign. It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of SEO that can thoroughly understand the profitable way to conduct it. The skilful SEO does not request more budget from the CFO, neither is the frequency of his sponsored posts increased more than twice. Find your own links and identify the powerful ones which make up the link profile of your competitors to ensure your team has enough link equity for its needs. If your marketing budget is stretched, leverage the existing relationships of an experienced link builder with abundant contacts in your market and territory. Poverty in your accounts causes your campaign to be maintained by contributions from a distance. Contributing to the maintenance of your campaign at a distance causes the team to be exhausted and dismayed. You have two choices when running an international campaign: you either invest in local natives with existing webmaster and link broker relationships, or you do it the hard way i.e. you assign the work to your existing team, who will struggle and make no progress to the cost of your budget and their enthusiasm. Note: I’ve heard it said that SEO isn’t a job; it’s a well-paid competitive sport, and this is so true. For this reason, state of mind is crucial. One enthusiastic team member is worth ten emotionally broken team members. The local presence of major brands competing in a developing market causes link prices to escalate; and high prices cause your budget to be depleted. This will generally impact the affiliates before it impacts the operators – relationships, negotiation skills and buying power will offset this inflation, offering an advantage to those who hire SEO heads who are wellconnected, skilled negotiators with large databases of link sellers and international local resource. A wise SEO makes a point of foraging the competitor’s links, resource and suppliers; just one of your competitors’ link brokers could be worth a thousand links.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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Now, in order to destroy the competitor, your team must be roused with anger, however, in order to make his defeat compelling to your team, they must be rewarded. Therefore, when targets are met in SEO, those who hit them should be rewarded. Our own positions in the SERPs should displace those of the competition and the competing site’s link profile should be mingled with ours. Poached suppliers and staff should be looked after and well treated. This is called “using the conquered foe to augment one’s own strength”. In SEO, let your objective be victory, not lengthy campaigns. Thus, it may be known that the leader of an SEO team is the arbiter of the people’s fate, the man on whom it depends whether the business shall be in peace or in peril.

chapter 3: attack by stratagem Sun Tzu said: “In the practical art of war, the best thing of all is to take the enemy’s country whole and intact; to shatter and destroy is not so good.” So too, is it better to acquire a domain or brand than displace it; to poach your opposition’s key staff, than to allow them to drift off into another industry or company. To some degree (where possible), this also applies to the acquisition of any asset, including Twitter accounts, fan pages, etc. Too often are company assets such as these technically the property of individual staff members rather than the company, since they emerged at a time when no-one really understood the importance of these platforms. Hence, to fight and conquer in all your SEO battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists of breaking the competitor’s resistance without placing a single link, potentially through acquisition of intact real estate or through acquisition and link equity purely for redirection. As such, the highest form of SEO strategy is to repeatedly counter-attack based on the moves and stratagem of the competitor. The next is to isolate your competitor from his allies; the next is to attack when your competitor is at full strength. In particular, if you are trying to overcome a publicly traded company at the beginning of their financial year for a major casino term; this is likely to lead to a Pyrrhic victory. When taking position number one from your competitor, the commercial impact to

iGB Affiliate June/July 2011

your competitor is greatest; you should be prepared for retaliation proportional to their loss in revenue. The worst policy of all is to besiege a heavily fortified number one position. The rule is to not besiege these ‘walled cities’ if it can possibly be avoided. The preparation of links can take up to three months to prepare and the acquisition of sites for link equity redirection may take three months more. The SEO unable to control his irritation will deploy his links and/or redirects before sufficient link equity has been accrued. Many of them will have no impact and the position remains untaken, such is the disastrous effect of such a siege. Therefore, the most skilful SEO subdues his opponent without buying links; he carefully displaces his competitor’s rankings, without laying siege to his prized and heavily defended number one ranking – he overthrows their market dominance without a lengthy campaign. With his team and suppliers enthused and intact, without losing a single site to a penalty, he will dominate the market, covering a wealth of page one positions for a multitude of short-tail prized keywords. This is the method of attacking by stratagem. It is the rule of SEO war that if your budget is ten times that of the competitor, surround him. Acquire the key web properties from which he derives most domain authority. Approach his link suppliers and assign head hunters to his staff (be sure to recruit the right people when acquiring personnel). Identify their link suppliers and brokers and commercially lock your competitor out of their own supply chain. “If five to one, attack him”. Pull together all your resources and deploy a timed campaign to generate the maximum possible link velocity. Spend one or even two months preparing links, redirects, PR (where applicable), all your legacy link bait, and deploy it all using sufficient anchor text and target URL diversity in a condensed period of time. If you are twice as well resourced as your competitor, divide the resource into two. Use one half working towards positively impacting your position, and the other team to focus on negatively impacting your competitor’s position. This approach aims to double your relative velocity, bringing victory in half the time. “If equally matched, we can offer battle”,

but only the most experienced SEO should consider this. He will have to use the sum total of his experience, skill and cunning if he is to win under these conditions. “If slightly inferior in numbers, we can avoid the enemy”. In the original text, the translation of this statement is ambiguous. Asian military scholars have suggested that it is better translated as ‘watch the enemy’ since guerrilla tactics would be the natural course of action. “If quite unequal in every way, we can flee from him”. I often say, ‘picking a keyword is picking a fight; don’t pick a fight unless you know you can win’. In this instance, you should never attempt to engage in optimising for a keyword for which you are in no position to seriously compete. You would be better investing in other marketing activities, which would yield some return, however small.

To reiterate... Always seek professional advice before hiring an SEO agency or hiring an in-house practitioner. ●● Picking a keyword is picking a fight. ●● Don’t pick a fight unless you’re sure you can win.

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 to download your free copy of the art of War (iGaming SEO edition) go to: http://artOfWar.biz. Having worked in Search marketing for over 12 years and having earned multiple awards and honours, today, Paul Reilly is regarded by as one of the UK’s most influential SEOs, and is the first port of call for almost all iGaming brands. Paul is widely known in the iGaming and SEO industries for his previous work in building the world’s most effective and technologically advanced SEO department. He is the founder of mediaskunkworks. com, a new generation service provider which has built its reputation on innovation and optimised methodologies which dissect the traditional agency model.

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AFFILIATE WEBSITE CRITIQUES This article is all about affiliate reviews and critiquing your website. If you are having problems with your website, either in terms of generating traffic or converting it, I might be able to help. The following seven affiliates submitted their websites to have them reviewed. Some issues overlap so I didn’t give all sites the same amount of attention for a critique while a few of those submitted have less issues to deal with and represent model websites. At the end of this article, I’ll share a few basic tools that you can use to see what your competitors are doing that, perhaps, you should be doing too. By John wright, Affiliate Coach at GamingAffiliatesGuide.com.

CasinOXOnline Website RevieW <h1>¡Bienvenido!</h1> The h1 tag was also the dice/dado.jpg image. The h2 tag was not used <h3>Oferta del Mes</h3> The homepage h1 tag should include what is in the page title as ranking for Bienvenido is not really what this page is about nor is it an appropriate search term. The tags are used almost perfectly on the other pages including review pages. One issue is that the h3 tag is the same on all pages for Oferta del Mes. This shouldn’t be h1, h2 or h3.

design and conversion issues

http://casinoxonline.com/ PageRank: ......................................................................................................................................................0 Content Management System (CMS): .................................................. Joomla Online since:...................................................................................................December 2010 Number of links: ................................................................................................................................ 73

GPwa useR, nico84, asked to have three of their sites reviewed. I usually review one site only but, in this case, the other sites were helpful in finding some common problems that are probably hurting search engine results. This affiliate is targeting Spanish markets worldwide which, in theory, have far less competition for online casinos and reviews than what you will see in English. One of their other sites is onlinecasinos.pl and I used this website to see if I could find common problems.

duplicate content issues ● First duplicate content issue: url canonicalization problem The problem is http://casinoxonline.com has the same content as www.casinoxonline.com. Most webmasters are not aware that this is a problem but, technically, this represents two domains both having the same content. The best solution is to choose one url structure you want and use a 301 redirect. For a quick read on this issue visit Matt Cutt’s blog post here: http://www.mattcutts.com/ blog/seo-advice-url-canonicalization/.

Having the domain in the page title isn’t exactly important and having it twice only makes it worse, in my opinion. If you are using an SEO plug-in for Joomla you can either keep the domain out of the page names or if you prefer to use it, I personally recommend having it at the end rather than at the start. Remember; if someone is searching for “casino titan reseña” then this is what the user should expect to see in the search engines where your page titles show up as the link in the results pages.

● Second duplicate content issue: recycling content I checked the other domain, onlinecasinos.pl, and found that this affiliate is using identical content across multiple websites. The casino review sections all use the same review text and some of the blogs/posts are also identical. Search engines in general will tend to devalue content that is copied and reproduced. The best solution to this problem is to take all three websites and ensure that for one casino review, like Titan Casino, that you have three different reviews written up. Although it will take more time to have two more reviews written per casino, this will ensure your websites are constructed with quality; something Google wants to see more of and will reward accordingly. On the onlinecasinos.pl review page for Titan Casino, this is not only an opportunity for improving your rankings but also your conversion process. Put a Chilean flag somewhere in the content that says ‘Chilean players accepted’ and put all the banking methods available for that specific country. Either way, if this issue isn’t fixed it could result in having your sites removed entirely from Google

h1, h2, h3 tags

Quick ﬁx solution

On the homepage, I viewed the page source to find out what is used in the code and here is what I found:

Assuming that casinoxonline.com is your number one authority site, update the onlinecasinos.pl review pages and add text stating

improving page titles ● Current homepage format CasinoXonline.com – ¡Los mejores casinos para jugar online! – CasinoXonline.com ● Suggested homepage format Los mejores casinos para jugar online

I will keep this short. Although the Joomla template used isn’t bad, the top part of the website has too much redundant space. Either a banner could be listed in this space, other links or, simply, the size could be reduced. Since this header area and logo takes up so much space it means the user always has to look below to find what they want.

iGB Affiliate June/July 2011

that those casinos accept Chilean players. Add in a good paragraph and link back to the ‘original’ review page on your authority site.

best solution Re-write the review pages completely on the other domains so that each domain has its own unique and original review. If time and resources are an issue, then do the quick fix solution immediately You can read Google’s say on the issue of duplicate content with suggestions on how to fix these problems at: http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer. py?hl=en&answer=66359. Last but not least, the blog posts should be a little more consistent and if you don’t update anything on your website for over a month, then your rankings might get pushed down further and, equally important, your users might notice and abandon you for another portal. Also, the site needs more links; most of the links are currently signature links from GPWA. Work to get more links and look for quality.

e-sPORtbets Website RevieW

POKeRneWsbOy Website RevieW Pokernewsboy.com PageRank: ................................................................................................................................ 3 Content Management System (CMS): ................. WordPress Online since: .......................................................... 2009 Number of links: ...................................................................................................2340

THis siTe is VeRY difficuLT to critique and, if anything, is a model affiliate site. The design of the site is well organised and everything is fairly easy to scan and navigate. The most important thing is that this site is called Poker News Boy and the first thing I notice on the website is poker news posts. This may sound obvious but you would be surprised at how many affiliate sites have a keyword based domain name where the website content and features have nothing to do with that keyword. I like the mascot used in the footer; I would recommend having him at the top to give the site an even better impression for the first time visitors.

duplicate content with excerpts Either your CMS is automatically generating these excerpts and copying them from the original blog posts or you are copying them in yourself. This might only be three to five sentences of duplicate content but I recommend you take all future excerpts and write them to keep them customised. This will mean your homepage and blog posts won’t ever share much duplicate content.

POKeRutility Website RevieW http://e-sportbets.org PageRank: ..................................................................................................................................2 Content Management System (CMS): ................... WordPress Online since:................................................................................................................ 2009 Number of links: ......................................................................................................... 850

THis is an affiLiaTe to whom I am currently offering direct coaching advice. In short, one of the things we worked on changing was to remove sources of duplicate content on the website by shortening the excerpts on the blog posts. In addition, the excerpts are now customised to ensure the content on the homepage and on the individual blog pages remains unique and not duplicated. We also worked on changing the h2 tags used by the WordPress widgets. H2 title tags should be used for your content but designers and coders commonly misuse these. For the blog posts, we suggested to add more calls-to-action especially in the middle of the articles to try to improve conversions. The text also makes use of h2 and h3 title tags, plus use of ‘bolding’ to highlight keywords and better interlinking.

pokerutility.com PageRank: ...................................................................................................................................0 Online since:................................................................................................................. 2009 Number of links: ......................................................................................................... 100

some of the previous suggestions about h1, h2 and h3 title tags might apply on this site. For example, if you have a page called ‘Free Tools’ and the page title is ‘Free Poker Tools’ then it would help to have the page title inside the text with the same or similar text. I searched this page just for ‘free tools’ and it was only found once on the link. The same goes for data-mining. Try to include the text of the keywords in your pages if you want to rank for them.

iGB Affiliate June/July 2011

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Online Casino City Website Review

The Slots Cafe Website Review

Http://online.casinocity.com PageRank:.......................................................................5 Online since:.............................................................1995 Number of links: ..................................................109,000

theslotscafe.com PageRank:....................................................................................................................................0 Online since:.................................................................................................................. 2010 Number of links:........................................................................................................... 100

This website is almost a case of ‘if it isn’t broken then don’t fix it’. The one thing I could suggest, which is more of a user interface improvement, is to keep a similar design, perhaps touch up some of the buttons, menu backgrounds, etc. What I think could be fixed is some of the layout and CSS code. For users that have large screens, the layout of the website looks disorganised as some of the modules like ‘Most popular online casinos’ and ‘Weekly Newsletter’ start to stretch out leaving large areas of white space. Aside from that, this website doesn’t need much changed at all.

I notice in the text that I cannot click on anything or highlight it. Maybe this is a plug-in you are using to prevent copied content but, personally, I don’t think this is a good plug-in to use. If people really want to copy your content, they will, and it will most likely happen with robots. Overall, I just think you’ll annoy your users more than you’ll prevent someone from copying your content. On top of that, I cannot tell if your links are actually clickable by real users in the content. I see orange text, red text, blue text and even bright yellow which I can’t read. I see that orange is the only link but not blue and I don’t think this is intuitive for the user. Try to stick to some standards that most users are used to like blue links and use of bold, underline, italics and red. On the homepage, you have a stapled blog post to welcome the visitors but this content also appears on that individual blog page which is resulting in duplicate content. I would keep a very close eye on your comments and I noticed they are available on pages and blog posts. For pages, I personally don’t recommend having these available and I also recommend removing most links associated with comments. I see some comments on review pages that I am confident were generated by robots.

Tournament Terminator Website Review tournamentterminator.com PageRank:..................................................................................................................................... 2 CMS:............................................................................ WordPress (ArrasTheme) Online since:.................................................................................................................... 2009 Number of links:............................................................................................................. 407

Organise your links I can’t find too much to change as the site is fairly well put together and organises content well. Some suggestions for improvements would be to remove comments in your posts since most of the time you’ll be flooded with spam. Some good pages to produce would be reviews of the poker rooms you list as this becomes additional content you can rank for and it can help conversions. Also, try adding some 468x60 or 728x90 banners in your post. You can try testing a banner in the bottom footer to see if it improves conversions. I had a quick look at the link portfolio and without looking at the quality of links alone, I would suggest working on building more links. I also didn’t see any social media links or couldn’t find a twitter account for Tournament Terminator. A few accounts can easily be created to give you a bit of extra traffic that is not only free but easy to auto-generate with some popular WordPress plug-ins like Twitter Tools. This also gives you a free link in the process.

Conclusions and recommended tools

<?php //Header( “HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently” ); Header( “Location: http://youraffiliateprogramlink.com/ pageid=1234889” ); ?>

Yahoo Site Explorer

SEMRush

examples is to know when you might have

https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com Use this tool to find out the link portfolios and number of pages a website has.

http://www.semrush.com/ Find out what you or your competitors are ranking for.

duplicate content and work on getting more

SEO Quake Toolbar

links for your site. Just remember that you

http://www.seoquake.com/ Something all webmasters should use, this tool allows you to get an SEO diagnosis on your competitors.

The two big things to take away from these

can always use Yahoo Site Explorer as a tool to find out what your competition has done for their link campaigns.

I see you are using direct affiliate links when you promote a casino. I would recommend you organise all your links into one folder. You might have noticed on some sites that they will have domain.com/go/allslots-casino for their link. If BrightShare told you tomorrow that you need to update all your links then it is best to update a small number of links at a time instead of changing hundreds all over your website. So open up a text editor and you can add this file into a go folder:

iGB Affiliate June/july 2011

John Wright is an Affiliate Coach. He can be reached at john@gamingaffiliatesguide.com.

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How to implement SEO in your website’s creation process. SEO is undeniably beneficial after a website has been built, but the implementation of SEO in a website’s creation process is far more effective. As we would like to make a good first impression in real life, so our websites should make a positive impact when the search engine crawlers visit them for the first time. Indeed, all that is done wrong at the beginning has to be corrected later, which will cost more money, resources and time.

The beginning Typically, new websites are created to generate income. Make sure that you are unique and that you do something better than your competition – be special. When you have your idea, the next step should be to plan your website structure, and here is where we start to talk about implementing SEO strategies.

strategy, you have defined your roadmap for the future structure of your website, as well as your future goals and direction. Always bear in mind that your website will develop to a greater extent when it grows naturally.

Domain name There are a variety of opinions about choosing the right domain name. You have plenty of choices; for example, getting a keyword domain (live-blackjack-casinos. com); getting an expired domain; getting a domain that has already been ‘live’ (to use its existing history to hit the ground running); or registering a new domain and branding it (lbjack.com). One special recommendation; I would get a holding page online as soon as possible, one that has text describing what you intend to develop on your site. Having this means that you can start building links earlier and earn your website some history.

Keyword strategies Let’s say you have targeted a niche gambling market such as ‘Live Blackjack Casinos’ and you are asking yourself, ‘what will the user type in the search engines to find me?’ You will likely get to the conclusion that there are many possibilities. Let’s consider that you are not alone in this market and there are older websites ranking at number one for the ‘best’ generic keywords. One strategy might be to target your homepage with these keywords, but on more of a long-term basis and with a focus on longer keywords where it should be easier to achieve relatively good rankings quickly. By working out your keyword

iGB Affiliate June/july 2011

Website structure Having carried out your keyword research, you now know where you want to start, what content your page should have from the beginning and what sections might be added in the future. Try to think in categories to structure your content: ●● Cars ●● Sports cars ●● Ferrari ●● Mercedes ●● Lexus ●● Bentley ●● BMW ●● Helicopters

There is never just one way of categorising a topic; in the previous example, we could also have taken the brands as top category instead of vehicle type. When you have written down your structure, analyse its ability to adapt for future developments. The next step is to implement the internal linking structure into your overview. Usually, if you have done a good job, you should have included all of your keywords into a hierarchy, which should make it very easy to implement logical links, for users and search engines, which contain your targeted keywords as anchor text. You might include additional elements like tags (blue cars, two doors, big trunk) to find even more ways to interlink between related web pages on your website.

SEO design template Bringing your ideas and structures into a format which is optimised for both crawlers and your target audience is the next challenge. Often, designers, programmers and SEOs (and, indeed, CEOs) have very different opinions about what elements should take priority. I can only recommend that you follow the basic guidelines of a clear template structure: ●● Navigation machine readable (DHTML

and CSS) ●● JavaScript only for non-search relevant

parts of the websites ●● Good implementation of site

elements (navigation, content, sitebar, advertisements)

“Link building is, perhaps, the most difficult and enduring part of your SEO strategy.” ●● Headings (h1, h2, h3) ●● Title tags containing the keywords you

want to rank for ●● Good use of meta-tags (especially

canonical and description) ●● Implementation of images using correct

file names and alt-tags ●● Avoid duplicate content issues

Of course, there are many more elements that could be mentioned, like the robots. txt, sitemaps, the robots-meta tag, among others. There are a number of guides on the Internet that can help you in this regard; even Google’s Webmaster Central Blog is a handy resource.

Link building This is, perhaps, the most difficult and enduring part of your SEO strategy. There are countless ways to get links pointing to your websites, some of which are not exactly popular in the eyes of Google – like

excessive link exchanges and link buying – but, nevertheless, can be part of your link acquiring strategy because one thing is for sure: without links, it is very unlikely that you will achieve top rankings. Making bad decisions with your link building strategy can lead to severe punishment and even de-rankings from Google. If you are not sure what to do, I always recommend consulting an expert. As a basic guideline, you should never forget that the process of building links should be as natural as possible. If you think, ‘hey, this link or website looks very suspicious to me’, than it probably does to Google as well, and you do not want to be connected (via links) to this type of website. If you need help with any of these steps do not hesitate to consult an SEO specialist. I have seen more than one website which has been doomed from the very start, all because SEO has been neglected in the site’s development.

Kay Schaefer is Founder of KSOM.es. Kay studied business administration and marketing before he settled on Internet marketing and SEO in 2004. His main specialty is improving a company’s search engine visibility using creative and unique link building strategies. His client portfolio includes companies in online gaming and other industries outside of gaming. In 2007, he started building his own SEO company and currently resides in Barcelona, Spain. http://en.ksom.es

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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Top SEO Tips for 2011 – Post Panda

There are many basic-to-advanced SEO tactics that you can read in earlier versions of Top 12 SEO Tips for 2006-2007 that are still spot-on in terms of the current state of SEO. This year, though, I timed it right with the Panda Update being released in February. AFTER A MAJOR update, I would normally get together with a bunch of other SEO freaks and do some testing to get real data to back my conclusions. This time, however, the research was already done. The same things work now that worked four or five years ago, just in a different proportion. Most of my 2011 SEO top tips directly relate to the Panda Update in some way because the basis behind this update is, in my mind, saturating the amount of information utilised to establish the most relevant pages in Google. The search giant is doing this with Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI), social media and information from third-party bookmarking companies like Furl, Facebook and Reddit. This makes it much harder for SEOs to manipulate the results, and easier for Google to identify sites attempting to engineer the results in their favour; companies like Furl, Facebook and Reddit.

Latent Semantic Indexing I’ve spoken many times in the past on LSI. It’s used by all three search engines, started years ago for various reasons, and now it is being injected into Google’s algorithm

more than ever before in the newest release of the ‘Panda’ or ‘Farmer’ update. Unlike the ‘Jagger’ or the ‘Caffeine’ updates, this directly targets sites by using LSI along with other triggers. For those of you that don’t live and breathe all things SEO, LSI is best defined thus: “Latent semantic indexing allows a search engine to determine what a page is about outside of specifically matching search query text. By placing additional weight on related words in content, LSI has a net effect of lowering the value of pages which only match the specific term and do not back it up with related terms.” That was SEO Guru Aaron Wall’s description and probably the best one when put into ‘layman’s terms’. Over the last four years, LSI has been in nearly half of the conferences at which I have had the opportunity to speak but, unfortunately, only by me it seemed. I started talking about it back when the ‘Minus 950’ penalty hit in one month and Universal Search was released the next. At that time, I told of Google buying a US-based company named Applied Semantics in April of 2003 to further its research on algorithms. Google even

talked about the residual integration of LSI publicly. So did MSN and Yahoo!. Yahoo! even applied for a patent on its own version. The odd thing was, although these conferences were considered advanced (gaming, affiliate and SEO), no-one else was talking about it. Google has been testing LSI in speech recognition software, cross-language document retrieval and search engine integration, as well as many others, for a long time. It’s a bit scary when you think about it. The military used this stuff to identify terrorist chat amidst billions of spoken words in a short timeframe. When you apply this powerful tool to search, you reduce the potential of engineered results from guys like me – SEOs. Because it looks at relative terms, it makes it a thousand times harder to ‘game’ the algorithm because of the number of terms that could be considered relative. Apply this to environments like social networks, add in sloppy linguistics, slang, native language and a little local salt and you can get a lot of variables. That’s the data Google has at its disposal to analyse. Even scarier when you consider that Google gets its information from everything you do. Ever think about

iGB Affiliate June/July 2011

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“Google gets its information from everything you do. Ever think about the fact that Google Gmail serves up AdSense ads that have some relevance to the actual content in your email?” the fact that Google Gmail serves up AdSense ads that have some relevance to the actual content in your email? Techniques like buying links with relative anchor text takes on a whole mew meaning when you add LSI into the mix. I personally think that with all the data Google has now collected, it can finally utilise the findings of Applied Semantics and build its own sort of ‘Semantic Synonym’ dictionary and use it as an algorithmic plug-in at will.

Source: Smart Insights Digital Marketing It makes sense that Google would use this ability and possibly even have a knob to turn it up or down. The easiest way to reduce the ability of SEOs to manipulate the results is to spread the area (or add the information) into the playing field and water down their ability. At the same time, it may truly have started its way toward delivering a top-notch set of results. Universal Search was meant to do this back in 2007 and although it helped to jumble the type of results, there were too many blogs, articles and, undoubtedly, spammy sites too. They have been tweaking it ever since, and average one update per day. So the significance of LSI or Longtail keyword targeting is now a huge part of life and although it seems daunting, successful SEO can still be broken down into manageable terms. It may require

iGB Affiliate June/july 2011

that you outsource much of the grinding work (like content writing) but much of the tasks I paid tens of thousands to get accomplished over the past ten years have been automated. There are a few new elements like Social Media, Web 2.0 and Social Bookmarking but even these can be managed. There’s one other thing that really needs to be pointed out. Before April 12, the playing field was dominated and even though it still is to a point, the long-tail variable in Google has opened the gates for people that have struggled in the past. Here are the facts: 25 percent of all searches are first time searches. That is a stunning statistic. When you combine that fact, and, if you are measured on conversions and conversion rates in whatever you do, then this next statistic will really open your eyes. 60 percent of all conversions come from this 25 percent. That’s a conversion rate of 15 percent. When you consider the average conversion rate across all sectors is between three to five percent and in gaming it’s 1.5 to 2 percent, 15 percent sounds pretty good doesn’t it? Well, you would think. When I get ambitious SMEs (small and medium enterprises) or Top FTSE/Fortune 500 companies questioning whether or not an investment in a SEO, PPC and social media mix for 12 months is worth the risk, it “twists me melon” (I live in Yorkshire, England and have been trying to fit that in somewhere – but coming from an American, it just doesn’t sound right). From what other investment can you be out of the red in six to 12 months? What business school did these people go to? Whether it’s gaming, forex, binary options, memory foam mattresses or pet supplies, you can make money very quickly when SEO, PPC, social media and conversion optimisation are implemented correctly. It has always been a ‘sure bet’ scenario, but now, the Farmer Update has

increased these odds. If you are an Affiliate, this is huge because we have always targeted longtail, or had to target long-tail because of big investment and/or brand protection in PPC. So where some feel this will hurt them, look at it this way: affiliates have always delivered 40 percent of the income of any given company regardless of sector since time (Internet time that is) began, and this will not change. Plenty of the top super affiliate websites have had good content and are neck-deep in social media and everything I have suggested to this point for some time now. Have a look at BingoPort; they are both Top Notch SEOs and social media strategists. To finish on this thought; if you haven’t financially prepared yourself for a 12 month building process then you shouldn’t be investing in what you see as such a highrisk endeavour. Some will get top ten very quickly depending on the niche, and most will start to offset the expenses almost immediately using PPC but its now going to take a bit longer and take more effort. This article is an excerpt from Gary Beal’s Top 12 SEO Tips for 2011. Stay tuned to the new iGB Affiliate website for the full version.

Gary R Beal is the Head of Search for Blueclaw Media and has been in the Search Engine Optimisation field for 15 years. He attended Ohio State University in the US and holds a Masters Degree in Biometrics and Mathematical Statistics. He specialises in SEO for very competitive markets; primarily in gaming, dating, travel, insurance and financial industries.

TRAFFIC

…who in the land has the strongest global SEO strategy of them all? ENSURING YOUR WEBSITE gets noticed in a foreign market can be tough work. Local competition, linguistic barriers and cultural differences can all contribute to the success or failure of your website’s international reach. Here are three top tips to ensure online success in the competitive global marketplace:

1. Localisation First and foremost, all search engines – from Google through to Baidu in China and Yandex in Russia – prefer localisation. In order to perform well in competitive markets you need to analyse both your local and global competition in each target market. For example, some search engines prefer that sites are hosted locally, with country-specific domain names.

the globe. The below SNS Chart shows that global Social Networking platforms are as varied as the people using them. For example, in China, QQ.com is by far the most popular social networking site, whereas, our good old friends Facebook and Twitter are banned. To maximise the effects of social media marketing, make sure that your social media strategy is specifically tailored to the region and market you are targeting. When it comes to taking your website to a foreign market, the one key fact to

remember is that localisation is the most important part of international search engine optimisation and marketing. Every country uses the Internet and searches differently, and the differences can be huge. By researching the culture, the language, and the political and religious views of a region, as well as the Internet trends, businesses will be able to develop an effective and successful online marketing strategy for the market they are aiming for. Global success doesn’t have to be a fairy tale.

Gobal Social Networking Platforms

2. Don’t just translate your keywords – think like your target audience Don’t base keyword research solely on translations from English to a particular language, neither for PPC nor SEO. Oban recently found that there was a ‘perfect’ German translation of a particular technology term but it registered only 140 monthly searches. Our German team identified an alternative term, which had over 40,000 searches a month.

3. Socialise efficiently – it’s not all Facebook and Twitter Social Media can be a great marketing tool, however, it is used very differently across JONATHAN MURPHY is a senior account manager at OBAN Multilingual with a strong background in international media and advertising and a particular focus in search marketing. At OBAN, Jonathan is responsible for consulting on global search campaigns and strategising across various forms of marketing such as PPC, SEO, social media and cultural multivariate testing.

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

You can meet the OBAN Multilingual team at the iGaming Super Show from May 24 to 26. Besides solutions for International SEO strategies, Oban Multilingual will be presenting their unique cultural conversion testing tool Global Maxer. One lucky visitor will get the opportunity to win a FULLY MANAGED three month trial campaign FOR FREE (value at least £15,000). Look out for the face of global search. If you are interested in more information about effective International SEO for your business, please feel free to contact us anytime or visit our website on www.obanmultilingual.com.

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Understanding information retrieval for greater revenue potential. When it comes to the topic of keyword research, there is plenty of advice and written guidance, tools, tactics and resources available. In my opinion, much of this information is flawed, not insofar as questioning the accuracy of the data, but more from the perspective of motive and methodology. It is my opinion (and regular finding) that with poorly conducted keyword research there is exclusive reliance on the quantitative method, with little-to-no understanding of the science of information retrieval. In essence, too much emphasis is placed on finding keywords in isolation (chosen because they may be relevant, drive suitable volume and are competitive to a level we’re willing to engage in) without any thought as to the qualitative interplay between keyword ‘query types’, and how such interplay drives revenue.

What are query types? Information retrieval (IR) is the division of computer sciences that focuses on the retrieval of information from large bodies of content, including the web. In particular, when it comes to the retrieval of information from the web, search engine data and computer scientists studying such data – it refers to four query types into which keywords (or search queries) could be classified. Informational: queries that are broad in nature and corresponding results-sets. We cannot infer a great deal about user intent; for example, ‘poker’ may be a query I would use if I wanted to learn how to play poker. Navigational: queries that set a defined target (‘Amazon’ or ‘Sky News’). Again, we cannot always infer too much about user intent here, however, we do know where they intend to achieve their objective. Transactional: queries that reflect an action-driven user-intent, for example, ‘rent holiday home’, or ‘no deposit bingo sign-up’. Connective: queries that seek to identify specific information about the nature of indexed data. However, ‘link:[sitename]’ ‘site:[sitename]’ are not commonly used by most search engine users.

Query types and the purchase funnel The concept of a ‘purchase funnel’ is a commonly used marketing model which is not web-specific, but looks at the stages of a consumer purchase decision. Whilst variations and expanded models exist, a commonly used purchase funnel would encompass the following stages:

Figure 1: Purchase Funnel

Common sense alone tells us that different query types are analogous to different stages of the purchase funnel as shown in Figure 1. Informational query types such as ‘bingo’ or ‘bingo offers’ may be considered relevant for the awarenessto-refinement stages; navigational queries ‘[merchant name] bingo’, ‘[merchant name] bingo sign-up offer’ may fit in any of the refinement-to-purchase stages, and our transactional term types ‘play [merchant name] bingo’, ‘join online bingo website’, fit primarily at the end of the decision stage and firmly in the purchase phase. In addition to common sense, click/ conversion-attribution studies support this; as does our own attribution modelling and advanced data analysis at theMediaFlow. Which is all why probability distribution and the oft-mentioned SEO wisdom of targeting a range of short and long-tail keywords, lacks efficacy as a keyword strategy.

Why probability distribution (volume and competition) is a flawed basis for keyword research Our use of the terms ‘long-tail’ and ‘short-tail’ keywords derives from probability distribution which, if envisaged, may be imagined as a comet shape. Shorttail keywords are (probabilistically) fewer in number, though volume (and competition) is high, whereas long-tail keywords stretch to an indeterminate length, with almost infinite variations on query length and make-up (though volume and competition decrease). Choosing to research and identify keyword targets that sit across the short to long-tail spectrum, purely because of volume and competition considerations is fundamentally flawed in two ways: 1. Understanding data in this way has volume and competition as its objective. I’m not sure about you, but my primary objective when practising SEO is revenue.

Sure, volume and competition levels have a contributory impact to revenue but my choice should not be led by volume and competition considerations. 2. U nderstanding data in this way has a ‘single visit’ mentality. Targeting short-tail terms because they are high volume, plus long-tail terms because they are low volume (yet less competitive) does not take into account the relationship between the term types. Long-tail queries of a transactional nature do not tend to magically materialise in the mind of a customer. I need to research ‘online bingo’ and ‘online bingo site offers’ before I am aware of the existence of ‘[merchant name] bingo double deposit special offer’.

Tips for affiliates seeking to apply query-type keyword research to drive increased revenue 1. Analyse, classify and understand the interplay between keyword types currently driving search visits to your site. 2. In looking at your own site, ‘navigational’ query types will be those terms that include your brand name (and misspellings). 3. Implement conversion attribution tracking so you can see the effect of different query types on ultimate conversion activity. 4. Use Google Analytics advanced segments to monitor visitor behaviour, by query type. 5. Analyse your site content. Does it ‘speak to’ the different purchase decision stages and where do the query types fit in those stages? 6. Track and monitor the position and volume of visits on informational query types. See how increased volume and visits on information query terms leads to increased revenue/conversions on navigational query terms. 7. Use the data collected above and this understanding of the interplay between query types to re-work your keyword strategy. Of course, do not lose sight of keyword volume and relevancy considerations, which can be sanity-checked well enough using Google AdWords tool (exact match) data, cross referenced against terms of a similar nature that already drive traffic to your site, using existing Google Webmaster Tools data. Nichola Stott is director and founder of theMediaFlow, a UK SEO and social media agency, and co-founder and director of SEO PR Training.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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The constant changes and developments on the Internet introduce new trends, obligating everyone who does business online to keep up with the competition. In order to stay ahead of the race, operators are aware of the need to invest in product development, to deliver advanced technology and to manage effective marketing strategies. Nowadays, as European gaming markets open up to regulation, there is a pressing need to take advantage of the new business opportunities on offer. New businesses must find innovative ways to provide an entertaining gaming experience that is attractive to the player, attends to their local preferences and keeps up with the competition in its local market. SEO professionals face the challenge of effectively adapting their SEO campaigns to those developments and new advances whilst managing concerns as to whether such progress will affect their page rankings. So, in late 2010, we came up with an innovative idea…

The ‘experiment’ We announced an SEO contest for our affiliates for the site, www.karamba.com. To qualify for the contest, our affiliates had to rank for a certain keyword phrase on Google, ‘Win Real Money Playing Online Slots at Karamba.com’. The biggest challenge our participants faced was avoiding over-optimisation, keeping a certain balance while monitoring their search engine rankings. Hundreds of affiliates participated in the competition and, because of this, we managed to reach over one million search results on Google within just two months. Trevor Weir, who won the contest, commented that his strategy “was not try to ‘game’ Google. Google wants to see a certain thing; you must give unto Cesar what Rome demands.” Although Karamba.com was not optimised for the keyword phrase ‘Win Real Money Playing Online Slots at Karamba.com’, the site reached the top three on Google as a result of the SEO contest. Remarkably, we realised that large sections of the SEO community had finally acknowledged and agreed on two very important and undeniable pieces of evidence on the Google algorithm: 1. Nofollow’ affiliate links do pass link

iGB Affiliate June/july 2011

juice. The trust and reliance of the Karamba.com domain was tremendously increased by the extensive amount (thousands) of backlinks. 2. That even sites/pages without extensive backlinks can be included in high rankings as long as the content is well optimised.

The explanation So, how did these sites, without many backlinks, rank well for the competition phrase without external links? After defining the title and h1 tag clearly, the strongest on-page SEO to be done to impress Google is to add the keyword phrase multiple times within the anchor text of the exact page that you want that specific phrase to be found on. This has always been true and at least two examples in this competition prove that easily. Anyone who knows the basics of search engine optimisation will be aware that linking your site to others is crucial in effective SEO. Most search engines rank sites according to the amount of links created. Google, on the other hand, emphasises on relevancy and quality rather than quantity. The experience gathered during the contest illustrates that if, for example, 20,000 backlinks were required to achieve a ranking among the top five, then all 20,000 of those backlinks with the exact text that the contest was looking for had to be used. Otherwise, one would have run the risk of over-optimising on the one keyword with unpredictable results on Google’s part. This is, Weir quoted, “what a lot of the competitors in the contest did and they reached the top five for a certain period of time before suddenly sinking to positions 40-100.” His winning site, win365bingo.com, counted more than 30,000 backlinks prior to the contest. Many of them were not being recognised by Google and Yahoo!, but

thanks to his well organised database, he could easily track the real location of those links and by sorting and grouping them, he could quickly see how many links had what kind of anchor text. Using this analysis, he was then able to create a well implemented back-linking strategy relatively simply. The contest awarded prizes of over €4,600 to the winners and, in addition, allowed the company to achieve an outstanding amount of low cost backlinks, amazing exposure in the online media arena and, most importantly, new affiliates. We managed to increase our site’s traffic, maximise revenues and optimise new player acquisitions. Innovation is one of the core values of this industry, and is certainly at the heart of our own philosophy. What the first SEO contest has shown is that innovation needn’t stop with product development; it can go far beyond to online marketing strategies where companies can, as we have demonstrated, build mutually beneficial campaigns with our affiliate partners. AspireAffiliates will be rolling out a similar SEO contest for the Dutch market.

Mickey Winitsky is the Affiliate Director of AspireAffiliates, formerly known as NeoGames Partners. Throughout his six years in the iGaming industry, he has held a variety of senior positions and has high level, widespread experience with PPC, SEO, social and contextual media and lead generation for products like skill games, poker, casino, scratch cards and financial products. Mickey’s extensive industry experience rooted from some of the industry’s biggest operators; PartyGaming and Yalicoo.com. Most recently, Mickey has become a frequent speaker at industry seminars and conferences.

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What follows in-play technology as the next driver for growth for sportsbetting? By Tim James, Coral Affiliate Manager. The rise of in-play markets and live streaming has seen some bookmakers increase sportsbook revenues by up to 100 percent in some cases, as the phenomenon has boomed over the last couple of years. Some operators made bold moves to dominate the in-play arena and have highly developed product propositions to take advantage of burgeoning customer demand. However, times change and technology and consumer interest moves on. Just as the high street bookmakers have had to face challenges from online businesses setting the pace in betting innovation, the advent of mobile technology will keep even the savviest of online operators on their toes. We know from our own customer research that in-play is what our online customers want and the mobile channel has the potential to become the ultimate home of in-play. It gives the customer what they want, when they want, wherever they are: in the pub, on the bus, at the football match. And 2011 already looks like the year the mobile channel really starts having the impact many have predicted as the technology catches up with operators’ ambitions.

Smartphones The increase in sophistication and sheer volume of mobile units owned means Smartphones are becoming that more prevalent and important in the sportsbetting industry. More people now access Facebook via their mobile than their PC and this trend is transferring to all areas of people’s lives. More people are becoming comfortable with mobile devices and the Smartphone evolution means people are becoming increasingly engaged with, and dependant on, these multi-purpose, utility devices. You can do your shopping via a mobile app so if you’re a sports bettor, you’re sure as hell going to have a flutter on your mobile given the opportunity. According to comScore, almost one third

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

“Operators have to adapt to Smartphone technology and act quickly. However, adapting and reacting to the public’s fascination with this new technology isn’t easy.” of all handsets in the UK are Smartphones and that figure has probably grown at least five percent since those figures were published in January 2011. In fact, predictions of Smartphone penetration of 54 percent by 2012, might even seem a little conservative. Sports bettors are becoming increasingly more comfortable with mobile gambling as the products they are being presented with become more advanced and the operating systems that support them allow for fast, reliable service. At least seven out of ten bets I place myself are now via operators’ mobile offerings. I also know friends, who were only occasional sports bettors, are becoming more familiar and are betting with mobile apps which can even populate a multiple bet randomly if you tell it how much you want to stake and win. Operators have to adapt to Smartphone technology and act quickly. However, adapting and reacting to the public’s fascination with this new technology isn’t easy. Choosing where and how to invest is a serious choice. There’s the mobile web, native apps and tablet devices to consider. The iPhone and Android split mean operators must make sure they support all operating systems to widen their reach and keep consumers engaged with their brand. The iPhone user has been identified as a high spender but Android devices are predicted to exceed the iPhone with a market share of almost 20 percent by next year. The mobile space is only going to become more intelligent and a more romantic proposition to sports gamblers as we see the development of betting intelligence services. The ability to now bet and watch horse racing via a mobile device is the latest development to excite sports bettors on the move.

This year, a record number of bets were placed via mobile gaming apps at the Cheltenham Festival, according to various mobile-gaming tech providers. Some operators are already quoting figures of around ten percent of total sportsbook turnover coming from mobile. The expectation from some is that it will rise further to around 30 percent by the end of the year.

Changing landscape Affiliates have to be mindful of this changing landscape and carefully consider the bookmakers they promote based on the increase in mobile browsing. It’s key for affiliates to consider partnering with operators who offer quality, diverse mobile sites and the ability to track referrals should a user go via a mobile device. It’s also important that affiliates have the right technology in place themselves and don’t over indulge in Flash-heavy and media-rich content. Those operators with strong mobile products can only improve the loyalty and retention of their customer base which benefits the affiliate in terms of revenue share. Even if affiliates don’t have mobile optimised sites they can benefit from the retention of the customers they have referred via the web. Affiliate partners also need to consider mobile growth and take advantage of the low CPCs associated with mobile PPC, as do operators. This will unavoidably change as costs are pushed up as the traffic via mobile continues to rise. What’s clear is that operators and affiliates need to be prepared and responsive to customers’ demands and needs. If the predictions surrounding Smartphone growth are accurate, the next 12 months could see some interesting results in terms of market share and operator position.

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Your Relationship with your Affiliate Manager Just how are the dynamics between sportsbetting affiliates and their affiliate mangers different or unique in comparison to other gaming verticals? Jonathan Chapman, Sportsbook Affiliate Manager at Ladbrokes, explores. I firmly believe the dynamics between sportsbook affiliates and their affiliate managers are very different from those in other products. This is primarily in respect of how the products work and, then, the diversity of the events in the product calendar. On a basic level, all the relationships are the same across all verticals; the affiliate manager is there to support the activities of the affiliate base. As we know, it’s the effectiveness of the operator in providing these basic services that allows the dynamics of the relationship to grow. These basic tasks shouldn’t be hard to achieve with the necessary resources in place. I won’t go in to them in too much detail, but the one key service an affiliate manager should be providing is an open communication channel. This sector of the industry is unique as, usually, you will have to deal with a network or an agency/ network combination, unless you are a ‘super affiliate’, of course (tongue in cheek). The communication is, therefore, only as good as the service level and quality of that provider. However, this sector allows affiliates to talk to the operator directly, something I believe is key, and if for any reason this isn’t happening then you need to ask yourself why. Direct communication to your affiliate manager, and vice versa to your affiliate base, is crucial to the success of any affiliate program. The affiliate manager should have an open dialogue with all their affiliate partners and both sides should be using this to mutual benefit.

“The event calendar for a sportsbook affiliate is set in stone usually months, if not sometimes years, in advance. This enables the affiliate and the affiliate manager to have long lead times to the next big event.” campaign calendar enables the dialogue to be a lot more defined and focused. The event calendar for a sportsbook affiliate is set in stone usually months, if not sometimes years, in advance. Sporting events like the FA Cup Final, World Cup Finals and the Grand National are always going to happen. This enables the affiliate and the affiliate manager to have long lead times to the next big event. This is somewhat different from other products. Sportsbook affiliates are, therefore, capable of building bespoke niche event sites with large amounts of content in place to capture key traffic determined on certain keywords they have mined. The affiliate can then, well ahead of time, be talking to the operators about bespoke deals, placements and providing relevant content for the site. It’s having the time to build these eventbased niche sites, writing content for them and working closely with the sportsbook affiliate manager on this standalone project that is the key uniqueness, in my experience. As a sportsbook affiliate manager, meeting affiliates, brainstorming ideas, brokering deals, providing unique content and, ultimately, enjoying the wins and learning from the losses is where the differences from the other verticals originate.

Uniqueness There are certainly manyunique differences between the relationship between sportsbook affiliates and their affiliate manager compared to other verticals. I think the role of the affiliate manager changes slightly; still providing the same basic services, but the sportsbook affiliate

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

Organic ranking A key element for the success of niche sites will be giving the site the best possible chance of ranking in the search engines’ organic results, unless you have money to burn in paid placements, of course. Let’s assume you have your strong URL, list of

keywords you will be optimising the site around and a back-linking strategy in place. You still need to remember that without relevant content, the site won’t rank. As we’ve seen recently with the movements of one rather large search engine, maybe the only search engine you should be optimising for, content is still very much king, but it must be relevant, up-to-date and not farmed. Overall, the more interesting and useful the content a website has, the more successful it will be. This is because more people will want to visit it again and again, and this is especially true if a website is constantly adding more and more content on a regular basis – be it articles, tutorials, news and opinion, etc. Keep it fresh and keep it relevant. The big ‘G’ will score you more favourably and, ultimately, it will help you in climbing the rankings. This is very much where the operator comes in. They should be pushing this content to you anyway. If you’re building a site way in advance of the event, they should be able to help and they will probably have more insight to key events on the whole.

It’s good to talk As I’ve discussed, it’s important that operators work closely with their affiliates and remain proactive in providing the basic services that will build a successful program for all parties. As we’ve seen with ‘Black Friday’, the industry changes fast and open communication channels between the operator and the affiliate is vital. The subtle differences between the verticals can then be explored, ultimately driving the sportsbook market forward.

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Affiliate Manager Interview iGB Affiliate talks shop with YouWin.com Affiliate Manager, Elaine Gardiner, to gain an insight into the state of the current sportsbetting environment. Is now a good time to be a sportsbetting affiliate? In my opinion, sportsbetting as a vertical has really exploded in the past few years as increased competition at an operator level leads to exponential growth in markets; both sports-specific and geographical. The more competitive we are as an industry, the more markets we naturally create which, in turn, offers huge opportunities to affiliates in terms of broadening their product offering to attract new players. Great news also for the price-sensitive player, as this has led to competitive odds and innovative promotions. From an affiliate manager’s perspective, how vibrant is the sportsbetting market comparable to other gaming verticals? The sportsbetting market is becoming increasingly vibrant. As technology rapidly advances, we have seen areas such as in-play betting develop and advance in terms of acquisition, conversion and retention which is, of course, great news for affiliates as they are seeing increased revenues as a direct result of this technology actively satisfying their demands. Casino and poker verticals have their own unique challenges and opportunities although creating real product differentiation is becoming increasingly difficult with a handful of networks servicing an entire industry. Sportsbetting moves away from this standardised format through aggressive odds strategies, which we as an industry can use to leverage our own individual positions and offerings. In terms of geography, what regions are seeing the most stability and growth at present, and where would you advise affiliates to target their activities? Stability and growth don’t often go handin-hand and I believe we should look at the difference between CPA and LTV in both existing and current markets. It is this percentage margin which dictates good business and potential. That said, Eastern Europe and Latin America are becoming increasingly fruitful, whilst Western Europe remains relatively stable, yet, still as competitive as ever. What about affiliate revenue levels? For those affiliates not yet looking at sportsbetting, how do affiliate sports

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

revenues differ from the likes of casino, poker and bingo? Affiliate revenues for sports are consistently strong. Obviously, they are not as instant or immediate as casino, although they are certainly more fluid than poker and more lucrative than bingo. Sportsbetting is its own animal with mass market appeal which is far broader globally than casino. In short, such a mass appeal when combined with aggressive revenue streams represents a solid opportunity for affiliates considering entering this vertical. What would you say is the best cross marketing vertical for sportsbetting affiliates (forex/financial trading, for example)? It is no surprise that a number of sports operators offer financial platforms and vice versa; the most obvious example being Betfair and Tradefair. If we were to drill this relationship further, the very essence of spread betting mirrors that of sportsbetting entirely, so whether we’re spread betting on a share price or taking a fixed odd, the players’ skills sets are interchangeable. In-play has been a huge driver of growth for both revenue and player traffic for the sector… where can affiliates derive the best opportunities here? For affiliates to leverage the in-play service offered by bookmakers the best acquisition tool is either live odds direct to an affiliate’s portal or in-play banners. These allow affiliates to directly promote a real-time price and offer to a prospective player during the actual sporting event. The call-to-action of such an ad format has huge potential with 100 percent relevance to players which has a direct impact on conversion rates. How can affiliates maximise their social media presence? Social media and gaming don’t always marry easily and, historically, social media platforms have been primarily used as retention/communication mechanisms, with varying degrees of success. Social media can be a ‘red herring’ and the challenge for affiliates is to use it as more than just a retention and news service. I’m talking about looking at companies such as Sony and the MMORPG industry and

how they are using social platforms such as Facebook to drive acquisition and retention. They are bringing a challenge element to the Facebook page, creating a true seamless and interactive experience harnessing the friendly (and not so friendly) competition that exists between an individual and their numerous friends. There will be winners and losers with this strategy although I am certain that the impact and traffic generated far outweighs the benefit of having a handful of Facebook ‘likes’. Finally, what would be your advice for a) rookie sportsbetting affiliates b) intermediate affiliates and c) already successful affiliates? For affiliates starting out in the sportsbetting industry, they can find invaluable information at online communities such as CAP, GPWA and AGD. This will also allow them to evaluate the various programs available and to directly contact their representatives. The key to success is to offer an engaging experience to players with regular and relevant content that keeps visitors returning to your site. New affiliates should also have infinite patience; gone are the days when overnight riches appeared with minimal effort. This also applies to intermediate affiliates, as you know you’ll have good weeks and bad, although you’ll be starting (hopefully) to see the fruits of your labour. You’ll be generating new players and revenue and your affiliate manager will help you achieve more through bespoke offers and promotions. By now, you’ll know what your traffic likes so make sure you ask your affiliate manager for what you’ll need. Super affiliates, or those that are a success in this vertical will know that the industry has changed rapidly over the years. You will, no doubt, have seen a change in your monthly revenues as a direct result of both the economy and the effects of regulation. Emerging markets will be as important to affiliates as they are to operators over the coming months/years, as even the affiliate market is saturated nowadays. My advice is to test and try new operators as they’ll have a less heavily populated player base than some of your preferred programs, which may help compensate for any dip in revenues.

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Sportsbetting SEO: Back to Basics It’s widely considered difficult, an exercise in guesswork, and often shrouded in mystery. But whether we like it or not, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is an integral part of the dayto-day life of a website, and getting it right is vital to your website’s success. SEO for sportsbetting websites is no different. Getting your SEO strategy right doesn’t have to be a daunting task. The easiest way to get ahead of the competition is to get your copywriting up to scratch and to do this, you might need to go back to basics.

“Long-tail articles can be likened to the foundations of a house. Strong foundations give you a sturdy building. Likewise, well-written long-tail articles packed with good keywords will result in a better and more relevant website.”

You need to find a niche: choose your keywords carefully

Construct relevant long-tail articles

If you rely on search engine traffic as your main source of website visitors, you need to differentiate your website from those of your rivals. If you have a football website, for example, you are one of thousands. How can you find that niche, that gap in the market, and work it to your advantage? The best way is to load your website with individual keywords that are commonly searched but not catered for by many websites. Use the Google Keyword Tool to help you with this; it is a fantastic aid which is free to use and could prove to be of immense value to you. In effect, it tells you how popular keywords are and how much competition there is within Google from other websites for that keyword, as well as making other suggestions along a similar theme. Take the search term ‘premier league betting’, for example. According to the Google Keyword Tool, during the last twelve months, an average of 2,400 searches per month were made for this specific term in the UK, and there is a high level of competition for that keyword. But dig deeper and you’ll find that ‘premier league games’ is searched for 8,100 times per month and has a low level of competition. That’s over three times as many searches, and not as many websites to cater for them. In short, you can potentially do yourself a massive favour by trying to be more specific with the keywords you use to optimise your website. It only takes a little bit of research – and don’t forget, it won’t cost you a penny.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

Next, you need to put the keywords on your website, but you’re no good implementing them in your website copy willy-nilly. Make sure you write good long-tail articles that are loaded with your chosen keywords. Long-tail articles can be likened to the foundations of a house. Strong foundations give you a sturdy building. Likewise, wellwritten long-tail articles packed with good keywords will result in a better and more relevant website (at least in the eyes of Google, Bing and Yahoo!). A good long-tail article is written with the long-term in mind. Ideally, it is the sort of page that can be revisited time and time again by your visitors. Your longtail article might take the form of a ‘fact’ page, or it could be an article about a past event. Whichever form your article takes, you don’t want it ever to be amended in the future. This is because longevity is a factor that search engines take into account when they come to rank websites. If your website has pages that can be considered an authority on whatever their subject matter might be, then you will, ultimately, feel the benefit in increased website traffic. Once you have your long-tail articles written and published, make sure you write regular copy which features your selected keywords. You might need to show a bit of patience in the short-term but, over a period of time, you will make your website a search engine authority on your chosen keywords.

Write good copy! The most underestimated aspect of SEO copywriting is the quality of the copy itself.

Tricks and gimmicks will only take you so far. There comes a point where the copy needs to stand up on its own merits. The main basic reason for this is obvious. Not only do you want people to return to your website, you also want people to think your website is so good that they will link their website to yours. This is known as backlinking. Possessing numerous backlinks, especially from reputable websites, will have the knock-on effect of boosting the credibility of your website. Search engines are constantly changing their search algorithms as they all try to work towards providing more accurate search results for their users. Google changed its search algorithm in February, for example, in an attempt to upgrade websites that are popular and downgrade websites that were, almost, ‘overly optimised’ (in Google’s eyes, at least). Good copy is hard to come by, of course, but you will help yourself if you endeavour to become an all-knowledgeable expert in whatever area your website specialises in. Spending an extra ten minutes on producing first-rate copy – by checking any facts you have used are correct, for example – will likely pay long-term dividends.

Garry McGibbon is the Communications Manager for StanJames.com. Garry has over a decade’s experience in the sports writing and gaming industries, having started out with the renowned horse racing publishers, Timeform, before switching to the betting and gaming industry.

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sportsbetting supplement

Is there a ‘Gambling Personality’? It could perhaps be argued that psychologists and those in the marketing business differ only in what they do with the information they collect about people’s behaviour. ‘Marketeers’ segment their target populations as a way of creating bespoke marketing strategies based on the needs and experiences of their potential customers in an attempt to increase revenue. Psychologists segment their target populations as a way of trying to predict what individuals might do in any number of given situations. One of the more interesting research avenues in the psychology of gambling is whether there might be a unique ‘gambling personality’; that is, a cluster of specific traits that marks out an individual as a gambler or a specific type of gambler (such as a sports bettor). One of the problems with this whole area of research is that ‘personality’ is a hypothetical construct that isn’t easy to define. However, most psychologists would probably agree that a person’s personality centres on the distinctive and characteristic patterns of thought, emotion and behaviour that define their personal style, and influence their interactions with the environment (including, for instance, the capacity or desire to have a punt on who will win next year’s English Premier League). The use of psychometric tests in research on gamblers has not been particularly promising. Most research has been carried out on three particular personality dimensions : ‘sensation-seeking’, ‘extroversion’ and ‘locus of control’. The American psychologist, Dr Marvin Zuckerman, defined ‘sensation-seeking’ as the “need for varied, novel and complex sensations and experiences, and the willingness to take physical and social risks for the sake of such experience.” Such a definition should mean that gamblers are more likely than non-gamblers to be sensation-seekers. However, studies in this area have provided contrasting results, with some supporting the theory, some showing no difference between gamblers and nongamblers, and others showing gamblers to be lower on sensation-seeking than nongamblers! In studies on extraversion, the findings have again proved contradictory. Since extraverts are highly sociable, crave excitement, and enjoy noisy and active environments, the theory is that gamblers

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

“Treating all forms of gambling as equivalent in terms of underlying psychology, personality and/or motivation may cloud the issue rather than clarify it.” are more likely to be extraverted. Although some studies have indeed found gamblers to be more extraverted than control groups, other studies have found gamblers to have lower extraversion scores, or have found no difference. One personality trait that has received more consistent findings is that of ‘locus of control’ (LoC). This personality trait refers to a person’s perception of how their own efforts affect events. For instance, ‘internal’ LoC individuals attribute their experiences to their own actions whereas ‘external’ LoC individuals attribute their experiences to chance. Research has shown that ‘internal’ individuals gamble more persistently when chasing losses because they believe all that is required is an increase in concentration and an overall improved effort in order to win. However, one of the problems with LoC research is that we do not know the direction of causality; that is, whether their particular LoC preceded the gambling, or whether the gambling preceded their LoC.

So why are there so few consistent results surrounding personality and gambling? One of the most obvious answers is that gambling is multi-faceted and not a unitary phenomenon. Treating all forms of gambling as equivalent in terms of underlying psychology, personality and/ or motivation may cloud the issue rather than clarify it. For instance, can we really say that a regular sports bettor has similar underlying psychology to a regular slot machine player? Is an online poker player similar to a roulette gambler? Of course not! And that is one of the reasons for inconsistent findings. Psychologists have tended to clump gamblers together as if they were a unified and homogenous group of people. Maybe the affiliate marketing industry can learn from the mistakes made by psychologists in trying to segment people’s behaviour. Invariably, one size does not fit all. In addition, demographic differences – such as age, gender, and culture – may produce very different findings in people’s motivation to gamble. This is one area

where affiliates may have the edge on psychologists. For instance, an adult horserace bettor cannot easily be compared to an adolescent slot machine player; a male sports gambler cannot easily be compared to a female bingo player; and slot machine players in the UK cannot necessarily be compared to slot machine players in the US. Affiliates seem to be well aware of this, but researchers in the gambling studies field seem to make the same methodological mistakes over and over again. All forms of gambling lie on a luck/ skill dimension. Games of pure chance are not attractive to sports bettors. While games of skill provide a significant edge for the gambler, sports bettors need more than an edge – they need an opponent who they think can be exploited. This is one of the reasons why sportsbetting – and particularly horserace betting – is so popular for gamblers. The edge available in horserace gambling can be sufficient to fully support professional gamblers as they bring their wide range of knowledge to the activity. There is the complex interplay of factors that contributes to the final outcome of the race. There is the form of the horse, the length of the race, the reputation of the jockey, trainer and stable, breeding, weight, the conditions of the racetrack and much else. From this mix of information, the punter will, broadly speaking, do one of two things: either they try to select a winner, or they try to select a horse that offers the best odds in terms of its true chances. Assessing these odds (i.e., handicapping) is done by developing ratings based on the available information. Precisely how all these factors can be combined to select a horse is a matter about which most gamblers disagree, but it is reasonable to assume that many punters believe that their knowledge of these factors gives them an edge over the punters they are competing against.

Higher intelligence? Gamblers clearly differ in how they use complex information to select horses. There has been some interesting research on the

psychology of handicapping, particularly in whether good handicappers are more intelligent. An American psychologist, Dr Steve Ceci, studied a group of experienced horserace gamblers, all of whom had been serious gamblers for over eight years and who attended racetracks most days. He split the gamblers into experts and non-experts on the basis of predicting the favourite and the rank order according to the odds of the three most favoured horses. Expert gamblers were those who correctly picked the favourite in at least nine out of ten races and correctly picked the top three horses in rank order in at least five out of ten races. In contrast, the best of the non-experts correctly identified the favourite in only five out of ten races, and selected the top three in only two of the ten races. The two groups were then given a number of intelligence quotient (IQ) tests. Ceci predicted that the experts would have higher IQs on the basis of their handicapping ability, but was very surprised to find no difference at all between the two groups’ intelligence levels. One of the things Ceci concluded was that there is probably more than one type of intelligence and that the IQ test that was used may not have measured the types of skill needed in

the handicapping of horses. At least Ceci’s findings give some hope to us all!

Market research It would appear from this brief overview that the usefulness and the value of psychometric-based personality studies remain doubtful. This is something for affiliates to bear in mind when carrying out their own market research. The notion that gamblers possess a unique set of variables or traits is a naive oversimplification and appears to be a fruitless direction for research. We all need to remember that gambling is complex and multidimensional, and personality factors are too ‘global’ to serve as the single cause. Research into gambling is still at a relatively early stage, and it is clear that a person’s gambling behaviour results from an interaction between many different variables including environmental, social, psychological and biological.

Dr Mark Griffiths is Professor of Gambling Studies at the International Gaming Research Unit at Nottingham Trent University.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

sportsbetting supplement

The Google Sportsbetting Stakes: Search marketing agency, Greenlight, produces reports that monitor the search patterns of UK consumers for keywords related to iGaming products and services. Here, we analyse sportsbetting statistics from Greenlight’s latest sector report charting total search volumes from April 2010 to March 2011. The agency’s latest sector report sheds some light on month-by-month search volumes for keywords in the iGaming space, covering bingo, casino, poker and sportsbetting. As we can see from both of the charts on this page (Figures 1 and 2), the combined search volumes for all gaming-related keywords has suffered a significant drop since August 2010, falling from 2.5 million searches to it’s lowest level in December 2010 of just 802,000. And although the data shows that volumes do start to pick up as we break into 2011, March’s level again dips to around 850,000 searches. Over period of the report, we can see that the keyword ‘bet’ (Figure 2) has fallen inline with the rest of the report, decreasing from 110,000 in April 2010 to a mere 33,100 in March 2011. Not shown in this particular data, the term ‘sportsbetting’ has towed a similar path, retreating

from 18,000 to around 4,400 over the same period.

So what is this data telling us? It’s hard to accurately predict the patterns we’re seeing in the data supplied by Greenlight, but although it appears negative, it isn’t necessarily bad news. Greenlight’s report is utilising a selection of short-tail keywords entered into Google’s search engine on a month-by-month basis, with many of the higher volume ones being relatively standard terms. What this uniform decline in volume could suggest is not that consumers are losing interest in the space, but rather that they are far more aware of what they are looking for, either using longer-tail terms to narrow their search, or bypassing Google altogether. The next report should give us more insight as it covers one of the seasonally

busy periods for sportsbetting in the UK, a period that includes the Grand National, the Boat Race and the Masters Golf tournament at Augusta, and which attracts the type of seasonal bettor who would be using Google to influence data sets such as this. Yet, these results aren’t showing any spike in search volumes despite the events being only a month away; even deep down in the bowels of the data, I can see that the term ‘Grand National Odds’ are constant from November to March having been, allegedly, at zero from the previous April (when the race is run) to August. So a possible question mark over that set of data, but generally, an interesting insight into the general search patterns of UK consumers. For more information on Greenlight’s gaming reports, please contact Krishna Rao at Krishna. Rao@GreenlightSearch.com.

Figure 1 Total search volumes in the past 12 months Apr-10

2,767,512

Oct-10

1,624,125

May-10

2,688,629

Nov-10

1,612,523

Jun-10

2,386,433

Dec-10

802,519

Jul-10

2,532,296

Jan-11

1,274,899

Aug-10

2,533,796

Feb-11

929,869

Sep-10

1,289,919

Mar-11

853,644

3,000,000 2,500,000 2,000,000 1,500,000 1,000,000 500,000 0

Apr-10 May-10 Jun-10 Jul-10 Aug-10 Sep-10 Oct-10 Nov-10 Dec-10 Jan-11 Feb-11 Mar-11

Source: Greenlight/Google Adwords In September 2010, there was a significant development regarding Google AdWords. In that month, Google rolled out its new AdWords keyword tool, which calculates searches purely on Google.co.uk searches alone. Previously, Google released UK search volumes accounting for searches on its .co.uk search engine and its search partner engines. As Google presented data across a number of search engines, search volumes for many keywords were greater than they appeared in September and thereafter.

Figure 2 Top ten keywords (2010) Bingo

Casino

250,000

Poker

Online bingo

200,000

Free bingo

Online casino

Bet

Free poker

Bingo sites

Online poker

150,000 100,000 50,000 0

Apr-10 May-10 Jun-10 Jul-10 Aug-10 Sep-10 Oct-10 Nov-10 Dec-10 Jan-11 Feb-11 Mar-11

Source: Greenlight/Google Adwords

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

black friday feature

So far, no affiliates have been arrested. That is what passes for good news, these days, in the world of Internet gambling.

The problem for affiliates, operators, payment processors and even players is that the world has become unpredictable, because the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) has decided to wage a war of intimidation against Internet gambling. The reasons for the war are clear. The DoJ is missing the two essentials to any prosecution: a statute that clearly makes the activity illegal and a defendant physically present in the US. So, the feds have announced showy legal actions against easy targets about every other year. Online poker would normally not be an easy target, since a Court of Appeals ruled the main federal anti-gambling statute, the Wire Act, is limited to bets on sports events and races. And the US does not allow trials in absentia: a defendant must be physically present in court. The US cannot extradite someone unless he falls under the terms of an extradition treaty. Very few treaties

traded gaming companies out of the US market. This vacuum was quickly filled by companies whose owners were difficult to find. Then, prosecutors went after payment processors, making it more difficult for players to find legitimate ways to send their money to betting sites. Now, unknown operators, with no connection to the US, are handling millions of Americans’ dollars, with no way for the federal government to trace the funds. On Black Friday, the feds seized .com domain names. Gaming sites immediately switched to .eu and .uk, and cut off all physical contact with the US. Even the present American operators can’t be extradited, so what hope is there for the DoJ to bring future foreign operators here to stand trial? Scaring away well-known poker names means that newcomers, some of whom will undoubtedly be sleazy, will take their

“The problem for everyone associated with the industry, as well as for the DoJ itself, is that prohibition is not regulation.” include ‘gambling’ on their list of crimes. Even then, the activity must be illegal in both countries. No nation would extradite someone it has licensed, to be tried for the very activity for which it is licensed. So, instead, the DoJ has decided to scare everyone into abandoning the American market. And it has been strikingly successful – and yet, also, a horrible failure. The problem for everyone associated with the industry, as well as for the DoJ itself, is that prohibition is not regulation. Every action by the federal government makes it more difficult for it to go after the next operator. The UIGEA, rammed through by the failed politician, Bill Frist (R.-TN), scared all of the publicly

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

places. If the multi-billion-dollar US online poker market becomes too hot for licensed companies, operators without any licenses, who won’t even reveal what country they are in, will be glad to run the games. When people want something, businesses arise to fill the demand. How much more so when the activity, online poker, is not even clearly illegal? If the commercial goods or services are not legal, then by definition, the organisations will be criminal. Prohibition created modern organised crime, by outlawing alcoholic beverages.

So, what are affiliates supposed to do? Since the DoJ is acting like this is Prohibition, the answer is to think like

someone who wanted to be involved in the liquor business, but did not want to be arrested as a moonshiner or bootlegger. If the gaming site is not violating any law, there is little danger in being associated with it. There are some archaic state laws that can be read as prohibiting the advertising of even legal gambling. But there are not very many of these, and they are of questionable constitutionality. But if the gambling is illegal, anyone associated with it risks being charged with a crime. There are three main legal theories for finding criminal liability for someone who is not actually taking bets: 1) Aiding and abetting, also known as accomplice liability, is a legal doctrine that makes a person liable for crimes committed by another. Referring residents of the US to a site where they can make real money bets could lead to a charge of running an illegal gambling operation, even though the affiliate never takes a wager itself. If the gaming site is breaking the law, so is the affiliate, especially if it is paid for referrals by receiving a share of the money wagered or lost. 2) Conspiracy, unlike aiding and abetting, is a separate crime. There is greater risk to society when two or more people agree to commit a crime than when one person is acting alone. Conspiracy is often called the prosecutor’s friend, since it takes so little to get a conviction. The crime that is the goal of the conspiracy need not be completed, or even attempted. All that is required is an agreement and an act in furtherance of the conspiracy. Of course, agreeing to help with online poker can only be a conspiracy if online poker is illegal. 3) Special gambling crimes. US federal law is limited to people who are in the business

of gambling. This means that mere players cannot be charged. But it also means that anyone who is involved in the business can be, completely apart from theories of aiding and abetting or conspiracy. The indictments of Black Friday included charges under the federal Illegal Gambling Business Act. This makes it a federal felony if five or more people do more than $2,000 in business a day in violation of state gambling laws. The only state law cited is New York’s misdemeanour anti-gambling laws. There is an obvious problem with using a state misdemeanour to charge federal felonies against foreign corporations licensed by and operated in foreign countries. But the point here is that courts have held that a person who helps an illegal gambling business and shares in the revenue is in that business. In my books, INTERNET GAMING LAW, both first and second editions, I discuss how affiliates and others can decrease their risks of being named in an indictment. It is not necessary to avoid linking with gaming operators. But even the most legitimate sites should be careful about how they structure their arrangement so that there is no possibility of being found to be aiding and abetting, conspiring, or in the business of gambling. The more a non-gambling website shares in the profits, the more likely it will be found to be a partner of the gambling business. Charging the gambling website a flat fee for referrals, not contingent on whether the patron wins, loses, or even places a bet, allows the non-gambling web operator to argue that it was just acting like the phone company. Unless the DoJ is making one of its showy attacks on major operators, it is only interested in easy cases, organised crime and consumer scams. Easy cases mean sportsbetting, with defendants who

“Since the DoJ is thinking like revenuers during Prohibition, you have to stay away from anything you know is illegal. A good gaming lawyer should be able to not only tell you what is illegal, but what the DoJ thinks is illegal, even if it is not, like interstate horseracing.” can be found in the US. Even in the recent poker indictment, the DoJ immediately arrested three defendants in Utah, Nevada and New York. Think how embarrassing it would have been to the DoJ to make a big announcement and then have to admit that it could not extradite anyone to stand trial. Prosecutors do make mistakes. So it is important to stay far away from anything that smells of organised crime. The same with consumer fraud. Online gaming is the one business where even when the patron is wrong, he is always right. You want to avoid having complaints made with state or federal attorneys general.

Avoidance Since the DoJ is thinking like revenuers during Prohibition, you have to stay away from anything you know is illegal. Of course, knowing what is illegal and what is not is very difficult, when it comes to Internet gambling. But a good gaming lawyer should be able to not only tell you what is illegal, but what the DoJ thinks is illegal, even if it is not, like interstate horseracing. It is best to only work with licensed gaming operators. Advertisers are rarely targets; they get dragged in when prosecutors go after someone else. Stop immediately if a government official tells you to stop, and contact your legal counsel. Do not do anything involved with the daily business of gambling. For example, never help with the collection of gambling debts.

Get a ‘reasoned Legal Opinion’. The UIGEA has accidentally given affiliates and others an additional weapon. Regulations require operators to obtain a reasoned Legal Opinion from a licensed gaming lawyer before they can open a bank account. This has allowed affiliates and others to also get these Opinions. It is not complete protection, but it increases your sense of security. After all, if it’s good enough for a bank, it’s good enough for an affiliate. It may help to remember that even during Prohibition, a lot of legal alcoholic beverages were consumed in the United States. Doctors made millions of dollars writing prescriptions for medicinal whiskey, and the consumption of sacramental wine increased by 800,000 gallons a year. Church bingo, anyone?

Harvard Law School educated, Professor I Nelson Rose is recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on gambling law. He is an internationally known public speaker and a consultant and expert witness for governments and industry. His latest books, INTERNET GAMING LAW (1st & 2nd editions), BLACKJACK AND THE LAW and GAMING LAW: CASES AND MATERIALS, are available through his website, www.GAMBLINGANDTHELAW.com.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

black friday feature

Although Black Friday primarily impacted players and the online poker sites that were still operating in the US post-UIGEA, there is another group of people who are feeling the aftermath of the DoJ’s actions: affiliates. While the full impact isn’t known at this time, the initial feedback from affiliates seems mixed but generally positive. One of the reasons that affiliates appear to remain optimistic is that most seem to feel that they are not necessarily at legal risk. As the main thrust of the charges against the online poker sites was associated with bank fraud and money laundering, many affiliates feel that the risk to them is rather low. Another reason is that affiliates have more options available to them. Unlike many furious players, affiliates can continue to promote Full Tilt, PokerStars, and Cereus (Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet) to their non-US traffic. Likewise, some see a short-term opportunity to move players from the big-three sites to smaller sites that continue to operate in the US.

Impact However, everyone will feel some sort of impact. According to PokerTracker the net change so far at Stars, Tilt, and Cereus has been -28%, -35% and -65% respectively. This will translate into lost income for many affiliates. Affiliates who focused on non-US customers as well as those who promoted other brands will feel the impact the least. In fact, longer-term, they may come out of this recent shake-up in better shape than before. Several affiliates are on a shopping spree at the moment, buying up smaller websites hoping to use their expertise in non-US markets to turn the sites around. There is also optimism that this major industry shake-up may reverse the trend in the operator/affiliate relationship which has mainly been negative for affiliates, with poker sites paying out less, becoming more creative in what constitutes a marketing fee and tightening player qualification requirements.

Level playing field With PokerStars and Full Tilt no longer able to use their US player base to fund

customer acquisition in less profitable markets, their competitors are energised and feel like they have a fighting chance on a more level playing field. They’re also looking to take advantage of the inherent chaos that results in an industry-changing event like Black Friday. While Full Tilt and PokerStars executives are preoccupied with meetings about whether or not to lay off staff, what to do with their roster of paid pros, which long-term projects need to be shelved, and simply coming to grips on where they take their business going forward, their competitors are reaching out to

accounts, this could be problematic for those affiliates, not just now, but going forward as well. For instance, as part of its new cash out policy to refund its US players, PokerStars is insisting that players cash out the entire balance of their account. However, once the account has been liquidated, whether Stars will allow players to access their accounts and how this would apply to a US-based affiliate who has MGR customers is currently unclear. It should come as no surprise that many affiliates who were too narrowly focused on a particular room or US-centric niche don’t have as positive an outlook as other

“Affiliates who focused on non-US customers as well as those who promoted other brands will feel the impact the least. In fact, longer-term, they may come out of this recent shake-up in better shape than before.” affiliates, increasing bonuses and doing everything they can do steal business away from them. It’s unlikely anyone will unseat Stars or Tilt in the near-term as their player bases are still very strong, even after the player losses in the US, but it will be a tougher slog going forward. Greater competition between the poker sites can translate into better deals for affiliates who will play a bigger role in the battle. Many of the nonUS facing rooms have been reaching out to affiliates with special offers, a move that is being warmly welcomed by affiliates.

affiliates. For many of them, their best course of action might be to sell out to affiliates who can still market to Stars, Tilt and Cereus, or change their tactics and begin targeting non-US traffic. While it may be many months or even years before we know who the winners and losers are from Black Friday (and there may be many twists and turns to come), at the moment, it is looking like affiliates who can weather a short-term loss in earnings and focus on the long-term potential of a market in flux may come out on top.

Affiliate outlook But it’s not all roses for the affiliate community. Many affiliates, especially those that are US-based, are reporting problems getting paid out. Because some sites either credit the affiliate’s player account or give them an option to cash out their monthly earnings to their player

Bill Rini was formerly the Poker Room Manager at PartyGaming. Prior to that, he was a Program Manager at Full Tilt Poker. He currently consults to online poker rooms and writes about the gaming industry on his Blog, www. billrini.com.

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black friday feature

Strangely, for a multi-national industry, the iGaming sector is often a lot like a rural village: news spreads fast and bad news even faster. So the charges issued by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) against the founders of PokerStars, Full Tilt and Absolute Poker (the Poker Operators) on April 15 have already produced a whole heap of commentary. Some people are now even nostalgically reminiscing on where they were and what they were doing on the infamous ‘Black Friday’. But to characterise the unsealing of the indictment as a one-off event is wrong; better to look at it as a continuum. Planned operation A prosecution of this magnitude probably took a year or more to put together and it will run and run like a bad soap opera. Comforting as it might be to read criticism and scorn poured over the legal grounds for the charges, one must assume that they would not have been drafted lightly, or carelessly, or without the benefit of experienced legal advice. Yet even if they were, there remains a difficulty in fighting a prosecution when you are not in, and do not wish to enter, US territory, for you would surely face arrest and objections to bail. Although (as far as I am aware) the DoJ has not previously attempted to extradite any gambling operators, it may well take the plunge in this case. It seems to me that arresting bankers and processors will not be enough in such a high profile case and the DoJ will want to remove the liberty of one or more of the founders of the Poker Operators. If the allegations about using numerous dummy companies, to deceive banks into opening accounts and unknowingly accepting the proceeds of Internet gambling are sustainable, then it may be possible for the DoJ to seek extradition for fraud without having to rely on proving any dual criminality for gambling offences.

The US has an extradition treaty with Ireland and mutual assistance arrangements with the European Member States. A 2003 treaty with the UK is particularly unfair to suspects extradited from there. The UK government has waived the requirement for the US authorities to make a prima facie case before the UK courts are obliged to order extradition (whereas it is still a condition of an extradition from the US to the UK). And if I am wrong about the DoJ seeking extradition, it remains a deeply unsettling prospect to be a fugitive from US ‘justice’ with a severe practical limitation on your freedom to travel.

problem for anyone named in them. Now, to be a fly on the wall of any discussions between the Poker Operators’ attorneys in the US and the DoJ would really make for some interesting listening. Implicated parties Yet it is not just those named on the indictment and/or in the forfeiture proceedings who have problems (although theirs are by far the most serious). The proceedings have also put other US facing poker sites in an increasingly difficult position as the indictment is an unambiguous statement by the DoJ that it considers the provision of Internet poker

“There is tangible concern as to who might be next to feel the wrath of the District Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York.” We should also bear in mind that there is not just a criminal case as there are also civil forfeiture proceedings against numerous defendants seeking billions of dollars in alleged illegal proceeds. Resisting these proceedings raises a similar potential problem in that the operators may be unwilling to attend a US court personally to give evidence (and be subject to live cross examination before a jury) for fear of arrest whilst in the jurisdiction. Thus, whilst one might criticise the legal basis for the indictments for all sorts of good reasons, undeniably (and at risk of stating the obvious), they present an enormously expensive and worrying

to US residents to be a breach of state and federal criminal law. Such operators now face a dilemma and could fall into one of two camps. On the one hand, the removal of the biggest players in the market provides a tempting opportunity to fill the lucrative vacuum. On the other hand, if the case against the Poker Operators is a success (even if only in terms of a huge fine as part of deferred prosecution arrangement), the DoJ may well be encouraged to vigorously pursue those who had the temerity to take the place of the Poker Operators; who, after all, owe much of their success to stepping into the shoes of the mainstream operators who pulled out

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of the US after the passing of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) in October 2006. Unsurprisingly, the indictment has also presented the home regulators of the Poker Operators (in Alderney, the Isle of Man and Kahnawáke) with their own dilemma in deciding how they should react and what level of support they should show. Each has issued short, fairly tentative statements at this stage. I doubt that they will be making too much noise publicly in the future either. However, another regulator may take a very different course. The government of Antigua and Barbuda has had its fair share of (highly successful)

case against the Poker Operators and the army of attorneys that has become involved. Tactically, I believe it will want, if not to resolve the case, then to feel confident that it has matters fully in hand before it thinks about another sizeable target. As I say, if it has a big success then it will probably look to pursue other US facing poker operators or may even move against the casinos (although that seems a lower profile and more fractured market with less obvious targets). In the interim, it is likely to continue the ad-hoc policy of seizing players’ funds from time to time as this presents high reward and little risk with foreign operators who are more likely to

“A prosecution of this magnitude probably took a year or more to put together and will run and run like a bad soap opera.” scraps with the US government and it may construe the inclusion of at least one Antiguan company in the forfeiture action as a tempting invitation to go back to the World Trade Organisation for yet another round in its battle of attrition – that really would be an interesting twist on events. Next in line There is tangible concern as to who might be next to feel the wrath of the District Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York. Of course, it is pure speculation but in my view, for the foreseeable future, the DoJ will have its hands full pursuing what is a hugely complex and multi-layered

reimburse players and write off the funds as an overhead rather than take on any litigation in the US. If, however, the Poker Operators are successful and get the whole case withdrawn or thrown out by a court, then what changes? Nothing really in the legal sense, unless there is some sort of declaratory judgement that Internet poker is lawful at both New York state and federal level. This is unlikely to happen as the law rarely wraps things up in a convenient and universally applicable fashion and most cases are decided on their particular facts. If the DoJ can be persuaded that it has a weak case, the most likely outcome will be

some sort of face saving deal where both sides try to claim a win. One thing is for sure, the Poker Operators are unlikely ever to recover their dominant position in the US poker market. In that sense, as with the fallout after UIGEA became law, the US authorities have already achieved a victory of sorts. Caveat The above text is not and does not purport to be legal advice and no liability is accepted in relation to the same.

Peter Wilson is a regulatory lawyer specialising in gambling and business investigations. His gambling practice has built up over 20 years expanding from advising UK land based businesses to an international igaming practice with clients in over a dozen jurisdictions. Peter is known for his comprehensive industry knowledge, and sensible, practical advice. Peter has a wide ranging and varied business investigations practice having represented both companies and individuals facing civil and/or criminal investigation by government agencies. His experience over the years includes dealing with allegations of fraud, tax evasion, money laundering and breach of statutory obligations in matters of food safety, gang master licensing, environmental law, trading standards and financial services. pwilson@memerycrystal.com

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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black friday feature

Black Friday Blindsided Everyone… or did it? Dominique, Founder of Games and Casino, explores some of the reaction and commentary that has shaped the fallout from the now infamous ‘Black Friday’.

Let’s go over some of the aspects of this with two prominent online gaming attorneys. Lawrence Walters lays out the basics of the story here: “The Department of Justice (DoJ) is once again flexing its muscle in an effort to shock and awe the online gaming industry, in the hope that it will have some tangible impact. But that train left the station long ago. The time for the US to have acted was back in the year 2000, when the industry was just starting to coalesce, and rational regulatory efforts would have paid big dividends. The US could have been the epicentre of legal online gambling, with large license fees paid to the Department of the Treasury, and larger taxes paid to the IRS, by operators, on the gaming profits. Instead, US lawmakers turned to the failed policies of prohibition, and after years of trying, eventually passed legislation in 2006 making receipt of illegal online gambling funds, well… illegal. So now the DoJ has turned its attention to online poker, making a big splash by seizing big money and bigger domain names. But the legal basis supporting the government’s prosecution is highly questionable. “The indictment, and corresponding civil forfeiture complaint, make veiled references to misdemeanour New York gambling statutes (which themselves do not reference Internet gambling), along with certain other unspecified state laws. Basing a multi-million dollar, international white collar conspiracy

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

case on some outdated state misdemeanour seems a bit tenuous, to say the least. Federal law does not outlaw online poker. That’s why the feds are scrambling to find some state law (or maybe a city ordinance) that criminalises the actual gaming activity at issue. Even if they dust off some state gambling statute, adopted before the Internet was even a glint in Al Gore’s eye, they have other major problems with obtaining jurisdiction over individuals and companies that are located in foreign countries – some of which enjoy substantial economic revenue from licensed Internet gambling activity. “The DOJ has a pretty impressive conviction rate, overall, but this one will be an uphill battle for federal prosecutors.” Lawrence G. Walters, Esq., www.GameAttorneys.com. So, it is near impossible to gain jurisdiction over individuals residing in foreign countries, especially if their activities are legal and licensed in their countries. Attorney Nelson Rose adds another aspect: “On Friday, April 15, 2011, the DoJ seized the .com names of five of the biggest poker sites. It is not even clear that online poker is illegal in every state and territory of the US. But players in countries like England, where it is indisputably legal, also found themselves unable to access their favourite sites. This is a door the US should never have opened. The next to step through could be an Islamic country, which outlaws

alcohol, seizing the worldwide domain names of every retailer and restaurant that advertises beer or wine.” Professor I. Nelson Rose, www.GAMBLINGANDTHELAW.com. What about the DOJ freezing all these player accounts, the monies that belong to innocent citizens? Nelson Rose has this to say: “On April 20, Preet Bharara, the US Attorney in Manhattan who had seized the domain names, announced that an agreement had been reached with PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker. Technically, the .com names remain seized. But the DoJ will now permit the companies to operate money games outside of the US, which they always had the legal right to do anyway. American players can also go to the .com sites and get their deposits back. “Bharara issued the following statement: ‘No individual player accounts were ever frozen or restrained, and each implicated poker company has at all times been free to reimburse any player’s deposited funds.’ “Technically true, but misleading. Exactly how were players supposed to get their money, when they could not log on to the seized .com sites? Did Bharara tell the operators they could refund players’ deposits, and how they were suppose to do that? Even today, the DoJ has not worked out all the details on what it will allow. Notice that the announced agreement is only with PokerStars and Full Tilt. Those companies have licenses and approvals

“What will happen next in the US is wide open for speculation. Was this a final swoop to open the market for the Las Vegas giants?” by foreign jurisdictions, including France, Italy and Alderney, which they want to protect. They also would like to someday return to the US, once the laws are changed. Absolute is licensed by the Kahnawake tribe in Canada and has always taken the position that it does not have to be overly concerned with the laws of Canada, the US, or any other jurisdiction. So it is standing tough.” (Editor’s NOTE: the above statement was prepared prior to Blanca Games, operator of Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet, announcing that both of its sites have ceased trading in the US, and have entered an agreement with the DoJ to ensure the refund of its players’ deposits, although this won’t include, as with PokerStars and Full Tilt, the return of either domain name to facilitate said refunds.) So then, what does Absolute have to say about this? Here is the company’s statement: “Absolute Poker has retained Blank Rome LLP as United States counsel to provide legal advice in relation to civil and criminal matters filed in federal court in Manhattan and made public on April 15, 2011. Absolute Poker is aware that on April 19, 2011, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York entered into separate

agreements with Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars. These agreements concern the use of the respective www.fulltiltpoker.com and www.pokerstars.com domain names. The US Attorney, in a press release dated April 20, 2011, stated that the government is willing to enter the same agreement with Absolute Poker and UB.” Indeed, at time of writing, an agreement has been announced, although as mentioned in the Editor’s note, slightly different in nature to that reached with PokerStars and Full Tilt. The official release stated that: “Absolute Poker has reached an agreement with the United States Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY). Under the agreement, the US Attorney’s Office has agreed to provide all necessary assurances that third-parties may work with Absolute Poker to facilitate the return of funds to players located in the US. This provision is an important first step to returning US player funds. “The Company has also notified the SDNY that it has closed its US-facing operations, and it has agreed to the cessation of real money poker play in the US. As such, Absolute Poker has not requested the return of its worldwide domain names, www.AbsolutePoker.com,

www.UltimateBet.com and www.UB.com, and today’s agreement does not provide for their return.” Meanwhile, Costa Rica’s version of the FBI, Organismo de Investigaciones Judiciales (OIJ), raided the offices of Absolute Poker and PokerStars and some private residences, accompanied by some US officials. Rumour has it that PokerStars was raided by mistake. The raids were short and employees were sent home for just a few hours. This is allegedly because Absolute had laid off a lot of employees without the required severance pay and these employees went to complain to local authorities. There was some fallout in the online gaming industry. The white label Rival casinos withdrew from the US market, as did BetUs and Bingo Entertainment. I haven’t seen many affiliates leave the market. What will happen next in the US is wide open for speculation. Was this a final swoop to open the market for the Las Vegas giants? What will happen to affiliates once the US market does open up? Looking at all the various bills submitted in the political arena as of late, one thing seems fairly certain – regulated online poker will soon come to several states, if not the entire US.

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black friday feature

Much of the discussion post-Black Friday concerned the migration of the indicted sites’ players – just who would benefit from the controversy of April 15, 2011? One of the earliest barometers of this shift in player numbers came from a weekly report from PokerScout.com the Monday following the indictments and here, PokerScout Founder, Dan Stewart, assesses the impact of Black Friday on the online poker community. On April 15, 2011, the Department of Justice dropped a nuclear bomb on the US online poker industry. The wave of indictments and seizures on ‘Black Friday’ dealt a crippling blow to a thriving market as PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker, the dominant two sites in the industry, immediately moved to pull out of the US. While some online poker players have found their way to other sites still serving Americans, many have seemingly stopped playing altogether. The ‘big two’ get a haircut Withdrawing from the US market did serious damage to PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker (see Table 1). However, those sites had built up a solid international player base and, as a result, they were not hurt as badly as they would have been just a year or two ago. After taking the initial hit, losing between 25% and 40% of their traffic, the ‘big two’ quickly stabilised as their European player base held firm. Full Tilt Poker even managed to rebound a bit from its initial 40% loss and

is now down 32% from early April. While most of the industry has begun to settle into the ‘new normal’, some sites are still experiencing fallout from Black Friday. Cereus Network and Merge Gaming Network have been the most heavily affected, although in opposite directions (see graph). Cereus trouble For Cereus Network, the fallout from Black Friday has proven to be highly radioactive. The network’s traffic once ranked as high as fifth in the world, but that has changed dramatically since mid-April. Cereus relied heavily on US traffic and, as a result, the network now finds itself struggling to stay alive. Unlike PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker, Cereus did not move quickly to bar US players from real money games, probably because the network’s traffic would have dropped to almost nothing overnight. Instead, network executives seem to be stalling for time, but with rampant rumours of debt default, problems with their customer

support contractor, police raids in Costa Rica, and employees and pros being laid off en masse, it is not clear what its survival strategy could be. Despite the recent announcement of an agreement with the Department of Justice, in which Cereus agreed to bar American players, the network continues to allow existing US customers to play. This means the network’s traffic has even farther to fall once the promised US ban goes into effect. Moreover, unlike the deals reached by PokerStars and Full Tilt, Cereus’ deal with the Justice Department does not provide for the return of seized domains, including UB.com and AbsolutePoker.com. Without these primary domains, the network will find it difficult to recruit the new players needed to survive. Meanwhile, US players and affiliates who stuck with the Cereus network are waiting for word on the fate of their funds, with many players hoping that the new agreement with the Justice Department will eventually allow them to cash out their accounts.

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black friday feature

“Overall, the worldwide online poker market shrank by 18% in the wake of Black Friday. The US market has been virtually destroyed, as nine out of ten players have simply stopped playing, at least temporarily.” Merge emerges as a winner Only a small handful of sites and networks still accept American players. Among them, Merge Gaming Network has managed to capture the lion’s share of traffic from US players seeking out a new poker venue. Merge’s player counts, already on the rise before Black Friday, have increased another 77% in the weeks since. This has pushed the network up from 20th to ninth place in the worldwide traffic rankings. Bodog and Cake Poker Network also saw an initial influx of players after Black Friday. Their momentum quickly stalled, however, as players latched on to Merge as the US market leader. Bodog and Cake have not seen significant gains since the week after Black Friday. The major European sites and networks have also attempted to take advantage of increased player mobility in a time of flux, but they

have not been especially successful. PartyPoker’s traffic has grown 10%, but this may have more to do with the site’s recent aggressive promotions, such as the Gladiator, than any real success in recruiting new players. The big picture Overall, the worldwide online poker market shrank by 18% in the wake of Black Friday. The US market has been virtually destroyed, as nine out of ten players have simply stopped playing, at least temporarily. Although this is a serious blow, it is hardly the end of online poker. In retrospect, this may be viewed as simply another painful step on the long road toward regulated Internet poker markets around the world. If the events of Black Friday help pave the way to outright legalisation in the US, then online poker may be headed into a future that is brighter than ever.

Table 1: Black Friday’s impact on real money cash game player counts Site/ Network

Net change (avg. players)

Net change (%)

Left US Market PokerStars

-7734

-26%

Full Tilt Poker

-5538

-32%

Cereus Network

-1542

-76%

Merge Network

+735

+77%

Bodog

+184

+28%

Cake Network

+155

+28%

Everleaf Network

+1%

Still in US

European Majors PartyPoker

+358

+10%

iPoker Network

-13

-0.4%

Ongame Network

-102

-4%

888poker

+77

+5%

Dan Stewart is the founder of PokerScout.com, the world’s premier online poker tracking site. Monitoring online poker traffic in real-time since 2006, PokerScout provides both players and industry participants with the information they need to guide their decisions.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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16/05/2011 19:56

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interview

With the British Columbia Lottery Corporation (BCLC) having achieved the first regulated iGaming framework in North America, iGB Affiliate magazine spoke to the company’s Director of eBusiness, Rhonda Garvey, about the success of its PlayNow.com site to date and the potential shape of things to come for provincial iGaming in Canada.

What instigated the decision to expand the lottery’s remit to include iGaming products such as casino games and poker? BCLC added casino games to PlayNow. com in the summer of 2010 in response to evolving player and online gaming market demand, and to offer British Columbians legal gaming options where revenue generated stays in BC to benefit all residents. Describe, if you will, your discussions with regulators in bringing about the creation and implementation of your iGaming offering? British Columbians were spending an estimated $100 million each year gambling on approximately 2,000 available unregulated offshore Internet gambling websites. Our partners in government agreed that PlayNow.com would offer those online players the option to play casino games on a secure and regulated website while helping to keep online gaming revenues in British Columbia. How have you assessed the success of your iGaming venture to date? Is it going to plan/exceeding expectations? We’ve been very pleased with the response to PlayNow.com and our results are exceeding expectations.

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We believe the site’s design rivals anything available in the unregulated environment, and player registration is up by almost 25 percent. What does that say about the market for iGaming in British Columbia, even Canada in general, in terms of demand and in terms of revenue that prior to regulation, was going to unregulated gambling sites. In 2010, when we began offering casino games such as blackjack, roulette and poker on PlayNow.com, we were the first government regulated gaming jurisdiction in North America to do so. Since then, our counterparts in Quebec have entered the market, with other Canadian gaming jurisdictions considering following suit. Revenues have increased by more than 25 percent from the previous year. How has revenue from your iGaming offerings impacted the business as a whole, looking at the percentage and monetary increase in revenue since roll out? Revenue from PlayNow.com comprises one percent of BCLC’s total revenue, and is expected to increase to four percent of total revenue by 2014. As mentioned above, the number of registered players continues to grow, with players attracted by the

convenience of the channel as well as new product offerings. What about the technical challenges in rolling out a significant offering such as this… acquiring the right software, integrating it into your core platforms, creating standalone sites? It’s certainly a complex system to manage. Probably the biggest challenge relates to the selection of vendors who are able to meet the strict requirements set forth by BCLC and BC’s Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch. There are exacting standards for vendors which relate to the integrity of our games and gaming platforms, and we must also adhere to strict procurement guidelines. In the end, these sorts of challenges are what ultimately enable us to deliver an outstanding online gaming experience to our players. Do you feel that lottery (government) controlled iGaming is a potential blueprint for regulated gambling in the US (given the District of Columbia’s path to allow the DC Lottery to offer “games of skill including poker”)? Obviously it’s a choice that each government and gaming jurisdiction has to make for itself. Having said that, we

believe we are demonstrating how it can be successful in North America. In addition, due to the nature of the distribution of revenue from lottery operated (provincial government controlled) offerings, do you feel that this is a more ‘ethically’ sound channel for the provision of iGaming, given the stigmas to which gambling is traditionally subject? Research shows that Canadians are gambling online. In our case, British Columbians were spending around $100 million each year on unregulated offshore gambling websites. Without question, it’s in our own best interests to spend that money here in our own province, where the revenues generated can used to benefit all British Columbians through government, community and charitable programs and services. What is your assessment of the current moves to regulate iGaming in the US and, indeed, the recent drastic action taken by the SDNY in pulling the plug on three of the biggest poker sites? These allegations show that, despite their

attempts to appear legitimate, the US has enough information to lay charges against the principals involved with PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker. It’s alleged these websites were operating illegally, without regulatory oversight, and in the absence of controls and standards that regulated companies must adhere to. PlayNow.com, the only legal online gambling website in BC, operates under strict regulatory controls and employs the highest standards available to provide British Columbians who choose to gamble online a website they can trust. In fact, Canadian banks accept PlayNow.com transactions because of the fact the website is legally operated by a recognised Canadian jurisdiction and in accordance with federal and provincial laws. How would you assess growth levels in terms of revenue and player volumes for the BCLC in the coming months/years – do you anticipate a vibrant provincial market in the foreseeable future? Like any business we were affected by

the recent economic downturn, but we’re fortunate to have turned the corner and are in a position to forecast revenue and player growth over the next five years. As mentioned, PlayNow.com is forecasted to contribute about four percent of BCLC’s total revenue by 2014. Finally, how do you see the future of iGaming in Canada? We see the trend towards digital convergence continuing. More information and services are moving to the cloud. Provincial lottery jurisdictions and the provinces themselves will have to make a decision at some point in the future to either take their games online or risk losing market share to outside operators. Competition for the Internet player will not go away, but as long as provinces and lottery corporations continue to be the only legal gaming option for Canadians, co-operation on best practises and other business verticals can prove integral in the effort to gain a competitive advantage over our nonregulated competitors.

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feature

Zynga Poker

The current shut-down of poker’s big boys has given an unprecedented opportunity to the many fledgling and struggling poker sites, usually dwarfed by the combined power of ‘The Big Two’. There has never been a better time for the underdogs to swoop down on players looking for a new residence in ‘value town’. But behold, there lies a looming behemoth, lurking in the wings, with the capacity to devour all usurpers. By Shelley Rubenstein. The name of this beast may surprise you, for the most successful poker site in the world in terms of numbers of signedup players – currently at around the 36 million mark – is not PokerStars or Full Tilt Poker, but Zynga Poker. Yes, the freeto-play site and one of Facebook’s biggest success stories. Zynga, also the creator of the irritatingly popular FarmVille and Mafia Wars, went live in January 2007, launching its poker spin-off six months later. Making itself the envy of other poker sites, Zynga is able to legally groom its players from the age of 13, the same age requirement to join Facebook, building up loyalty from a young age. Such is the nature of the social networking beast that word spread fast and it wasn’t long before the introduction of cash payments for chips, allowing entry to higher stakes games. As well as electronic booty, it’s now possible to win a seat into the ultimate of poker tournaments, the WSOP Main Event. To those who scoff at the likelihood of accruing serious revenue from people paying money for play chips, Zynga’s current monthly take-home is estimated to be a minimum of $15 million.

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The inevitable regulation of online poker in the US is speculated to be the catalyst required to trigger a full-on assault on the poker market from Zynga. Even the least business-minded person would reach the conclusion that with such a massive player base, most of whom have no existing allegiance to any other poker site, it would be a no-brainer to introduce real money play as the next logical step. When being interviewed, Lo Toney, Zynga Poker’s General Manager excels in delivering the kind of vacuity of answer a politician would be proud of. It seems that the initiation process Zynga requires from a spokesperson is to swallow the company handbook whole, blindly regurgitating random paragraphs expounding the Zynga mantra, with scant regard to the relevance of the question posed. Curiously though, it’s only when asked about future plans for real money play that Toney’s answer categorically seeds roots in the negative, vociferously denying any moves into that area… further reminiscent of the political theme (the moment when Bill Clinton went on record to deny sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky comes to

mind, and we know what happened there…) If there are genuinely no plans to introduce a real money offering, then how does Zynga qualify its recent acquisition of the team from MarketZero? As the company states: “MarketZero is a pioneering force in the online poker world, having established the largest online portal tracking career statistics of online poker players, PokerTableRatings.” Surely, this would only be of relevance when playing with real money? Certainly, no-one in the industry seems to be buying Zynga’s vehement denial of plans to monetise the site for pay-to-play. Lance Bradley, Bluff US Editor, comments: “I think it would be crazy for Zynga to not consider preparing themselves for a real money offering either internationally or in a regulated US market.” He continues, “They’ve recognised that they’re not a poker savvy group which explains why they purchased the guys behind PokerTableRatings.com. I mean, 36 million people a month? One percent of that would be massive.” Wanting to fully immerse himself, and Zynga’s fans, into the live poker experience,

Lo Toney spearheaded Zynga’s inaugural PokerCon at the Palms, Las Vegas, held earlier this year. “The goal of Zynga’s first event was to bring fans from the web to the felt. We hosted it as a ‘thank you’ to our 35plus million fans across the globe, to bring Zynga Poker to life. We realised through interaction with players that they wanted a way to meet each other in person, while having fun playing the game.” When asked the not particularly loaded question as to whether there are plans to bring a similar event to Europe, Toney goes characteristically company line. “We are thrilled with the feedback we’ve received from the 500 fans who attended our inaugural event, and hope to continue to show our players appreciation with more of these events. We are still focused on providing our users with a high-quality and free social game.” Top prize if you can spot an answer to the question there.

Q&A with Lo Toney, General Manager, Zynga Poker What were the initial plans and timescale for Zynga Poker? Zynga Poker was Zynga’s first social game, launched in July 2007, and was one of the games developed to support Zynga’s mission to connect the world through games. Our goal was to make a game that was fun and could be played with your friends, no matter where they lived around the world. Did the success rate and the amount of players signed up far exceed expectations? We hoped that the game would be successful and, as a company, we are humbled that Zynga Poker is now the largest online poker game in the world. Social games are now considered to be mainstream – ten percent of the world’s population have played a Zynga game. Are there any territories which have surprised you by the number of sign-ups? We’re thrilled that people all over the world love Zynga Poker – it was clear early on that there was a huge opportunity to localise the game experience in native languages for our players. Two thirds of our players are non-native English speakers, and Zynga Poker can now be played in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese and traditional Chinese.

“If there are genuinely no plans to introduce a real money offering, then how does Zynga qualify its recent acquisition of the team from MarketZero (PokerTableRatings)? Surely, this would only be of relevance when playing with real money?” Zynga Poker is available to players from the age of 13 – are you concerned that there may be people who learn to play on the site and then go on to encounter gambling problems? A player must be 13 in order to play Zynga Poker, as that is the age restriction to join Facebook. The popularity of poker has experienced a huge spike in the past ten years, and we like to believe that by giving poker fans an outlet to play the game not only for free, but socially, they are doing something they love. Are there any plans to extend the game range from Texas Hold’em to include Omaha, Stud, etc? We are always looking for ways to improve the player experience, but we can’t comment right now on new games that may or may not be in development. Ashley Mitchell was sentenced to two years in prison when he stole 400 billion Zynga Poker Chips, re-selling them on the black market. Can you talk about the process from suspecting something was amiss to Mitchell’s prosecution? On background, we are not commenting on the issue with Ashley Mitchell. Our goal is to provide our players with the most fun social game experience, which includes ensuring the safety of our players to the best of our ability. One component of that, which we take incredibly seriously at Zynga, is protecting against illegal player activity. We aim to make social games that focus on having fun with your friends, and take every measure possible to ensure the integrity of our games is not compromised. If the UIGEA is revoked, do you think Zynga Poker will branch out into real money games? No, Zynga is not interested in venturing into the real money US online poker market. We are focused on providing a great poker game experience for our players – Zynga Poker is and will continue to be free-to-play. How much of an impact on the site and the poker world do you think it would be if there was a WSOP winner borne off a Zynga Poker freeroll? Our game attracts a wide spectrum of

players – from people who have never played a hand of Texas Hold‘em, to those who frequent poker rooms each weekend and are quite skilled. We work hard to make sure that Zynga Poker is not intimidating to players new to the game, but also sophisticated for the more skilled players. We’d be thrilled if one of our players went on to win the biggest title you can in poker – the World Series of Poker!

Zynga’s staggering facts and figures ●●Since

it launched in July 2007, seven million players from every country log on each day. ●●Zynga Poker was Zynga’s first social game. ●●400, 000 people are playing simultaneously at any given moment. ●●260,000 hands of poker are played each day. ●●Zynga Poker sees seven million daily active users and nearly 38 million monthly active users at its peak. ●●The average player logs on for two sessions of 45 minutes each per day. ●●Zynga Poker continues to be one of the top five applications on Facebook. ●●Zynga Poker’s fan page has more fans on Facebook than any other page including global brands, YouTube (28 million) and Coca-Cola (23 million). ●●Zynga Poker can be played on Facebook, Yahoo!, MySpace, iPad, iPhone and Android.

Shelley Rubenstein plays, commentates and writes about poker. She organises high profile tournaments, advises the leading online gambling sites, mentors celebrities with a genuine interest in the game and has brokered many sponsorship deals. She is a regular contributor to various magazines, such as Poker Player, Inside Poker and Bluff. Shelley advises and writes for many online gambling sites and poker players including Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars, PartyPoker, Bodog and Ladbrokes.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

FEATURE

As this issue of iGB Affiliate travels to the iGaming Super Show in Dublin, it seemed prudent to provide delegates and those unable to attend the conference, the lowdown on the regulatory environment for gambling and iGaming in Ireland. Introduction Irish law on gambling distinguishes between three forms of gambling activity: gaming, betting and lotteries. The legislation which regulates each of these forms of gambling was enacted long before the development of the online forms of gambling, with the result that the regulatory environment in Ireland for online gambling operators and businesses servicing the online gambling industry is uncertain. The unsatisfactory state of Ireland’s gambling laws has been long since acknowledged, and a number of the preparatory steps required to update and reform Ireland’s laws have been undertaken, with two key developments occurring shortly before the demise of the government which left office in March 2011. In this overview of the Irish legal landscape, we provide a high level synopsis of the current regulatory regime, together with a summary of the legal developments which are coming down the track. Irish law on gambling: the key points Irish law on gambling distinguishes between three forms of gambling activity: gaming, betting and lotteries (including bingo). Irish law on gaming and lotteries (including bingo) is set out in the Gaming and Lotteries Act, 1956 (the 1956 Act). Ireland also operates a staterun lottery, which was established pursuant to the National Lottery Act, 1986. Betting is regulated by a 1931 Act, which establishes a licensing regime for retail bookmakers. Although none of this legislation specifically deals with online gambling, Irish law principles of statutory interpretation require that a “purposive” approach be adopted when construing legislation, and that allowances be made for changes in technology and social conditions. The result is that the restrictive rules and principles devised for landbased operators in the 1931 and 1956 acts of parliament must be applied to online gambling activities.

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

Gaming Section 4 of the 1956 Act prohibits the promotion or the provision of facilities for “unlawful gaming”. The definition of unlawful gaming is extremely wide, and includes all games played for stakes, whether they are games of skill or games of chance, in which the chances of all players (including the banker) are not equal, or in which the promoter or banker profits from the stakes, otherwise than as winnings from the result of play. The result is that most (if not all) forms of casino gaming are prohibited. However, gaps in the legislation have facilitated the development of a number of ‘loopholes’ which have paved the way for the development of a number of land-based ‘private members clubs’ offering casino facilities in Ireland. To date, the Irish authorities have tended to take the view that the provisions of the 1956 Act do not extend to online gambling services which are located and operated offshore, even where those services are received by Irish players. Furthermore, the authorities have not raised any significant issue or objection to the physical establishment in Ireland of support services and back office operations related to the provision of online gambling services, provided that the gambling website being supported is operated outside of Ireland. However, no official guidance on this point has been published. Lotteries Although the National Lottery has a monopoly on large prize draws, it is possible to apply to the District Court for a licence to run a lottery (including bingo) in which the total weekly prizes paid out do not exceed €20,000. However, it is an express provision of a lottery licence issued pursuant to the 1956 Act that the lottery must be for some charitable or philanthropic purpose, and that the promoter must not derive a personal profit from it. On the face of it, this rules out the running of a commercial lottery or bingo operation in or from Ireland, whether on-land or online. That said, the lottery licensee is

permitted under the legislation to apply up to 40 percent of the gross proceeds of the lottery towards the expense of running and promoting it, and that provides some scope for promoters to obtain a reasonable return from lotteries run in Ireland. Betting The starting position in relation to betting is that all betting in Ireland is prohibited, unless regulated pursuant to the Betting Act, 1931 (the 1931 Act). Although the 1931 Act has been amended more frequently than the 1956 Act, it still only regulates retail bookmakers, and does not expressly deal with online betting. Notably, section 33 of the 1931 Act as originally enacted prohibited betting with persons outside of Ireland. The effect of this section was that Irish punters could not legally place bets online with operators established outside Ireland. However, it was repealed in 2001. Advertising gaming, betting and lotteries in Ireland The 1931 Act prohibits the exhibition of certain signs outside a bookmaker’s premises. It does not, however, impose restrictions on media advertising. In general, therefore, advertising of both onshore and offshore betting is permitted. One exception to this rule is Section 32 of the 1931 Act which deems advertisements which invite persons to bet on “football games” to be unlawful. This prohibition is rarely, if ever, enforced, but to stay within the confines of the law, advertisements which expressly promote football betting should not be published in Ireland. In relation to advertising online gaming, there is a risk that online advertisements could amount to either unlawful promotion or assistance in promoting gaming. There are various technical arguments which can be put forward to counter this claim, and the risk of transgressing the law may also be tempered by reference to the aggressiveness of the advertising campaign in question; for example, it

could be argued that an advertisement which simply provides basic information about online gambling, without encouraging gambling, is not captured by this restriction. Advertisements in relation to lotteries (including bingo) face the same dilemma as gaming advertisements; the 1956 Act provides that no person shall “promote or assist in promoting a lottery”. The section of the 1956 Act which deals with lotteries also prohibits all print and radio advertisements of lotteries (including bingo), with the exception of the National Lottery. Long-term forecast: the DoJ paper on the options for regulating gambling in Ireland Following a public consultation process conducted in 2009 which generated 70 submissions, the Department of Justice (DoJ) published its paper on the “Options for Regulating Gambling in Ireland” in December 2010. The paper is intended to provide a ‘roadmap’ for the Irish legislature in devising a modern system for the regulation of gambling, including online/remote gambling, in Ireland. The paper proposes that the existing 1931 and 1956 Acts be repealed and replaced with a single statute regulating all forms of gambling, including casino gaming, betting, gaming machines, lotteries and bingo, and their online versions. When the paper was published in December 2010, it was criticised separately by Fine Gael and Labour, who subsequently formed the new coalition government. Then Labour TD and current Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte, described the DoJ paper as “a ham-fisted report without direction [or] conclusions, for a sector that has been awaiting regulation for a very long time”. Then Fine Gael TD and current Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Alan Shatter, was quoted in the Irish Times on January 5, 2011, as saying that he deplored the government’s failure “to take any meaningful position” on a range of issues discussed in the paper. It remains to be seen what level of priority Ireland’s new government will attach to overhauling Ireland’s gambling laws. While comprehensive reform is clearly required, it is unclear at this stage how quickly the new government will take up the baton of reform, and whether it will endorse the DoJ paper, or seek to go another route.

Short-term outlook: a licensing and tax regime for online bookmakers and betting exchange operators? Pending a complete overhaul of Ireland’s gambling laws, the indications from the new government are that a licensing regime for online bookmakers and betting exchange operators will be introduced in the short-term. Following the budget announcement in December 2010, that the government intends to extend the application of betting duty to all operators accepting bets from Irish customers, the promised taxation provisions were passed into law in January by Section 49 of the Finance Act, 2011. These include a licence fee for “remote bookmakers” and “remote betting intermediaries” (i.e. online betting exchange operators); the extension of Ireland’s existing one percent turnoverbased betting duty to remote bookmakers in respect of online bets accepted by them from Irish punters (regardless of where the online operator is located); and the introduction of a new form of duty payable on the commission earned by betting exchange operators on bets placed by Irish customers using their services. There has been some media speculation that the existing one percent rate may be increased to two percent. Section 49 has not yet been commenced and, indeed, cannot be commenced until such time as a licensing regime for “remote bookmakers” and “remote betting intermediaries” is introduced. However, while introducing new taxes before developing the licensing regime which is required to collect those taxes is very much a ‘horse before cart’ approach, the introduction of a licensing regime for online betting operations would appear to be on the new government’s immediate agenda. In April 2011, the new Fine Gael/ Labour government revealed its legislative programme, which included a “Betting (Amendment) Bill” in a list of twenty urgent Bills which are to be published by the end of the Summer Session (i.e. before July 21, 2011). The stated purpose of this Bill is to amend the Betting Act 1931 in order to bring remote betting (including betting exchanges) within the existing regulatory framework, i.e. to pave the way for the tax provisions in Section 49 to be commenced. Concluding Remarks Notwithstanding the criticism levelled by the political opposition at the DoJ policy paper late last year, it is clear that there is

a political consensus about the pressing need to update Ireland’s gambling laws. Indeed, the Labour Party are on the record as advocates for a licensing system for online gambling following the publication of a policy paper entitled “Raising the Stakes” in January 2010. Ireland is likely to take encouragement from other European jurisdictions, including Greece and Spain, and to introduce a licensing system whereby operators offering their services to Irish customers will require some form of Irish licence, regardless of where they are located. The key challenge in Ireland, as in other EU jurisdictions, will be to equip the regulators with effective enforcement tools to take action against operators who do not subscribe to the licensing/regulatory system. Whatever Ireland ultimately decides to do, it will have to be mindful of the wider European context. In particular, Ireland needs to be conscious of adopting a consistent and systematic approach to regulating (and taxing) different forms of gambling. If Ireland takes steps to regulate online betting in isolation from online gaming, this may potentially be subject to challenge by online betting operators who seek to press a claim grounded on unfair or prejudicial treatment. Assuming Ireland does regulate online betting in the immediate future as planned, it also needs to look at introducing a licensing regime for gaming, sooner rather than later. JOE KELLY is a Partner with A&L Goodbody Solicitors in Dublin, one of Ireland’s largest law firms. For almost 20 years Kelly has advised clients active in the Gaming, Leisure and Licensed Trade Sectors. He heads up the specialist Gaming Law Group which advises landbased casinos, suppliers to the sector, Internet gaming operators and trade associations. Joe heads is a member of the International Masters of Gaming Law, one of the leading international organisations in this sector. DR JOHN CAHIR is a Partner in A&L Goodbody’s Firm’s IP & Technology Group. John has extensive experience in advising domestic and international clients on the creation, commercialisation and enforcement of intellectual property rights both in Ireland and the European Union. Joe and John head up A&L Goodbody’s Betting and Gaming Group.

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

More details including sponsorship packages, conference schedule, the official hotel, all the parties and much more will be available soon on www.BarcelonaAffiliateConference.com

INSIGHT

Attention iGaming affiliates! If you are reading this article at the Dublin Super Show, while sipping free beer and gazing at semi-naked models walking the floor, you are probably quite good at what you do. But would you like to quickly and easily make more money from your traffic by maximising ROI? Of course, but can that really be done, you ask? And easily? THE ANSWER IS simple: yes and yes. But before we look at the solution, first let’s break down your activity and business model into simple terms. You invest your resources in an effort to create or acquire traffic through a range of marketing techniques, and send them to operators which you hope will give you the best return. That return (your ROI) is dependent upon the operators’ abilities to convert your traffic and generate high life-time value (LTV) from your players. Now, interestingly, it is the operations with topnotch retention teams that are most able to generate high LTV from your players, and which result in you getting paid better. Even if your deal is entirely CPA-based, if the operator understands that your players have a consistently high LTV, they will be willing to agree to higher CPA terms. Therefore, by ensuring that the operators you work with have adopted better conversion tactics and a modern retention marketing strategy, you can earn more from your traffic. What steps can an affiliate take to gauge the effectiveness and capabilities of an operation? Let’s start at the beginning.

Basic conversion CRM, just like all iGaming activity actually starts with first contact. As consultants, when we’re reviewing an operator’s website, we look for the items of interest to long-term players. There are clear and obvious differences between what a serious long-term customer wants, and they contrast dramatically with the desires of bonus abusers. Here are a few CRM considerations which players take into account when deciding where to play and what you can look for on a brand’s website when evaluating if they are a good destination for your traffic. ● Big winners’ page: this is why players come to check out new brands – they want to win! As such, this section must always be updated and pumped with new content and exciting stories. It is astonishing how many iGaming operators don’t have this information listed at all. ● First deposit offer: when an operation

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decides on a first deposit bonus, they are doing more than just posting a deal online. They are crafting a perception of the quality and stability of their business. The offer can’t be too high, and it can’t be unattractive, nor should it be entirely generic. You should pay particular attention to whether the sign-up offer actually fits the brand and is relevant to the players you are targeting it with. Terms and Conditions: who reads those? Enough players – that’s the right answer and, as such, you must ensure the text is coherent and has no contradictions between the paragraphs. Also, a key part of the offering is the play-through (or wagering requirements) and, as such, this specific part should be well explained. Look for trick clauses and pay attention to maximum allowable cash out, as this will clue you into the financial position of the brand itself. Of course, nothing is worse than sending traffic to a brand that doesn’t pay.

Retention rules!! OK, so now that your players have converted and you’re starting to see some cash being sent in your direction, how can the operators take your traffic to the next level, and generate more value out of each existing depositing player? Make sure the operator is consistent in the following areas: ● VIP Club: high level players deserve to be treated differently, and with distinction. Otherwise, those moneymakers will look for another place to donate their charity. Your operators really need to respect and go the extra mile for the high profile players you send, from personal VIP hostesses, to different financial terms and all sorts of creative promotions. If an operation doesn’t have a VIP program… Pass! ● Headline promotions: your operator’s website MUST include a dynamic list of ongoing promotional activities. There is no other way to describe it better. This is the barometer being used by players when determining a brand’s attractiveness and, therefore, it should always be as vibrant as possible.

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Promotional backbone/loyalty scheme: this is the predefined, ongoing set of promotions which is being sent to a brand’s segmented player-base. This scheme includes brand efforts for reactivation, preventing churn, growing potential VIPs into high-rollers, as well as cross-sale (make sure you’re not being shaved). Understanding how an operation sets up its promotional backbone is a key component in evaluating a brand’s capabilities and the likelihood that they will be able to get you the most from your traffic.

Conclusion It all comes down to picking the most attractive offer, and players can evaluate this elusive parameter by reviewing all manner of aspects before deciding with which brand they would like to play. This is why for them, and even for affiliates, retention is king. Send your traffic to operations with the tools and understanding to keep your players happy, and you will make more money. Not only that, but it will actually boost your own reputation as you can show the high value of the traffic you send. An operation that is thinking about long-term value has certainly not forgotten about the importance of an efficient and attractive conversion process, and through proper brand analysis, you can identify brands that are more likely to convert well and give you high recurring revenue over the long haul.

SHAHAR ATTIAS, the Founder and CEO of Hybrid Interaction Ltd, is a globally recognised CRM/loyalty expert, and a frequent speaker at iGaming Conferences. Since 1997, Hybrid Interaction has grown into the industry’s leading iGaming CRM Consultancy, with a portfolio including: bwin.party, Casino Club, Play65, eToro, Grand Duke, Viaden and more. Come and meet us during the Super Show at the VIP lounge on May 25 and 26 for a FREE 30 minute ‘Operational Review’. You’ll be glad you did… shahar@hybridinteraction.com +972-52-8577539

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In an excerpt from the forthcoming Global Business of Affiliate Marketing Report, published by iGaming Business, Alex Timlin, Senior Consultant at Communicator Corp, defines the strategies to build revenue from your email acquisition campaigns. THERE IS AN OLD saying in the technology world, “Garbage in Garbage out!” By getting the data right from the beginning of a player acquisition programme, we can use it to drive forward a successful marketing strategy. The following article will provide you with advice on how to put the right fuel in the tank and build a steady stream of income from email acquisition campaigns, by looking at: sign-up process; qualification; planning an effective strategy; initial customer engagement and ensuring long-term success.

Sign-up The sign-up process on your website or landing page is, perhaps, the most crucial part of the process. Unfortunately, it is something grossly overlooked or taken for granted. When I speak to affiliates, and even the operators, there is always a big debate on whether or not to use ‘single opt-in’ (simple text box for email address and a button to ‘sign up now’) or a ‘double opt-in’ (making someone re-enter their email address or confirm their details before they enter your database). Many marketers use a single opt-in method, as they want to make it easy as possible to grab the email address and details. The problem is that it is very easy to make mistakes. For example, artimlin@hotmail.com becomes artimlin@ hotmal.com because I am always in a hurry! Therefore, even though you have that valuable email address on your database, it is worthless; simply because you have no mechanism to verify it is a ‘valid’ email address. We’ve also seen instances of abuse where people are deliberately signing up with incorrect email addresses to cause problems for affiliate/acquisition marketers (e.g. notarealemailaddress@idontexist.com). A simple alternative is to have two text boxes to enter details, making a new subscriber double check that the email address is entered correctly before they ‘submit’ it to your mailing list. This is a great option, as it only adds a few seconds to the time it takes to enter details, and it ensures they have entered the correct email address. However, you still run the risk of people maliciously entering other people’s, or nonexistent, email addresses. When using a ‘double opt-in’, you’re giving yourself the best opportunity to

validate an email address and, more importantly, that they want read your marketing messages. Use an ‘Activation Link’, as well as the above, to send an automated message to new subscribers with a link to confirm they’ve received it. This means neither malicious (notarealemailaddress@idontexist.com) nor other people’s email addresses can be falsely added to your clean mailing list. More importantly, it means people on your database really want to receive your messages and are likely to convert more easily into paying players. It will also assist in achieving better email delivery rates, as one of the things Internet Service Providers examine when filtering messages is how many ‘unknown users’ (non-existent or inactive email addresses) are in a dispatch.

Activation link Use the Activation Link as a thank you, to build a little excitement and let people know what to expect from your future marketing. An example: “Thanks for joining our mailing list, we’ll send you all the best offers...” Think about personalising your brand (introduce a chat manager, casino manager, fictional author or the newsletter, etc). Subscribers should feel they are entering a relationship, not just getting a single free-play, which is likely to make them more reluctant to leave, especially with poker and bingo. Also, use the Activation Link as an opportunity to allow subscribers to add your email address to their ‘safe-senders’ list. This ensures your images and links are always displayed, helping you achieve better inbox placement and better conversion rates. Another good idea is to let subscribers know how often you’re going to send a message. It’s a very simple thing to do: if you send monthly emails but a subscriber is expecting a weekly newsletter, they’ll either email you about it (a waste of resources) or forget you (a waste of revenue). With some gaming clients, we’ve implemented the ‘thank you message’ send after subscribers have clicked the Activation Link, and we have achieved very impressive results, because you’re building a dialogue of actions between you and the subscriber (making them more receptive to your brand and ensuring a better quality of data by

“The sign-up process on your website or landing page is, perhaps, the most crucial part of the process. Unfortunately, it is something that is grossly overlooked.” eliminating tyre kickers and competitors). The best results, we’ve had, are when we use this ‘thank you message’, not just to get added to the ‘safe-senders’ list, but to link to a short survey or preference centre where subscribers can select what they do and don’t want to receive. By letting a client decide between casino, bingo, poker, slots on a daily, weekly, monthly basis, we can ensure they stay on our database for longer (thereby, increasing their lifetime value to us). It also helps build rapport between your brand and the new subscriber.

Brand loyalty We’ve seen that by adding these steps, and creating more interaction during the sign-up process, subscribers become more loyal to the brand. They are also likely to invest more time and effort in looking out for and interacting with your messages. By developing this dialogue with them, and by them providing more information on their preferences, we’ve seen better delivery rates, lower unsubscribe rates, better open rates, better click through rates and better conversions. By looking more closely at how people enter our database and what they’re looking for when they do, we can use that information to maximum effect and achieve better results. Ever since the onset of the ‘global downturn’, the number of acquisition email campaigns has been on the rise. This means that it’s a more competitive marketplace, but it also means that the number of SPAM emails is increasing. However, if you have good data, and you send your marketing messages to people that want them, then you have a chance at creating a reliable source of revenue month in, month out. The question you need to ask yourself is, ‘do you want a database of 1 million email addresses or do you want $1 million?’

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

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Get the best position in mobile app stores. More and more gaming operators are launching Smartphone applications to attract the fast growing mobile player community with instant access to sportbooks, casino games and poker tables. Business operations are supporting themselves with new job positions such as mobile game managers and mobile affiliate managers, and departments are being prepared to handle mobile support requests. Today, we are witnessing an industry getting ready for the mobile boom much predicted by industry experts and research groups. As the industry is getting ready to deliver stable and robust mobile games to players, we can fully expect affiliates to follow this trend in the coming months. Indeed, affiliate systems are being updated to support mobile logistics with player registrations, deposits and wagering, but mobile marketing is still a new practice for most of today’s affiliates. Going mobile will allow existing affiliates to extend their services to the blossoming mobile player community, but how will players find your app and how can you maximise your exposure in the apps marketplace?

has approved gaming apps in both the UK and Sweden, it is no guarantee that any gaming app will be accepted for these markets; this decision is made by the app store’s Q&A process.

Strict restrictions for gaming apps

Native app or HTML5 app

There has been much discussion as to how the strict stance of app stores towards gambling is crippling the gaming industry, and only a handful of operators have developed mobile apps that have been approved by the respective Q&A processes of the stores. Unfortunately, it isn’t possible to get a pre-authorised confirmation from the app stores. Despite the fact that Apple

When going mobile, the app architecture is very important. Whether you develop a native or HTML5 app, they represent two very different marketing strategies. Native apps must be installed on the Smartphone and are bound to its operating system, similar to what we experience with Windows and Mac computers. HTML5 apps are mobile web applications that

Understanding the mobile ecosystem In order to successfully market mobile services, marketers must understand the mobile ecosystem. The mobile ecosystem is the Smartphone environment that explains how apps are being evaluated by the stores and how easily or, indeed, how difficult it is for users to find your app. The ecosystem can be compared to search engine marketing concepts: as websites are achieving better search engine rankings with proper optimisation techniques, a good link building strategy and social media integration, mobile apps face different rating criteria in each app store. Today, apps are the driving force behind the consumption of Smartphones. With half a million apps available in the Apple App store and a quarter of a million apps in the Google Android Market, app stores are an extremely important element of the mobile ecosystem.

execute in the mobile Internet browser and are, therefore, executable across mobile device operating systems. As a marketer, the decision regarding the app architecture will provide the framework for how it can be marketed. Native apps need to be downloaded from an app store or distribution site, whereas HTML5 apps are simply accessible by pointing a browser to the app URL. HTML5 apps are not usually accepted in app stores, as this is primary reserved for native apps. This means that your customers will not find you in the app stores if you have an HTML5 app. There are ways to package an HTML5 app into a native app to gain access to app stores, but this might be frowned upon by many users if it is not done properly.

Achieving top positioning in app stores After submitting your app store application and receiving approval from the Q&A process, life can quickly get lonely if your preparations are not thorough. Think of app stores as large online shops with several hundred thousand items in stock. Each item is an app, sorted into categories, the smallest category having 15,000 listed apps. Now you need to make your app visible. Let’s look at some of the elements marketers could consider in preparation for an app submission.

The app launcher icon Each app is presented with an icon. This icon becomes the visual identity of the app that users identify with in the stores and when launching the app on their

Android app stores accepting gaming apps

Name

URL

Description

Getjar

www.getjar.com

A recognised app store with millions of visitors.

Opera Mobile Store

mobilestore.opera.com

The leading mobile browser recently launched its own app store. Increasing popularity.

Freeware Lovers

freewarelovers.com/Android

A popular app directory.

Pdassi

android.pdassi.com

A fast growing European-focused app store.

Appoke Social App Store

appoke.com

A popular social app store.

Brothersoft

www.brothersoft.com/mobile/android

Wide reaching app store with worldwide sub affiliates.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

Native Vs HTML5: pros & cons

Use this opportunity to provide additional information about your app and use videos, as this is an excellent presentation tool to explain what makes it unique.

Native

HTML5

Pro: Very fast as locally installed on phone

Pro: Cross platform

Pro: Provides excellent user experience

Pro: No local installation is needed

Pro: Utilises all phone features

Pro: Easy to manage and measure

Get started today

Con: Updates require new app installation

Con: A new language, needs some time to mature

Con: Strict publishing rules for gaming apps

Con: Network traffic can be slow

Con: Dependent on app store policies

Con: Not installed on local devices

Mobile apps are still in their early stages. There are less than one million apps on the market, compared to over 100 million websites, so securing a good position in app stores is definitely possible if done correctly. However, don’t merely submit an app to an app store and wait for traffic to build up. Work actively to promote your app in forums, blogs and social media sites. Optimise your descriptions and carefully monitor your download metrics to understand how the mobile ecosystem relates to your app.

Smartphones. Make sure that your icon follows good design principles and looks inviting for potential users.

time to prepare your descriptions before you start your submission.

Screenshots The app description This is probably the most important part of your app submission. App stores usually support both a short and long description. With tight length restrictions, it is a challenge to write an excellent, concise description. Not only are users evaluating apps based on their descriptions, but the app store search engine will also index the descriptions in local app search engines. My recommendation is to make enough

This the first ‘sneak preview’ users see from your app. Make sure that screenshots are up-to-date and use action screens that give the user an accurate preview of the game experience (and not screenshots of the registration or deposit page, for example).

Promotional videos and images More and more app stores now support additional promotional images and videos to integrate to your app inventory page.

Henrik Mandal is a ‘new media marketeer’ with extensive experience with multi-channel marketing development including a variety of online and offline channels. He is recognised as a forward thinking marketing professional, and is the man behind the mobile sportsbetting portal, Kyoogi.

For Poker Players, Webmasters & Party People!!!

iloveonlinepoker.com iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

INSIGHT

Diversifying your Afﬁliate Offering WE HAVE ALL sat down at a restaurant and ordered a soft-drink (e.g. 7UP) and have been told that the restaurant only offers the competitor (Sprite). We generally say ‘no problem’, and happily enjoy our meal, chug our drink and think nothing of it. Yet, there is a small percentage of people who decide to cancel the soft drink as the brand offered does not appeal to them – which translates as lost revenue to the establishment they are eating at. This type of scenario often occurs within the online gambling sector, but with casinos, poker rooms and bingo halls, rather than soft drinks, with the affiliate losing out on potential revenues earned. Although there may be specific cases where an affiliate needs to limit the offering on their sites – such as when their offering is a certain software or a very targeted site (i.e. Bestxwyzpokerbonus.com) – there is always room for portfolio diversification and it’s in every affiliate’s best interest to make sure they have the right balance of product/service diversification in their affiliate offering. Here are some of the reasons that affiliates should really start taking portfolio diversification seriously as those who do, simply make more revenues.

Increase revenues Studies have shown that a vast majority of online accounts with multiple brands enjoy playing their favourite games with multiple software providers. This said, affiliates want to make sure they are taking every step in earning revenue for each gaming account a player opens, and this means making sure they have an effective offering of quality gaming products.

Spreading risk Promoting one brand or only one gaming group may not prove to be the best risk

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

“Affiliates need to realise that being an affiliate is being a business owner… what you put in is what you pull out.” management strategy as the affiliate’s entire cash flow is dependent on that one source of income; should anything happen to disturb cash flow, the affiliate is likely to take a hit. Offering more products, as well as promoting more than one gaming group or affiliate program, better protects affiliates from the seemingly common cash flow and payment issues that the gaming industry is subject to.

Build customer affinity The best kind of player is one that returns to the affiliate for more offers. Having a rich product offering gives players a reason to return to a website or open a newsletter as they know that the affiliate site gave them a legitimate gateway to the gaming site of their choice and when they want more, affiliates who have more to choose from, earn more revenues.

Be the master of your domain OK, Seinfeld jokes aside, this issue should be taken seriously as newer affiliates need to realise that being an affiliate is being a business owner. What you put in is what you pull out and one need only look at the successful affiliates within the industry in order to see that each and every one of them dedicates time, effort and interest in not only diversifying their product portfolio, but choosing the best possible products to offer to their users So, affiliates need to take charge, check each and every program to know what to offer and, most importantly, take a calculated approach to making their affiliation efforts as effective as possible.

Choosing the right strategy Portfolio diversification is not entirely black and white as there are many ways an affiliate can choose to build their portfolio. Everything from offering multiple brands, multiple software providers and multiple verticals must be considered when building the proper organisational infrastructure and long-term acquisition strategy. Affiliates need to properly assess their strategy, as unexpected issues may arise that could increase costs and ultimately decrease potential revenues – it may be difficult to target the traffic needed to get results as the entire affiliate operation and product offering is too vast to optimise effectively. Ultimately, the most common challenge that affiliates face when trying to offer different products to the end user is trying to figure out how many products to offer as not to over-saturate and over-diversify the total product offering. This can be difficult, especially for newer affiliates, but with a bit of patience of process, one can optimise the amount to get the best monetisation results from their product offerings.

It’s all about maximising earnings potential At the end of the day, affiliates who diversify their portfolio, diversify their earnings; so make sure that you are one of those affiliates who has taken every step in order to earn better revenues from your hard earned efforts. JOSHUA KRIMBERG is currently the affiliate director for AffStars.com, and has over six years of marketing experience in the online gaming industry

INSIGHT

WRITING FOR AN online gaming magazine comes with a fair share of risk. The relative latency of bi-monthly print media within a fast paced industry means any topical analysis could end up incomplete, irrelevant or plain obsolete by the time the copy makes it to the print rolls. Toying with potential topics for this column on a scorching Easter weekend in West London, I considered addressing the Farmer/Panda Google update and its effect on the affiliate industry, or alternatively something about the now infamous US indictments. But by the time you read this, Panda will be history. Most affected affiliates will be working their way back up the rankings, and the next update – ‘Engineer’ or ‘Squirrel’ according to my sources at Google – could be on everyone’s lips. Equally, dust will have settled over the US indictments and, for all we know, AbsoluteTiltStars.com could already be live. Topic of the day could be a US land-based Casino Group quietly buying stakes in one of the weakened giants. Or Playtech buying Luxembourg. Who knows? In the end I decided to avoid shallow waters and settled on something long-term and closer to home: the Virgin Games website re-design project. As those of you who visited us at the LAC Affiliate Conference in London will testify, this has been keeping us busy for a few months now. It’s one of the few curses of the online world: while a downtown Vegas casino can trade happily for decades without any need to replace their old, nicotine-scented carpets, their online counterparts need more than a fresh coat of paint every few years. Regular site overhauls are dictated by the ever-changing design, ergonomic and social trends, as well

as technological advances. The thing with an operator’s new website project is that almost all business units must get a piece of the action. Everyone has to contribute one way or another to their new home’s architecture and features. The customer acquisition and affiliate teams are amongst the most demanding of them all. After all, a new site is a new opportunity to address issues pertaining to conversion rates, one of our industrycrucial levers. Acting on this lever involves ensuring that almost every logged-out page features an inviting call-to-registration module whose aim is twofold: to charm new visitors and convince them to join. Tools of charm inevitably include sign-up bonuses, and any other marketing asset that distinguishes your operation from the crowd: a unique reward system maybe, unique prices and events, unique games portfolio, etc. Tools of conviction are call-toaction assets, graphics and buttons. Their design and labelling are more often than not a reflection of a company’s approach to customer acquisition: aggressive, ‘Sign-up now or else!’ or needy, ‘Register with us… Please’. With our eyes firmly set on presenting ourselves as an entertainment destination rather than a hardcore gambling den, Virgin’s approach sits pretty much in the middle: fun, non-intrusive and inviting. Our secret weapon? The Big Red Button. Ultimately, what the acquisition team expects from this exercise is a large number of prominently placed charm features, combined with healthy looking, big red call-to-action buttons. A big ask, considering our affiliate system provides full deep-linking functionality, allowing our affiliate partners to link to any page on our casino, bingo and poker sites. Quite

demanding as I said, but we have to fight our affiliate’s corner. The product and retention teams also have their own justified requirements: dynamic and customised content serving, full CMS control, social functionalities, to name just a few. The production, development and IT teams want stability, scalability, site performance and good plumbing. The design squad seeks creative flexibility within the boundaries of brand guidelines. All things considered, such a large scale project sounds like a cacophonous affair, and, often, it is. The key to success here is never to lose sight of the end goal: increased accessibility, efficiency and harmony. Now, will we achieve this harmony? Will our design team get the last word on a surprising colour scheme for the new Virgin Bingo site? Will our acquisition team get the Big Red Buttons they so much crave? The answers will be online in a few weeks.

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

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

INSIGHT

THE FUTURE IS NOW Moving away from conventional marketing. WE HAVE ALL become accustomed to using the normal marketing channels to promote our products. Most of us, operators and affiliates alike, still make predominant use of email marketing, banners/media buys and the like to attract new customers, but are these marketing channels getting the right message across effectively, using the latest developments in technology? I don’t know about you but, personally, I get a number of emails everyday from sites I have subscribed to (and others I didn’t) and the reality is that even on the best of all days I may, if I’m lucky, open a maximum of ten percent of these emails. So it’s a fact that 90 percent of emails I receive from

a PC/Laptop to find out more about promotions received, has vanished. Operators and affiliates wishing to take advantage of this trend must make sure they capture mobile phone numbers and that this field becomes as important as the email address when capturing data. It could also be suggested that one forgoes email verification and pushes for mobile number verification upon user registration as this is more accurate. I did some quick research online and found that a number of operators are requesting a phone number as part of their required information to be submitted by a registering customer, but very few of these actually ask for mobile number (without

“In my opinion, the future will actually move towards the integration of services over multiple platforms (mobile and non-mobile) in such a way that people are connected to each other and the outside world seamlessly.” subscribed services go unnoticed and even when I do open an email… that’s just the start; it takes much more effort to convince me to part with my hard-earned cash. Nowadays, there are a number of specialised email marketing firms that help companies maximise email open rates and the conversion rate thereafter, but the fact is that there could be another channel that might be more effective than email marketing – mobile text marketing.

SMS marketing It is a fact that I open every text message I receive even if it’s some sort of promotion, so the first battle is won. It is then up to the marketer to make sure that the message delivered to the potential customer is attractive enough to induce the person to follow the links provided. This form of marketing is now becoming more and more attractive as most mobile phone owners are switching to Smartphones, which means better Internet access and the ability for these potential customers to follow links in text messages instantaneously. The time lag that existed between receiving a message and finding

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

giving the option for work/home number). I didn’t find any operators using mobile phone verification.

Mobile optimisation Another criterion that has become extremely important and that most operators are giving due attention to is website optimisation for mobile browsers. As consumer behaviour shifts to mobile, marketing efforts will have to support mobile optimised sites. Companies that wish to attract business all day long while customers are on-the-go, will have to enable consumers to start and complete transactions via mobile. There are two major challenges for operators and affiliates wanting to jump on the mobile channel bandwagon. First of all, marketers are constrained by a much smaller screen on Smartphones than on laptop/PC screens. This limits the amount of information and graphics that marketers can present on a page. Another important potential problem to consider is bandwidth. Bandwidth for cellular networks is considerably less than that of landline Internet connections, which means slower

page downloads and page loading times. Although mobile operators are investing in faster Internet connectivity, marketers must make sure to build mobile sites that support the variety of Smartphone browsers on the market. Be sure to conduct consumer usability tests to ensure that the consumer experience is consistent and that the online user experience is replicated via the mobile channel. As with any online presence, web analytics becomes crucial in analysing the relative success of the mobile channel. Make sure to monitor the customer conversion rate, bounce rate and other key indicators of visitors using mobile websites and compare these to the analytics of your online website. Critically assess any significant differences that emerge and optimise the mobile website content as you would do the online content. The mobile revolution is already happening – can you afford to miss the boat? With the speed things are changing these days, we can simply say that ‘the future is now’. Could we already be facing the challenge of Web 3.0 when some of us are still contemplating Web 2.0? In my opinion, the future will actually move towards the integration of services over multiple platforms (mobile and non-mobile) in such a way that people are connected to each other and the outside world seamlessly. Whether we call it Web 3.0 or any other name, it won’t be long before this will become standard practice for everyone as social media is for most of us today. The choice is whether to be an innovator and start planning ahead or be a follower and wait for others to take the lead. Can you risk being a follower? MATTHEW CASTILLO is an iGaming and Affiliate Marketing specialist who has experience working for a leading affiliate software provider, providing affiliate marketing consultancy services to a number of leading iGaming operators. Matthew can be contacted on matthew@actifusion.com

INSIGHT

Is your Website an Endangered Species? Ten non-SEO guru tips to protect your sites from future Google Panda updates. HAVE YOU BEEN HIT by the recent Panda update? If you escaped, maybe you are a little nervous as to whether your sites will be hit by Panda II, III, IV, or V? If you are fed up with trying to trick Google, here are some tips which may help you to build content which both your visiting traffic and Google actually want.

1) Stop building bad quality content In the attempt to rank for volume keywords, many affiliates have built hundreds of sites and thousands of pages of, in the most, pretty poor content for the reader. The words are there purely to get the page ranked, with little care as to whether they are actually read, as long as a percentage of traffic clicks straight through to sign-up. This has worked in the past but in the future, content which isn’t read, let alone shared, is unlikely to be seen amongst the top pages of Google.

2) Get passionate people to build content for you People who are passionate about the subjects you cover on your site will enjoy writing about them and will naturally produce good content. At OLBG.com, we have given a group of bloggers a platform to write about what they love. Together they generate hundreds of pages of quality content per day. People who find the content actually want to read it because it’s genuine and interesting and, due to point 1) above, there isn’t much of that type of content out there.

3) You will no longer be able to game social links effectively Putting up a page of content, bookmarking the page yourself and sharing it on a couple of social sites won’t continue to fool the mighty Google. It looks as though the search engine giant is spreading the factors it uses to determine if your page is liked by genuine visitors. As well as increasing the volume of social indicators it looks at, it now looks likely that Google will

assess the range, quality (authority) of the social accounts ‘liking’ or sharing a page of content. The spreading of these factors looks set to continue in the future.

there any point wasting time trying to gain easy links?

4) How user generated content builds your social links

We see a huge amount of ‘news’ put out by affiliates targeting specific keyword terms with the hope of generating betting accounts. In our experience, efforts on news type content would be far better spent trying to write awesome unique content on trending topics with the aim of that content being good enough to be linked to.

The bloggers who love writing for OLBG gain us regular social links. As mentioned earlier, passionate writers are proud of what they write and they want to share it with their friends and followers so they tweet it, bookmark it or share it on Facebook and other social networks, from where their followers then ‘retweet’ and re-share creating a vast e-word-of-mouth network.

8) Use news and trending stories to gain links not traffic

9) Have content on your site discussing the latest topics

As Google advances in determining what is likely to be a natural link, surely the time spent trying to ‘game’ this becomes far too great? Wouldn’t you be better investing this time just building content which does gain natural links?

Building a community of people interested in your subject area will, of course, automatically generate lots of discussion about the latest trending topics. Live search results are becoming of more interest to people and are being used more by Google. This content won’t only rank better in search in the future, latest opinions are more likely to get shared and linked to as well.

6) Good quality, genuine unique content still gets linked to

10) People who are buying don’t care what you think

By way of example, OLBG.com picks up brand new fresh links from other websites every day. Aside from the social links mentioned above, the blogs at OLBG gain links from other webmasters sharing alternative opinions to their viewers. Authority sites such as the BBC and Daily Mail link to the blogs as well, to allow their viewers more background reading/ different viewpoints on the subjects they are interested in.

Most of us want to read reviews from people who have actually bought and used the products or services we are interested in and, ideally, people we know or whom we know are respected. Genuine discussions about bookmakers on our forums or the user generated reviews on our bookmaker review pages are far more powerful than any saleslike content we could write.

5) Building your own keyword backlinks is becoming an even more dangerous business

7) Easy links are almost worthless As Panda seemed to downgrade the value of content on some article submission sites and/or so called content farms, so too is it likely that the power of the links from these sites has been downgraded too. On the assumption that the harder the link is to gain, the more value it is likely to have, is

RICHARD MOFFAT joined the Sports Betting Community site OLBG as a tipster in 2004 and a year later became a full time employee. OLBG.com and its family of sites hit over one million unique visitors in April 2011 and the community now boasts over 84,000 members. OLBG also provides live odds boxes for sportsbetting sites via its award winning ValueChecker affiliate program and an industry blog at blog.invendium.co.uk.

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

webmaster world

insight

If you are thinking of becoming an affiliate in the iGaming industry, you have to assess what it will take to achieve a successful business venture. Things like cost and developing a strategy should be at the top of your list of considerations The reality is that there is no magic formula and no exact timeframe that will guarantee financial success in affiliate marketing. What you also need to consider in order to calculate costs are the tools that you have at your disposal, your marketing channels, your knowledge of the industry you are in, and how much time you are willing to invest in developing your affiliate business.

Your tools All beginner iGaming affiliates need a website. There are a variety of affordable options when it comes to launching your own site, which can vary from free templates to a new domain name that has never been purchased, even to acquiring an existing URL. Next, you’ll need to register for a web hosting account, which can be free or commercial. Some aspects to consider when choosing your web host are reliability, speed of access, bandwidth allotment, file type and size limitations, FTP access and the amount of web space allocated. It’s not that free is necessarily bad, but you will need to think of your long-term goals if you are to ensure that your web host can sustain your business as it grows.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

In terms of your design budget, this is going to depend on whether you will be doing it yourself or hiring a designer and/ or a programmer. If you will be designing your site on your own, there are a variety of free and commercial web editors out there with an abundance of free tutorials to help you. Keep in mind at this stage that the design elements, navigability and basic attractiveness of your website are important considerations both in terms of how well your site will rank and how it will attract and, more importantly, retain visitors. The question to consider here is how much value will a professional website designer bring to your business? If you have no programming or design skills, this investment could be money well spent. The real challenge here is not launching your website, but gaining and retaining traffic. The cost of this really comes down to time and you can safely plan on six to 12 months to get a healthy position in the search engines. Your content needs to be relevant to search terms most used by your target market. To find what people are searching for, relative to your niche, you can use tools like Google’s AdWords Keyword Tool. Here, you can enter the topic of your website, and it will display

keyword phrases that are relevant, as well as the intensity of the competition for those terms. To get the most out of your chosen keywords, they should be used in several places. First, use them in your meta description and the title of your page. If you have a blog, you can often download plugins (depending on the type of blog software you are using) to help you accomplish this easily. Secondly, they must be used in the text of your copy. Use keywords or keyword phrases once every 60 to 80 words for best results. Search engine optimisation is also based on how many links point to your site. It is good practice to connect with other affiliates to share links. Remember, the higher their pages rank, the more clout links from those sites carry.

Your marketing channels In the last section, we quickly touched on the value of SEO. While SEO is time consuming, it’s free if you do it yourself, and can save you from having to spend as much on paid advertising, if you do it well. It can be strategic to have a varied marketing mix, especially when you are a beginner and are uncertain about what works best for you and your skill set.

“As an affiliate, time is one of your greatest resources and assets. Your business is only as successful as the time you dedicate to making it successful.”

The cost of marketing will depend on the marketing mix that you explore. To create an affordable balance, it is a good idea to combine free marketing with paid marketing, at least while you get your affiliate feet wet. In terms of paid marketing, pay per click (PPC) tends to be one of the more expensive options available but, at the same time, may provide faster results when done right. Unlike investing in a good SEO strategy, however, where the time and effort you put in can have a long-term impact, with PPC, once payments stop, so do the benefits. In the iGaming industry, bidding on keywords can also be expensive and as an affiliate there are strict rules to follow in order to launch a campaign. If you are exploring the area of email marketing, you will have to consider creating a database. As a beginner, you may not have a mailing list, or you may have a limited one, in which case, you can do what some companies have done and purchase a list of names. This can be very pricey. Make sure you create an opt-in section on your site so you can eventually have a targeted list of users who are confirming that they are eager to receive your content. There are a number of ‘free’ marketing strategies available to bring traffic to your new affiliate site. They include things like social media, blogging and forums. As you consider these options, make sure to keep in mind that while there may be no cost to using these tools, the time invested on your part can be significant. Your marketing options can certainly go far beyond what has been suggested here, but testing and tracking is the key to analysing your performance. Knowing how well your marketing campaigns are

doing is vital to the survival of an affiliate marketer. Without the proper information on where campaigns are succeeding or failing, it will be impossible to know where adjustments need to be made. So whether you are into PPC, SEO, bonus codes, rakeback, blogging, social networking or emailing, one thing that can’t be overlooked is measurability and ROI. On this note, while a marketing channel like PPC may be expensive, if it’s bringing you an incredible return, then the cost is relative. The same is true of free marketing endeavours like blogging, for example – while there is little cost here, if you’re not converting players with your copywriting skills, then ‘free’ begins to look pretty expensive.

Your knowledge The knowledge factor is twofold: how much do you know about affiliate marketing and how much do you know about the vertical you are promoting? These two considerations go hand-in-hand, as it is easier to start marketing something that you are passionate about, rather than promoting something simply because it is lucrative. Stick with what you love, and the money will follow. That being said, there is a wealth of knowledge at your disposal that you can leverage as a member of an affiliate community. The iGaming space is renowned for its forums where both rookies and experts are welcome to exchange ideas, ask questions and get an abundance of information on the industry. Conferences are another great place to attain more knowledge in your vertical. They provide you with an ideal meeting place to find expert affiliates who have combed the same grounds that

you are now navigating as a new affiliate. And finally, when choosing an affiliate program, make sure to keep your affiliate manager top of mind, especially when you’re just starting your business. A good affiliate manager is critical to your success, especially in the early stages. So while you may be tempted to choose programs based on their commission structure only, keep in mind that it is the affiliate manager of the program that has the ability to develop meaningful relationships and support their affiliates that can make the biggest impact for your start-up.

Your time As an affiliate, time is one of your greatest resources and assets. Your business is only as successful as the time you dedicate to making it successful. It is what allows you to monitor your campaigns, measure the effectiveness of your marketing channels and make enhancements as you progress. In essence, time is the one thing that allows you to continue repeating the efforts that generate a strong return on investment. It also helps you learn to steer clear of campaigns, programs, marketing creative, designs, calls-to-action, etc, that just don’t work. Without time, you can have all the money in the world, but if you can’t create continuity, your traffic will eventually dry up and your affiliate business can end up being a financial drain instead of a financial investment. Nicky Senyard is CEO of Income Access, overseeing their independent iGaming affiliate network, market-leading affiliate software and expert affiliate management services.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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webmaster world

With the saturation of search marketing in online gaming, and the clampdown on US players, the world of social media is becoming more alluring to gaming companies and online marketers who must fight for every depositor. However, if you don’t know what you are doing the cost can be immense and the return small. The idea that you can only profit from branding in the stream is a fabrication made by those who have likely attempted and failed to tame the beast. The creative marketer can, and will, benefit from social media, like any marketing channel, if they can learn that the social user is simply a different style of customer. There are basically two places I have not seen a company in gaming completely dominate: 1) Social content 2) Facebook That is not to say that there are not gaming companies doing amazing jobs. It is simply to say the space is still uncluttered, and ripe for creative companies to begin to draw players.

Social content When I talk about social content I am speaking about what historically has been utilised by online publishers to draw visitors and reap CPM rewards. This traffic comes spilling from forums, Digg, Reddit, Twitter, Facebook and niche social sites to view and interact with amazing content. It is the basic concept of creating catchy headlines, interesting articles/media and propagating it through the web. Businesses have shown that there are ways to make ‘social’ have positive returns. Mint, WePay and a host of other USbased start-ups are using social content to fuel brand recognition, customer acquisition and even corporate acquisitions. It is really not much different than the concept of optimising your newsrooms for Google News. But why, then, is there not a major gaming company with the kind of presence in the social space that the above companies share? Because gaming companies feel the need to push gaming as hard as possible, and convert every visitor into a depositor. Social traffic will not convert in the traditional sense, EVER, and this is where gaming companies lose the ROI perspective. What it will convert in is the following: 1) Repeat visitors to whom you can drive pop-overs based on entry funnels.

2) Newsletter sign-ups. 3) Brand recognition (anyone who says this isn’t important should look at the budget they are spending in London on public signage). 4) Online reputation management. 5) Improved search traffic. 6) The cross-pollination of content via Facebook and Twitter ‘like’ buttons.

“Social traffic will not convert in the traditional sense, EVER, and this is where gaming companies lose the ROI perspective.” Each of these items can easily have a dollar amount assigned to it within your organisation, as it is likely you are already driving downloads via these methods in some fashion. Except, the volume available via social media is staggering, even outside of the US where adoption of social media is growing.

rewards from Facebook’s demo targeted ad system and some killer content can be quite substantial. If you are willing to look outside of the onsite, direct-to-download conversion and get creative with off-brand content, you can find immense value in Facebook. With a gifted Flash developer, CSS/HTML developer and a designer, you can create extensive returns in the channel that will exceed anything being spent offline. That is really where the pivotal point is. Stop gauging social campaigns against search. They are not search. They will not convert the same, and they are not even close to being similar in practice. Be willing to accept the fact that this is a different type of online marketing, similar, in many regards, to other online media programmes, and even nicely ‘trackable’. The key difference is that in order to unlock its true value, you must be willing to interact with your customer. In essence, you must ‘earn’ their business. The way to the social user’s heart is through interesting content that they can share with their social graph. It is that simple, and that complex.

Facebook Beyond being a growing phenomenon, this social platform has become the ‘walled garden’ of the new decade. People live and breathe within this portal and, unfortunately, the gaming community was not invited to the party. Despite not being able to leverage the platform for onsite gaming, Facebook offers a lot of value to the competent marketer. This is especially true with iframes replacing FBML. The iframe replacement allows any offsite content to be pulled into Facebook pages, meaning that Flash, HTML and images can all be pulled from offsite. Creative web teams can leverage this into off-site promotions via: 1) Newsletter sign-ups 2) Incentive-based Flash applications The best part of this is that if you are willing to think outside of the brand box, the

Dave Snyder is SVP of Product Development at BlueGlass. Dave is a world renowned Internet Marketing Consultant and has spoken around the world on search marketing and social media, and has consulted for some of the world’s largest companies. Dave parlayed his gifts as a former teacher and writer into his current role as a thought leader in the arena of search marketing. He is also one of the publishers of SearchEngineJournal and DailySEOTip, where he shares his unique perspective on concepts related to search marketing. Dave’s strengths lie in both organic and paid search marketing, and he excels in utilising social media for brand building and online reputation management. Dave is considered one of the foremost authorities on link marketing.

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INSIGHT

tHE DOs anD DOn’ts OF a/B tEstinG FOR HiGHER COnVERsiOns A/B TESTING is a method of marketing testing widely used in the iGaming industry by operators to evaluate various elements of their webpage, such as registrations, marketing tools and landing pages. The value of A/B testing, also known as split testing and bucket testing, is equally important to your affiliate site, and yet is often underutilised. The goal of A/B testing is to increase your response rate and as an affiliate in a competitive field, this is paramount. If you have already incorporated A/B testing methods in your affiliate business and keep this as a recurring activity, then you have begun to identify areas of your online business that yield the best results for your specific end goal. Testing really isn’t an option in affiliate marketing. It’s a must. It’s what allows you to repeat what works and avoid costly mistakes. Here’s a guide to introduce you to A/B testing, and help you begin to yield your best affiliate marketing results yet.

What is A/B testing? Put simply, A/B testing can be used to cultivate your website’s traffic and potential conversions in the same way a farmer would seed his crops in the hope of a more bountiful harvest. Basically, you need to be willing to work the land and try a variety of methods if you want to generate the highest possible yields. A/B testing is all about variety, analysis and refinement. The genius of A/B testing is that it is, a) theoretically quite simple and, b) practically can be as complicated and indepth as you see fit for your business. By

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

taking two versions of the same website and comparing the performance of each based on your metrics of choice, you can determine if your current site has already reached its zenith. More likely, however, you will be assessing whether your site could use some slight modifications or a complete overhaul in order to increase traffic and revenue figures.

The practicality of A/B testing As we all know, quality player registrations are what lead to quality revenue, and unless you instinctively have your finger on the pulse of your target markets, you will want to rely on A/B testing to some extent to get into the heads of potential players. Ultimately, you are doing both yourself and

their traffic through to the test site with the updated banners, while keeping the majority of traffic passing through the standard site with the original banners. This is just an example of one of the many aspects of your site that could either attract or repel players that can also be better assessed through the use of A/B testing. Those other aspects include everything from the aesthetic make-up of a website to the writing style used.

Getting down to testing There are a variety of tools that can be used to actually carry-out your A/B testing. Some of the better known names in the industry include: Google Website Optimizer, Optimizely, Ninja Button and

“There is little doubt that A/B testing will continue to gain in popularity and eventually be discussed with the same regularity as other tactics such as search engine optimisation.” your potential converting traffic a favour, as you are making a conscious effort to provide them with a product they have already confirmed that they want supplied. To better illustrate this concept, a hypothetical case study seems appropriate: If an affiliate were considering replacing one or more of the ads displayed on their site or modifying some other aesthetic feature of significance, they would be well-advised to use A/B testing. This would allow them to direct a certain portion of

Visual Website Optimizer, to name just a few. And while an entire article could be written analysing the strengths, weaknesses and pricing of each of these tools, this is an area where some diligent research and investigation will guide you to the choice that is right for you. One of the things to keep in mind when reviewing the available tools is evaluating what type of A/B testing you want to perform. There are a couple of options available.

The first option is where a modification has been made that requires the display of an entirely new webpage for the site. For instance, you may want to test the receptiveness towards a new skin that you are considering implementing. In this case, you would need to set-up an entirely separate URL to accurately measure this featureâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s effectiveness. If you are testing a more isolated element, such as a variety of banner styles, your site can be set-up to rotate the desired variations on the same page. You will then be provided a statistical breakdown of which banner style performed the best based on your selected metric of conversion.

Standard rules of A/B testing There are some fundamental rules by which to conduct A/B testing to ensure that the time and effort you put in here yield the improved results that you are seeking. Here are a few tips to consider: 1. Regardless of how many different variations of the same feature or element you plan on testing (i.e. different version of a new skin), it is crucial to make

sure that all permutations are tested at the same time. This ensures that all environmental factors are consistent throughout each variation. 2. D o not test too many different elements at once (i.e. skin, banners and font), as you want to be able to narrow down the one or two most crucial elements that could be improved or amended to make your site more attractive and successful. The more elements being tested at once, the less effective you will be at targeting the most important site changes. 3. The lifespan of your testing is also an important factor to consider. Just because a football club loses the first couple of matches of the season does not necessarily make it a lost cause. Then again, if that same team continues to lose games as the season progresses, you may want to consider putting your money down on a different club. The items of your A/B testing should be treated in a similar manner. Your new page set-up might not give instantaneous results but extending the

Justin Way is an Account Manager at Income Access. In this role, Justin assists with the integration and training of new clients, as well as providing support on a daily basis to an existing roster of partners.

lifetime of your testing will provide a more accurate analysis. 4. A degree of humility will be necessary for successful testing and implementation. That says nothing of the importance of having implicit trust in your testing tool, which is why it is crucial to choose carefully. There is little doubt that A/B testing will continue to gain in popularity and eventually be discussed with the same regularity as other tactics such as search engine optimisation. And as that popularity increases, the more likely it is that progressively more in-depth analytical tools and strategies will be developed to help affiliates make better decisions through their testing.

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

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MAKE YOUR ONLINE CAMPAIGNS WIN BIG

WIN!

How to get huge payoffs with landing page optimisation IN THE ONLINE marketing world, a lot of time and resources are spent buying media, tracking pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, driving organic traffic via SEO to landing pages, and installing and customising web analytics software to properly track online marketing activities. Dedicated in-house or agency staff craft keyword lists, write ad copy, and manage keyword bidding to achieve the proper profitability, cost per action (CPA), and return on investment (ROI). Copywriters adjust headlines and sales copy to improve click-through rates (CTRs). You may agonise over every word in your emails, test headlines and offers, and analyse ‘bounce rates’, ‘open rates’ and ‘unsubscribe rates’ with almost religious fervour. But what are you doing after the click? Are you giving nearly as much attention to optimising your site to improve conversions as you are in driving traffic to it?

form of missed opportunity. Even a good landing page can be improved, and small improvements can have a dramatic impact on your company’s profitability.

Marketing departments are often evaluated on the volume of traffic they can generate. Their goals include maximising CTR and lowering CPC. Conversion, or what visitors do once they are on the site, is seen as a sales activity. But the Internet has blurred the traditional distinctions between marketing and sales. People are not only accustomed to self-service, they have an expectation that when they arrive at your site from an ad, email or search engine, it will be easy for them to find exactly what they want. If they don’t, you’ve lost a sale. Because of this self-serve mentality, the conversion efficiency of your landing page is one of the biggest profit drivers under your control. Are you getting your visitors through to your conversion goals? Many marketers think they are, and it is costing their companies a lot of money in the

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

Funnel analysis

Path analysis allows you to see the sequences of pages that visitors use to traverse your site. It may be possible to change the position of key conversion pages or links within the site to benefit from such ‘drive-by’ visibility.

Regardless of your visitors’ initial wandering path on your website, they must often pass through a well-defined series of pages in order to convert. The funnel narrows as people drop off during each step. High drop-off percentages may signal that a particular step is especially problematic. In addition to using your analytics to uncover problems, take a ruthless look at your landing page as if you were viewing it for the first time. Does it have a lot of visual clutter, such as unnecessary, gratuitous graphics that distract people from looking at your call-to-action? Is your call-to-action clear? Is your copywriting bogged down with marketing fluff? Do you promise one thing in your pay-per-click ad, but fail to mention it on the landing page? Or maybe you do mention it, but it’s buried among too many choices? With these basic considerations in mind, you can start exploring variations to your landing page that you could test against the original to find the perfect recipe for conversions.

Top entry pages

Timeless testing themes

A list of the top entry pages shows you the point of first contact with your site. Generally, the more traffic that is hitting a landing page, the more attention that page deserves in terms of conversion tuning. Traffic levels can help you to prioritise the landing pages that need to be fixed first.

Using your analytics and ruthlessly evaluating your website is likely to give you plenty of ideas on what you could tweak and test on your landing page. If you’re still feeling stumped, here are some broad themes that you can adapt and explore:

Double digit conversion gains Landing page optimisation and testing can often produce double digit conversion rate improvements and transform the economics of an online business. But where do you begin? How do you know which landing page elements will perform best? Your web analytics can provide many important clues to uncover and prioritise potential site problems:

Most visited content If a key page is not getting enough traffic, it may be necessary to move it to a more prominent location on your website, or to create more links to it from other popular pages.

Path analysis The shifting role of marketing

traffic pages are a red flag indicating that those pages need attention.

Less is more Top exit pages Exit pages are the places where visitors leave your site. Each exit page can be viewed as a leaky bucket. If visitors exit your site, they probably did not find what they were looking for. High ‘bounce rates’ on high

Although the general idea of de-cluttering is powerful throughout the decision process, this testing theme has an especially powerful impact on improving visitor awareness. If visitors do not recognise quickly that you have something

in which they might be interested, they will leave your site immediately. These shorttimers are the ones who have ‘bounced’ and not clicked on any other links from the original landing page. They represent a significant problem. Within this problem lies the opportunity for clearing away the clutter and significantly increasing the number of people who have meaningful interactions with your site. ‘Less is more’ applies to a whole range of test elements: ●● Fewer and smaller graphics. ●● Shorter bulleted text. ●● Reduced number of choices and links. Cut until you can’t stand it anymore, and then cut some more. You will be surprised at how little content is needed on a well-designed landing page. Don’t be afraid to try radically stripped-down alternative test elements.

Personalise it Personalisation builds desire and affinity for your particular solution. Customisation can be a powerful conversion tool. Personalisation can be tested using a wide array of available tactics. Some examples include: ●● Echo the keywords that visitors used to find your landing page as the page title. ●● Pre-populate your search box with the text of the keywords that visitors used to find your landing page. ●● Present localised content by using geotargeting information. ●● Do not require people to log-in if they have been there before. ●● Fill in checkout information for returning e-commerce buyers. ●● Customise content-by-visitor role once someone has self-selected. ●● Allow visitors to configure your product or service offering. ●● Display deeper or richer content to those who have shown enough commitment (based on page views or time on your site). ●● Show last-minute special offers via exit pop-ups to visitors who are about to leave your site without converting. ●● Follow up by phone or email if someone abandons your registration process part of the way through. ●● Proactively initiate a live chat session if your visitor is clearly struggling with something on your site.

Test the offer Ultimately, it is your offer that gets a visitor to act. However, when considering specific testing elements, there are many ways that you can influence someone: ●● The primary offer. ●● The total solution surrounding the offer (as discussed previously). ●● Headline. ●● Sales copy. ●● Images chosen. ●● Call-to-action text and graphical format. ●● Repetition of the call-to-action in multiple screen locations and formats. ●● Offer context (e.g., by bracketing the desired action in a bronze/silver/gold set of options). ●● Limited availability or other scarceness indicators (e.g., deadlines, remaining inventory). ●● Pricing.

Test and tune your way to higher conversions Finding the perfect combination of elements for your landing page is not a question of design or opinion. You may have some brilliant marketers on your team, but the only experts who really matter are your visitors. The landing page that delivers the highest conversion rate may not be your favourite or even your second favourite. Testing is critical to remove personal biases. And the success of the first test is critical for establishing the long-term momentum for subsequent tests. Here are some testing tips that you can pursue as you get started.

●● Simple page changes: if you make

simple changes such as headlines, sales copy, and call-to-action buttons, you won’t need much outside support to create your alternative test elements. You can also make such changes in a short amount of time. ●● Basic test structure: use A/B split

testing (either on a granular or coarse level) for the test. The data analysis is simple – there are no complex variable interactions or complex design matrices to worry about. ●● Low-cost testing platform: several low-

cost tools are available for running basic A/B split and multivariate tests. Many of them are hosted on the Internet and do not even require installation. An excellent choice for this purpose is the free Google Website Optimizer tool. But remember, your test must still produce results that are meaningful. This means your data rate must be high enough to complete the test in a reasonable period of time, and the financial impact (or at least the percentage of improvement in the conversion rate) must be significant. Don’t run your test if the data rate will be too low, or if the proposed test elements are unlikely to produce conversion improvements on the landing page.

Now it’s time to get started Start small A great way to start your testing program is with a small test. Once you have demonstrated your ability to pull off a complete end-to-end landing page experiment, you should have enough support to continue. The key to this approach is to appear nonthreatening and not ask for a lot of help. Components of a small test may include: ●● Unimportant landing page: do not try to fix your homepage or highest-traffic landing pages first. Such efforts may be actively resisted before you have proven yourself. Pick a secondary landing page that has a reasonable amount of traffic (perhaps from a single online marketing campaign). ●● Small diversion of traffic: if you have only

Of course, you have to be careful to use personalisation properly. It can be very effective. However, if your tactics are unexpected they can backfire and become off-putting in a ‘big brother’ sort of way.

baseline, the overall drop in conversion rate will be small.

one landing page, you can still conduct your test by diverting a small percentage of the traffic to testing alternatives. This will guarantee that even if your tested alternatives underperform the current

Landing page optimisation is part art and part science. It requires many diverse skills including design, usability, copywriting, psychology, statistics and project management. But the payoffs from a disciplined landing page testing program are simply too great. Ignore this critical activity at your own peril.

Tim Ash is the President and CEO of SiteTuners, a landing page optimization firm that offers consulting, fullservice guaranteed-improvement tests and state-of-the-art software tools to improve conversion rates. He is the author of the bestselling book Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions (John Wiley & Sons Press, 2008) LandingPageOptimizationBook.com. Tim can be reached by email at tim@SiteTuners.com.

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webmaster world

Duncan Fisher, Head of PPC at Latitude, explores PPC and the mobile opportunity. The latter half of 2010 saw mobile Internet search take off, with remarkable growth stimulated by not only the iconic iPhone 4 and iPad releases during last summer, but also a wave of new Android devices hitting the market at ever more affordable price points. Research carried out by Latitude digital agency has seen this trend continue in 2011. The first quarter of 2011 saw mobile paid search impressions level out at approximately 6% of total ad impressions, falling slightly from a peak of 6.7% in December 2010. This statistic in isolation might imply mobile search is nearing saturation, however, mobile click volumes have continued to increase, reaching 6.7% of total paid search click volume in March. This trend reflects rising click through rates (CTR) resulting from refined targeting by marketers, and increased consumer engagement with mobile as a search medium. Mobile ads continue to see significantly higher click through rates than desktop, rising to 4.9% in March compared to 3.3% for desktop. So what does this all mean? Well, if you are in charge of a sizeable online marketing budget then it would be wise to have a mobile marketing strategy in place. As mentioned above, consumer engagement with mobile ads appears to be improving, demonstrated by increases in CTR. Below are some of the

key considerations for advertisers to bear in mind for paid search marketing on mobile.

Develop a mobile site The majority of users will engage with your product/service by landing on your website as opposed to purchasing a mobile commerce app. If landing on a nonmobile friendly site, advertisers risk losing potential customers through poor user experience. Quick page loading time is vital for mobile devices, hence: ●● If using a standard HTML landing page, avoid Flash. ●● Use a page with minimal JavaScript (although this is required for Analytics). ●● Large buttons and hyperlinks to make it easier for users to click. ●● On page simplicity – make sure content is to the point, and calls-to-action are prominent and high on the page.

Optimise your Google AdWords account Google currently dominates approximately 98% of mobile paid search traffic in the UK. Through AdWords, you can setup a mobile targeted campaign to ensure maximum traffic is yielded within your target ROI. Here are some best practice guidelines: ●● Create separate mobile campaigns, targeting mobile devices only. ●● Target devices (iPhone, Android and

“Whilst desktop searches may continue to dominate the overall search market share, it’s becoming widely accepted that mobile Internet search activity will exceed desktop at some point over the next few years.”

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

iPad) separately as users are likely to respond different to your offering in different ways. ●● Effective keyword strategy. Target one to three keyword search terms as queries tend to be shorter on mobile. ●● Use mobile specific calls-to-action within ad copy; “call us now”, “text for info”, “click to download app”. ●● Implement click to call ads if possible and schedule ads to display when your call centre is open. Send traffic to an online conversion page when the call centre is closed. ●● Aggressive bidding strategy. Position one/two on mobile is recommended as sponsored listings occupy the majority of the initial SERP real estate. ●● For localised activity, make use of Google Places, location extensions and geo-targeted mobile campaigns. Geotargeting is more accurate for mobile than it is for desktops.

Track and monitor effectively It’s a must to ensure effective analytics are in place to track mobile activity. Advertisers should be monitoring this activity constantly, with mobile activity growing and user behaviour constantly evolving and adapting to the channel. It requires regular testing and refining of campaigns to find the right keywords and messaging to drive relevant traffic to your site. Whilst desktop searches may continue to dominate the overall search market share, it’s becoming widely accepted that mobile Internet search activity will exceed desktop at some point over the next few years. The role for all online marketing mediums will be significant as search engines and marketers continue to adapt their search offerings. Some of the things that we can expect to see develop are more in-line with desktop marketing opportunities; behavioural and demographic targeting through both mobile web and applications. From a PPC perspective, now is a great opportunity for advertisers to take advantage of low cost CPCs, averaging 30 to 40% lower than desktop, depending on the sector. With increasing volumes on mobile, this will change and it won’t be long before the increased competition across mobile search terms leads to CPCs more in-line with desktop. So the key message is, if you’re not taking mobile marketing seriously now, get on it before the competition leaves you behind!

June 15th, 2011

JoinTelemedia 360 and iGaming Business for the first event dedicated to mobile gambling. With two conference tracks over one day, numerous networking opportunities and an exhibition floor to enjoy this is an event not to be missed if you are serious about finding a space in the mobile gambling market. Expect to hear from and meet the leading players from the worlds of mobile and iGaming, and take the time to enjoy an exclusive networking party at a top London venue to round off the day. Sessions include: Unlocking Apps Stores & M-web Mobile Marketing Linking Into Social Networks CRM & Data Billing & Payment Products and Services Branding Tie-Ups Licences, Regulation and Jurisdictions M-Gambling at Live Events Crossing the Channels

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marketplace

Welcome to the MarketPlace listings section in iGB Affiliate Magazine. All Listings below are from our iGB Affiliate Directory 2011 which is a 150 page directory of affiliate programs and services companies specifically for affiliates from translation toÂ SEOÂ services. 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

BetOnline

PartnerLogic

Frontroom

www.affiliates.betonline.com

www.partnerlogic.com

www.frontroom.com

Betfair

Rich Club Affiliates

GameOn Marketing

www.betfair.com

www.richclubaffiliates.com

www.gameon-marketing.com

bwin

Slotland

Lyceum PR

www.bwin.org

www.slotlandaffiliates.com

www.lyceummedia.com

centrebet.com

StanJames

Market Handle

www.centrebetaffiliates.com

www.stanjamesaffiliates.com

www.markethandle.com

Chilli Casino

Star Games

McBoom

www.chilicasino.com

www.stargames.com

www.mcboom.com

ComeOn!

Star Partner

Bingo Affiliate Programs

www.comeon.com

www.starpartner.com

Affiliates United

Dragonfish

Wingate Affiliates

www.affutd.com

www.dragonfishaffiliates.com

www.wingateaffiliates.com

bet 365

EuroPartners

youwin.com

www.bet365.com

www.EuroPartmers.com

www.youwin.com

Dragonfish

Fortune Affiliates

Content & Translation

www.dragonfishaffiliates.com

www.fortuneaffiliates.eu

services

Gala Coral

www.affiliates.galabingo.com

StarGames

Genesys Affiliates

www.stargames.com

www.genesysaffiliates.com

Casino Affiliate Programs

Grande Vegas Affiliates

AffiliateClub

www.grandvegasaffiliates.com

www.AffiliateClub.com

Guru gaming

Affiliates United

www.gururevenue.com

www.affutd.com

Intertops Casino

Bet365

www.intertops.com

www.bet365.com

Jackpot Capital www.jackpotcapital.com/affiliates

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

Market Handle

youwin.com

EuroPartners

www.markethandle.com

www.youwin.com

www.EuroPartmers.com

Moniker & SnapNames

search marketing (organic)

ExtraBet

www.moniker.com

Market Handle

www.extrabet.com

Email Marketing

www.markethandle.com

Gala Coral

Market Handle

McBoom

www.affiliates.galabingo.com

www.markethandle.com

www.mcboom.com

Hollywood Sportsbook

Hosting & Managed services

Moniker & SnapNames

www.hollywoodpowerplayer.com

Moniker & SnapNames

www.moniker.com

Intertops

www.moniker.com

search marketing (paid)

www.intertops.com

poker affiliate programs

Market Handle

Invendium

AffiliateClub

www.markethandle.com

http://affiliates.valuechecker.co.uk

www.AffiliateClub.com

McBoom

Sportingbet

Affiliates United

www.mcboom.com

www.sportingbet.com

www.affutd.com

Moniker & SnapNames

StanJames

Bet365

www.moniker.com

www.stanjamesaffiliates.com

www.bet365.com

sKIll gaming affiliate

TOTE Sport

Betfair

Programs

www.totesportaffiliates.com

www.betfair.com

Affiliates United

Victor Chandler

bwin

www.affutd.com

www.victorchandler.com

www.bwin.org

bet 365

youwin.com

centrebet.com

www.bet365.com

www.youwin.com

www.centrebetaffiliates.com

bwin

webdesign

Chilli Poker

www.bwin.org

Market Handle

www.chilipoker.com

Gala Coral

www.markethandle.com

ComeOn!

www.affiliates.galabingo.com

Moniker & SnapNames

www.comeon.com

Rummy Royal

www.moniker.com

Dragonfish

www.rummyroyal.com

www.dragonfishaffiliates.com

StanJames

EuroPartners

www.stanjamesaffiliates.com

www.EuroPartmers.com

StarGames

Gala Coral

www.stargames.com

www.affiliates.galabingo.com

sports betting

Intertops Casino

Affiliates United

www.intertops.com

www.affutd.com

PartnerLogic

Bet365

www.partnerlogic.com

www.bet365.com

PKR

BetOnline

www.pkr.com

www.affiliates.betonline.com

Poker Pod

Betfair

www.pokerpodonline.com

www.betfair.com

StanJames

bwin

www.stanjamesaffiliates.com

www.bwin.org

Star Games

centrebet.com

www.stargames.com

www.centrebetaffiliates.com

iGB Affiliate june/july 2011

webmaster world

OPinion

The Future for Poker Affiliates On April 15, 2011, the online poker industry was forever changed by the United States Department of Justice. The Department of Justice seized the domains of PokerStars.com, FullTiltPoker.com, AbsolutePoker.com, and UltimateBet.com, as well as issued indictments against the principals of these companies. Jeremy Enke, Founder of Poker Affiliate Listings, explores. While there are indeed still a small number of poker sites for US players to play at, this has decimated the income of many poker affiliates. Many poker affiliates are questioning whether they even want to remain in the industry. Regardless of the current state of affairs, I still believe that the poker affiliate industry is one of the most profitable and exciting affiliate niches to operate within. Unfortunately, given the recent developments, it is also one of the most uncertain industries to be in. With that said, it is important for poker affiliates to diversify their businesses and leverage their Internet marketing prowess into other affiliate verticals. Any individual that can be successful in a highly competitive industry such as poker affiliate marketing will surely be able to emulate that success into different niches. Let’s face it; the future of online poker for US poker players is widely unknown right now. There is no doubt that US players will always have options to play online poker. However, where they can play and how they can process their deposits is still evolving. For poker affiliates, this makes long-term

iGB Affiliate JUNE/JULY 2011

“The new face of online poker will more than likely resemble VIP and player rewards programs such as you currently see in the Las Vegas casinos.” strategy and planning nearly impossible. Most in the industry agree that in the future, we will see some form of online poker regulation in the United States. When this does transpire, it will more than likely be led by lobbyists and Las Vegas casinos. In this scenario, it’s difficult to predict exactly what the poker affiliate landscape will look like. My guess, however, is those incentive schemes such as rakeback, and even revenue sharing for affiliates, will be eliminated. The new face of online poker will more than likely resemble VIP and player rewards programs such as you currently see in the Las Vegas casinos. With a more limited number of online poker sites available to US players, there is no doubt that the player values will increase. Unfortunately, I foresee the payouts and commission amounts to affiliates decreasing. My vision of the poker affiliate industry, should regulation take place, is one that closely resembles a more

mainstream or retail affiliate structure. With regulation, you’ll also see a new breed of affiliate marketers who once thought of online gaming to be ‘illegal’ or a ‘grey area’. These marketers will bring with them additional skill sets such as pay per click and retargeting strategies that are not actively being used in the current US poker affiliate market. In closing, it is impossible to predict exactly what the online poker landscape will look like a year from now, let alone one month from now. Regardless of how things wind up, there will always be an opportunity for poker affiliates and Internet marketers to earn an income in the online poker industry. In the meantime, the best strategy for poker affiliates is to diversify their businesses and stay informed on the daily changes taking place within the industry. Those who learn to quickly adapt to these changes will be the poker affiliates that continue seeing success for many years to come.