F E A T U R E P O W E R 5 0 A F F I L I AT E S
eGR: Do you feel the role of news content on an affiliate site is less signi?cant for casino than for other verticals? NZ: I think it’s as equally important to have casino industry news as any other. Then again, we cover news from all main verticals, including but not limited to casino, poker, sports and bingo, at our dedicated websites. We also cover worldwide gambling-related news, both online and land based. We believe it’s important to provide vast sources of information and cover those “main” regions that are relevant to our business. eGR: Do you feel casino has lagged behind when it comes to innovation in the affiliate space? NZ: There is room for a lot more improvement, that’s for sure. But I think it’s not that much a question of innovation but rather a question of trust and transparency. We all know that some programmes often shave affiliates and there is nothing you can do about it (aside from dumping them and promoting someone else). Naturally there are many trustworthy programmes, and if we speak of innovation they should be the ones to start the new trends, improve the tracking, provide more info on referred players, real time stats etc. In affiliate business, the trust is everything. Once you break it there is no coming back. eGR: Have you made any tweaks to the site over the past year which have served you well? NZ: We are constantly tweaking and upgrading our network sites ?? ? it is a never ending process, as the moment you start stagnating is the moment your stats will start dropping. One of the latest things we’ve done was the forum upgrade, which gave it a more appealing and modern look. Last year we also launched our “What’s going on right now!” feature that provides real time tracking of our visitors’ activity including their location and the page they browsed/read and a game played at our site(s). And a lot of the tweaks are only visible behind the scenes. We have few more ongoing projects that I won’t be discussing until they are done. But I can say that most of the improvements we made in the past years have served us all well on some level as they were always player-focused and designed to improve the player experience.
ASK GAMBLERS
Founder/Principal: Igor Salindrija Domains: askgamblers.com, superbetting.com
Multi-service platform remains dominated by its casino offering which brings in traffic from the US, as well as Germany, Italy, France and Sweden, for which it has language-speci?c mini-sites.
CASINOMEISTER
Founder/Principal: Bryan Bailey Domains: casinomeister.com, gonegambling.com
Widely respected affiliate portal and community, playing a leading role in solving disputes and handing out awards to the best and worst in the sector on a yearly basis. Traffic has moved from mostly US to mostly non-US in recent years.
CASINO
CASINO AFFILIATE PROGRAMS
Founder/Principal: Warren and Arjun Jolly Domains: casinoaffiliatenetwork.com; affiliaterevenue.com
One-stop shop for affiliates with regularly-updated content from its inhouse editorial team as well as videos, conference news and SEO advice. Community has more than 15,000 registered members, while new venture Affiliate Revenue offers an exclusive and singular channel for affiliates to ?nd and promote the most pro?table offers, track all their data and receive one payment a month, all from the same platform.
CASINOPORTALEN
Founder/Principal: Mikkel Pedersen Domains: casinoportalen.com/net/se/ pl/fr/es/dk/de
Danish-based affiliate boasts more than a decade’s industry experience. Launched Norwegian-language dot.net site in last 12 months as Mikkel Pedersen continues to head up operations after replacing founder Søren Mirzai in 2011.
CASINOVERDIENER
Founder/Principal: Jesper S Domains: casinoverdiener.com
German-language site celebrating a decade in the industry this year. Predominantly focuses on German-facing companies, with dedicated sections for Merkur and Novomatic.
CASINO CHOICE
Founder/Principal: Richard Skelhorn Domains: casinochoice.co.uk
Giant of UK casino affiliate space with more than a decade in the industry, Casino Choice also has subsections for all main verticals plus mobile. Owner Skelhorn rebranded operator arm Mandalay Media as bgo in 2012, and is poised to branch out into sports and lotteries on the operator side.
GAMESAND CASINO.COM
Founder/Principal: Dominique Domains: GamesandCasino.com; gamesandcasino-pokerforum.com; bingochatter.com
Veteran affiliate Dominique runs sites across various verticals, with ?agship domain GamesAndCasino.com catering largely to bettors from the US and Asia, with multiple languages including English, Danish, Taiwanese and Turkish.
NEW
CASINO.DE
Founder/Principal: Jan Balslev Domains: casino.de; online-casinos. com; online-gambling.com; gambling.dk
One of largest German affiliates also has Danish- and English-language sites for the casino vertical. Has dedicated YouTube channel offering tutorials for various casino games.
ONLINE CASINO KING
Founder/Principal: N/A Domains: OnlineCasinoKing.com
Mico 8 Ltd-owned affiliate gives pride of place to mobile casino reviews alongside reviews of dozens of online casinos, and negotiates exclusive bonuses for its users.
NEW
CASINOBONUSGUY
Founder/Principal: Judy Matthews Domains: casinobonusguy.com, casinoveritas.com, pokerbonusguy. com, luckydabberbingo.com, newcrapsplayer.com
Leading affiliate across egaming industry albeit predominantly in casino, despite having been in operation for less than ?ve years. Parent company ScriptyCan Media was set up by Matthews in Canada
ONLINE CASINO SUITE
Founder/Principal: Ben Ogden Domains: OnlineCasinoSuite.com
Around since 2006, OCS reviews both US and European-facing casinos and has a lengthy blacklist of untrusted sites in addition to those it recommends.
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