INSIGHT
at 320px and going up to and beyond
2000px. The hardest part was thinking on
every level - mobile, tablet and desktop. It
was so much easier before when you only
really had one platform, but times had
changed and we needed to as well.
Traffic
Even before the Gamingslots team sat
down and started planning out the new
site we were fully aware we needed to
start thinking to the future in terms of
traffic. For too long, we had been reliant
on the constant supply from Google.
However, changes to the algorithm, a new
ads display and multiple ‘animal-themed’
updates meant that this source of traffic
could not be our sole focus. So we started
looking at what other sources of good
quality traffic were available.
Social networks were a little bit of an
unchartered territory for the team, but
we decided to invest time in research and
design to improve our pages. We now post
fresh content on our social networks every
day, getting conversations started about
slots, gaming and off-topic stuff. Little by
little it is paying off, as our numbers are
growing. There is a long way to go, but I
feel that the social networks could be the
key to being less reliant on Google traffic
for Gamingslots in the future.
Community
Something that none of the Gamingslots
team had done successfully in the past
was to build a strong community around a
site or a brand. We wanted to change this,
so we spent time in building a strategy to
help us achieve a great community. With
the investment in time and resources in
social media, we know that this was going
to aid our community growth. There is
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iGB Affiliate Issue 48 DEC/JAN 2014/2015
now the facility to log into
Gamingslots.com and access parts of the
site that aren’t available to non-members.
Our aim is to expand this and allow more
of reviews, free play games and videos at
any slots portal.
So going back to my two goals, do I
think they were achieved? Well, I did
“For too long, we had been reliant on the constant supply
from Google. But changes to the algorithm, a new ads
display and multiple ‘animal-themed’ updates meant this
source of traffic could not be our sole focus.”
community interaction within the website.
So far a forum has been side lined, just
due to the work involved, but it is a distinct
possibility for the future.
USP
Finding a unique selling point in a
crowded market place with a product
like slots was always going to be tricky,
but we feel we have something. Before
the decision was made to re-launch the
site, a project was unde rway to collect
data on all the slots. This was general
information that is normally available
in the pay table within the game, such
as pay lines, bonus games, free spins,
multipliers etc. To a person that doesn’t
play slots, this is probably gobbledygook,
but to a slots player this is useful and
interesting information. From this data,
we have created a new product called Slot
Analytics, which is available for free for
Gamingslots users logged into the site.
It is a simple idea, but we think we can
do a lot with this information and we are
looking forward to really developing this
part of the site.
Other USPs for Gamingslots include a
high quality news feed and blog for those
people that want to stay on top of the
industry and enjoy discussion about it.
We also have one of the largest collections
manage to go to the World Cup and saw
seven top quality games, including Brazil
being thrashed 7-1 by Germany. And with
Gamingslots, we have re-launched the site
and are currently working at improving it
every day. It’s certainly not ‘job done’, but
we are a long way towards it.
A word of advice to those considering
re-launching their own website or
building a new one. Co-ordination
between project manager, designer and
developer are critical to the success of
the project. We ran into delays due to
a variety of things that could have been
easily resolved with more cohesion
between these three parties. If you are
essentially going to be fulfilling all of
these roles then you may find you don’t
experience any of these difficulties.
BREAN WILKINSON
has been involved in affiliate
marketing for eight years,
working primarily in the
online gaming sector. Having
got into building affiliate websites
as a distraction from the day job, his
company now boasts over 60 websites in
a variety of different verticals.