TRAFFIC
THE EVOLUTION OF
AFFILIATE MARKETING:
TECH, MARKETING &
AUDIENCE
With the related fields of tech and design evolving just as fast as the affiliate space, John Wright of
adventures.io runs through the tools and techniques that every webmaster should be aware of as they
repurpose their websites and properties for today’s iGaming market.
AN UNDERLYING THEME of my
articles for iGB Affiliate is how we, as
webmasters, are living and working in a
constant state of change. Your decisions
and actions now, or lack of, will affect how
successful you will be in the future. Behind
every successful webmaster, there is a story
of how they have changed and adapted to a
new environment, and taken some risks in
order to make the affiliate market work for
them. In other words, if you are not taking
pre-emptive steps and are instead just
blindly following others, you aren’t going to
reach the top in this field.
Here’s a quick summary of what I
intend to cover in this article focused on the
evolution of affiliate marketing:
1. What they said
2. Meet your next challenger
3. Tech, speed and security
4. UX design: not your ordinary designer
5. Tools and resources
6. Know thy user and content marketing
What they said
They said it, not me! The iGaming affiliate
space is undergoing significant change at
the moment.
Nik from LatestCasinoBonuses.com
“The LCB network has grown
tremendously over the past few years
through acquisitions and the purchase
of smaller or competing affiliates. We
see this as a trend within the industry as
larger companies continue to grow and
expand their networks. It is possible we
will witness some big affiliate mergers in
the near future. So the game has already
changed and our strategy is to continue
to strengthen the company through more
acquisitions and keep on innovating at the
same time.”
Stephanie Wynters from 138.com Affiliates
“I believe that the biggest change has been
in technological advances. Affiliates and
affiliate managers need to move fast and
learn about all the new ways to track and
quantify data. Try the new marketing
resources and various methods to acquire
customers while doing A/B testing. Pay
close attention to your data and have the
knowledge of what your player value is per
campaign.”
Marius Filip from Bonnier Gaming
“I have over seven years of experience
in the iGaming Industry and the wave
of consolidation and mergers, predicted
to happen to the industry six years ago,
has evidently increased in 2016. The
gambling industry has undergone a series
of acquisitions which have happened so
fast that it suggests further consolidation
will follow. The start of this process in the
affiliate space was marked by big affiliate
network companies acquiring the majority
of strongly ranking sites in International
and Scandinavian markets.”
“I make millions working just four hours
a week.”
Said no-one, ever!
Meet your next challenger
For many of us in the business, we have a
lot of friends that are competitors. Some
are directly competitive; others indirectly.
There are some affiliates which are
getting even bigger: LatestCasinoBonuses.
com acquiring WizardofOdds.com and
more recently Catena Media buying
AskGamblers.com. There are many
affiliates that recently entered the space and
have seen short-term success, while other
more established webmasters are struggling
to maintain their performance with the
formula that brought them initial success.
As long as you are earning a decent
income from a niche, or someone thinks
you are, expect someone to try and
construct a very similar site or, horror
of horrors, something even better. You
can expect the market to become more
competitive as time goes on, with newer
affiliates jumping into the business. What
they lack in experience, they make up for
in enthusiasm and ability to adapt since
there is a greater need for them to do more
than just create another standard gambling
portal. Your next challenger is willing to
iGB Affiliate Issue 57 JUN/JUL 2016
25