creating sites that work

[Dukes]

Hi everyone,
hoping to get some advice.

I have been in the casino business for over 30 years and currently own a fun casino business. Would like to step into the world of online casinos.

I have read some of the forum comments (some of which seem quite negative towards newstarts) and have checked out casinomeister website.

Some are of the opinion that big sites are better, some prefer small sites.
I would like to ask:
1. is it better to have a site that caters to many many countries or just aim at a few that are considered to be heavy gamblers such as Australia, UK, US, South Africa.
2. Is it better to have a site that covers all types of gaming...casino, slots, footy, poker, horses etc or concentrate on just casinos and slots, and have another site for sports maybe.
3. Is it better to spread your affiliate partners over several or just 1 or 2 with multiple casino's. and if an affiliate program has a good casino, does that mean all of their casinos are good?
4. Have seen a site called adsforgambling is it a good place to buy traffic, or would you steer away from it?

I have several domains, and have thrown up sites with affiliates to get some ranking and aging. I would now like to do my homework and do them properly with high quality reputable casino brands (I was unlucky enough to pick Titan as one of my casino's).
I also picked Acerevenue, betway partners, Affilistars, Nextcasino, Star partners & revenue giants (last looks like a bad pick too).
These picks were really just from searches and people who contacted me from seeing my sites. Have had heaps of others since then.

Any genuine advice would be appreciated, don't need to hear "if your asking this question you shouldn't be starting a site". Am looking to provide quality links in the best way possible with the best service for my future customers. That's why I signed up to this forum.

Thank you in advance,
Dukes.

[ElaineGardiner]

Hi Dukes,

Here is my opnion on your questions, i'm sure others will have different opinions as well.

1) I think its best to pick a country/language and stick with it, once you do that well you can add other. You don't want to spread yourself too thin in the begining.
2) IMO i think it's better to pick one and stick with it as well, again pick 1 and do it well then expand.
3) Again it depends on the affiliate and the casino, if it's a UK affiliate and you know that your X casino performs well in the UK i would recommend that to the affiliate rather than wasting their traffic on your other brands that don't work in the UK, or maybe don't except UK players (for example).
4) I can't commend as i've never used them. (But check out: https://www.gpwa.org/forum/has-anyon...om-220169.html)

Hope this helps.

Elaine

[MrBinaryAff]

Hi Dukes!

I will happily answer your questions, even though I am in online casino affiliate world only for 5 years

1. Go for specific country or language, you can make separate pages for casino gamblers in UK, US etc.
2. It depends on how big you want to be, of course more coverage brings you more money, but more work needs to be done. I personally would separate sports and casino, as Betting is not considered as gambling for some people.
3. Go for several, and I always work directly with the casino affiliates, not 3rd party ones.
4. No idea, never heard.

I don't know why you hate Titan, they brand RedLuck casino converts pretty well and we had no problems so far. I would suggest: MrGreen, 888Casino, Titan/Tropez/Europa from Europartners, Crystal and MaxCasino via GamblingAttack, CasinoX via PoshFriends.

Hope I helped you at least a bit.

[Dukes]

Thanks Elaine for taking the time to reply.
I appreciate your feedback.

[Dukes]

Thank you, yes all answers will help.
In regards to Titan, I meant Titan Casino which is Affactive who are no longer online.
I will check out the ones you have suggested.
Regatrds.

[MrBinaryAff]

Thank you, yes all answers will help.
In regards to Titan, I meant Titan Casino which is Affactive who are no longer online.
I will check out the ones you have suggested.
Regatrds.

http://casino.titanbet.co.uk/ - that is the Titan Casino which I know for 3 years now.

[baldidiot]

1. The difference in rules between countries is huge, so the information is very different for say a US player v a UK player. In fact no casino that can (legally) accept UK players will accept US players. If you are going to have multiple target countries you'll definitely want to geotarget to make sure the correct info is being shown. Personally if this is your first site I'd do a guide to your own country.

2. I wouldn't bother with poker, it's fairly dead these days - so focus on sports and/or casino. In our market (UK) there is definitely scope to crossover and add casino info on a sports betting site if you do it right as a large number of sports bettors play the casino. I rarely put sports info on a primarily casino focussed site though as I don't really think the reverse is true.

3. 10 casinos from 10 programs is better than 10 casinos from 2 programs - from both a risk perspective but also to give variety. Many programs that operate multiple casinos are effectively running clones of each other (or to a lesser extent, use the same software etc...).

4. Haven't heard of it, wouldn't use it.

[DanHorvat]

Hi Dukes.

1. It is better to get a foothold in one market and then expand to the others.
2. It is better to deliver the promise to one customer than to disappoint five customers.
3. Numbers don't matter. Choose the good ones, it's your job to do that so you can offer your customers quality casinos.
4. Never pay for traffic in that way.

[wonderpunter]

1, there is enough english speaking space if you want to make money.. dont worry about any other lang just yet
2, I actually do both.. and i would recommend just doing one "Sports" as even though i have capabilities sports is always my big earner... however there are some guys on this site that make all work well.. And i still make money from casinos and poker.. just no way as much as sports..
3, ARE YOU TARGETING CASINO SPORTS OR POKER? most sports have all of the above.. 5dimes, bovada etc betonline
4, DO NOT BUY TRAFFIC... if it was that good they would keep it for themselves and run rev share programs.. but they feed off newbiews looking to make a quick buck.. it does not exist..

[JackTenSuited]

go super niche and specific to start off with, you can always expand later.
Make sure to do your kw research and check the competition too.

[universal4]

I am sure MrBinary would be happy to supply you with sub-affiliate links for signup to the properties he mentioned.

Be sure to do some research here at the GPWA as some of the groups mentioned so far in this thread have less than stellar reputations so due diligence is in order.

Geotargeting is certainly something to consider, especially of you have a mixed target group on the same website.

I agree that purchasing traffic in such a manner is not in your best interest.

Since you have not gotten too many recommendations on RTG's I would encourage you to take a look at Affiliate Edge, Mainstreet and Deckmedia. (deckmedia also has other software providers) I am happy to supply sub-aff links for those, and you will find a number of threads here researching those groups.

Rick
Universal4

[Muppet]

Personally if this is your first site I'd do a guide to your own country.

Though no doubt given with the best of intentions, please ignore this suggestion.

I encourage you to read the Interactive Gambling Act 2001, specifically section 7A, and if unsure speak to a lawyer. This part describes penalties for advertising or promoting online gambling sites to Australians. Every online casino that accepts Australians is breaking Australian law, though none are based in Australia so it is a bit of a moot point. Anyway if you are running an affiliate site you are benefiting from the advertising, promotion, or referral of customers to those casinos. So:

For the purposes of this section, an interactive gambling service advertisement that is included on a website is taken to be published in Australia if, and only if: (a) the website is accessed, or is available for access, by end‑users in Australia; and
(b) having regard to:
(i) the content of the website; and
(ii) the way the website is advertised or promoted;
it would be concluded that it is likely that a majority of persons who access the website are physically present in Australia.

Take my word for it, if you are in Australia which it does say on your profile, forget about making a casino-focused site that specifically targets Australians using a .com.au domain for example. You would be a fool to do so. You must make an internationally focused site where the majority of visitors are not Australian, otherwise you will be breaking the law and Nick Xenophon will hunt you down

[TravG]

My 2 cents

1. Do you want to be fully legal or live on the edge? I think the US is a great market and the potential to make a lot of money is there, but we all know the headwinds USA friendly casinos face. Regardless I would go with English as the first language and start with a particular country and once you know what is working and what is not you can expand into other countries.
2. Personally I think a gambler is a gambler and the more you offer the more they will use. The easiest way to answer that would be how much work do you want to put in and what are pain levels? Casino and sports betting are two entirely different businesses and you can get taken advantage of pretty quickly if you do not know what you are doing in the sportsbetting world. I would start with casino/slots/bingo to start and once you are comfortable you can always add a sportsbook.
3. Not sure how you would have multiple affiliate partners? I would think choose one and monitor their performance closely or start your own. Doing in house affiliate marketing would be my choice. just make sure you pick the right team to run it.
4. I have never heard of them either, but like someone else said if they were that good and got that much quality traffic they would be rich by now through driving their traffic through to their own affiliate accounts. Depending on which market you choose to start with there is probably much better ways to spend ad dollars.

Good luck with your new en devour!

[Dukes]

Thank you to all who have replied.
Some opinions differ, but I will look at various options.
@Muppet. Thank you for your concern in these matters, yes was aware of the regulations though not to to the extent that you pointed out. My current sites have Australia, but also other countries which it seems is best in your opinion. I don't want to get in trouble as I may want to work in casinos again one day.
I will check out the casinos and the affiliates listed within several of the answers, but wonder why no one recommends 32Red as it is regarded very highly at casinomeister (I got the link from here).

So I have 6 domains.
2 have the word slots in it, so will aim at slot/pokies with mention of casinos.
2 have the word casinos in them, so just casino sites
2 have the words where can i bet which I can aim at bookies and sports betting.
Will start with one and work on the others after that.

Sports betting definately big here in Australia, slots seem to be the go in US, and casinos I will aim for US, Europe, and Australia
Happy to sign as a sub affiliate after I check out some of these sites and get feedback.

Happy to forget about poker, I agree, its not as popular as it used to be, and there was a recent hack which will slow it down even more.
Everyone is unanimous about avoiding the traffic site. (I saw it for sale on Flippa).

Thanks again everyone.

[baldidiot]

Though no doubt given with the best of intentions, please ignore this suggestion.

I encourage you to read the Interactive Gambling Act 2001, specifically section 7A, and if unsure speak to a lawyer. This part describes penalties for advertising or promoting online gambling sites to Australians. Every online casino that accepts Australians is breaking Australian law, though none are based in Australia so it is a bit of a moot point. Anyway if you are running an affiliate site you are benefiting from the advertising, promotion, or referral of customers to those casinos.

Sports is legal though, isn't it?

[Muppet]

Yes, so long as the affiliate programs are with bookies that are licensed to operate in Australia. But obviously you can't have a site for Australians that has a mix of sports, casino, poker etc. It would have to be sports only.

[Dukes]

At the moment on TV here we get ads for William Hill, U bet, & Bet 365 for sports betting. If I put links to those 3 sites (plus any others that are in Oz) on my site it would be safe. but what if a customer found links to casino games as well as Sports bets whilst on their site. From my point of view I am pointing them to sports betting within the guidelines of the gaming commission.
I have 1 .com.au site which advertises my fun casino business (physical business), but has links to online casinos, so I will have to remove those links, but will replace them with sports bet sites.
Has anyone ever been done by this legislation, I imagine they would give a warning to remove links before prosecuting.

[Muppet]

I don't think anyone has, but do you want to take that risk? There are some casino focused portals on .com.au domains where the people running them post their photos, names, addresses etc and talk about how Aussie they are and how much they understand what Aussies want etc. I'm sure they make loads of money but they are either ignorant of the law or stupid. All it would take is one complaint to the right person.

Do a bit of googling of Australian parliamentary records and you'll find some interesting stuff. Xenopohon for example has written to the commissioner in Gibraltar demanding that he force the Mansion group to refund some significant losses made by an Aussie punter in their casinos. No idea what happened in the end but its on public record from a few years back. So it is certainly not off the radar.

It is much safer for you if you just make an English language site focused on the world wide market.

[Dukes]

Even though I am in Australia, it is not my main focus. With a population of 25 mil, there are much bigger markets out there. Will stick to sports bets for Australia and build a site with links to each country that is legal. Prefer to stay safe in Aus.
Thanks for taking the time to reply in a comprehensive way.

[Dukes]

Thank you,
will take you advice on poker as I think the same. Will also follow your advice in regards to sites with sports and casinos being separate, with mentions of casino on the sports sites but not the other way around.