So where does your traffic land...?

[LazyRiver]

Hi,
this is the dilemma I am having since the day I started with my websites. Where should the aff link direct to?
1. casino's home page
2. casino's registration page / box

First one lets the potential player look around, get a feeling for the casino and make up his mind. Second one forces the player to register - or get annoyed and leave.

I personally hate landing myself on registration pages when I look for services on-line. Then again, it's all about converting our traffic...

I was wondering what's your take on this one?

[xecutable]

On the casino registration page seems too aggressive. I've done it a long time ago and had negative impact on the conversions. I'd go with the home page and let the casino's website itself convert the customer. Of course no two websites are the same, nor traffic, so be sure to test it out first.

[JackTenSuited]

I personally hate landing myself on registration pages when I look for services on-line. Then again, it's all about converting our traffic...

said it yourself, not many people are going to signup to a site without browisng it and reading up on it first.

[Doolally]

I'd go with the home page over the signup page, however, you're normally best directing them to where they want to be. Say you have a page on Blackjack with a banner or link on it, when clicked on, the player is going to feel more benefit being redirected to the casino site's blackjack page than anywhere else.

[slotplayer]

Definately not the registration page, you've won the players trust as they've clicked your link, why take them to a registration page that could scare them off?

And for the most part I don't fully trust the tracking on many landing pages nor do I trust that if a players registers through the casino's free games page that I will get credited, so linking to the free games page is out.

I link to the home page unless its a landing page for an exclusive bonus or specific bonus.

[FictionNet]

Drives me nuts when a casino pushes me to send traffic to a landing page, and it doesn't include easy links to the casino's homepage and other important info pages, ie. banking, bonus t&c.

Right now, I've got Go Wild pushing a totally incomplete Playboy landing page, no links to the main site or banking or t&c, unless you want to redirect the visitor via a mobile phone landing page. Bleugh.

[-Shay-]

It depends. General pages with quick clicks = homepage or a promotional landing page.

Reviews almost always convert better with the signup page.

Theoretically, you have captured their interest to learn more or see for themselves if they're clicking from one of your general pages. If clicking from the review, you've sold them and they want to sign up now.

[universal4]

A couple of good points made. We actually debated this some years ago and I remember having a pretty thorough discussion with Ben about this on the phone.

At the time we debated a series of landing pages by the blaster guys and it took quite a bit of convincing to get them to add links back to the home pages of the sites. They had created a bunch of landing pages for specific games, blackjack, roulette, craps etc. Upon arrival the visitor could either #A download the software, #B leave.

A few people had told me that at the time they did ok with some of the pages, but during our discussions we realized that the effectiveness of the landing pages was directly related to how "sold" the visitor was before he landed. (that is fairly true of any visitor we send)

Personally I stuck with sending visitors to the home page until we finally convinced them to add links back to their home pages.

Now getting groups to understand advertsing a slots bonus on a blackjack page is not cool is another debate, but I will always choose a home page landing unless targeted to a specific game or theme or bonus, but never if the visitor can not get to the home page so they can read about the bonuses and read the terms.

Rick
Universal4

[slotplayer]

A few people had told me that at the time they did ok with some of the pages, but during our discussions we realized that the effectiveness of the landing pages was directly related to how "sold" the visitor was before he landed. (that is fairly true of any visitor we send)

I think the landing page has got to look complete or it could scare the visitor off. I like them to really be like the home page with the promotions tab, banking tab etc.. perhaps its incorrect thinking but I just assume if I don't like it or trust it others won't.

[bauss]

I only advertise poker rooms, and I send my players to the home page of the poker site, and I also provide a link where they can download the software in one click on some pages.

[edgarf76]

What do you guys think about using a direct download link without stating it is a download link. For instance click here to claim you bonus, but the link would take the visitor to a download, does everyone think that is too aggressive?

[bauss]

What do you guys think about using a direct download link without stating it is a download link. For instance click here to claim you bonus, but the link would take the visitor to a download, does everyone think that is too aggressive?

Yes that's too aggressive, and I'd be annoyed if I clicked on a link like that, because I like to check out sites before downloading. You could experiment with it though, and see if it helps with conversions.

I wouldn't do that on my own site, because I don't like tricking my users. Especially since a large majority of my players are users that are joining poker rooms to support my community.

[universal4]

I agree also with that.

Many times I have seen where programs go to a lot of trouble to create decent looking landing pages but then they will screw them up and have every single link start the download often at the same time as not providing any links to the home page, or like Edgar says they don't state it is a download link.

I agree that clicking the link that says claim bonus or whatever may ultimately lead to a situation where the visitor has to download the software, but I also think download links need to be fairly clearly marked.

It's a bit of a trade off, we are trying to get the software on to the visitors computer, but getting them to sign on the dotted line (fill out the form and submit it) is far more important in my opinion.

Once they do that, by all means, let's ask for their wallet.... if they click a download link first, great let's ask them to sign up while the download is in progress, but holding their hand and being very clear on the process is also very important to a lot of visitors.

Sure some very savvy players may come to the site presold and ready to throw their wallets at the casino, that's great, but those players are already looking for the sign up button or the download button when they arrive, but those very same players may also be looking for the promotions pages or the terms and conditions links, and they should be easy to find and read before we shove the download at them.


Rick
Universal4

Disclaimer: Having been in sales of one form or another for more than 30 years, one should NEVER be afraid to ask for the wallet, the difficult part in face-to-face sales is determining whether to ask the woman or the man. If you guess wrong and ask the man and you see the womn suddenly put her hand over her purse, you know you just screwed up and asked the wrong one, since "she" controls the household money.

And if you ask the woman and the man places his hand on his back pocket and you are not making eye contact with him you just blew it since he is gonna feel that you threatened his manhood because you placed too much emphasis on her power within the relationship.

Of course most of that doesn't work the same way online, and since selling casino gambling is more of a private thing you only have to sell one at a time, but it is very similar to selling timeshares since you are selling a dream....lol

[edgarf76]

I agree also with that.

Many times I have seen where programs go to a lot of trouble to create decent looking landing pages but then they will screw them up and have every single link start the download often at the same time as not providing any links to the home page, or like Edgar says they don't state it is a download link.

I agree that clicking the link that says claim bonus or whatever may ultimately lead to a situation where the visitor has to download the software, but I also think download links need to be fairly clearly marked.

It's a bit of a trade off, we are trying to get the software on to the visitors computer, but getting them to sign on the dotted line (fill out the form and submit it) is far more important in my opinion.

Once they do that, by all means, let's ask for their wallet.... if they click a download link first, great let's ask them to sign up while the download is in progress, but holding their hand and being very clear on the process is also very important to a lot of visitors.

Sure some very savvy players may come to the site presold and ready to throw their wallets at the casino, that's great, but those players are already looking for the sign up button or the download button when they arrive, but those very same players may also be looking for the promotions pages or the terms and conditions links, and they should be easy to find and read before we shove the download at them.


Rick
Universal4

Disclaimer: Having been in sales of one form or another for more than 30 years, one should NEVER be afraid to ask for the wallet, the difficult part in face-to-face sales is determining whether to ask the woman or the man. If you guess wrong and ask the man and you see the womn suddenly put her hand over her purse, you know you just screwed up and asked the wrong one, since "she" controls the household money.

And if you ask the woman and the man places his hand on his back pocket and you are not making eye contact with him you just blew it since he is gonna feel that you threatened his manhood because you placed too much emphasis on her power within the relationship.

Of course most of that doesn't work the same way online, and since selling casino gambling is more of a private thing you only have to sell one at a time, but it is very similar to selling timeshares since you are selling a dream....lol

I never looked at it as decieving the visitor. I have not been in sales for almost 20 years now. It takes about 5 no's to get a yes statistically. During the start of a presentation i have heard people ask if some feels comfortable and confident at the end are they planning to move forward. The reason is to hopefully get a yes but also to get the reflex no out of the way.

When it comes to the internet, I do not know how to gently go through the process of giving a good "presentation". What I mean specifically is if I put a download link in, I am asking for the signature and also getting a reflex no out of the way, the way I was thinking about it. However there needs to be a smooth process so the buyer does not get buyers remorse, I think this is what you guys are refering to when you say the visitor going to the home page, promo page, TOS, ext...

If a person is ready, willing, and able I want them to "sign the contact" but I also know that the bulldog agressive approach face to face turns people off. Versatility is key in sales IMO and I guess I am trying to find a way to adapt depending on the visitors buying patterns.

[AceOdds]

I generally send visitors to the home page but do experiment occasionally and try to track any changes.

One downside I've been thinking about with sending people to the homepage is how efficiently the bookmaker tracks the source of the signup. I imagine registration forms always track but am more dubious about the download & register in app conversion tracking. I've been meaning to investigate this once I have time, at-least with a html registration page the user doesn't get sidetracked as often into a non-tracked channel.

[NorwegianViking]

I've tried a lot of different stuff and surprisingly maybe to some, sending visitors to the index page seems to work best. Unless you have a really good landing page about a specific, really nice offer, that could work too. I don't ever send anyone to anything else than those two, but generally, always to the index page (over 90 % of the time).

[slotplayer]

What do you guys think about using a direct download link without stating it is a download link. For instance click here to claim you bonus, but the link would take the visitor to a download, does everyone think that is too aggressive?

I think its a bad idea.

I always use the download link in conjunction with the landing page link. I anchor the landing page link with Visit Casino and the dl link with Download Casino, although lately I've been experimenting with using "Install Casino".

[LazyRiver]

It depends. General pages with quick clicks = homepage or a promotional landing page.

Reviews almost always convert better with the signup page.

Theoretically, you have captured their interest to learn more or see for themselves if they're clicking from one of your general pages. If clicking from the review, you've sold them and they want to sign up now.

I have to agree with that logic. Probably the best solution would be to wrap up a review site with two call-to-action buttons : "Visit the Casino" "Sign Up", where obviously the first one goes to HP, the other one to registration page.
Thanks for this post!

[bonuscenter]

I think it depends.


If you publish a very comprehensive review and your visitors trust you, then they can go directly to the registration page.


If you try to send a visitor directly to register without providing enough information, it is likely that the visitor will be offended and consider your site as unsafe and unreliable.


Particularly I do not use the registration pages as the first choice.