Newbie question. How to start? Next steps?

[BigBlu]

I have bought expired gambling domains before. And have placed banners on these sites. But I didn't have any conversions despite the domains getting about 10 visitors a day. I tried for 6 months and gave up. That was..... about 3 years ago.

I am coming back this time and seriously want to successfully sign up referrals and earn commission from affiliate programs. Why? Because I've lost so much $$ in gambling, I now finally believe that the only real consistent winners are the casinos. And I'd like to be on their side.

There are so many affiliate programs out there. What criteria to consider when choosing affiliate program? Which criteria are more important than others? I consider the following. Any other criteria?

1. Earn commission on the referral for life.
2. Good paymaster.
3. Training, guidance and support.
4. High payout. (How high is high by the way?)
5. Are there any affiliate programs that allow us to create and personalize campaigns?

Where can I find reliable reviews of affiliate programs?
Where can I find data on the gaming industry? For example, which are the top ten internet gambling websites by revenue or by users?

I would also like to know where I can get guidance or advice on how to make my site become successful. This time round, I want to learn from people who have been successful instead of starting out on my own, clueless and experimenting along the way.

Thank you for your feedback.

[jackten]

Your questions are too broad.

Even if we want to help you out, you'll have to be more specific.

An analogy to your question is "what's the best car?". That depends on who you are, what you want to do, how much money you have to spend and a whole lot more.

I'm currently working on an extensive video course that answers all of those questions from A to Z, and shows you exactly how to do everything step by step, but it won't be ready before early january.

[WinYourWayKyle]

Hi There,
The GPWA is a great place to find all of the info you will need to become a successful webmaster in the online gaming industry.
The GPWA has many guru's in this industry, and the forum is for the most part a very friendly place and a great resource.

The GPWA as well has sponsor affiliate programs that they work with, which is a good place to start. Also though, depending on your business model for your website, make sure to do your due dilligence to make sure that program is right for what you are trying to accomplish.

I would recommond becoming active in the forums here as well, as you can learn a lot from just reading the posts and engaging in the conversations.

If you are looking for advise and guidance, again use the forums, and note that many affiliate managers are members of the forum as well, so they will be a good resource to ping as well.

As far as stats on the industry, over the years it has gone up and down, with people coming in and leaving every day. I would be more focused on the kind of site you are knowledgeable about, and focus on adding great content, update it often, and focus most of your efforts on SEO SEO SEO. This is the key to becoming a successful affiliate in this business. Learn about SEO, research how it works, understand why it is so important... etc

Good luck in your venture. I wish you all the best!

[BigBlu]

I'm currently working on an extensive video course that answers all of those questions from A to Z, and shows you exactly how to do everything step by step, but it won't be ready before early january.

Looking forward to the video

Hi There,
The GPWA is a great place to find all of the info you will need to become a successful webmaster in the online gaming industry.
The GPWA has many guru's in this industry, and the forum is for the most part a very friendly place and a great resource.

The GPWA as well has sponsor affiliate programs that they work with, which is a good place to start. Also though, depending on your business model for your website, make sure to do your due dilligence to make sure that program is right for what you are trying to accomplish.

I would recommond becoming active in the forums here as well, as you can learn a lot from just reading the posts and engaging in the conversations.

If you are looking for advise and guidance, again use the forums, and note that many affiliate managers are members of the forum as well, so they will be a good resource to ping as well.

As far as stats on the industry, over the years it has gone up and down, with people coming in and leaving every day. I would be more focused on the kind of site you are knowledgeable about, and focus on adding great content, update it often, and focus most of your efforts on SEO SEO SEO. This is the key to becoming a successful affiliate in this business. Learn about SEO, research how it works, understand why it is so important... etc

Good luck in your venture. I wish you all the best!

Regarding the statement in Bold, what do u mean by business model? Which type of affiliate programs are suitable for which business models? Sorry, I really don't get this part.

Regarding SEO. Yea, I know a bit about SEO. Thanks for bringing this up so I can add to my list of things to do.

[jackten]

What he meant is.. do you want to do casinos? sportsbooks? poker? bingo?

Slots? Baseball? Online poker tournaments?

Are you making a forum?

A community portal?

A membership site?

An opt-in page?

Is your market english? german? chinese?

Are you targeting the US? Ouzbekistan?

That's what we meant, your questions are too broad. Even if we want to help, we can't give you the specific information you want because it would take too long and would cover too much content.

[WinYourWayKyle]

Hi JackTen,
Thank you for clearing that up.
There are so many variables when it comes to designing your website. JackTen has given you a bunch of those variables.

But, keep in mind that SEO is the most important part of your business. You can have a horrific looking website, but if you have excellent SEO it will still make you money.

SEO = Higher Rankings = More Traffic = More Conversions = More $$$

[jackten]

But, keep in mind that SEO is the most important part of your business. You can have a horrific looking website, but if you have excellent SEO it will still make you money.

And even then, you still need to do tests, work on conversions, promote the website etc.

But I guess if you want to summarize affiliation to its bare minimum, call it affiliation 101:

1- Research your market / keywords
2- Get a domain
3- Get hosting
4- Install website
5- Design website
6- Add content
7- Add affiliation links
8- Marketing

The problem is that each of those bullet points are huge topics in themselves and can be debated for hours.

[WinYourWayKyle]

Hi jackten,
Agreed.....Those tasks are huge undertakings.
My new website, Win-Your-Way has only been online for 2 months now, and there are still pages that are still being designed and worked on. I have also been testing our different banners and affiliate programs in different places on the website to see how well they work.

Even though affiliate marketing can be a great second income, it kind of becomes a full time job with little reward in the beginning stages, and until you become established within search engines for keywords as well as have other methods in place to move traffic to your website.

[craig96]

Yeah, it looks like more visitors are they key, regardless of if paid or free.

You maybe getting 10 visitors a day but if these people are not interested in your site they will click straight off it. They may just find your site by accident.

[BigBlu]

One quick question. I've read somewhere that it's best to avoid programs that place cookies for long duration of time (example 30 days). This is because when the visitor visits my site, it could still be carrying cookies from previous sessions of another affiliate. Is there a way to overcome this? I am interested in a program, but the program has cookies for over 30 days.

[casinogod]

One quick question. I've read somewhere that it's best to avoid programs that place cookies for long duration of time (example 30 days). This is because when the visitor visits my site, it could still be carrying cookies from previous sessions of another affiliate. Is there a way to overcome this? I am interested in a program, but the program has cookies for over 30 days.

You could teach the visitors how to clear their cookies but without some kind of incentive ( such as rake back) then I
Don't think many would bother.

[thepokerkeep]

One quick question. I've read somewhere that it's best to avoid programs that place cookies for long duration of time (example 30 days). This is because when the visitor visits my site, it could still be carrying cookies from previous sessions of another affiliate. Is there a way to overcome this? I am interested in a program, but the program has cookies for over 30 days.

It depends on the cookie. Some programs are set up so the first click gets the conversion, others use the last click where the new cookie over-rides the older one. Sometimes the bonus code over-rides all cookies... when you sign up with a program, ask questions so you know how things work!

I have bought expired gambling domains before. And have placed banners on these sites. But I didn't have any conversions despite the domains getting about 10 visitors a day. I tried for 6 months and gave up. That was..... about 3 years ago.

I am coming back this time and seriously want to successfully sign up referrals and earn commission from affiliate programs. Why? Because I've lost so much $$ in gambling, I now finally believe that the only real consistent winners are the casinos. And I'd like to be on their side.

There are so many affiliate programs out there. What criteria to consider when choosing affiliate program? Which criteria are more important than others? I consider the following. Any other criteria?

1. Earn commission on the referral for life.
2. Good paymaster.
3. Training, guidance and support.
4. High payout. (How high is high by the way?)
5. Are there any affiliate programs that allow us to create and personalize campaigns?

Where can I find reliable reviews of affiliate programs?
Where can I find data on the gaming industry? For example, which are the top ten internet gambling websites by revenue or by users?

I would also like to know where I can get guidance or advice on how to make my site become successful. This time round, I want to learn from people who have been successful instead of starting out on my own, clueless and experimenting along the way.

Thank you for your feedback.

Warning!! This post is going to be long and should probably be in it's own thread (or posted on my website) but what the hell, it's Sunday and I'm a little bored - so grab a cup of coffee and settle in for the long haul - it's worth the read.....

First, let's get some things out of the way.

You will not succeed in today's competitive market by buying a domain and throwing up some banners. That approach died years ago. Building a successful portal in any niche is hard work and most affiliates fail within their first year.

If you are SERIOUS about the business read on, if not - save yourself some time and quit reading now.

Domain Name
Choosing a marketable domain name is critically important and often overlooked by new affiliates. If you want to "brand" your business, you need a name that's easy to remember. The domain name needs to be user friendly too. For example, if you plan on running a general site about slots, you want a simple domain like slots.com or slotgamesonline.com. Having slot-games-online.net will probably do well with search engines but will not earn you any type in traffic. Users will type slotsgamesonline.com without the dashes, you lose the return visit and the sale!

TLD
Your top level domain should be a .com if you plan on marketing to a variety of countries. Failing that, using .org or .net will work but you need to make sure your visitors see the complete domain in your header or logo. You don't want to lose your potential repeat customers to your competitor who just happens to own the .com version of your domain.

If you plan to focus on a specific country, buy the TLD for that region and pick up the other available TLD's that are available. For example, in Canada, the country TLD is .ca but I would also buy the .com, .org, etc if they're available. Then, redirect all the other domains to your site.

In fact, buy all the available versions of your domain regardless of your initial plans. Don't let your competition pick them up.

Branding vs Search
How many times have you wanted to find a site that you've visited previously but didn't bother to bookmark it? Too many to count? Me too! That's why branding is so important.

Granted, we all rely on search engines for the bulk of our traffic but the truth is, if we fail to convert the visitor on the first visit we usually don't get a second chance unless they can find our site again. Having a well branded, easy to remember domain guarantees you more repeat visits. I'll take a "brandable" domain over an exact match (for your chosen keyword) any time. You may get fewer visits, but your conversion rate will be much higher.

Content
Write for your visitor! If you write informative content that actually helps your customer, your conversions will come. Each article should focus on one topic and contain your keywords a few times but should not be stuffed for the benefit of the SE's. Your customer will recognize BS when they see it and click the back button so fast your head will spin.

Use graphics to break up long bodies of text. Go light on the flashing banners, use logos or static images instead.

Navigation
Make sure your navigation structure is user friendly. It should not take more than two or three clicks for a visitor to reach any page on your site. Name your links in a way that the customer knows what to expect when he clicks your link. If the link says "poker reviews", make sure that's what they get when they click.

Website Colors
I see way too many sites that make my eyes bleed. Sure, they look cool but if I can't read them, bye bye! Make sure your site pops but also make sure it's readable. Remember, the population that has disposable income tends to be a little older so their eyes will not be quite as sharp. Using dark background colors is usually a mistake. Use white or other light colors behind the text. For contrast, use dark borders or dark logo colors.

Site Layout
Keep it simple! Use lots of white space!

Choosing a Niche
For your first website, choose a niche you're interested in. Remember, you will be living and breathing the topic for the next 6 to 12 months so if you're going to lose interest after a month, you may as well quit now. If you play (and love) poker, do a poker site. Sports fanatic? Why not build a sports site.

Refine Your Niche
OK - we decided on a general theme for the site. Whether it's poker, casino, sports, whatever... I suggest narrowing the field even further. Now we need to drill down to the micro niche level. Why? It's much easier to dominate the searches if your site is super focused on one niche or a few specific keywords. Plus, the more topic specific your site is, the better the conversion rate. It's also easier to find marketable domain names in some of the less competitive niche markets. For example, let's say you decided to market poker. Let's narrow the niche to tournaments. Now let's narrow it further to sit n go tournaments. And once more, we can refine the niche to pot limit hold'em. So now we're concentrating on Pot limit hold'em sit n go tournaments. That's an extreme example but you get the idea! We can be as broad or as narrow as we want in our approach to the business.

Research
There are specific tools available that will aid you in deciding on a profitable niche. Do your keyword research. How many monthly searches does your keyword get? How competitive is it? Are there less competitive variations that you should be targeting?

Still with me? Wow! I'm surprised and impressed!!

Content
Yup, back to this topic again.... now that you've gotten a great domain name and a killer looking template and your site is set up on a good hosting plan with a reliable hosting company... it's time to write your little heart out.

CONTENT IS KING!
Repeat.... CONTENT IS KING!

Whether you write short bulleted content for your pages or you write essays (sorta like this post...) remember that each and every page will add visits to your site. And what do we do with these visitors? We convert them! Using your powers of persuasion along with strong calls to action is the key to successful marketing. By placing well written, keyword rich (but not spammy) content on your site, along with strong calls to action, you will increase and convert your traffic. It really is that simple.

Optimization
Learn from those who have already done it! Having a site with hundreds of pages, each targeting one keyword or key phrase is your license to print money. Look at the sites your competitors own. See how they have optimized for the search engines but have written for their human visitors. Look at their layout, color schemes, navigation structure, writing style, target keywords, marketing partners, back link structure.... don't copy them but LEARN FROM THEM!

Affiliate Program Partners
Choosing the right program for you and your site is another absolutely critical component of your marketing plan. If you're marketing pot limit sit n go tournaments, you don't want to advertise a poker room that has zero pot limit action. Right? Or if your market is American players, you wouldn't want to push Microgaming properties since they don't accept new American players.

You also want to be sure the folks you do business with are trustworthy and reputable. After all the blood sweat and tears you've invested in getting those sign ups, the last thing you want is to lose your commissions to an unscrupulous program.


I'm going to end here even though I could write a novel on the business.

If you are really serious, read the forums here. They're stuffed full of great advice. Also check out my site, see my sig links. I only promote the best, safest, most reputable programs and my articles are just what you need to get off to the right start.

Again, if you are truly serious, pm me with your questions - I'm happy to help.

[BigBlu]

Excellent post, Terry. I'm going to re-read this post again tomorrow. It's midnight at my place and I have to hit the sack now.

[craig96]

Man, Terry, that post is so long. Very great information for newbies too. Most have took you ages to write?

[BigBlu]

...removed