The gambling market is growing every year, attracting more and more new users. It is expected that by 2030, online gambling revenue will increase to $370 billion. Therefore, this vertical remains one of the most promising for affiliate marketing. Let's discuss what gambling is, what are the main partnership models, what newbies should pay attention to, which traffic sources to use, and how to create effective creatives.

What is gambling?

Gambling belongs to the grey verticals of affiliate marketing, among which there are also dating, nutrition, crypto, adult, etc. Some also include sports betting in gambling. However, as approaches and partnerships for betting and gambling can differ significantly, we will divide them into separate verticals. By gambling, we mean traffic to online casinos where players play for real money.

Why choose gambling?

Despite its challenges, gambling remains a popular vertical among webmasters for several reasons:

1) High profitability

The industry revenue is enormous, and advertisers are eager to invest in promoting their businesses.

2) Market growth

More players are entering the market, which means more lucrative offers for webmasters.

3) Variety of promotion methods

There are numerous traffic sources available for promoting gambling, and various approaches and methods exist for creating effective campaigns and creatives.

4) Suitable for beginners

You don't have to be an experienced marketer to promote gambling. While careful selection of partnerships and offers is important, this holds true for all verticals.

What payout models are there?

Payout in gambling can be divided into two types:

1) Cost Per Action (CPA)

In this case, the network can set a fixed rate for player actions. Targeted actions usually include making a minimum deposit or a specific number of deposits by the player.

2) Revenue Share (RevShare)

A webmaster receives a percentage of the casino's profit. Depending on the offer, the rate ranges from 30% to 80%.

Hybrid partnership models are also commonly used, where an affiliate’s profit depends on both player actions and the money they lose.

Both models have their pros and cons. If you work on a CPA model, your income doesn't increase even if players deposit substantial amounts. RevShare may seem like a more profitable option, but it's suitable for those who work in the long term. With quality traffic, attracted players will continue to make deposits actively for several months, bringing a decent passive income to you. Long-term offers require a large budget, careful selection of partnerships, and high skills. Therefore, beginners might find the CPA model or hybrid models more suitable.

Features of the gambling vertical

1) Competition

In this vertical, there are not only high profits but also competition. Online casinos are willing to pay big money to attract gambling players, so there are many people who want to earn a lot with the casino. Additionally, competitors often buy traffic at a high price to not leave chances for other webmasters.

2) Target Audience

The target audience for gambling consists of legal age (in legal online casinos) players. This is more of a plus than a minus since they are financially capable. Among them are both men and women with different financial statuses from all over the world.

3) Grey Vertical

As mentioned earlier, gambling falls under grey verticals. This means that in many geos, it's not possible to openly advertise casinos. Therefore, sometimes you may have to work hard on creatives and cloaking.

4) Creatives

In gambling, there is fierce competition, and players are already accustomed to the most common combinations and banners. To attract users' attention, you need to show inventiveness. This doesn't mean you should completely stop using spy services, which remain the most useful service for affiliates.

Traffic sources in gambling

Advertisers in the gambling industry accept traffic from almost any source, which is a plus for an affiliate. However, since gambling falls under the grey vertical, one must be prepared for bans and find ways to successfully bypass them for successful traffic monetization. Some of the main sources include:

1) Spamming through messengers or social networks

This type of traffic is technically free but requires a significant time investment from the webmaster. Spamming can be done in comments on various public pages, through private messages on WhatsApp, Telegram, or Facebook. However, this method inevitably leads to bans and account blocks.

2) Ad networks

Google Ads and Facebook Ads remain popular sources of traffic, but there are nuances to consider. Google doesn’t not allow advertising online casinos openly, so one has to find workarounds, such as using names of specific casino slots. On Facebook, you can use keywords related to gambling directly. However, despite this, you will still encounter a large number of blocks. All these difficulties can be overcome if you use high-quality proxy servers and anti-detect browsers, different bank cards, and accounts.

3) Traffic to apps and ASO

Mobile apps are more trusted by ad networks. However, since direct traffic to gambling is not allowed, you will need to cover up with a cloak linking to a white page and disguise the offer well. App development can be entrusted to partners who lease them out or assemble your own team of developers. You can also try ASO (App Store Optimization) to promote your app in search results. This way, when users search for keywords, they will see your app among the first in the list. Creating and promoting apps require significant budgets, but it is definitely a high-quality source of traffic.

4)    Influencer traffic

Influencers are popular sources of traffic in 2024. A blogger can stream and redirect their audience to an offer, or warm them up and provide a link to an offer under the mask of online earnings. This is a rather expensive source of traffic; you can create such a blogger yourself if you have the time and desire.

5)    SEO

This is the most profitable and the most complex source of traffic in gambling, where it is almost impossible for beginners to succeed. The most common approaches in this source are pages with free slots, articles with online casino ratings, blogs, etc.

6) Social Networks

In addition to spamming in comments and personal messages, there is a more inventive way to use social networks to drive traffic. A webmaster can disguise their account on any social network as a blog about online earning, do streams on YouTube, or post memes with links in the description. A good idea would be to buy pages in groups with similar themes and start posting your content there with links to the offer.

How to choose an affiliate program?

To choose a suitable affiliate program, pay attention to the following:

1) Reliability of the affiliate program

To avoid scammers, choose reputable advertisers. Study reviews, consult with other specialists, and read which offers this affiliate program works with.

2) Payment terms

If the advertiser provides vague cooperation terms, unclear payment schedules, and inconvenient withdrawal methods, it's worth considering finding another affiliate program.

3) Working with newcomers

Not all affiliate programs collaborate with newcomers. If you are just starting in the field of affiliate marketing in gambling, pay attention to the entry conditions for the affiliate program. Some advertisers conduct serious interviews and may not be ready to accept a novice webmaster into their team. At the same time, there are affiliate programs that support newcomers by offering them educational courses, promotional materials, and personal managers.

4) Offer specifics

It's important to carefully consider not only the affiliate program itself but also the offer. The offer should match the vertical and target audience. If the offer has inconvenient deposit conditions, for example, if money can only be deposited from a local card, it's unlikely that you will achieve a good conversion rate. It's also beneficial if the affiliate program includes well-known and large online casinos among its offers. Pay attention to the geo-targeting; perhaps you have already worked with these locations, which can make your life easier.

5) Marketing materials

Large and reliable affiliate programs are willing to offer webmasters their landing pages, creatives, applications, proxy servers, etc. The more support the affiliate program provides, the easier it will be for the marketer to work.

6) Interface

The affiliate program interface should be user-friendly, especially for newcomers. Trusted affiliate programs provide webmasters with a convenient interface with multiple functions, analytics, etc.

How to make creatives for gambling?

There are several main approaches to making creatives in gambling:

● News

The creative is created in a video format simulating a news story. Typically, the host talks about a family or a hero who won at the casino and improved their life. To create the creative, voiceover selection, and audio track, AI tools can be used.

● Emotions

The most common option here is people's reactions to winning. Elements for the creative can be found from any other reactions or streams on YouTube. It will be great to show bundles of money in a person's hands and elements of a luxurious life: expensive cars, iPhones, etc. Also, add in bank pop-ups with winnings, but make sure to disguise them as local banks characteristic of a specific geo.

● Engagement

In the engagement approach, we guide the user through the basic, straightforward elements of the casino. It's possible to depict the operation of a casino slot machine and show how a winning combination appears on it. Once again, we can add emotional reactions, bank pop-ups, etc.

● Promo Videos

A promotional video about an online casino showcasing its key features and bonuses. It would be effective to use calls to action such as "get $1000 on deposit," "download the app," "grab the bonus," etc. To avoid getting banned by ad networks, it's better to use such creatives for legal online casinos in permitted geos.

A few more tips and tricks:

Pre-landings. Use pre-landing pages with roulettes, quizzes, surveys, etc. Gambling addicts easily fall for such enticing gimmicks.

Geo. Online casinos are popular in almost all geos. In developed countries, gamblers entertain themselves, while in poor countries, users try to improve their lives through quick earnings and big wins. It is worth paying attention to the geo in the context of specific offers, whether there is technical support, whether payment and deposit methods are convenient, etc.

Lures. Be sure to show various bonuses, free spins, gifts for deposits, roulettes, and quizzes in your creatives. Gambling addicts come in with a desire to use the free spin and cannot leave without spending a lot of money.

Emotions. Emotions should be the main element of your creatives. These are not only reactions but also success stories, influencers, luxury items, banknotes and bank pushes, the sound of coins clinking, etc.

As you can see, gambling remains a very attractive vertical for affiliate marketing, including beginners. Choose reliable affiliate networks and offers, use various sources of traffic, show creativity, and share profits with the industry.