More Gambling Affiliate Frustrations
Published On 24th April 2023
Back in 2017 the online gambling industry was forced to get it's act together with a serious of interventions from The UK Gambling Commission. Huge changes occurred across the industry with respect to bonuses, child appealing images and content and how terms and conditions were displayed. These changes also applied to the affiliate industry so sites like ourselves were forced to take steps to be compliant. For example we had to remove various images and logos that might appeal to young people, indicate clearly using #AD where affiliate partnerships occur and link to important terms and conditions. The implementation of these elements have never been an issue although in truth the roll out of requirements could have been better organised with uniformity across all operators. In 2023 these things are second nature when it comes to compliance, but that's not to say everything is fine, because it's not.
Enforced Restrictions
Adding to our list of things to do to be a compliant affiliate are a mixture of restrictions that makes things tough to operate in this sector. Firstly there are restrictions with what we can and can't do on social media. It doesn't help that Facebook has issues with gambling sites setting up pages or communities but some operators forbid the use of social media for promotions. You can, it seems, link to content on your own portal but for all intents and purposes it's simpler to avoid the social media platforms. Secondly we can't do any email marketing or have a mailing list. In fact one operator won't let us be part of their platform if we continued operating a mailing list for content not related to gambling. Now that Loquax Competitions and Loquax Bingo have become independent entities we guess it might not be an issue now, but the damage has been done and our newsletter is pretty much dead in the water. And it doesn't end there! Whilst our arms are tied for marketing and we're busy being compliant, if we don't hit certain targets then we can find ourselves removed as an affiliate.
Jeopardy
However, even if we do hit targets then it's possible that an operator can decide to close off revenue streams because of [insert any bogus reason that they like]. Often these decisions are taken without any empathy towards or understanding of small/medium affiliates versus the big well established brands who sit high up on Google. Additionally the decisions often don't take into account market conditions or business changes. For example if a company doesn't have a decent bingo offer then that doesn't help affiliates produce players for them. In essence we've had our legs tied, arms tied and been blind folded but if we don't keep running at 100 miles an hour then we're at risk of losing revenues. And these are lifetime revshare revenues which should be paid contractually. Oh yes contracts are pretty meaningless when it comes to some operators mentioning no names like Betfair, Sky or Paddy Power. This kind of business jeopardy isn't fun and perhaps it explains why there seems to be so few bingo affiliates these days.
Minutiae
Despite all the above we've managed to - just about - carry on. But once again we find that there's more to digest. This time we're being asked to not mention certain games and include terms and conditions if we mention certain promotional elements. So for example if we write "XYZ Casino has a daily free game called Spin" then we'd need to then add the relevant terms to this promotion. In an article about the daily free game this makes sense, but not as a line within a review. It's this kind of minutiae that seems to have become an obsession amongst operators. Gambling companies are plastered across sports, TV, radio and social media and yet here we are having to insert a short paragraph that apparently will make us more compliant. A bag for life may be sensible with respect to global warming but it's completely missing the bigger picture. Yes we should be as compliant as possible but why does it feel that the microscope is focused solely on affiliates whilst the rest of the gambling industry ticks along? The Premier League may have decided to ban sponsors on the front of shirts but they'll still be on the arms. Surely that has quite a big reach? Yet how many people have been encouraged to gamble by not seeing a line of terms or having read that "XYZ Casino has ABC Game" on an affiliate site? Is there any data on this?
What's The Solution?
If online gambling operators want small/medium affiliates in their marketing arsenal then things need to change. Firstly rules on quotas need to be relaxed or dropped completely. They need to be realistic and affiliates shouldn't be penalised for what's happening today. They did their work and promotions in the past and therefore should be rewarded according to what was agreed not penalised. Secondly there needs to be some kind of industry wide discussion on compliance and what it should entail. Data needs to be shown to demonstrate the effect of using and not using required terms. How many people are being influenced by content writing to gamble? How many are underage? There's a fair argument that "if it stops just one person" but let's be sure that it does actually stop just one person. It'd also be interesting to know whether the presence of terms on anything and everything actually influences a reader. Personally we'd prefer affiliate managers helping us to attract players who want to play and not spending our time or their time getting more and more tied up so as to make it almost impossible to function as an affiliate.
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