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How to Start an Affiliate Marketing Program
Starting an affiliate program is one of the most reliable ways to help a casino or sportsbook achieve maximum exposure online. Affiliates attract potential players to online gambling websites.
While there are different ways to promote online casinos or sportsbooks, affiliate marketing has earned its status as the most effective model in iGaming. Let’s take a closer look at how to start a successful iGaming affiliate program, using insights from our experience in performance marketing.
Business Analysis and Goal Setting
The first and most important step is to analyse your overall business performance. What advantages will such a step bring? It allows operators to align current business opportunities and goals with available resources.
In terms of strengthening an iGaming business, affiliate marketing is a powerful way to grow your audience and raise brand awareness. While affiliates are a major traffic driver in the industry, operators should strike a balance with other promotion methods that bring relevant traffic at the best value.
Even though business analysis is done mainly by an iGaming operator, here are a few general aspects worth considering:
Current business status (number of brands, statistics, current audience, etc.)
Short– and long-term goals, including new markets for expansion. Identify your priority locations and target audience profiles.
Financial KPIs and targets. At this stage, calculate how many players your brand can attract and whether your spend versus ROI is competitive. These figures help operators plan outreach across all available promotion channels, including affiliate marketing.
Scaling plans. This includes any plans for business expansion, the introduction of new brands, and the ability to manage them within a single affiliate management platform.
Conceptualising Brand Promotion
This stage involves establishing contact with iGaming affiliates and sets the tone for relationships with both partners and players. Building an environment that attracts the right players requires:
A credible brand reputation. This is a critical point in terms of affiliate partnerships, as both players and affiliates expect fair and transparent terms.
A satisfying player experience. The point applies not only to players but also to affiliates: both the casino and the affiliate profit from players. They won’t send traffic to a site where players feel cheated.
Clear messaging. An impeccable reputation is an excellent foundation for creating a unique brand proposition for players and affiliate partners.
At the same time, think about the return on partner investment. Affiliate commissions should be attractive and motivating, but not damaging to the business. A good affiliate management solution is flexible enough to adjust reward terms based on business requirements.
On the player side, relevance is key. No matter how loyal the affiliate is, if the offer is not relevant, it will be nearly impossible to engage players. Test campaigns and bonuses, run themed tournaments, and measure results. Trial and error are your best teachers here.
Choosing an Affiliate Software for Your iGaming Business
If there’s one thing you can’t do without, it’s choosing the right iGaming affiliate marketing software provider. The right platform provides the tools to make partnerships cost-effective for both operators and affiliates.
What should operators look for when choosing affiliate software?
Affiliate Commissions
Multiple reward options are essential in iGaming affiliate programs. This means a business has more freedom to offer financially advantageous and enticing terms for affiliate partner cooperation.
Modern software doesn’t stop at RevShare, Hybrid, or CPA. Advanced solutions let you combine conditions, set up multiple thresholds with special reward types, and build unique commission structures.
Payments Processing
Not all affiliate platforms include built-in payment processing. That means operators may need alternative third-party services to pay their partners.
iGaming affiliate marketing programs allow for two options:
Handle payments outside the platform, using the software only as a tracker.
Make payments directly from the affiliate tracking platform.
If affiliate payments are important to you, pay close attention to the payment processing options the platform offers. Strong relationships with partners depend on prompt payments.
Making payments directly from the software, under the provider’s supervision, is often the more convenient option. This way, operators don’t need to rely on third-party services.
Although the function is valuable for running a successful affiliate program, it's not common to find affiliate solutions that include it. Affilka offers built-in payment processing to streamline transactions for operators.
Multiple Affiliate Campaigns
Before starting an affiliate marketing program, make sure the software allows affiliates to create multiple campaigns for different traffic sources. In this case, an affiliate campaign refers to a partner’s promotion in a particular traffic channel, such as social media. The partner then uses specific banners and text to engage the audience and track clicks through referral links.
Partners value having access to different media formats and resolutions, since they often work across multiple channels. If your software supports this need, affiliates are more likely to choose you over another iGaming affiliate program.
Multi-Brand Management
Operators with multiple gambling brands should look for software that enables tracking across all of them. At the same time, it should allow brand-specific settings rather than one blanket approach. Creating custom commissions, assets, and reports for each brand makes more sense than applying the same rules to all. That's why the best affiliate software lets operators manage affiliate marketing for several iGaming brands under one account to see the full picture.
Admin Permission Management
An iGaming affiliate marketing software must provide strong management controls. This means offering multiple administrator roles and ensuring accountability for each affiliate manager. Ideally, the platform also includes role-based permissions to keep access secure.
Multiple Affiliate Levels
Some affiliate platforms go a step further by allowing operators to set up affiliate tiers. This means affiliates can recruit other affiliates who also generate traffic. for their gambling websites. This hierarchy is known as a sub-affiliate system.
Both parties benefit from this:
Operators get stronger affiliate recruitment, as partners recruit other partners to increase their rewards.
Affiliates gain extra motivation since partners can focus on bringing in affiliates who drive traffic, so they can earn more as master affiliates.
Define Affiliate Rewards
Once you’ve chosen the right iGaming affiliate program, the next step is to set commission structures and customise them.
iGaming operators often make individual deals with partners, but there should also be a basic set of terms published on the website. In addition to this, you should form a motivation system – bonuses or special conditions for affiliates that will deliver outstanding results.
A fair commission plan is a huge advantage, but your reputation is just as important. Still, you also need to build a positive image: be honest and fair to your affiliate partners, keep your promises, and respond to any queries they have.
Competitor Analysis
Finding the right affiliate software is only part of building a program. The next step is actually hiring iGaming affiliates. At this stage, operators will need to conduct a competitor analysis, studying the most successful players in the market.
Start with competitors’ landing pages to see how they attract partners. Look at the offers they provide, the terms they set, and the commission structures they use. It is also important to note which affiliate reward plans successful market players use. Also, pay attention to where they promote their affiliate programs beyond their websites.
Prepare Marketing Assets for Affiliates
Create all the necessary marketing materials, including email templates, videos, banners, and texts for affiliates. A partner can and most likely will tailor the content, but an operator is responsible for determining the basis of that content.
Alongside preparing materials, the operator should start building a dedicated affiliate team. Their tasks will include:
Finding and recruiting affiliates
Keeping affiliates engaged
Responding to affiliate questions and tracking their performance
Negotiating terms with high-volume affiliates
Sharing updates about current and upcoming promotions
Find iGaming Affiliates
Recruiting affiliates requires an attractive affiliate program and effective outreach. Maximise your digital presence to ensure potential partners can find your affiliate program.
Ways to do this include:
Place information on your website. Ideally, include a dedicated affiliate landing page so potential partners can easily learn about your offer.
Join affiliate forums and communities. They allow operators to reach partners inexpensively, and it's where affiliates actively look for opportunities.
Use social media. Affiliate outreach via social media can be a useful tool to attract affiliates and retain their loyalty.
Attend affiliate conferences. Trade shows and conferences are perfect venues for networking. Whether you are a presenter or a participant, iGaming events like iGB Live!, London Affiliate Conference and SiGMA Affiliate Conference allow operators to get a closer look at potential partners.
Creating a Profitable iGaming Affiliate Program: Essential Components
Once your program is set up, the focus shifts to operations. At this stage, operators aim to get results, establish an ongoing outcome analysis, and build productive relationships with affiliates.
The operational phase includes:
Tracking and analysing affiliate performance
Helping partners resolve issues
Building trust and fairness
Making reward payments on time
These steps are key to running a profitable affiliate program that drives revenue and delivers a steady flow of quality traffic to the iGaming project.
Of course, success also depends on the software powering the program. Affilka is an iGaming affiliate marketing platform that helps manage partners, track their ad campaigns, optimise marketing expenses, and reward affiliates. Through Affilka’s ongoing innovations, distinguished customer service, and absolute flexibility in all matters, clients can leverage the affiliate platform to its full potential and constantly upgrade their affiliate marketing programs.