Delegates returned to the ExCeL today for the second day of the London Affiliate Conference 2017. Despite being a Saturday, snowy weather and plenty of sore heads from the eve before, the expo floor was full of activity and delegates were making the most of the outstanding networking opportunities available.
In addition to hosting the huge booths of established brands in the online gambling affiliate space, the LAC is also a wonderful location to unveil new brands and provide visibility for start-ups.
We first heard about Breakout Gaming from Gian Perroni at LAC 2015 and two years later, the brand has esablished itself with a big booth at the event. Perroni told CalvinAyre.com LAC 2017 has served as Breakout’s “coming out party” and he was delighted with the exposure provided, especially seeing as the brand has plenty of unique elements to offer iGaming affiliates.
Perroni went on to reveal Breakout Gaming has recently done a deal with Income Access to launch BreakoutAffiliates.com and said the brand accepts fiat and cryptos such as Bitcoin where available. He added Breakout Gaming is the only operator to own its own crypto-currency and also the only operator to service both gambling and gamer communicates via their own eSports competition site and retail game stores, featuring 2,000+ games from top publishers.
Football Index is a start-up company in the iGaming space, a revolutionary betting platform where customers can buy and sell footballers like they would on the stock market. When asked why punters would choose to go with Football Index as opposed to traditional betting sites, Mike Bohan told CalvinAyre.com his offering is different from regular betting because they enable punters to use football knowledge 24/7 as opposed to just during the matches.
“It’s a fun place to keep some money”, he said. Its a “long term bet” as opposed to a “short term bet”.
Bohan told CalvinAyre.com of Football Index’s plans to reach a wider audience by undertaking their first above-the-line marketing on radio and TV, a major investment from the company and living proof of the success they’ve seen over the past 14 months.
Bohan exclusively revealed to CalvinAyre.com Football Index has plans to branch out into geographical regions beyond just the UK due to demand from betting operators across the globe, but he’s unable to reveal details at the present moment. “Watch this space”, he teased. He added the company is hiring, so if you’re interested in a job with a killer start-up in our space, be sure to reach out to Bohan.
In addition to delighting delegates with an active expo floor, the LAC provided plenty of sessions designed to educate affiliates and ultimately help them earn more commissions.
Today’s “A picture is worth 1000 words: How to make the most of Instagram” session featured Gavin Flood of AdRoll as a speaker. Flood kicked off his presentation with some numbers to put everything in perspective for affiliates. He said Instagram currently enjoys over 500 million users, many more users than Twitter. Facebook is far ahead in terms of their user numbers, but Flood pointed out Instagram reached these numbers faster than Facebook did…its a much more competitive landscape now, so its impressive Instagram has hit these numbers so fast, he said.
Flood said Facebook’s marketing space is crowded and its is a place to look at what other people are doing as opposed to Instagram which is a place to look at pictures of everything, therefore resulting in much more engaged users. These users are very mobile driven and heavy on millennials, so an ideal group to tap into as an iGaming affiliate.
When it comes to the benefits of engaging with Instagram ads, Flood provided seven solid points:
1) Its native inventory, it takes the form and function of the platform its in. Its always going to be incorporated in what you are seeing, Instagram posts look similar to Instagram ads.
2) With a paid advert element, you have the option to drive conversations to your ad.
3) The ads are cross device, so anyone you engage with on desktop you have the ability to engage via mobile on Instagram.
4) You can reach over 500 million users, the numbers are absolutely huge.
5) The ability to target based on location, age, likes, etc. (Same as Facbook paid advertising).
6) The carousel ad unit gives you the opportunity to showcase more than one image. For example, as an affiliate, if you’re pushing a specific game, you can use this feature to highlight offers from multiple brands.
7) Call to action buttons- “download now”, etc.
Flood then provided five tips for affiliates who wish to take advantage of Instagram advertising best practices:
1) Create a mobile friendly destination page!
2) Limit the number of clicks, keep the user experience as tight as possible.
3) Use the call-to-action (CTA) buttons and make sure you’re aligned with your CTA button.
4) Align your campaigns and make sure you’re not sending out mixed messages. Keep the campaigns consistent across Instagram and Facebook.
5)Encourage swiping through with carousel ads.
The importance of A/B testing was covered and Flood promised affiliates they would be surprised at how much the testing helps. He also advised to keep creatives fresh by switching them up often, keep the ads branded and pay attention to the caption as well, avoid getting hung up on just the photography.
Before closing out, Flood left affiliates with five tips on how to driving organic engagement:
1)Post consistently and strategically, build a narrative.
2)Use hashtags wisely, people often use their own hashtags related to their brands, instead, figure out how to piggy back on what else is out there.
3)Interact- encourage people to post and tag them.
4)Host contests and giveaways, use your Facebook strategy here and apply it to Instagram.
5)Work with influencers- as opposed to celebrities, bring in experts from your space such as tipsters and game developers, take people from the context of your own network and industry.
“There are huge, huge opportunities [with Instagram] in the iGaming sector, both as an affiliate and as a brand”, Flood said.
This afternoon’s “Accelerating customer acquisition through behavioral marketing” session featured Kris Mobayeni of BounceX as a speaker. Mobayeni emphasized the importance of targeted email marketing and said although not sexy, “email has become the digital world’s universal identifier”. He said continuity of messaging can increase conversions upwards of 20% and recommended introducing on-site messaging as well. “Use hyper targeted email and custom audiences messaging”, he advised.
