Alina Famenok, CEO of tech-driven affiliate and media company Already Media, writes for iGaming Expert describing the importance of brand awareness for affiliates in the iGaming space, as even SEO-focused affiliates should be considering how their brand impacts the way users interact with them.
Every couple of months, I see the same heated debate erupt on LinkedIn.
Here’s how it usually goes:
An affiliate posts about their suspicions that an operator might be ‘skimming’ clicks off them and not fairly compensating them for traffic. The affiliate complains about the lack of transparency provided by operators and their partners’ programmes.
Others weigh-in about the need to build greater trust between operators and affiliates, while those same operators and affiliates bicker with each other over perceived grievances.
Rinse and repeat.
As affiliates, we’re rightly very focused on the issue of trust. Building two-way, trustworthy partnerships with operators is central to everything we do,
But I’d argue that there’s another, trust-based relationship that is every bit as important, but rarely given as much attention.
I’m talking about the trust our audience places in us.
Don’t believe everything you Google…
For many years, affiliates have taken the trust of their audience for granted. Now it is absolutely vital we do more to earn it.
This really boils down to how our audience finds us, and how they interact with us.
For SEO-driven affiliates, it has been enough to derive trust from nothing more than a high Google ranking itself. The thinking is that users will inherently trust reviews and listings because Google has deemed them worthy of page one.
Of course, we all know this is a dangerous way to think, and we’re increasingly seeing audiences waking up to the fact.
One recent survey from WalletHub found that 63 percent of users thought Google search results have dropped in quality since last year, while 71 percent thought the world’s most popular search engine displays bias to major brands.
If trust in what Google serves users is declining, affiliates need to work harder to regain it themselves.
Staying on brand
For me, this is a branding challenge, and there are huge benefits for those who get it right.
By creating a strong brand around which a community can engage, affiliates aren’t at the mercy of the Google algorithm.
As we saw in March’s core update, a change in the algo can have a profound impact on SEO-focused affiliates. Some who fell foul of that particular update saw previously successful businesses turned on their heads overnight.
Core updates like this underline how vulnerable affiliates can be when overly reliant on the whims of a search engine’s algorithm. When rankings drop, so does traffic, and with it, revenue. For affiliates who focus entirely on SEO, this is a fragile foundation to build upon.
Affiliates should be looking at branding not just as a way to make themselves more algorithm-proof, but also as a way of building those bonds of trust directly with the audience.
Coming back for more
This brings me onto another word affiliates are usually scared even to whisper: retention.
Even today, most affiliates consider retention to be the sole responsibility of the operator. They consider their role as merely making the referral… then it is ‘job done’.
This way of thinking makes sense in an SEO-driven environment, where getting to the top of Google and securing that all important click is the end game. A nondescript review, or a list of bonuses, is enough to succeed.
But as we’re seeing, that’s changing, and there’s a bigger prize up for grabs.
Become a genuinely trusted source for your users, and you might just secure that click from position six, even when your competitors are ranked higher. Others will skip the search altogether, and come straight to you when looking for a bonus or a review.
This means you can maximise per user revenue by gaining the opportunity to refer to a single user multiple times, rather than never seeing them again once they’ve clicked away from you.
Building for a post-Google future
All of this becomes even more important when you consider a future where search transitions away from Google and towards social and AI platforms. It’s a trend that will only accelerate.
There’s no one single playbook for building a great brand, but there are a few broad areas to consider.
Remember that brand should supplement content. Lots of affiliates produce fantastic content. But great branding is what frames that content, and makes it memorable to the user. It’s the difference between appreciating something, and coming back for more.
Community is best when it grows organically. Give users the space and impetus to congregate around your brand.
And above all, deliver your audience genuine value – even if that may take a change of approach after years of optimising for that quick click.
Because as trust becomes the ultimate differentiator, only affiliates who invest in their brand and audience will thrive in a world where that single click is no longer enough.
