Power affiliates 2011 - sports betting

Asian Bookie
Founder/Principal: N/A
Domains: AsianBookie.com
Established in June 1997 in Hong Kong.
Launched website to extend to Asian market in September 2000. Asian handicap betting portal covering all major global football leagues such as the English Premier League, Italian Serie A, Spanish Primera Liga and German Bundesliga.

At the Races
Founder/Principal: James Singer
Domains: AtTheRaces.com
Website of the horseracing TV channel owned by UK racecourses operates through a joint venture partnership between BSkyB and Arena Leisure, has more than 650,000 unique visitors a month.

Best Betting
Founder/Principal: Ben Clifford
Domains: BestBetting.com white labels include Bookies.com
White-label version of the odds comparison platform for this Betgenius-owned portal is used by around 50 other sports betting affiliates, including Betrescue, Punters Lounge and Bookies.com.

Betbrain
Founder/Principal: Ebbi Groes
Domains: Betbrain.com
Odds comparison giant with strong presence across Europe. Also spawned the EveryMatrix gaming software business.

Bettingdirectory.com
Founder/Principal: Danny Campbell
Domains: 100+ sites including: Casino.betting-directory.com; Poker.betting-directory.com
Campbell, owner of multiple domains, a few of which are listed above, has more than a decade under his belt as an affiliate and is one of the top earners in sports affiliation.

Betting Pro
Founder/Principal: N/A
Domains: 50 sites
New entry. Monthly income of more than £100,000 and monthly traffic of more than one million unique users. In the past 12 months, Bettingpro.com has attracted a loyal readership and has more than 250 reviews on its site, covering sports, casino, poker and bingo rooms. It also won the 2010 eGaming Review Review Site of the Year. Matthew Glazier, formerly of bet365, is managing editor of Bettingpro.com.

Covers
Founder/Principal: Paul Lavers
Domains: Covers.com; Covers.co.uk
Large US-facing sports betting information site driving traffic mainly to offshore sportsbooks based in Curacao, Antigua and Costa Rica. Also has a UK-facing site.

Iapuestas
Founder/Principal: N/A
Domains: Iapuestas.com; iBetTips.com
Sports betting site driving large volumes in Spain and South America. Also operates the iBetTips.com English and Portuguese language portals. English translation available.

Oddschecker
Founder/Principal: David Watkins
Domains: Oddschecker.com es, .de, Casino.oddschecker.com, Poker.oddschecker.com
The portal, owned by Sky through its 365 Media Group subsidiary, is the dominant force in the UK odds comparison market and, despite losing Ladbrokes on a trial basis, continues to go from strength-to-strength with a monthly income of six figures, traffic of around 900,000 unique users a month and conversion rates from registrations to new depositors of between 60 and 85%.

Racing Post, The
Founder/Principal: Mark Renshaw
Domains: Racingpost.com
The free and paid-for expertise available to punters via the website of the UK’s leading racing newspaper generates high traffic and player values.

Ruedesjouers.com
Founder/Principal: Vikash ’24’ Dhorasoo
Domains: Mastr.com; Transfert-foot.net; Lotostat.com
Newly regulated markets such as France have spawned several sizeable affiliates including three-year-old Ruedesjouers that provides independent information, advice and player guides to French poker, sports and horseracing punters. Founded by former French football international Vikash ’24’ Dhorasoo, also part of French poker site team Winamax, the site generates an average monthly income of €150,000 to €300,000, has three million monthly unique users and a conversion rate from registrations to new depositors of 25%.

SportyTrader
Founder/Principal: N/A
Domains: Sportytrader.com; Sportytrader.co.uk/de/fr/pt/it/nl
Ranked number one in search in France on prognostic football (football forecast) and in the Netherlands with Sportweddenschappen (sports betting), top 10 in Italy on scommesse with both SportyTrader.it and Scommesse.it, top 10 in Portugal on Apostas with both SportyTrader.pt and aposta-futebol.com. It has three million pages viewed per month, 700,000 visitors, 60% traffic directs to sports and 40% to poker. SportyTrader is available in nine languages with its network of websites highly ranked on search engines in Spain, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Netherlands and France.

Q&A affiliate focus
OLBG (Online betting guide)
Founder/Principal: Richard Moffat
Domains: 15 sites including: Olbg.co.uk; Affiliates.valuechecker.co.uk; Valuechecker.co.uk
OLBG is Europe’s biggest sports betting community site with large tipster competitions, betting school content and forum. It has an average monthly income of more than £200,000, monthly traffic of between 500,000 to 1m unique users a month and an average conversion rate from registrations to new depositors of 75%.SEO and PPC research specialist Greenlight found that OLBG was the 10th most visible website for sports betting keywords.

eGR: What has changed in the affiliate space and for affiliate managers in the last year?

RM: It is a lot tougher to get traffic now because bookmakers are improving their SEO and PPC has become much more expensive. Affiliate departments budgets are getting lower and they are accounting for their spend more. A number of them have no budget to spend on Cheltenham or horse racing, for example. Last year we had 15 bookies spending money with us on Cheltenham, now we have six. They are also focusing more on the top affiliates rather than spreading their risk across a broader range. This is great news for us. They [affiliate managers] are also looking elsewhere for acquisitions because many of them believe the UK, for instance, to be a saturated market. They are used to year-on-year growth so now that’s diminishing they’re examining other territories.

eGR: What is your main focus for the next year?

RM: The focus for us is the launch of the Oddsbox programme through our Valuechecker site. Rather than build sites in other languages we can provide more than 200 affiliates with good content such as live odds and take a share of the traffic. The affiliates sign up, they choose the bookies they want to promote and they can then plug the box into their existing site showing the best odds wherever they want on the site. It avoids sending customers to separate domains or going to other odds comparison sites. We are also three to four months away from launching new Facebook and iPhone apps.

eGR: Are you looking to expand or exit?

RM: We’re definitely expanding and growing 30 to 40% a year. We now have 15 full-time staff including a graphics designer and a statistician and we will continue to expand without taking risks. The brand recognition is the key and we see this as a great way to grow. We’re also always on the lookout for acquisitions but are careful about what’s out there. We’re not looking to exit.