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It has been a very interesting year for me, and I have learned a lot along the way. I thought I would share my ideas with you all about who I trust, and who I don’t. First let me say that I am in somewhat of a unique position in that I get lots of email from my players, and I ask them to share all they are willing to about their play. When did you sign up? How much did you deposit? What games did you play? How much did you win or lose? I ask for as much info as they are willing to give me, and I store it all. I can direct players to do sign ups for me to check how a place is tracking, and I encourage them to make a habit of emailing me every time they play. So let’s jump right in.
The first big surprise is that the vast majority of places track amazingly well, but here are the guys that don’t.
Money Mechanic – Some high % of players just don’t show up as sign ups. Maybe as high as 30%. If you write them about specific players suddenly they show up. Once the players do show up they track accurately.
Focal Click – These guys are just weasels. First they went from all casinos being independent, to aggregate without telling anyone, and it all seemed to slide by. Now they are carrying over some kind of charges which they say are bonus money but I aint buying it. If you look at the difference between the players stats, and the casino stats they make no sense at all. They told one webmaster I know, “Read the terms. We can do whatever we want.”
Ace Club/Starluck – like Money Mechanic some players don’t show up. If you call them on it they say, we have that player but he didn’t come through your link.
Belle Rock – I don’t think these guys are dishonest, just terrible software. Players can’t download using Firefox and even with IE trying to download is often a problem, and because of this you end up not getting credit for some players. Once you have a player they track fine.
Income Access – This place has a problem that if a player signs up at both Lasseters and Aus Vegas you only get credit for the play at the first of the 2. I found 2 players like this that they then corrected but I have no idea how many I lost. I don’t know that this group is dishonest. It seems more like their tracking software is awful and they are grossly incompetent.
Vegas Partner Lounge – This place will steal big players. You have a big player that is tracking well, and suddenly they just disappear. One thing they do is offer the player a VIP account. Before I was a webmaster I was a big player, and they offered me this account. I asked how it was different? Higher limits? Different games? No, just a new account with $100 in it. I asked why they couldn’t put the money in my old account. Because this was a VIP account, but they couldn’t tell me what made it VIP. I now suspect it just didn’t track to the affiliate.
Casino Rewards – I just am unsure about these guys but my gut says watch them closely. I had one month where all my stats were tracking 35% of what they should. Now because that is a precise number it is easy for them to say it was a software glitch. They fixed it when I called them on it, but they said, how odd that this only happened to your account. If it really was a software glitch wouldn’t everyone have only received credit for 35% of what they should have?
Ok, there is my list. I hope this makes for lively discussion, and Happy New Year all.
Thanks for the valuable insights BJF. I’m sure these will spark some discussion. Having a close connection with your players is a great way to get the inside scoop.
Some of your conclusions do seem to mirror my experience with conversion numbers.
Very interesting.
Re. Money Mechanics – they either don’t convert for shit or just don’t track players back to me. Of all MG, they and goldenstar are the worst for me.
Re. Focal: used to be my fav program for a long time. Since they changed the stats I barely promote them anymore. I too recognize discrepancies between different sets of stats they offer – and I just don’t make money there anymore. I got a nice special promo from them and pushed it exactly the same way I pushed the Casino Rewards free hour – I have 5 new active players at Focal and 135 at Rewards. Focal is completely focussed on their Poker now – which just crawls with spammers in their rooms stealing players. I hear Rakeback folks do well with the Poker. Compare Partnerlogic – partnerlogic is doing just fine for me. With much less exposure. That will change for sure – partnerlogic will get lots more exposure.
Ace Club – I have had one whale for ages making me nice money. Other than that not much going on, and starluck is barren. I will be speaking with Party soon about a myriad of concerns.
Referback seems to respond pretty well to the exposure I give/don’t give so on the whole I think they are honest. Have no way to tell if players get lost on their way in…
Vegas Partner – for a while they were starting to do better for me so I increased their exposure very gradually. Right at the point when they bought goldenstar they dropped off and haven’t recovered. Plain text link for them now.
Income access – I will have to check on that. Sounds like Ausvegas and Lasseters may be crossmarketing without carrying afflinks across. I will talk to Lasseters about it – doesn’t sound like an IA problem.
I used to be very suspicious of Rewards but have been testing them lately with good results.
Casino Partners – I think they turned my stats on low trickle. Doesn’t ever make any difference if I give them a push or not. Static at next to nothing.
Casinopays, Blaster, Allstars – slow improvements over the months. Cpays is starting to look like it might lift off, Blaster and Allstars have too many winners.
Brightshare, Referspot, Trident – nice. Seem to track nicely and nice retention, especially Trident.
Fortune just doesn’t convert well. I like their present tracking.
Roxy – gave them a little push in december and seems very responsive.
Wager profits, Wager Junction, United – always improving but can’t touch Micros.
Sunset from Boss is doing great – brandnew platform and games and what a difference it makes.
That’s all I can think off for now.
And while a lot of people don’t think so – I still strongly believe that different programs convert differently on different sites. I see it even on different pages on the same site. It’s not so much the site perhaps but the type of traffic, the type of person responding to the chosen keyword.
I don’t have alot of time today. But if I had to choose which to drop right now it would be Vegas Partner Lounge.
Well over 1500 clicks 2 new players 0 deposits over a 3 months. Not to mention I have never once won a cent there. Stupid promotions and poor player retention I assume. Their being moved to the back of the bus in the New Year soon as I recover from my hang over. greek39
A couple additional thoughts.
Casino Pays and other Playtechs that carryover–I get a lot of sharp play. These places get buried by my players because they give up so much bonus money. Once the players get ahead I have to dump them because I will never make anything.
Vegas Partner Lounge tripled or quadrupled their wagering on the 15% Neteller bonus a few months back. That hurt my traffic a lot.
The playtechs carry over and they bundle – and they give huge bonuses, and they more winners than anyone else. I rarely make any money worth mentioning there.
The only thing that works for me at cpays is Ruby bingo, and thats because I have a nice whale there and cpays followed my advice and is retaining her..
