affiliate programs

[jsol07]

Are there any affiliate programs you would recommend?
Is gamecities worth a shot?
What could someone with a few thousand dollars to invest do as far as online gambling?
Thanks

 

[webber286]

Gamecities doesn't look like a pure affiliate program. There site has you actually develop your own online casino. Most affiliates create review and watchdog sites that refer people to casino sites.

If you only have a few thousand to invest, starting up your own online casino won't go very far. You will be competing against close to 2000 online gambling sites, many of which have major marketing budgets and have been established for some time. You also have to be careful about where you are located, it isn't legal to own an online casino in some countries, however it is legal to market an online casino in most every country.

Now, if you want to be a true affiliate marketer, then a few thousand should be more than enough to get you started, assuming you have a unique idea for a website and are able to develop solid content. If you don't possess the skills to build your own site, you could eat up that budget getting a site launched. In either case be prepared to spend hours upon hours understanding the ins and outs of the industry, optimizing your website, trading links, becoming an seo expert, writing newsletters, monitoring forums, etc, etc. The long road of an affiliate marketer is not as easy as it seems, but you can make some decent money if you treat it like a real business and put a lot of hard work into it. Plan to invest at least 12 months of your time if you are serious about giving it a go.

 

[dominique]

Gamecities doesn't look like a pure affiliate program. There site has you actually develop your own online casino. Most affiliates create review and watchdog sites that refer people to casino sites.

If you only have a few thousand to invest, starting up your own online casino won't go very far. You will be competing against close to 2000 online gambling sites, many of which have major marketing budgets and have been established for some time. You also have to be careful about where you are located, it isn't legal to own an online casino in some countries, however it is legal to market an online casino in most every country.

Now, if you want to be a true affiliate marketer, then a few thousand should be more than enough to get you started, assuming you have a unique idea for a website and are able to develop solid content. If you don't possess the skills to build your own site, you could eat up that budget getting a site launched. In either case be prepared to spend hours upon hours understanding the ins and outs of the industry, optimizing your website, trading links, becoming an seo expert, writing newsletters, monitoring forums, etc, etc. The long road of an affiliate marketer is not as easy as it seems, but you can make some decent money if you treat it like a real business and put a lot of hard work into it. Plan to invest at least 12 months of your time if you are serious about giving it a go.

Not much to add to that.

I really don't recommend starting your own casino. You don't have anywhere near the money to make an actual go of it.

You see sites like Bryan's and mine covering most everything, but for starters that is not a good idea. It's best to concentrate on one aspect of online gambling and creating a site around that.

Ask yourself what you would like to see available to you and create it. What is your biggest question about online gambling? Create a site that answers it. Research and create content.

As far as affiliate programs go - a pretty good start is to pick one of Bryan's recommended casinos, go there, click on the webmaster link and you will have found a decent affiliate program in most cases.

You can also visit one of the affiliate forums.

 

[Webzcas]

I really don't recommend starting your own casino. You don't have anywhere near the money to make an actual go of it.

Agreed. Not only that, you are relying on the Turn Key Casino operation to provide proper support to the players you put their way. You have no guarantee that they will do that.

 

[CindyGame]

I hope this will help

To best help understand what GameCities is offering you need first make sure knowing the difference on the following area.

affiliate vs Business opp
Affiliate program if you are an affiliate for example like PartyPoker your driving traffic and branding PartyPoker. Your building business for PartyPoker.
Business opp You have your own domain name. your driving traffic to your OWN site. Your building business for yourself.
The key here is your building business for your own domain name or someone elses domain name. GameCities make sure when they do post marketing to the player who sign-up they goto YOUR domain name.
Investment vs return
Typical GameCities site owner makes about $500/mth. Is that a good return for $1000 investment. It is your call.
Some Site owner doesnt drive any traffic they do make ZERO.
Some site owner make more than $3000/mth and they will leave GameCities and to get their own full license solution.
Baby step principle.
In the world of gaming the Casino license could cost anywhere from $50,000 to $250,000 we recommend that you take the BABY STEP with GameCities to find out if you have what it take to drive traffic to make profit from the online Casino industry.
PS: most of the successful GameCities site owner are driving there traffic from OFFLINE marketing to start.. it is very true takes very big $$$ to compete with rest of the big 2000 online casino out there with just a few thousands.


In summary, GameCities is not for everyone. But it one of the best and cheapest way to get your feet wet in the world of Online Casino.. maybe you can be one the top tier people to upgrade yourself to a full license after learn some experience with GameCities.

 

[CindyGame]

I guess come to the bottom really is what you as an individual really want. The decision is on you. I hope the postings above will give a better better idea of what GameCities really about and also helps you make your decision.

Cindy

 

[CindyGame]

Add a little bit more info ~~~

Gamecities also offer free demo, you can try it before you make any decision.


ps: I hope this is helpful lol

 

[mary]

Some caveats:

*Gamecities software looks like the Futurebet suite. Futurebet has a very bad record with respect to player treatment; Futurebet sites have gone down leaving players unpaid. They do not say on their site the source of their software; why not?

*Two of the games on their suite, Three Card Poker(tm) and Casino War(tm), are patent protected games; these guys may face a lawsuit at any time.

*This marketing page uses the tradmarks of World Poker Tour9tm) and World Series of Poker(tm); another couple of lawsuits in the offing.

Link Removed ( Old/Invalid)

*Gamecities is awfully coy on their web site about who they are and where they are located. Do you really want to do business with a company that won't tell you who they are and where they are? Who are the officers? Where are their offices? Under what legal jurisdiction do they operate? What will be your recourse if they fail to pay you as a partner?

Why don't they have this information on their site?

gamecities.com

Registrant:
Game Cities, Inc. ()
GameCities.com, Inc.
CNR of Grandby & Sharpe St, Suite K2077
Kingstown, .
VC
1-877-642-3045


Domain Name: gamecities.com



Admin Contact:
Sys Admin ()
GameCities.com, Inc.
CNR of Grandby & Sharpe St, Suite K2077
Kingstown, .
VC
1-877-642-3045


Technical Contact:
Sys Admin ()
GameCities.com, Inc.
CNR of Grandby & Sharpe St, Suite K2077
Kingstown, .
VC
1-877-642-3045


Billing Contact:
Sys Admin ()
GameCities.com, Inc.
CNR of Grandby & Sharpe St, Suite K2077
Kingstown, .
VC
1-877-642-3045


Record created on Dec 8 1998.
Record expires on Dec 7 2008.
Domain servers:
ns1.dns-station.com
ns2.dns-station.com

Or this?

Brian Lewis Licensing Manager

 

[Webzcas]

Exactly Mary. If you are to play at an Online Casino, transparency of the business, the people behind it, the software and a proven track record is required. This is certainly lacking as far as the information on the GameCities Website is concerned.

 

[dominique]

Typical GameCities site owner makes about $500/mth. Is that a good return for $1000 investment. It is your call.
Some Site owner doesnt drive any traffic they do make ZERO.
Some site owner make more than $3000/mth and they will leave GameCities and to get their own full license solution.

$500 a month is not a good return for any web business because of the time involved to make a go of it.

If you have plenty of money to invest in adbuys, you may be able to do decent business with a white label. Then you have to be confident that the company who sold the site is actually financed properly and you won't become a rogue operator.

Since you can hardly SEO a casino site ( you can somewhat), if you have no money for adbuys you will make no money. If you want to make $, the $1000 is merely the start of what it will cost you.

Unless you become an expert spammer, and even that is costly.

Something gets compromised here - your pocketbook or your morals, or probably both.

Buying a real licence because you have managed to make $3000 a month - geez! The net would be riddled with even more underfunded and floundering casinos!

 

[CindyGame]

To answer everyone's questions, GameCities is actually a sitebuilder and turnkey casino operator. We are in the business of helping individuals get started in the gaming industry on a startup budget. As our packages are moderately priced, our clients often use us as a testing ground for their marketing strategies before committing to a full-license either through us or another provider. We are in the process of migrating our backend gaming services from Futurebet to Interactive Gaming, which should address the concerns in your post. Also, payment processing has been switched to a new processor and since then there have been no payment issues.

In regards to potential earnings, $500 per month income may not seem like a lot for a stand-alone business but this opportunity can be quite lucrative for affiliates that have access to a lot of relevant traffic already, i.e. gaming traffic. or online marketing experts (SEO). And the return on investment is quite good so theoretically you could even have multiple sites generating $500 each per month if you want to scale up. True, SEO is not easy but it's feasible with hard work or the help of hired professionals. Our value proposition is that we bring it all together for you so that you don't need to worry about the costs & mechanics of the actual gaming site, and can leverage your resources on marketing instead. Our clients have discovered that the most effective marketing is actually done via off-line methods since there is a lot less competition. I hope this address your concerns.

There are some good ideas in this thread, and we'll start to incorporate these into our site. Thank-you.


Cindy

 

[mary]

Who is Interactive Gaming? Why should anybody believe that they are other than just a name change for the guys at Futurebet (who have already undergone several name changes as they burn partners). If Interactive Gaming is a separate company, what is their relationship with Futurebet?


Registrant:
Interactive Gaming Systems
IGS Inc.
2022 Cliff Drive, #378
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
US
+1.8774044451 (FAX) +1.8774044451


Administrative Contact:
Interactive Gaming Systems
IGS Inc.
2022 Cliff Drive, #378
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
US
+1.8774044451 (FAX) +1.8774044451


Technical Contact:
Interactive Gaming Systems
IGS Inc.
2022 Cliff Drive, #378
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
US
+1.8774044451 (FAX) +1.8774044451


Billing Contact
Interactive Gaming Systems
IGS Inc.
2022 Cliff Drive, #378
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
US
+1.8774044451 (FAX) +1.8774044451


Registrar..: gkg.net (

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

)
Domain Name: INTERACTIVEGAMING.COM
Created on..............: 14-FEB-1998
Expires on..............: 13-FEB-2009
Record last updated on..: 21-OCT-2005
Status..................: ACTIVE

Domain servers in listed order:

NS1.INTERACTIVEG.COM
NS2.INTERACTIVEG.COM

Registrant:
WW Processing
Heritage Plaza
Main Street
Charlestown,
KN

Domain name: FUTUREBET.COM

Administrative Contact:
Administrator, Domain
Heritage Plaza
Main Street
Charlestown,
KN
869-555-1212 Fax: 869-555-1212

Technical Contact:
Administrator, Domain
Heritage Plaza
Main Street
Charlestown,
KN
869-555-1212 Fax: 869-555-1212



Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC.
Record last updated on 14-Jan-2005.
Record expires on 08-Feb-2006.
Record created on 09-Feb-1998.

Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.WWPROCESSING.NET 66.199.173.146
NS2.WWPROCESSING.NET 213.129.69.146


Domain status: ACTIVE

 

[mary]

What is Brian Hurley's involvement with Gamecities?

From SEC filings for IChance, later Futurebet:

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

DIRECTORS AND EXECUTIVE OFFICERS

The current executive officers of the Company are as follows:


Name Age Title
------------------ ------ ----------------------

Brian Hurley 32 Chairman of the Board,
Chief Executive Officer
President, Secretary and
Chief Financial Officer



8


Brian Hurley is the Company's Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Hurley brings to the
Company a wealth of online gaming experience. As an integral consultant to
Software Licensing Networks he was instrumental in developing that company from
a startup operation to its present condition. Mr. Hurley graduated from the
University of California, San Diego with a degree in Political Science.

 

[jetset]

Ah, names with a history - a walk back through some not so pleasing message board memories.

I'm sure readers will find that a search on IGS and Futurebet and Hurley (Brian and Jeff) will bring forth all sorts of interesting material, from screwed players to questionable operator conduct and corporate manoeuvres - it will all be there in the archives.

Who can forget the IGS troubles after it licensed a teenaged college student to run an online casino??!! The story then was that Futurebet was not involved with them and had sold IGS its source code.

Names like Indio Casino and its software dispute with Futurebet (and consequences for owed players) will appear, as will the sad tale of one frustrated operator who eventually resorted to posting his FB problems on a website.

Last I heard, though was that some of their licensees had banded together to bail the company out of financial difficulties, and they were now effectively in charge although Brian Hurley's name still seemed to associated with the venture.

The 'meister, if I remember correctly even managed to identify one of the new owners?

 

[dominique]

In regards to potential earnings, $500 per month income may not seem like a lot for a stand-alone business but this opportunity can be quite lucrative for affiliates that have access to a lot of relevant traffic already, i.e. gaming traffic. or online marketing experts (SEO). And the return on investment is quite good so theoretically you could even have multiple sites generating $500 each per month if you want to scale up. True, SEO is not easy but it's feasible with hard work or the help of hired professionals.

If it was possible to market the way you describe, no one would be using any affiliates or adbuys.

Casinos are very hard to SEO. The larger places surely have the money to hire all the SEO experts online. And they actually used to, except that any honest SEO expert will tell you that there is no way they can get any gambling site into the top ten listed sites because of the number of sites competing.

Google results: Results 1 - 10 of about 23,700,000 for online gambling

Yes, there are some casinos that do make it, but they are not going to be any white labels. To promote a white label sucessfully you either need a whole bunch of money or a web presence that even the most successful casinos cannot achieve.

There are some affiliates and publishers with that kind of webpresence, but they would likely buy a real licence if they chose to do so. nd I have seen several do that over the years and seen them fail.

If you think the type of SEO that puts sites on the top of google in gambling terms can be applied to casinos, you are mistaken or uninformed.

The very few casinos who make it up there are all old, established outfits who have name recognition everywhere. To think that a new casino could make it by SEO is ridiculous.

 

[CindyGame]

Important 2 know

Interactive Gaming is not related to Futurebet in any way

 

[The Dude]

Interactive Gaming is not related to Futurebet in any way

The have a common past - so that is a relationship (albeit a former one) in my book.

 

[jetset]

Just so - and both have had their not very professional moments!

 

[mary]

So, in addition to violating patents and trademarks, Interactive Gaming Systems miscodes VISA and Mastercard transactions.

VISA and Mastercard can freeze their accounts and seize the funds any time they desire.

They also assume no responsibility for quality control of their affiliates.

https://www.casinomeister.com/forum...ve-gaming-systems.4563/?highlight=Interactive