Starting a Sportsbetting Site

[PokerProp]

Originally Posted by ThePokerBank

Also, how come sportsbook visitors are more reluctant to click through affiliate links?

Simple answer is way to many scams. Everyone will run into a bad experience if they bet long enough or will have a friend that does etc. Even losing bettors learn to be on their toes a little ways into their online betting careers.

Its a bit different with Euro focused sportsbooks where everything is more corporatized. Here there are plenty of shady sportsbooks none the less but many good ones and far less out right scams.

I'm not just calling books that are shady scams. BetUS, BetMania etc are just the more shady of shady books (borderline scams). Other books like Lazer Wager, Cascade etc weather or not it was their intention have reached the point of beng scams because they've become deposit only books that don't pay. There are many books that start off with this intention that never paid at all no had any intention to ever pay.

Its a very dirty industry where there is a lot more $ to be made as a scammer than there is as an honest affiliate.

My personal opinion is that taking the affiliate approach to making money off the sports betting industry (unless already long since established) to the American market is a bad idea unless your really passionate about sports betting - from a business standpoint there are many much better markets. Even if passionate about it I don't think affiliating is the best way to make $ either. You're better off becoming a tout - or building a big information site and using google adsense and other programs plus selling advertising to touts that don't market sportsbooks (in order to get in no trouble with google). If you build a profitable enough site off that where you no longer need Adsense - remove them and sell ads to sportsbooks - who by the way will spend a TON of $ for ads on established site.

[ThePokerBank]

Awesome post, thanks a lot.

[Stocks]

Hey PokerProp some good info there. I'm actually in the process of starting a sports betting site and having that as my only site so I can put 100% effort into.

I found my domain the other SportsBettingWorld.com what do you think I defintly like it for a sports site.

Anyway the site will have all the good stuff like matchups and lines and a forum I'd like to build a nice community there in time. But I was wondering about promoting sports picks. Is there much money to be made promoting picks and if so whats the best way to go about it.

Thanks

[PokerProp]

Yes a lot of money can be made, however I haven't capitalized on it, and don't know much on the affiliate side of it. The search volume for people looking for picks, predictions, and game stats / break downs is amazing. The want someone to break it all down for them.

While I don't know the conversion rates of people that actually end up purchasing picks or what touts offers affiliate program or details of though etc. I do know this is extremely profitable on getting paid per click. To give an example last year I started and NFL betting blog right at the start of the season. By mid season I was getting a few thousand uniques on peak days (Thursday - Saturday), I would look up keywords where I got a couple hundred + hits in a day and notice I was #8 through #20 for those terms. I came to learn that desperate gamblers will keep searching over and over till they find what the want to hear said how they want to hear it. In addition semi sharp players actually spend time doing homework and looking for stats. Can appeal to both markets with covering some basic stats while still telling the fish want they want to hear.

If I do the same next season it will likely be either 3 way link exchanges with big sites, Adsense, or selling ads on the page.

[hanford@paradise]

some good questions and replies here.
thought i'd chip in from more of a european point of view.

SERPs on sportsbook will be tough, depending upon your market. As far as i recall the US market is very crowded, as is the UK market so trying to rank will take along time and a lot of effort. as mentioned earlier some of the exsisting sites have been around for years.

if you find a niche you will be able to rank, but that niche is likely to have smaller volumes.

Pokerprop mentioned going down the advertising route rather than the affiliate route, but i disagree. although biased as an affiliate manager, i think you have a better chance of making more money faster with profit share. You want a program that will pay you across all thier products with no monthly negative roll over.
So if your players win, you dont lose out the following month as well.

So why will you make more money with affiliate links?
simply because you only need to refer one or two big players and you'll make a lot more on profit share than you will selling advert space on CPM/monthly fees.
a few months ago we paid an affiliate over €20,000 becuase of one customer, and then again a similar ammount last month in the same situation - thier traffic however is tiny and there is no way they could have made over €35k in advertising fees!

Focus on some big events throughout the year to drive volume and make sure you can give your visitors as much info as possiable. sports punters want stats and lots of them. they also want odds, and as mentioned earlier all the sportsbooks have xml feeds you can use.

Pick your target region carefully as well, if you have the option to taget different languges then do so as there is plenty of money to be made in the growing markets across Europe.

[PokerProp]

Hanford, let me provide additional clarification to my statement which is there but is not highlighted.

My statement should of had this emphasis:

My personal opinion is that taking the affiliate approach to making money off the sports betting industry (unless already long since established) to the American market

I think the days of making big affiliate money marketing Sports betting to US players is over, and much more money can be made taking Non Affiliate approaches to this market. You can still hustle promoting shady books etc and make a lot, or work your ass off and make some cash with the few top tier American friend books with good affiliate programs, but this same effort could produce better results financially elsewhere.

The opposite can be said for the European market where I think the affiliate side of the business is still on the upward climb to its peak and will likely remain stable for quite some time.

[melaniej]

Hi poker69,

Do you have a preference... promoting to the US market or European market or another market?

The UK market is great, even if many sportsbook affiliates focus on that market, because this demographic tends to convert well.

The other advantage is that if you target markets like the UK or Europe, there will be overlap with other countries that enjoy the same sport. For example, the IPL cricket league has started and will attract bettors from several countries, not just the UK.

[Ozpoker]

As a sport punter sub-continent cricket is likely to have some serious integrity issues imo.

I would not bet on it