I’m kind of still new in that I don’t have much traffic but what I am seeing of it is that something is happening with downloads/real player ratio. Getting a great clickthrough/download ratio but few signups and little or no real players. So I did a search ( http://www.casinoaffiliateprograms.com/bb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1295&highlight=downloads+depositing+players )on this site last nite and dug up an old thread about this topic, and it seemed like the major problems were:
1-bonus hunters
2-the signup process at a casino/banking
If anyone can suggest off the top of their head online casinos/poker etc. that do not push the bonuses and have ease of use for the 1st time player it would be much appreciated. I’m getting a little irritated with having to go out and test every site. It is time consuming when those efforts should be geared toward improving my own site or marketing it. I’d much rather see fewer downloads and a few real players than all of these gaudy stats for the categories that, in the end, do not pay a dime.
As an example, at least one casino makes the new player go through two downloads to get to their games. The first one is small, but really unneccessary in that they ask the player to give their email, download their casino icon on their desktop, then use that to download the casino software. A lot of people are still on dialup and for a new player to come to a page and see they are going to be immediately hit with two downloads, plus giving their email up front (so they can be spammed to death if they decide not to play there-in their minds) cannot be attractive to them. If it was up to me, and it is not, I would have a landing page with:
free play on one side-which would lead directly to a game page, which would be a download software link. Let the free player play, without any hassles other than the download. If they never play for money, what does it cost the casino other than some bandwidth? If they decide to play for real money they will remember how easy it was to start playing and be back. And I really believe this is an issue for players (ease of use) and with there being hundreds of possible online gambling options available any little edge helps. Imo, whatever casino can accomplish this-making the playing of their games not an ordeal/same with the banking, will have a huge edge on the competition. They can have all of the fancy graphics or ridiculous bonuses they want but if the player hits what they perceive to be a wall trying to play the games, they won’t be back.
real money play on the other side, which leads directly to an easy to understand banking page. These players know what they want, a direct path to games for real money. Why is this so difficult? Why not create a form asking which of the following payment options they already have access to-Neteller, Firepay, Credit Card? Depending on which one, or none, send them to the respective relevant page with easy 1-2-3 type instructions. And quit giving people the impression they can use their credit card in a direct way. Most people think when they see the Visa/Mastercard logo they can just type in their numbers and start playing, which is not the case.
A new potential player/payer does not want to read/sift through all of the possible options. They are confusing enough one at a time, but these huge banking landing pages have got to be a turnoff to people. You might as well hit all of these players over the head with a sign that reads – “this is really illegal, which is why you are sitting here reading instead of playing casino games-you might as well go out to the Pogo site and avoid all of the hassle” When people go to a site to play these games they are excited and don’t wish to have to go through a series of disappointments to get where they want to go. It is suppose to be fun for them. So would someone out there please make the not so fun parts as painless as possible?
Oh, and maybe a section just for the bonus hunters. It is getting to the point where I am thinking about not having one banner/text link that promotes these things on my site.
Sorry for getting this off topic, but I feel better now. And to the thread starter, if it was me and I sent that much traffic- the bottom line is the bottom line. If you don’t make money with them, you move on. There is always another one to try.