I know that we we first started with Bet365 (back in about 2000?) we also had a couple of negative months while we built up a user base.
I will also share that the business plans that we put in place for our sites after the first shock means that we never allow a single site to grow to be more than 25% of our revenue – as it does put too many eggs in one basket.
As in most things guys, diversification is the secret to success.
Andy, you know that we promote Bet365 over at GoonersGuide.com and we are really happy with what you guys are doing … but the possibility of a large negative can still hit us … I beleive that we were down around 15K euros at one stage this month before turning it around.
So as DoyoWeb and Alex777‘s situation illustrates – that might actually be a useful option to have when you have affiliates you are really hopping into to bed with one major group?
In their case it does seem that the protection from negatives would be a good thing for smoothing revenue flow, and therefore useful for Bet365 in retaining good affioliates that have “bad luck”.
Some ideas :
There may be a scope for Bet365 to offer different plans for longer term affiliates who have proven their worth to your organisation?
No negatives ?
As suggested – a plan with a lower percentage share with the protection of no negative rollover? But only Bet365 will know what that percentage might be to be a similar overall payout offer – it could be as low as 20%-25%?
Seperate streams ?
Or perhaps Bet365 can split the segments for Casino, Poker, Games and Sports, so that a major negative in one area does not affect other streams.
(eg If casino is -30K then that has to be worked off via casino traffic, but the other streams continue to pay).
Case by Case
Or of course you can continue on the case by case basis as you do now. But if we lost 100K in a month – we would also have to look closely at the mid-term rev streams.
That being said – I consider outfits such as Bet365, Ladbrokes and PaddyPower as premium gaming destinations, with quality offers, great customers and affiliate support and MUST have destinations for any serious site promoting to UK and European players.
They are a class above the rest.