Renee, incentivized marketing is not a bad thing, so long as it’s done correctly. And you are wrong that most sites don’t allow incentivized marketing, because they do. Maybe not casino sites, but definitely poker sites.
Fraudulent players are going to sign up wherever…regardless of whether the site is incentivized or not. And bonus hunters will always be part of the equation, whether the sites like them or not. The real problem is the fact that most poker sites don’t have the proper fraud detection system in place to handle these players. There are a lot of great sites out there that deal with fraudulent players very quickly, and then there are sites like Cake that take forever. My problems could’ve been avoided if Cake would’ve gotten back to me just a week earlier.
I have no problems paying Cake back for these fraudulent players. That is not the issue. My problem is if I pay them back for these fraudulent players, what happens 6 months down the road when they discover that we had another 20 fraudulent players from the beginning of the year. There’s no way that any affiliate can operate like this. The operators have to assume some sort of responsibility in detecting these fraudulent players in a reasonable amount of time.
You keep mentioning T&C’s, but both you and I know that the poker sites’ change these T&Cs fairly frequently, and they only cite these T&C’s when they don’t want to pay an affiliate for their work. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve not been paid by the date specified in the T&Cs.
As far as the $1700, incentivized marketing is not cheap. We consider it a marketing expense just like any other SEO or rakeback affiliate. why would it be “over the top” to spend that much? I don’t get it.