How Blocked Traffic Impacts iGaming Revenue
Blocked traffic is one of the most overlooked challenges within the iGaming industry. Companies put in considerable efforts to attract visitors to their websites or offers. However, a portion of the traffic may not find its way to the company’s destination.
For iGaming’s publishers, affiliate marketers, and casino operators, blocked traffic presents a challenge to their revenue. However, by understanding how blocked traffic occurs and implementing strategies to minimize revenue loss from blocked traffic, iGaming companies can significantly improve their revenue and the number of visitors that successfully complete the conversion rate.
What Is Blocked Traffic?
Blocked traffic refers to visitors to a website or offer who are prevented from accessing the website or offer. There are several reasons why a visitor may be blocked before they can access a company’s products or offers:
Geographic restrictions
- ISP restrictions
- Regulatory restrictions
- Advertising platform restrictions
- Browser restrictions
- VPN systems
- Company acceptance rules
- Payment restrictions
Several of these restrictions can prevent potential visitors who click on an iGaming publisher’s offer from being able to reach the company that published the offer.
Why Blocked Traffic Matters in iGaming
For the iGaming industry, blocked traffic directly impacts the revenue of the industry’s participants. Consider the scenario in which a user is very interested in a company’s products yet is blocked from accessing them. The consequences of blocked traffic for the iGaming industry include:
- Lost revenue for affiliate marketers
- Reduced conversion rates
- Reduced return on advertising spend
- Increased costs of acquiring visitors to a company’s website
- Poor performance in measuring the success of advertising campaigns
- Reduced revenue for casino operators
For many affiliate marketing networks, the revenue loss caused by blocked traffic represents thousands of dollars per month.
Common Causes of Blocked Traffic
Geo-Blocking Restrictions
Geo-blocking traffic is the most common cause of blocked traffic for the iGaming industry. The licensing of iGaming companies limits their location to a specific jurisdiction. Visitors from outside of this specific jurisdiction will be blocked from accessing these offers.
For example, if an iGaming company licenses only within the U.S., then any visitor from Canada will be blocked from accessing the offers that the company publishes.
Regulatory Compliance Requirements
The regulations for the iGamming industry continue to evolve. Companies must comply with various regulations, such as:
- Licensing requirements
- Responsible gambling regulations
- Know Your Customer (KYC) regulations
- Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations
- Advertising regulations
If a visitor is blocked at any of these steps, their blocked traffic can directly impact the company’s revenue.
Advertising Platform Restrictions
Many of the most popular advertising platforms have specific policies in place regarding the industry of iGamming. For example, they may not allow ads to be published in certain regions of the world. Or, they may not allow visitors of a certain age to be shown these advertisements. If a visitor is blocked due to these regulations, the company will lose revenue from that visitor.
VPN and Proxy Detection
To protect their company from potential fraud and hacking attempts, most iGamming companies deploy advanced security systems that will block users from specific locations. These locations usually include:
- VPN services
- Residential proxies
- Data center proxies
- Anonymous browsing software
The issue for the company is that these blocked users may have been very interested in their offers, yet they are prevented from accessing them.
Payment and Banking Limitations
Some of the most common reasons why users may reach a company’s website yet fail to convert to customers is because of the limitations on the banking and payment methods that they use.
For example, a visitor may use a payment system that the company does not accept. Or, they may use a banking institution that does not allow deposits to the company. Such a visitor will reach the company yet be unable to convert to customers.
The Hidden Cost of Blocked Traffic
The cost of blocked traffic is usually overlooked by publishers and iGamming companies. Most of the analytics tools used by publishers and companies do not accurately reflect blocked traffic.
While publishers may enjoy high click-through and engagement rates, they may see poor results in relation to the revenue they generate from these traffic sources.
For example, if they determine that 100,000 visitors monthly click on the offers that they publish, and if 15% of those visitors are from restricted jurisdictions, then 10% may be blocked from accessing the companies that published their offers. Additionally, 5% of those visitors may be blocked from the operator’s acceptance rules. Such blocked traffic will reduce their earning potential from these visitors.
How Blocked Traffic Affects Affiliate Marketers
Blocked traffic directly impacts affiliate marketers’ revenue, and most affiliate marketers are unaware of this impact on their revenue.
Lower EPC Performance
As a result of blocked traffic, affiliate marketers will experience a drop in their earnings per click (EPC). Even the best sources of traffic can provide low returns on investment if the affiliate marketer does not account for the revenue that will be lost to blocked traffic.
Misleading Campaign Optimization
Affiliate marketers may end up pausing some of their best advertising campaigns for the iGaming industry because of the poor performance statistics generated by the blocked traffic. Their campaign performance statistics will not reflect the number of users blocked from these companies.
Reduced Revenue Growth
As the number of visitors to the websites of the iGaming industry’s companies increases, the number of blocked visitors will grow at the same rate. This will result in an affiliate marketer’s revenue growing at a rate lower than that of the company’s traffic growth.
How Operators Can Reduce Blocked Traffic
Casino operators and sportsbooks can take several steps to reduce the impact of blocked traffic on their revenue.
Improve Geo-Targeting Infrastructure
Operators can deploy software solutions that will allow their website to geo-target the visitors coming to their website. This can determine a visitor’s location in real time and allow them to offer their products to visitors from specific countries.
Create Market-Specific Funnels
Operators can create advertising funnels that target specific markets or countries for the products that they offer. These funnels can be optimized to allow for the best user experience and the highest conversion and deposit rates from the visitors who use their software.
Optimize Redirect Logic
Instead of simply displaying a message that tells the visitor that the products they want to view are not available in their country, the operator could use the visitor’s location to redirect them to another company that may offer the same products to visitors in that country. This will preserve the visitor’s interest in the products and improve their earning potential from these interesting visitors.
Strategies for Publishers to Recover Lost Revenue
In addition to improving the experiences of their visitors, publishers can implement several strategies to recover the revenue that they lose due to blocked traffic.
Segment Traffic by Geography
To manage blocked traffic better, publishers should segment the traffic according to the geographic locations of the visitors. They can collect data on the location of each visitor and the type of device they are using to view their offers.
Use Smart Offer Routing Technology
Smart offer routing software will automatically direct a visitor to another company that may be able to offer the same products to the visitor according to the visitor’s location and devices.
Monitor Rejected Traffic
In addition to the approved traffic that visits the websites of the iGamming companies, publishers can monitor the number of visitors who are rejected from those websites. This will allow them to track the issues caused by blocked traffic.
Diversify Operator Partnerships
Publishers could work with several operators instead of one company. This will allow them to diversify their revenue and ensure that even if a visitor is blocked from one company, they may be able to earn revenue from another operator that will accept them.
The Future of Traffic Management in iGaming
The future of traffic management in the iGamming industry will focus on reducing the number of instances in which visitors’ traffic is blocked from accessing the companies’ products and offers.
The industry can use emerging technologies to improve the experiences and revenue potential of publishers and operators. Some of these technologies include artificial intelligence to manage traffic, blockchain for security, and virtual and augmented reality for immersive viewer experiences.
Publishers and iGamming companies that adopt these technologies will have a better chance of increasing their revenue while adhering to the regulations set on the industry.
Final Thoughts
Blocked traffic is a revenue issue in the industry. Every visitor that is blocked from gaining access to the products and offers of the iGamming companies is a potential visitor that could have eventually converted to customers for those companies.
For the companies in the iGamming industry, understanding the reasons behind and where traffic gets blocked will allow them to improve their revenue and the returns that they generate from their traffic sources.
By utilizing strategies mentioned in this article and others, the companies can significantly reduce their revenue loss and increase their earning potential from the traffic they currently have in their industry.