GPWA Times Magazine - Issue 11 - January 2010

ChanceAffiliates represents three brands – ChanceRoom Sports- book, ChanceRoom Poker and ChanceRoomCasino.Whichprop- erty has proven to be strongest withplayersso far? Fromwhatwe have seen so far, I’d like toput all three products on the same level in terms of player strength. How- ever, eachproducthas itsownad- vantage. For example, Casino has proven tobeaproduct thatbrings instant revenues and high vol- umes, albeit fluctuating. Poker, on the other hand, takes a while to grow but the revenues show a steady, promising in- crease. Sportsbook, while taking abit lon- ger than theother two products in terms of volume, does enjoy a very loyal customer base, and that even- tually translates into steady and stable rev- enues. What distinguishes ChanceAffiliates from other affiliate pro- grams? Afterwewent live in September 2009, the first goal was to build credibility. Our approach to this was to bewhite- listed on affiliate portals only by an affiliate’s request and not be- cause we have money to throw away. I think this is one of the aspects thatdifferentiatesus from our competition. Secondly, despite the uphill task of being a new operator/affiliate program, it gives us a lot of scope to involve the affiliates and to in- clude their feedback intobuilding upour affiliateprogram. Another aspect is that we offer a 50 percent revenue share promo- tion by default for the first three months. This gives us enough time to evaluate an affiliate’s per- formance and then discuss with them a custom deal, as against offering everyone a regular tiered commission. This alsohelps us to cut off those who demand unre- alistic deals without having any- thing to justify. Most importantly, wework close- ly with affiliates. Our team of account managers has an ever- growing portfolio of affiliates on their list and we are constantly in touch with them to see how we can improve the existing cam- paigns.We see it as apartnership and we work toward making it a successful one. Besidestrust,whatarethekeysto building successful relationships between affiliates and affiliate programs? Affiliate Support: We believe in acknowledging, even if not find- ing a resolution to, an affiliate’s problem or issue in less than 24 hours. It takes a lot of time and effort for an affiliate to get a new program up and running and we respect that. Apart from the fact that affiliates can directly contact their account managers, we also have a generic email ad- dress, info@chanceaffiliates.com, that is constantlymanned by our personnel so as to ensure that the queries are replied to within the stipulated time. Payments: Among other things that play a role would be pay- ing out the affiliates on time. At ChanceAffiliates we commit to the payment date of the 5th of every month. And we have been successful at being consistent on meeting this deadline despite the external and procedural depen- dencies. Tracking: The tracking of players is another critical issue. Thank- fully, although we don’t yet have a full-fledged affiliate program to boast of, we have taken care to have the basic cross-prod- uct tracking in place in order to award the affiliates what they are dulyentitled to. Optimizing:Weconstantlyupdate our affiliates and followupon the campaigns and also inform them when they are in thenegative (we haveanonegative carryoverpoli- cy,butnoone likes toseenegative orzero revenue)andsuggestways toget thembackon track. Coordination: It’snotaneasy task when you have different account managers spread out in differ- ent locations. Although every- one works toward the same goal, it’s easy to step on one another’s toes. It takes teamwork to man- age a successful affiliateprogram. While each teammember works independently, we all work to- warda commongoal. Do you gamble yourself? If so, what games do you like to play? I think it is essential to know the products one is marketing/pro- moting in order to provide better serviceandvalue (my justification for gambling). Of course I love to play inpoker tournamentsmostly (I still treasure the jacket Mike Sexton gave me after winning an offline tourneyatoneofmyprevi- ousworkplaces)and Icangetvery addicted toblackjack. What is the last book you read? Didyouenjoy it?Whyorwhynot? The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook . I picked up thisbookduring theScandina- vian Affiliate Summit conference and thoroughly enjoyed reading it. I prefer reading biographies and nonfiction, and this one fits thebill. If you had a theme song, what would itbe? Ah,hard tochoose just one.But if ithas tobe, then itmust be “Astrix – Beyond the Senses.” Thiswas thefirst track Iheard that contributed tomyreligiousconver- sion toProgressiveTrance. “Webelieve in acknowledging, even ifnotfinding an immediate resolution to,an affiliate’sproblem or issue in less than24hours.” JOHN BENJAMIN | ChanceAffiliates 68 AffiliateManager Interview Series