For bookmakers · Theme 03 of 04
The symptoms are already in your numbers.
Fraud rarely announces itself. It shows up as business problems that get other explanations: a tough market, a changing affiliate landscape, “that’s just how media buying works”. If these sound familiar, look closer.
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Q-15Question
Have you ever detected affiliate fraud on your brand?
Every affiliate programme with real money in it attracts fraud attempts. If you have never found any, the likelier explanation is that nobody is looking, or nobody is looking in the right way.
If the answer is no, you’ve probably missed it. And if you run several brands, ask the question brand by brand: fraudsters stay clean on the brands that are watched and save the fraud for the ones that aren’t.
Red flag“No”, or “not that we know of”, especially on your smaller brands.What we checkYour affiliate base on every brand, starting with the partners whose numbers have grown fastest. -
Q-16Question
Have you lost organic affiliates because they can’t convert any more?
When a fraudster stuffs cookies or hijacks clicks, they overwrite the honest affiliate who actually sent the player. The honest affiliate sees traffic going to you and nothing coming back.
They conclude your brand doesn’t convert, and move their traffic to a competitor.
Red flagLong-standing SEO and content affiliates report falling conversion while the traffic they send you holds steady.What we checkWhether clicks from your honest affiliates are being overwritten before registration or first deposit. -
Q-17Question
Do new affiliates drop away because conversion is poor and “the market is saturated”?
“Saturation” is the usual explanation, and sometimes it’s true. But if new affiliates’ real clicks are being overwritten, they will never convert well, however good their traffic is.
Red flagRecruitment works but retention doesn’t, and nobody has checked why.What we checkThe journey of a new affiliate’s click, from their page to your registration form, to see who ends up credited. -
Q-18Question
Is a high concentration of your conversions coming from a few media buyers?
A small number of affiliates taking most of your FTDs, especially ones with undeclared channels, is exactly the pattern you would expect if they are capturing traffic rather than creating it.
And if they won’t say where your ads run, a big share of your new players may be arriving from sites you would never approve.
Red flagA handful of “media buyers” produce most of your affiliate FTDs, and you can’t see their placements.What we checkConcentration of FTDs and revenue share by affiliate, against what each one can show for its traffic. -
Q-19Question
Are you now paying big affiliates fixed fees because they can’t convert their traffic?
Fixed fees and listing deals are sometimes reasonable. But when large, genuine affiliates ask for them because revenue share no longer pays, it is often because their players are being credited to someone else.
You end up paying twice: the fixed fee to the real affiliate, and the revenue share to the fraudster.
Red flagFixed-fee deals have grown while revenue-share conversion from your top partners has fallen.What we checkWhether players from your fixed-fee partners are being tagged by other affiliates before they deposit.
Diagnosis
The explanation you’re given vs what it may really be.
Each of these has an innocent explanation. Each also has a fraudulent one. Only evidence tells you which.
| Symptom | Usual explanation | What it may really be |
|---|---|---|
| Organic affiliates leaving | “They’ve moved to bigger brands.” | Their clicks are being overwritten by cookie stuffing or click-hijacking. |
| New affiliates won’t stick | “The market is saturated.” | New affiliates’ conversions are being credited to incumbents. |
| FTDs concentrated in media buyers | “They’re just good at paid traffic.” | Your ads on sites you’d never approve, and undeclared channels taking credit for your organic and brand traffic. |
| Big partners asking for fixed fees | “That’s how top affiliates work now.” | Revenue share no longer pays because their players are tagged by someone else. |
| Brand search flat, affiliate FTDs rising | “Affiliates are growing the brand.” | Brand-term bidding, lookalike domains or extension hijacking. |
| A smaller brand’s affiliate costs out of line with its size | “Emerging markets are expensive.” | Affiliates running clean on your main brand and fraud on this one, where the team is too small to check. |
| Affiliate cost rising faster than new players | “Acquisition is getting more expensive.” | You are paying commission on players who would have come anyway. |
Your website & tags
Scripts on landing pages, who controls your Google tags, Content Security Policy, iframing, cookie stuffing and click-hijacking.
Read the questions →Where affiliates promote you
Declared channels, “media buyers”, vetting, and why fraudsters stay clean on your flagship brand and target your weaker ones.
Read the questions →Warning signs in your numbers
Organic affiliates leaving, a “saturated market”, conversion concentrated in media buyers, and big partners on fixed fees.
You are hereOwnership, incentives & terms
Who is responsible, what affiliate managers are rewarded for, zero tolerance, and terms that stop fraud coming back.
Read the questions →Next step
Stop paying people to give you back your own players.
We’ll show you which of your affiliates are creating players and which are claiming them, with the evidence to act.