The Online Gambling Industry and Advertising

The Business of Online Gambling is big business, and is invariably fraught with problems (often legal issues, but also connections to the mafia).

Disclaimer - We do not endorse gambling or advertising for the gambling industry.

Advertising for the gambling industry therefore is also big business, which means there are lots of money to be made by people who are unscrupulous and don't mind people developing gambling addictions and all the problems associated with gambling (higher crime rates, spousal abuse, child abuse, over drinking, etc).

The goal essentially with the online advertising end of the business is to legitimize their websites by getting reputable websites to link to them.

One way they do this is by contacting sports oriented websites and offer them a lot of money for advertising on their website. Typically $100 USD for 1 page of content is the going rate, but it can often be a lot more.

They then write and submit to the website's owner the content to place on the website. All the owner has to do is place the content, possibly create internal links, and receive payment via PayPal. For people who have never done advertising before, they will quickly realize it is the quickest $100 they have ever made - ignoring all the time and effort that went into making their website, which they have just tarnished their reputation by advertising gambling.

While it can help a person earn money, their website's reputation may forever be damaged.

In the example below is content produced for a sports website we own, but the content was never used. It was originally for a specific sport, but we have altered some of the words and changed it to Lacrosse instead (because so few people ever play Lacrosse).

Since we never posted the content, we see nothing wrong with changing a few of the words and reposting it here as an example of the kind of Black Hat SEO that should be frowned upon.

The red highlighted sections would be links if this article was used. The links go to various government websites, news articles, and of course the gambling website they are looking to promote. By including government / news / popular sports links in to the mixture of links, it creates the illusion that the links on the page are all to reputable sources. It is a Black Hat SEO technique used to escape the notice of Google. Google recognizes that there are links to reputable sports websites, government websites, and news articles about sports and/or gambling, and this tricks Google into thinking the new page of content is supporting something reputable, when in reality if someone actually reads the content they realize they are trying to trick people into losing their money on gambling websites.

Sometimes they will even add internal links within the article to further embed the idea that is article is part of the website's regular content.

Example One

Sports betting is of course a huge business in all countries of the world, and if you are a Canadian citizens and you have an interest in betting on one or more different types of sporting events, then you may be interested in learning more about the online sports betting environment. Before you start, check out this review for Canadians to see a wide variety of sporting games.

Anyway, it is not illegal for you to place sports bets and wagers online in Canada, however the laws surrounding sports betting sites clearly state that any gambling site based and location in Canada must hold a Government issued gambling license.

As there is a very good chance that any sports betting casino you come across online is going to not be based in Canada, you need to ensure any site you do sign up for and join does at least hold a valid gambling license in a recognized jurisdiction, for by doing so you will be afforded the full protection offered to customer of such sites by the licensing commission or licensing authority.

Many online betting casinos and sites have an automated system in place in regards to settling all winning bets placed at their respective sites, and as much you should never be waiting more than a minute or two to have your winning bets and wagers settled once the actual sporting event you have bet on has ended. Occasionally any very large bets that are struck and turn out to be winning ones may have to be settled manually, however this will not usually see you having to wait for a long period of time for your winning to reflect in your account.

If you have any problems or complaints with any sports betting site then you should first try and get the site itself to resolve those problems, however if that is not possible for whatever reason then you should escalate your complaint to the license issuer for that site. This is why betting online at betting sites and casinos that hold a recognized gambling license issued by one of the more respected gambling commissions will bear fruit, as those licensing commissions offer bettor a complaint service and they will step in and help when help is needed.

You may be used to picking out your sports bets and wagers in advance and will once you have selected them place those bets and wagers before a sporting event starts. However, many online sports betting sites will now allow you to access and utilize something known as a live in play betting market and this is a betting market that opens up and become accessible only once a sports event has started. In Play betting markets are proving very popular as they allow sports bettors to hedge bets placed before the sporting event started and bets can be placed on these IN Play betting markets right up until the dying minutes of that event. Soccer, hockey and basketball are among the most popular sports to bet on in Canada, but if you are a fan of lacrosse even a little bit, you’ll enjoy this article about rules and laws or lacrosse. Maybe it’ll get you big money, you never know.

Do not be under the impression that you are not going to be able to place every single type of bet that you can place in a land based betting venue if you choose to utilize an online sports betting site. There are no differences at online betting sites and casinos in regards to the type and variety of bets and wagers that you can place at such sites, and in fact you may find a few exclusive and new bets on offer at some sports betting sites.

 So above in Example One you see the examples I am talking about:

• review for Canadians links to the gambling website. It is at the top so it has more prominence/value.
• gambling license links to a government website about gambling licenses.
• this article links to an internal page about Lacrosse rules and regulations.
• land based betting venue links to a newspaper article about gambling.

 Example Two

If you thought the only way to get closer to the NFL, NHL, NBA, or CFL action was to increase the size of your HDTV, think again. Gambling online in Canada offers you way more legal thrills than you probably knew existed. By sports betting online, you can feel like you're smack down in the middle of the field, court, or ice. Read this comprehensive review because if you’re a fan of quality welcome bonuses, you’ll like this one.

Not every legit online sports betting site is open to Canadians. And not all of the ones that are open make it lucrative to place real money bets in the currency you want. The best sports betting sites for Canadians offer solid bonuses and allow you to deposit in Canadian dollars.

The sports betting sites Canada players can choose to play at will offer odds on the favorite and the underdog. If you're betting on the favorite, you typically need to wager more than C$110 to win C$100. You can also bet on point spreads, where you predict how much, for example, a hockey team will win or lose by. And the best online sports betting sites also feature prop bets, where you can bet on unpredictable things like which team will win the coin toss.

NFL, CFL, NBA, and NHL are some of the sports leagues you can make bets on through online gambling sites. With 32 teams to bet on and 17 weeks of games, the NFL, or National Football League, is one of the most popular and lucrative sports to get involved with, including NFL betting. Lacrosse, on the other hand, is not so popular as these other sports, but if you are a sports fan in general check out lacrosse rules and regulations and maybe you can try betting on lacrosse as well. You never know, maybe big money is waiting for you!

Anyway, there are all kinds of popular online betting sites Canada gambling fans can get their hands on. Each top website tries to hook in players in with promises of big betting bonuses and bigger payouts with every win; some even promise payouts on losses. Before you choose one Canada online sports betting site over another make sure you understand the incentives. Low juice Internet betting sites offer lower lines than you'd find at the competition.

For example, the industry standard money line is -110, but low juice sites offer lines of -105.

What that means is instead of having to lay down C$110 to win C$100, you'd only have to lay down C$105. But their odds on the underdog are usually not as good as the competition. Other online sports betting sites in Canada include cash back sites and deposit bonus sites.

Let's face it - if online sports betting Canada residents were offered the chance to bet on just CA league sports, sites probably wouldn't be that successful. Sure, Canadian Football League is exciting, but the season is fairly short, so there's not that much opportunity to rake in some real cash long-term.

Thankfully, the biggest and best online betting sites Canada players can enjoy on the Internet have access to markets for every game in every major league international sport. That includes MLB baseball, NBA Basketball, NFL football, the English Premier League Soccer, NCAA basketball, golf, tennis, lacrosse, and, in some cases, even darts and bowling. If the sport exists, Canadians can enjoy online sports betting!

In Example Two you see more of the same types of things:

• Read this comprehensive review links to an online casino website, again, right at the top.
• lacrosse rules and regulations is another internal link to create the illusion the content is part of the Lacrosse website's regular content.
• Canadian Football League links to the CFL website, a reputable sports website.
• NBA Basketball links to the NBA website, a reputable sports website.

THE BACKLASH OF A BAD REPUTATION

The problem however is what happens when Google eventually notices that your website is linking to gambling websites.

Google routinely downgrades websites that get a bad reputation for advertising anything disreputable such as gambling, xxx, contraband, illegal activity, etc.

Just in writing this article we had to be careful what keywords we are using to make sure what we write is family friendly, and while we do talk about gambling, we make it clear we do not endorse gambling or advertising for the gambling industry.

Once a website is downgraded it is very difficult to fix a bad reputation. It can be done, but it could potentially take years and a lot of money. Depending on the amount of money invested in the original website it might actually make more sense to just start over with a new website and a new brand name.

Because articles like the two examples shown above are designed to fly under Google's radar by masking themselves with government, newspaper and popular sports websites they can go unnoticed for a long time, but when Google does eventually notice the effect will be immediate.

Google could even potentially remove your entire website from their search database. The whole thing could just DISAPPEAR.

Your website would still exist, and appear in less popular search engines, but since Google is the search engine of choice for 90% of the world, if you are not in it you can expect your website's popularity to drop to 10% of whatever it used to be. Along with your profits.

So while quick money may seem like a good idea at the time, you will eventually regret taking it.

HOW TO SAVE YOUR REPUTATION

If you already took gambling money, and the gambling content has been up for two months or more, you should probably just take it down immediately. Hopefully Google has not noticed your website.

If the people advertising the gambling website contact you asking why you removed it, just say the following:

Sorry. We got an email from Google saying that we had to remove the article and links. They were threatening to ban our website from their search engine. We didn't have much choice.

And because it has been two months since you received the payment via PayPal, it is past the time that the advertiser can demand a refund via PayPal's dispute resolution process. You already rendered your advertising services, so you are under no obligation to give a refund.

This means that in theory, if you wanted to, you could take their money, leave their advertising up for 2 months, then take it down, and keep the money. And if they ever complain, copy/paste the reply up above regarding Google threatening to ban your website.

And there you go. That is how you stick it to the man and make money off the gambling industry. By ripping them off.

Gambling is for losers.

Guest Posts Do Not Equal Free Links, + How much to charge?

Or WHY YOU SHOULD BE CHARGING $30 EACH TIME SOMEONE ASKS FOR A LINK

Back in January of this year I wrote a post titled "Guest Posts, Free Links, and Why it is Bad for your Business".

In the post I explained the following key points in more detail:

• Guest posts should contain zero links.
• "Guest posts" that contain links are not "guest posts", they are advertising.
• Giving away free links = charity that is hurting your business.
• People should be paying for links, because links = advertising.

But I did not explain how much people should be charging for links when they accept a guest post.

The basic price = $30.

This is the minimum price you should be charging just for your time and effort of adding a guest post containing links to your website. You have to edit and format everything on the page, add images, add the link(s), and you deserve to be paid for your time, effort, and the value of the link advert.

If you are charging less than $30, then you are not getting paid enough for your time.

Plus guest posts are presumably permanent advertising. Until the website is eventually deleted, the advert will be there for years. So $30 is a bargain when you consider the duration it will be there.

The premium rate = $60.

This is when your website is more popular. You can demand the higher rate because of the following reasons:

1. Your website is more popular and therefore worth more to advertisers.
2. Your website is more exclusive. Less outgoing links means the few outgoing links there are are considered to be more valuable. (Thanks to Google's "less is more" algorithms.)
3. You might also simply want to discourage advertisers by charging a heftier price, this then enforces the notion of value and exclusivity - while allowing you to present a website less bogged down by copious amounts of advertising.

The expensive rate = $100

This is when your website is super popular. It is probably your full time job working on this website / the business you have associated with it. Like above you benefit from the following factors:

• Super Popular.
• Super Exclusive.
• Possible Brand Name Recognition.

The website in question probably also has a social media presence on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc - and therefore is worth more to advertisers if they can be promoted on those too.

The super expensive rate = $200 or more...

The sky is the limit when it comes to popularity. Some very expensive / super popular blogs might be charging $400 for a single blog post.

This is sometimes the result of being a niche topic, the pseudo-celebrity status of the writer of the website, or just the sheer ridiculous popularity of a particular website.

What about sponsored content?

Now not every website accepts guest posts. Some websites might prefer that they write / make their own content, but they are still accepting sponsors for said content.

An example of this is video blogger Hanna Hart - best known for her "My Drunk Kitchen" YouTube channel. In the video below she has a guest on her YouTube channel, Seth Rogen, who is promoting the animated film "Sausage Party".

At which point you have to wonder, how much was Hanna Hart paid to be sponsored by "Sausage Party"?  Good question.



Well...

Hanna's YouTube channel is insanely popular. Over 2.5 million subscribers.

She has hundreds of videos. So many I was unable to find an actual statistic.

And she has access to working with companies selling both food and alcohol, and evidently films about food or alcohol.

So clearly she can make lots of these videos for sponsored clients if she so wished, and presumably charging a lot for her services and time.

Never Annoy a SEO Expert

Here is a good SEO tip...

Not just for advertising your business, but also for life in general.

Never annoy or piss off a SEO expert.

Let us pretend for a moment that you are running your business, whatever it happens to be - for the sake of the sheer boring-ness of it, lets say you are an accountant.

And for whatever reason you get into a dispute with a SEO expert.

And the SEO expert knows:

• Your Name
• Where you live
• Your occupation

If you manage to annoy or piss off the SEO expert they might decide to do the opposite of Reputation Management and instead deliberately ruin your reputation.

This happened to a recent potential client of mine. They pissed off a different SEO expert, who then proceeded to leave nasty comments all over the internet, post fake news stories about the person, making up all sorts of nasty stories about the person, and so forth.

And they didn't just post such things. They made links to those articles and comments, and SEO-ed them so that they would be boosted up in the search rankings. They used websites, social media, posted in directories, blogs, discussion forums - they honestly did a really good job of ruining his reputation. Respect.

The client then came looking for a different SEO expert in order to fix their now damaged reputation.

And I said:

"Honestly, it would be easier and cheaper for you to just legally change your name."

Well, they didn't like that idea.

So I quoted a price for what I felt would be required to write enough positive comments / articles to drown out / dilute all the bad ones, but honestly, it is not going to be cheap.

And the client didn't like that either. Too expensive. Can I do anything cheaper?

Nope. Not really.

Plus consider this.

What happens if the SEO expert who hates you simply goes back and does more damage? Again and again?

You could end up spending thousands of $$$ or even tens of thousands over many years trying to fix your reputation, and if the hater keeps posting more it will just be a constant battle that will never be won.

You could try to sue them in court, claiming defamation, but since the things are being posted online anonymously, you would never be able to prove who is saying the bad things about you, and it would never stop. Defamation is super hard to prove when the person posting it is anonymous.

So the best thing to do when it comes to Reputation Management is to never annoy someone who is internet savvy - and definitely don't piss anyone who is a SEO expert.

But if you do, we can help you. It won't be cheap. It will cost a lot and it may take years, but we can fix it for you.

Or alternatively, you could always legally change your name.

The client mentioned above is still mulling over what to do. They want to keep their name, but they are unwilling to pay the costs needed to fix this problem. If they do nothing their reputation will be permanently damaged.

Another option would be to move further away and switch careers. I imagine they don't like that option either.