Online Gambling Quarterly: DraftKings and Unibet lead key US affiliates in spring 2022
OGQ deep dives into the advertising of sports betting and icasino operators through key affiliates and looks at SEO in the US market
Online Gambling Quarterly (OGQ) analysts have prepared a detailed vertical/segment-specific analysis that identifies online gambling operators most frequently featured on key affiliate websites in the US. Of these sites, DraftKings is present on most betting-focused affiliate sites in the US and when it comes to the casino segment, Unibet leads this ranking.
To benchmark brand/operator presence on affiliate websites, OGQ looked into the affiliate sites that appear among Google’s US top 50 results for 20-30 betting- and casino-related keywords. The researchers then analyzed the advertisers/brands (gambling websites) featured on each of the affiliate sites ranked.
Betting-specific affiliate benchmarking
The analysis was based on 119 affiliate websites that made it into Google’s local top 50 search results for 20-30 betting-related keywords. DraftKings leads this ranking and is featured on 77% of the betting-focused affiliates. Runner-ups are FanDuel and BetMGM.
Casino-specific affiliate benchmarking
The analysis was based on 75 affiliate websites that made it into Google’s local top 50 search results for 20-30 casino-related keywords. Unibet leads this ranking and is featured on 67% of the casino-focused affiliate sites. Runner-ups are BetMGM and DraftKings.
Top-ranked affiliates in the US
So far, only a few affiliates have been able to establish their own brand reputation in the US. Therefore the Google ranking is of key importance for most affiliates. To prepare the SEO ranking for affiliates, OGQ analysts looked at the top 50 Google organic search results for 20-30 specific keywords (or terms) related to betting or casino (e.g. “best casino site”). Then they produced a search result ranking for every keyword/vertical and gave each affiliate site ranked a reciprocal number of “SEO points” regarding its rank (e.g., rank 1 = 50 points, rank 2 = 49 points, … , rank 50 = 1 point).
The SEO analysis included 31 betting-related keywords and 21 casino-related keywords:
- For betting-related keywords, Oddsshark.Com, and Vegasinsider.Com reached the highest SEO score.
For casino-related keywords, Onlineunitedstatescasinos.Com, and Playusa.Com reached the highest SEO score.
