FEATURE
not a static number that is destined
to remain metaphorical “back of
the sofa” money when it comes
to search volume and if a brand
makes minimal effort to undertake
whether the user is looking for the
most relevant result for the brand,
or looking for the most relevant
result for the keyword – and in most
cases, it’s going with the keyword.
“It isn’t enough to simply act as a springboard for
Google users to then bounce off to their chosen operator
(while pocketing the commission in the process)”
any broader awareness advertising
or above-the-line activity, then
we really have to question whether
they have a right to command
high organic rankings for top
bingo keywords.
There are few areas of search
where we would expect – or even desire –
a little-known brand to secure the top
ranking position for a short-tail generic
keyword term, so equally we can’t
expect that to be the case when it
comes to igaming.
Taking Bingo Port and
Which Bingo into consideration,
both undertake their respective
above-the-line and brand building
activity in the form of awards, surveys
and events, and this all helps with that
all important brand recall.
Keywords are no longer brands
Another side to this particular coin
is the way in which affiliates have
historically tried to build their
entire brand around expensive
exact-match domains, mapped to
the big generic keywords.
While this approach had its merits
under previous iterations of the
Google algorithm, this creates
complications in a more brand-focused
algorithm. When your brand is the
keyword, Google has to determine
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iGB Affiliate Issue 64 AUG/SEP 2017
That muddying of the market is why
many affiliates have fallen out of
favour with brand search, and it
makes it difficult for those affiliates
to generate their own brand IP.
The answer is, put simply, to
build a brand. Build something
that sets you apart from the other
affiliates and the other operators
in the market, and don’t try to
convince Google that your keyword
is actually a brand, or that your
brand is actually a keyword.
idealistic but amid the gloom, there
are green shoots that say that if you
get it right, if you offer what Google is
craving, you can rank and you can get
traffic from organic search.
Affiliates have the power to do
all of these things, and they have the
advantage of agility – something that
very few operators tend to have.
Yes, it will be hard work. Yes, it will
require some big decisions and yes,
SEO still requires many of the
old-school fundamentals that often
get overlooked. But get it right,
and you have a much stronger
argument for demanding a seat at
Google’s top table.
“I don’t believe that Google is out to crush the industry.
It simply wants affiliates to be better. It wants them
to be better content creators, better at engaging users,
better technically and better brands”
Google doesn’t necessarily
hate you, it just wants you
to be better
Being an affiliate is hard, but I
don’t believe that Google is out to
crush the industry. It simply wants
affiliates to be better. It wants them
to be better content creators, it
wants them to be better at engaging
users, it wants them to be better
technically and it wants them
to be better brands.
A cynic might call that notion
With over 14 years in
digital, MIKE MCDOUGALL
has helped build teams
and worked in a variety
of roles in agencies in the
UK and North America. Mike
has previously led search marketing
teams for a number of leading agencies
and has also worked client-side for a
number of prominent online brands,
including lastminute.com. In his current
role, Mike heads up the search team,
ensuring Stickyeyes’ clients are
leading the way with forward thinking,
content-led digital strategies.