Mobile optimisation and mobile traffic are hot topics for discussion here at Affiverse. There is no denying that mobile traffic is on the rise and with mobile betting being a key feature in most sports books it can’t be ignored as a key traffic source. This week, we’re taking a look at mobile and how you could be using this medium to grow your business and take advantage of it’s reach.
Mobile usage is now triple that of desktop browsing times
There’s still a lot to discover in the world of mobile, with new tech coming out all the time. The statistics on mobile use are only going up, with more and more of these devices in circulation all the time. Way back in 2008, it seemed radical that experts predicted mobile phone browsing would overtake desktop browsing by 2014. The total amount of browsing time per month is now much larger on a mobile than on a desktop. In the UK, an individual spends roughly 29 hours per month browsing on desktop, but a whopping 66 hours on our mobile devices. Convenience , ease of use and privacy seem to be the driving factors that support these numbers. Our desktop browsing time also tends to be more for business or more serious transactions, like buying holidays. On mobile, we’re usually looking for something fun or informative – both of which an affiliate portal can stand to be.
Mastering the App Store
Around 80% of our time spent on a smartphone is spent within an app, so this is well worth considering within your marketing strategy. Historically, gambling based apps were not allowed in the Google Play store but this has since been changed. This offers a brilliant opportunity for new affiliates to build momentum early on in their launch strategies. Building an SEO strategy for app store search is a great challenge and offers you the chance to go outside your regular sphere to really learn something useful. Gaming accounts for 11% of the time spent within these apps, so you could be referring someone to a gambling app for your rev share. How do the numbers stack up? As of March 2017, there are 2,800,000 apps in the Google Play store and 2,200,000 in the App Store. These figures are massive and it poses an interesting conundrum for iGaming affiliates and operator brands that want to stand out among these millions as they really need to consider how their app will add value and engage an audience to continue usage and monetisation within it.
Mobile Sites
With the mobile first index being phased in soon, we also know that search engines want to see more sites with a mobile responsive design. This means that an app might not be enough to get your site ranking, as you need both to ensure the best possible experience for your users. We covered this a few weeks ago in our Google AMP Project update. These different ranking factors will come to impact your SEO scoring, even for those on desktop. This overall impact is palpable, as each small change can have you rising or descending through the ranks. Those browsing on mobile tend to be in a fact finding stage, so this is a great time for affiliates to be found by users.
Brand New Mobile Trends
There are always new mobile trends to get up to date with and these can drastically affect how your user views your site. Virtual reality and augmented reality are among the hottest topics within the mobile development sphere, as they allow users to interact with your product in an entirely new way.
We’re starting to see new products like VR slot machines and casinos, which can entice new players to try out the latest technology. Many users want to try out the very latest in gaming, so these trends can be a great way to bring in new players. Creating an app can be really easy with tools such as Apps Village which create branded apps from your Facebook page, you can start to market to your community via mobile strategies to ensure conversion and retention to and from your site.
The Internet of Things is also a big exploration area for affiliates, as everything that we do is now connected. This means that you get a similar experience on a range of devices. There’s expected to be 26 billion devices in the IoT network by 2020 and this is an area worth exploring. Sharing news and features on these devices will become ever more important, for big media channels and for affiliates.
Finally, we come to cryptocurrency, which is already blazing a trail in a range of different industries. This has already begun to make its mark on the iGaming space, with affiliates and operators looking to get their share of the devolved currency. With a third of banks expected to start accepting this payment method in 2018, this could potentially be big business. The fact is mobile usage and spending has been consistently growing I reach over the last few years and it’s not going anywhere. Users are jumping on this trend to allow them to access pretty much everything that they need on the go. If you’re not a part of this trend, then you’ll be missing out.
