The profit-making partnership of Gaming Innovation Group and Merkur is not about to end anytime soon. The two affiliate marketing companies have announced an extension to their partnership following a successful business year as a team.
Merkur
Merkur, the German iGaming operator that focuses on slots and online casinos, is known throughout Europe for its various gambling outlets, including arcades and casinos featuring virtual and classic slot machines and money gaming machines. Founded in 1957, its main focus nowadays is online casinos with a robust affiliate marketing platform.
It is a brand within the Gauselmann Group, which is known for taking brand protection as its highest priority on the German market. As a result, the iGaming company has been working with GiG Comply, an automated affiliate marketing compliance tool in order to allow affiliate managers to better ensure that they are following FTC, EU, and other regulations in their marketing campaign.
GiG
The Gaming Innovation Group, founded in 2012, has enjoyed a growth spurt over the past few years, wherein a partnership with News Corp was announced in the UK and Ireland. News Corp serves millions of online readers via a range of premium media websites, including The Sun and talkSPORT. They also enjoyed an integration of AskGamblers following an acquisition from Catena Media in late 2022.
The partnership has been in place since 2022, wherein the flexible compliance tools of the Gaming Innovation Group software has been in use across Merkur’s affiliate marketing efforts, automating a lot of the more tedious elements of compliance in iGaming marketing.
As part of its automated system, GiG Comply scans web pages for affiliate content across the internet, where it scans content for red-flag words, iGaming code, examines links and checks regulatory requirements across various jurisdictions.
The combination has created an affiliate program that is automatically checked for compliance violations, taking the work from affiliates or their managers. Additionally, insights are gained about promotional content and how it’s used in brand marketing from the GiG Comply partnership.
Gaming Innovation Group also has an affiliate business, GiG Media, which is a global iGaming affiliate marketing operator. It is known for aiding its affiliate partners in generating qualified traffic via multiple channels, including social media, SEM and PPC.
Jonas Warrer, CMO at GiG, said: “The need for operators to protect their brand is at a critical stage in the evolution of the industry and we’re delighted to be trusted by so many big players to look after such a pivotal function.”
Martin Collins, Affiliate Lead at Merkur, said: “Compliance is a key factor across many markets now, particularly in Germany. We are pleased to continue growing our business with the trusted help of GIG who bring to the table a wealth of knowledge making this partnership easy and enjoyable.’’
Compliance
Compliance is important because affiliate marketing stretches across formats and demographics, each of which have their own set of regulations to follow. Following regulations is particularly important in iGaming as age and geo restrictions, as well as issues like gambling harm are taken particularly seriously by governing bodies. For instance, in January of this year In Touch Games was fined £6.1 million for non-compliance issues.
