William Hill Online COO Marcus issues rakeback rallying call 02/07/2009

Ian

I run a /forumserver.twoplustwo.com/51/affiliates-rakeback/william-hill-up-60-existing-members-472327/">this thread on 2+2 shows William Hill offering 60% (yes 60%) rakeback to players as a "celebration" of their move to the Ipoker network. What's more the affiliate promoting the deal was also actively encouraging people to sign up for rakeback on the Cryptologic skin so that they would be grandfathered over onto Ipoker with rakeback and so they would be eligible for a promotion such as this 60% rakeback deal. I find it highly hypocritical to make a statement such as this when William Hill themselves are actively involved in this means of player acquisition.

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Paul

Operators would like rid of rakeback to help create a better business model!

Affiliates would openly like rakeback to be governed better!

Operators would like to be affiliate free eventually!

Affiliates quietly like back door rakeback deals!

William Hill offered a rather large percentage prior to changing networks!

Each of the above statements is probably correct in its own right, so where do we find the happy medium?

Will we find our UTOPIA? Very doubtfull.

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hehe

Ipoker is owned by playtech who fines or ban operators that give rakeback, strangly WillHill is aloud to do it but we have to remember that they are partly owned by playtech so a family company can do whatever they want.

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Anonymous

Rakeback is now all about backroom deals and stealing players.

There are no norms, and it's a close to a criminal element in this industry as you can get.

Good riddance.

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Anonymous

I think Marcus' views are actually perfectly reasonable: rakeback doesn't do the industry any good, and is as bad for affiliates with otherwise more sustainable models as it is for opeartors.

Good for him for for actually coming out and trying to make some progress on the issue, not just whining but doing nothing like most of the other operators.

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Tom

What’s most interesting is the intensity that this debate has taken. There has always been significant opposition from a number of operators towards rakeback affiliates and licensees. Some may argue, rightly so. For me, the key is whether such affiliates and licensees are providing additional value to the players through other channels. If they are, then fair play to them – they’re using the tools they have to make money, whilst still providing an educational service to the player. I disagree with the view that the affiliate’s role is simply to drive traffic, although Peter Marcus is 100% right to point to the need to avoid the cannibalisation of traffic. However, rakeback is not the prime proponent of this. Operators need to look at the way they market their products. The bonus-led culture we work in has inspired rakeback, and is the main reason why companies are “stealing each other’s customers” as Marcus states. Rakeback is not the problem, backwards marketing strategies are. Poker rooms need to position themselves further apart and provide their players with something differentiable if they want to force the rakeback affiliate’s hand.

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Steve

And how do WH suggest the small operators compete with a dragon like WH. Naturally a smaller operator can never win a marketing battle against WH, so small operators take other avenues to attract the players. It's called free market. Rake back is just a a way to lower prices, and we all know that low prices is exactly what many are looking for. Try getting all the electronics stores to stop giving rebates, lowering thier prices. If WH think rake back is so bad, they can start by stopping thier own rake back schemes, set the norm and wait and see how many will follow. God Luck.

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