Best Marketing Strategies for Online Casinos in India

Due to unclear gambling laws and strict advertising regulations, online casinos (and other gambling operators) that wish to market themselves and spread awareness of their brand in India are working under tough conditions.

Prohibitive guidelines from the Advertising Standards Council of India (ACSI) prevent online casinos from advertising their product on national or local television channels as is possible in many European markets where these brands and their respective marketing teams are based.

There are a few exceptions to this rule though, such as when the Asian betting site Dafabet had their TV-ads shown during an ODI series between Australia and India via the SonyLIV streaming platform.

This ad ended up being shown to both Australian and Indian users, much to the dismay of gambling prohibitionists here in India, where sports marketing campaigns related to betting are usually not allowed.

However, this case can be categorised as a bit of an anomaly, because it fell through a legal loophole as the telecast rights and control over the game fell under the jurisdiction of Cricket Australia, rather than the Indian cricket board (BCCI).

Furthermore, such advertising stunts are only possible for online casinos and betting sites with million dollar marketing budgets. So what can smaller online casinos with an interest in the booming Indian casino market do?

Here are a couple of strategies we suggest you take a closer look at to give yourself the best chances of capturing a share of the fast-growing Indian gambling market.

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is the practise of using social media personalities with many followers (also known as influencers) and making them market your product, typically by publishing a positive review of your product, or something along those lines.

Influencer marketing has huge potential in India, where more than 750 million people use some form of social media (a number that has grown by 3 since 2018).

Furthermore, there are 180 million Instagram users in India, making India the biggest Instagram country in the world by quite a wide margin.

This means that there’s a huge potential user base on Instagram who are just sitting there and waiting to hear about your amazing online casino.

The only downside with influencer marketing is that it requires quite a lot of research. You need to make sure you are using the right influencers, who have a follower base that is made up of users who are most likely to be using your online casino - otherwise you will have a low ROI.

This means that you could be spending a lot of money on influencers, refining your strategy and narrowing down your audience, without seeing any big results for the first long while.

If that seems discouraging, then have no fear, we have another strategy for you that requires much less research and which always brings results.

Affiliate Marketing

According to us, affiliate marketing is the best, most secure way to market your online casino brand in a new market like India.

Using affiliate marketing enables you to start bringing in new players in a very cost-efficient way.

When you make a deal with an affiliate partner, it usually means that you will get listed on their website, and their visitors, who are searching for the best online casino sites, will be able to find your site and become a player on your site.

When using affiliate marketing partners, you basically don’t have to pay any up-front costs to be accepted on an affiliate site; you simply need to negotiate a revenue share deal with the affiliate (which is to say the amount you will be paying them for each dollar that a referred player spends in your casino).

The downside of using affiliate marketing is that you don’t own the players. You have to pay revenue share to the affiliate partner for as long as a referred player stays active in your casino

Furthermore, if you run into disagreements with your affiliate partner, they could turn off your stream of players at any time, and if that’s the only source of players you have, then you end up relying too much on your affiliate partners to deliver you results.

On the other hand, the best part about affiliate marketing is that you only pay for the players you receive. In general, you don’t have to pay a single cent before a player has made a deposit and begun to spend money in your casino. That’s why affiliate marketing is the cheapest way to start bringing in new players!

Conclusion

As we have shown in this article, there are plenty of ways to market your online casino brand in India, so how do you find out which approach is best for you? 

Usually, a hybrid approach that combines several different marketing tactics is what will give you the best results. 

Influencer marketing is best for short-term gains, but if you’re playing the long game, then you definitely want to start looking for strong affiliates, such as MyCasino.in, which can bring your brand out to a wider audience.

If you succeed in using these two marketing strategies effectively, your casino brand could very well benefit from the massive Indian gambling market that is opening up to the world right as we speak!