In the competitive iGaming landscape, content marketing has emerged as a powerful tool for enhancing Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategies. By creating valuable, engaging, and optimised content, iGaming businesses can not only attract and engage their target audience but also improve their visibility and rankings in search engine results, like on Google where 86% of internet users go to habitually. Let’s explore the central role of content marketing in iGaming SEO and how it can drive success for your iGaming business.

CAPTIVATING & INFORMATIVE INFO

Let’s define our terms – what do we mean by ‘content marketing’? Basically, ‘content’ encompasses all the different forms you can publish like high-quality articles, blog posts, guides, videos, and images – in this case, related to iGaming. By making content that is captivating and informative and resonates with your target audience, which our team has ongoing experience doing for our iGaming clients like PowerPlay and Olybet, you can establish your brand as a credible and authoritative source of iGaming information. Engaged users mean longer sessions of time spent on your site and help improve search engine rankings.

TARGETED KEYWORD OPTIMISATION

Content marketing offers the chance to optimise your iGaming site with targeted keywords in mind. One of the very first things you should do when it comes to content marketing is to work backwards from keyword research. 

Carrying out keyword research, using tools like SEMRush, Keywordtool.io, and AnswerThePublic, you can assess which keywords have the highest search volumes and are going to be your choice to tap into and rank for. The selection of keywords via research is similarly crucial for Voice Search optimisation. 

The best approach is to, for each page on your iGaming site, choose a primary target keyword that will feature in the page’s meta title and meta description, the H1-Heading and within on-page text. Note down any variations of this that also have volume and that you want to target as secondary phrases. These should be put in H2-Header positions and incorporated naturally throughout the body of text. 

For any pictures that you add to the page, you should save the image on your device beforehand with the primary target keyword within the file name. Once uploaded, include the relevant keywords in the image’s ‘alt-text’. This will all signal to Google exactly what your content is related to and improve its visibility in search engine results. 

LINK BUILDING OPPORTUNITIES

Our previous blog post highlighted how massively important link building is for iGaming SEO, and any site for that matter. So, we won’t go into too much detail here. 

In this context, though, content marketing creates opportunities for earning high-quality backlinks. When you produce valuable and shareable content, other websites, influencers, and bloggers in the iGaming industry are more likely to link to your content, thereby improving your website’s authority and credibility. Gaining these topically-relevant backlinks from reputable sources is a significant SEO ranking factor and can boost your iGaming site’s visibility.

SOCIAL MEDIA ENGAGEMENT

Content marketing on your site goes hand in hand with social media engagement. By promoting your content onto social media platforms like we do (see example above) on our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Threads, you can reach a wider audience and encourage social sharing. Including relevant hashtags will get you seen by the right users. All of this increased social engagement leads to more visibility, traffic, and potential backlinks. Moreover, search engines consider, to a certain degree, these social signals as a measure of your brand’s popularity and authority in the iGaming niche.

UX ENHANCEMENT

Whilst content marketing focuses on providing valuable and engaging content, this will also improve the overall user experience (UX) on your site. When users find your content helpful and informative, they are more likely to spend more time on your site, navigate around various pages and potentially engage in contacting you or commenting on a page. Internal linking is vital here, where you should include links within your text (like we have throughout this post) that point to other relevant pages on your site, facilitating users digging deeper into issues that you cover.

EVERGREEN & FRESH CONTENT

By embracing and utilising content marketing’s potential, you can produce ‘evergreen’ and fresh content that remains relevant and valuable as time goes on. ‘Evergreen’ content, like comprehensive guides or educational articles, will continue to attract organic traffic and backlinks and help with longer-term SEO success. To supplement this, you should regularly publish fresh content to signal to Google that your site is active and up-to-date.

As you’ll have figured out by now, content marketing is a massively important tool in a marketer’s kit, offering numerous benefits for an iGaming business making a name for itself online.

Our SEOs see the tangible and direct benefits on rankings and engagement that a well-executed content marketing strategy can have for any website. By creating captivating and informative content; optimising it with primary and secondary targeted keywords; attracting strong backlinks; engaging with your audience on social media; enhancing UX; and creating evergreen and fresh content; you can nail your SEO. If you’re in the iGaming industry and want to pick our brains, here’s where to get us.

As the popularity of voice search technology continues to rise and ingrain itself into the homes and daily habits of people across the world, iGaming sites that want to stay ahead of competition must consider leveraging this technology. You will be hard-pressed to come across someone who hasn’t at least heard of Apple’s Siri, the Google Assistant, or Amazon’s Alexa. Although completely artificial, these have become household names at this point and are used widely as a novel and convenient way to interact with search engines.

As with any website that wants to remain maximally visible in an evolving technological world, your iGaming site should consider how well it is optimised for voice searches. Here, we outline some key ways to carry out iGaming SEO but with the focus on Voice Search and its growing userbase.

Focus on Conversational Keywords

When optimising specifically for voice search, your keyword strategy should primarily pay attention to conversational, long-tail keywords. People making a voice search querie tend to do so in a more conversational tone and inherently are asking questions or making demands of this technology. 

Use a tool like SEMRush to search for the long-tail keywords that have decent volume in your target location and AlsoAsked to  collate all the variations of queries from Google’s ‘People Also Ask’ section. These together will give you a good idea of what type of conversational keywords to target for your niche. Make a point of incoropoarting natural language queries for iGaming terms like “best online casino for…[X Game Type]”; or “top sports betting sites in…[X Location]”; or “online poker tournaments near me.” 

All of these types of queries and keywords should then be included naturally into your on-page content, featuring in meta titles and descriptions and your H1 and H2 Headings. Read more on these types of strategies in our other post.

Write Concise and Direct Answers

Someone making a voice search is often looking for a quick and direct answer to their query. This is still the case in the business of iGaming, and it’s vital that you write and structure your content in a way that helps whatever search engine they’re using present your answer concisely. This is where you should clearly set out your on-page content in a clear Question and Answer format, like having a dedicated FAQs section addressing commonly asked queries for a topic that that page targets. This should all come from your prior keyword research. To help search engines to extract that data from your page for voice-enabled tech to then read aloud in someone’s living room, you can use elements like schema markup coding.

Embrace Schema Markup

To help search engines find your content and be able to capture sections of it to include in ‘Featured Snippets’ and answers to Voice Search Queries, schema code is powerful. Using a generator tool like this one, you can create a piece of coding with your FAQ Questions and Answers laid out neatly for search engines to crawl. This code should be added into the header of whatever page it relates to, via a plugin perhaps, depending on your website’s backend. Also include ‘Local Business’ and ‘Organisation’ schema markup with iGaming-specific elements like casino games mentioned. You can then test if this is all working effectively. This will enhance the visibility and relevance of your iGaming website in voice search results.

Optimise Your Local SEO

Since iGaming voice searches often have a local intent behind them, like “online casino in [X location]” or “sports betting near me”. To optimise your iGaming site for localised terms, you should include location-specific keywords in your meta titles and descriptions and throughout on-page content – even going down the route of creating dedicated landing pages for different locations is a strong way to tap into Local SEO. Also, verify and fully fill out your Google My Business listing and sync it with Bing Places to increase exposure over both search engines. This will all work to support voice assistants in giving accurate, location-specific recommendations to users.

Utilise Local Business Directories

Continuing with the local perspective, if you are targeting your iGaming site at a specific geographic market, like the UK, it is important to have your brand listed in relevant local directories and review sites. When you feature your iGaming brand’s name, physical registered address, and phone number, as well as links to your website and social channels, this will increase the chance that your iGaming business can be picked up for voice search technology to provide. The link pointing to your site here can also help with your important link-building efforts. When users seek recommendations or information about local gambling options, these online listings and reviews can show that you are a trusted, authoritative option to go with. 

Create a Mobile-Friendly Experience

Voice search is strongly linked to mobile devices – it is therefore vital to ensure your iGaming site is optimised to be mobile-friendly. Your website’s design and structure should be laid out intuitively and offer a seamless user experience across whatever mobile device screen they’re using – mobile or tablet. 

Conduct lots of ongoing testing to guage whether users of varying degrees of technological competence can navigate the site smoothly. Sign-Up or Contact buttons should ideally be clickable to facilitate First Time Depositers and returning users. Can any of this be simplified more? Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly test and pop in your iGaming site’s URL. The results will help with any glaring red flags. The speediness at which your site loads is also important, which you can test here. A positive mobile experience not only enhances voice search performance but also benefits user engagement and conversions. 

As the search behaviours of your users evolve over time, you must stay abreast. To maintain a competitive edge in the rapidly evolving digital landscape, optimising your iGaming website for voice search is therefore crucial. By following the various different strategies our team have outlined here, your can boost your iGaming website’s visibility and accessibility to voice search users. 

At Big Pond, we love to get feedback on the advice we give out. If you have any to give us, please get in touch here. 

Within the intensely competitive world of iGaming, having a well-executed online presence is vital for attracting players and staying ahead of your competition. Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) plays a central role in improving your iGaming site’s visibility and where it ranks in Google or Bing’s search results. Here, we will outline five essential iGaming SEO strategies that can enhance your website’s performance, attract more organic traffic, and boost your bottom line. Our team utilises these strategies together synergistically for a range of iGaming clients.

1. Comprehensive, Well-Considered Keyword Research

Using tools like KeywordTool and SEMRush, the first port of call in an SEO project should be to find out exactly what users are searching for, and which terms are getting the most searches that you can tap into. Conducting thorough keyword research specific to the iGaming industry. Will then let you map out all the different routes you can go down for targeting search terms. Identify relevant keywords and phrases related to casino games, sports betting, or poker, for example. Hone in on long-tail keywords that have high search volume and lower competition – like ‘free football betting offers in Canada’. The more specific you go, the more targeted you are in generating visibility in front of these users. Assign a target primary keyword per page and incorporate them naturally throughout this page’s content, including its headings and meta title and description.

2. On-Page Optimisations

Using your keyword research, you should focus on optimising each page on your iGaming website in order to improve rankings on Google, Bing, or elsewhere. Generate a ‘crawl’ of your website using the tool ScreamingFrog and this list of pages can be used to map out the meta-data and headings for each page. Ensure that every page has a unique and descriptive title tag, meta description, and URL structure all featuring target keywords. Within your on-page text, organise it intuitively to guide users and search engine bots smoothly through the sections you cover. Optimise images by using descriptive alt tags and compressing file sizes for faster loading times.

3. High-Quality Content

Draft up high-quality, informative, and engaging content that will resonate with your target audience. Create in-depth articles, guides, and blog posts, just like this one, that offer a hub of valuable insights, tips, and industry news. Include targeted keywords naturally within all this content and aim for a good balance between keyword optimisation and readability – avoid obvious ‘stuffing’. Engaging content attracts visitors, encourages longer sessions, and improves rankings.

Using a tool like SurferSEO is a smart way to determine whether your content is effective enough compared to your iGaming competitors, or perhaps misses the mark and needs improvement. This tool scores your content out of 100 and nudges upwards into the green zone as you add the keywords they suggest.

4. Link Building Campaign

Be proactive in creating a strong presence online, so much so that you earn backlinks from other reputable and relevant sources within the iGaming industry. Reach out to iGaming influencers, bloggers, and industry publications to inquire about options for guest blogging or collaborations. Engage with online communities, forums, and chat rooms, sharing valuable insights with them that link back to your site. By using the tool Majestic, you can pop in a competitor’s site and it will show you their list of ‘Ref Domains’ that are linking to them. Use this to identify these types of potential link sources.

High-quality backlinks, that are ‘dofollow’ as opposed to ‘nofollow’, will signal your website’s authority and trustworthiness, helping improve rankings. To read deeper into this, why not check out our post highlighting the importance of building links for iGaming SEO?

5. Mobile Optimisation

Mobile usage continues to rise with haste in the realm of iGaming. It is therefore imperative that your website is well optimised for mobile devices. Ensure your website is responsive, loads quickly, and offers a seamless user experience across various screen sizes. Implement mobile-friendly design elements, like easy navigation and clearly visible and clickable  ‘Sign up’ and ‘Login’ call-to-action buttons. Mobile optimisation is not only essential for SEO but also for user satisfaction and conversion rates.

By implementing these five essential SEO strategies, you can finesse your iGaming website and enhance its visibility and rankings, and attract organic traffic. It’s important to stay abreast with the latest SEO trends and monitor your website’s performance, particularly after major algorithm updates by Google or Bing that may have tanked your rankings.

It’s key to remember, SEO is an ongoing and long-term process, and by continuously refining your strategies, you’ll position your iGaming website for success. At Big Pond, our team always starts every iGaming SEO project with the caveat that patience is required as the optimisations can take weeks or months to come into effect. Even longer so against established iGaming platforms. From Olybet to PowerPlay, our clients in the iGaming industry have undoubtedly seen the benefits of investing in an effective SEO strategy.

If you’re reading this and work in the iGaming industry, why not get in touch? We’d love to hear your thoughts!

When it comes to boosting the visibility and search engine rankings of your iGaming site, backlink building is a crucial component of your SEO strategy. In the fiercely competitive world of online gambling, building high-quality backlinks that are topically relevant plays a central role in establishing your website’s authority, credibility, and presence online. From Big Pond’s direct experience in this area, let’s discuss why link building in iGaming SEO is so important and can move the needle massively on your rankings.

Improved Search Engine Rankings:

Search engines, like Google who dominate the market, consider backlinks as votes of confidence for your site. The more top-quality, highly-relevant backlinks you have pointing to your site, the more search engines perceive your iGaming platform as a trustworthy and authoritative player in the field. Quality backlinks from reputable iGaming sources can significantly improve your search engine rankings and help push you onto Page 1 for key terms users are Googling.

We have seen the first-hand effects of this for our clients like PowerPlay, Olybet and BetOlimp, who all operate within different markets – Canada, Europe, and South Africa respectively. Although link building is a key part of all of our SEO projects, it is a pivotal part of competing in the online casino/sportsbook/iGaming space, increasingly so based on how saturated a particular market is already. 

Establishing Trust and Authority:

In the increasingly competitive iGaming industry, an essential part of success is around the authority and trustworthiness of your site. Backlinks from reputable iGaming influencers, industry publications, and established websites act as endorsements, signaling to both search engines and users that your website is a reliable source of information and services. This trust encourages users to engage with your iGaming platform and become FTDs (First Time Depositors) and returning players.

Driving Targeted Traffic:

Building out your site’s Backlink profile not only improves your exposure online, but drives targeted traffic to your iGaming platform. When you earn backlinks from relevant and authoritative iGaming websites, you expose your brand to a wider audience of interested players. Users clicking on these backlinks are often highly engaged and can be converted into players more readily.

Expanding Brand Awareness:

Especially if your iGaming is newer to the market and is striving to make a name for itself, backlinks can help expand your brand’s reach and awareness within the industry. When your website is mentioned by and linked from authoritative sources, it increases your brand’s visibility among industry influencers, competitors, and potential players. This exposure can lead to more partnerships, collaborations, and opportunities to grow your iGaming business.

Longer-Term SEO Value:

Building up a strong network of backlinks provides SEO value from a longer-term perspective. Unlike other SEO tactics that may fluctuate in effectiveness based on algorithm updates, quality backlinks continue to benefit your website’s rankings and visibility over time. The big players in the iGaming industry, ranking highly for the terms that are in your sights, will almost always have a well-developed, lengthy backlink profile. If you are looking to dig into your iGaming competitors and get inspiration for sources that you can reach out to yourself, use a tool like Majestic and their ‘Ref domains’ feature. Here, you can see all the referring domains linking to the iGaming site you’re inspecting.

As will be clearer now if you’ve got this far, link building has a multitude of tried and proven implications for iGaming SEO. As with any SEO project, backlinks are a core part of any successful strategy, and iGaming websites can benefit from the value that external links have. Link building is, however, one part of a web of different SEO strategies that should work together to influence your online presence. For more detail on these additional strategies, read our other recent blog post.

In short, link building helps improve your website’s search engine rankings, establish authority and trust, drive targeted traffic, and expand brand awareness. Invest in obtaining high-quality and relevant topical backlinks from reputable iGaming sources. This will enhance your iGaming platform’s exposure, attract the right audience, and position your brand as a trusted leader in the online gambling industry. Focus ideally on acquiring links naturally and prioritise quality and relevancy over quantity.

When carrying out iGaming SEO for clients, our team invests a substantial amount of time in link acquisition because of its sheer importance, especially in this niche.

Do you have any thoughts on all this? Fire them over to us here.