The TRUTH about this iGaming Vertical | Dmitry Starostenkov

iGaming Real Talk is launching the next series. This is the fourth event out of the 11 events we're doing this year and I'm very excited to bring you the insights from the expo floor. This time on the affiliate as well as operator relationships as well as what's missing in the industry. What's the trend? What are we looking at when it comes to 2026, 2027 and beyond in terms of the trends, AI and everything else. This series is brought to you by EvoVerse.

They offer custom crypto casino solutions as well as source code. This series is also brought to you by Wicked Games. They create slot games that slap. Hello and welcome back to day two of Afiliapub conference. I'm here in Madrid and we have Dimitri from Even Bet who are known for poker for a very long time. Who's the brand I think of when I think of poker because that's what they have been doing for almost two decades as far as I remember. So, Dimitri, welcome to the show.

Thank you. Thank you for hosting me.

Cool. So let's kick off. I mean, you know, this has been on my mind for a long time. I played my first poker game last time in Brazil just I wanted to see what it is. A lot of people told me if I enjoy chess, I would enjoy poker. So, I'm like sure, let me try. So, when I was in the flight, I was doing some practice and then I was sitting at the table. It was a nice experience. I like the experience and entertainment of it.

And then I started thinking like how would it actually work online because it felt like this game is essentially a physical game where you see people's faces where you see how they react when they lose when they win. It felt like a lot of physical social game. So you know what I'm thinking is does online poker work? I mean it works. You have a business but have you seen it has gone down or gone up in these last years?

Okay, I think we could the analogy is similar between landbased casino and online. So kind of... some of the players they go only to landbased casinos, right? Yeah, I know a lot of players poker.

No, no, I'm starting from casino side. All right. Yeah.

So we know that from casino vertical there are land based casinos and online casinos and from one side there a lot of players I know a lot of casino players which go only to landbased they never play online because they love this feeling environment they want to sit on the table drink and it's kind of part of the experience and some of the players they play purely nowadays purely online they would never go to land base especially younger generation you know.

Yeah. Yeah. So as part of the demographic we see... Yeah. Yeah.

And some of the players they both... Yeah. Yeah. They play both offline and they online and the same about poker players.

So you don't think there's a difference between you know casino players going to land base and poker because poker feels like a bit more but my perception. I don't know.

Yeah. Yeah. You're right. Absolutely. But I know that some of the players they mostly play only online.

Okay.

And it's kind of it's also also social interaction through chats, through like objects, emojis and all these online forums where they can discuss different hands and so forth. For some players, it's anyway very big social experience even playing online. But you are right that some of the players they don't feel this thrill when they play online. They only feel it in real environment when they can interact face by face.

So like it's maybe very personal thing like and depends on player.

Right right. So online poker is still growing... Compared to last five years like what you're seeing in the market is it the interest you think is going up or down at the moment?

The problem of poker is that it's only like casino vertical gambling vertical that is that has a skill in inside and skill and learning curve.

Learning curve. Yeah, it's beauty of poker.

It's a beauty of poker because through the learning curve, you get engaged. Yeah, you start from the basics.

There's a lot of calculation involved because I was at the table because I wanted to understand the game. I'm doing all these interviews and I'm like I want to experience and learn. So what I understood is there's a lot of calculation that requires the skill. Although what comes is random in the beginning but then everything is dependent on how I calculate and how I read the room. So the this is the beauty and this is the weak point of online poker because...

Not everyone has a skill.

No, not only but players feel engaged only while they are improving their skills. But on they reach certain level there's no room for to improve themselves and they might they probably leave poker as a entertainment and that's the point like poker quickly get saturated on certain markets.

So like it quickly quickly go through a very big rise and then goes to the plateau and then like adoption of poker in specific country gets to some specific amount and that's it specific level and not growing anymore and then we... Wow. What we need to do is go to other regions...

So like emerging markets like Latin America, Africa and so forth to grow there or other option is to evolve poker like new formats, new games.

Oh, you launched a new format. I saw something end of the last year you launched a new format for the poker game became little famous, right? That was the reason why you...

Yeah. Yeah. This we are trying to add some new things into poker to keep like interests of players. Yeah. So like this is what I'm doing.

Cool. Let's talk about affiliates for a moment. Since we are in Afiliapub and you know in one of the interviews you mentioned that affiliates can generate up to 90% of the poker traffic. So what do you think actually makes a strong affiliate program today if you have to give advice to new operators for poker maybe?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Again since poker is very specific vertical there is kind of specific affiliation for poker with players. First of all there are many agent based affiliations when some people usually it's professional poker players they have community around them like 100 200...

Streamers. Yeah.

Like not it started even before streaming like they active on forums. They everybody knows them as like professionals. They follow this guy and then the this influencer let's say influencer can bring the players who follow him to one website or another website. It's kind of engine agent model that doesn't exist actually for other verticals.

So like players follow some specific like influencer... Is if he or she tells them like this website is great to play they all go. Yeah they're very devoted to some influencers.

Second is community based affiliation. So strong poker affiliates usually they are based on communities like gypsy team like very strong in CIS countries and their main core asset is forum where players get together and discuss like poker. Poker affiliate managers it's essential to work with affiliates which have strong community which have strong user base and retention of players and loyalty of players is Hi.

Mhm. This how they can build strong operation. Okay. Okay. Is that the main channel for poker operators? Usually affiliates... Community based... How can they strengthen?

It's the main the main channel and it's influencer like ambassadors.

Yeah.

It has been again right now been there for a while. Like right now ambassadors is very popular like influencer right among all the iGaming verticals like everybody is using this channel but for poker it had been actual like already for many years like using way to promote work with well-known poker players to promote brands. So like it's been a while. So like and still very actual.

The only thing like nowadays because of streaming it went to micro level or like you know like you can work with...

This is how Tony Bet came into existence. I remember this brand.

Yeah. Tony Bet. Yes. Tony G you know. Yeah. Yeah. This is how he built this because he was well known as a poker player and when he started his business like and invited everybody to go and play on his website it was...

It's natural. Yeah.

Yeah. It's from natural.

So like nowadays it's like more on the lower micro level when brands can work with very small influencers which have just...

Few hundreds. Yeah. Followers in streaming few thousands but still they can bring some traffic.

Do you provide it as a service as well? Because let's say there is an operator they're running casino they're running sports book and now they have integrated poker from you and they have no idea about this vertical for example. Do you also like support them through you know providing them some context or service regarding acquisition or...

We don't have it as like full service like because we don't we don't feel that we are professionals in traffic and affiliation. The thing we do as as a network we also have brand uh we play network inside Even Bet so like it's a poker network basically mainly in Europe in Africa and Middle East region and when we launch on this network a new brand, a new pocket skin, we usually help them with affiliates. We introduce some affiliates to them.

So in order to help them to start their business, but it's not like we have been thinking about this...

Okay.

Very often like returning back to this idea but for this we need to set up really strong marketing team. Yeah, because obviously it's all based on the trust. They come to you for the platform or the solution. So you only do things that you that you're very comfortable and that trust can be maintained is the main goal.

Yes. Yes.

Cool.

Also I mean recently I saw the announcement that you also expanded into turnkey casino as well as the aggregator business. So I wanted to know more about it as in Even Bet is kind of like a household name for poker. That's that's how I have known the brand since I was working at SiGMA like 8 years ago 10 years ago or so. So what's the main intention behind this expansion to other?

As a poker provider we are serving our customers like in two like mainly two different solutions. First we are integrating our games content into existing operators platform. Like normal operators. Content provider like usually like content provider. We approach platforms. We agree with them. We give them API and they integrate and activate for specific operators. But we also serve part of our customers and we have been doing it from the start of our business. Yeah.

With turnkey solution because very often especially it's actual for startups when they come to us and ask for like we want to launch our poker business. They don't want to go separately and buy a platform and then from us games and then wait for integration and so forth. They want like simple... Like invoices. Quick solution like that they can go online tomorrow. Yeah, this why we developed this many years ago we developed this platform.

But this was more like pokercentric platform but then it has been evolving towards casino platform because once you launch for operation our customers operates they ask ah where can we add casino games into this because you want to crossell and so forth and then we added casino games we added sports book and it has evolved to like normal platform and last year we tried to launch it as a separate brand Flex Play.

Okay. Ah okay.

Yeah but we figure out that maintaining two brands. It's kind of too complicated for us. At this stage of our development, we're not yet on the level like we when we are huge company that can afford different brands, different marketing teams and so for different budgets.

Yes.

Exactly. So like we made decision that okay it's not that right idea then we like let's say we return back this casino vertical into our main brand and relaunched from the image perspective it's recently under Even Bet brand but the idea behind is the same to have this like small niche platform mainly for poker operators but also for a wider like casino small operations.

But it's trust in the markets Even Bet is known. It's trusted so I think it was the right move from the marketing perspective I've been ahead of marketing in the B2B as well it's much easier you know working on the trust that a brand name has rather than add a new brand also working again from the zero from the on trust yes.

Exactly you're right so it was really good when I saw I was like wow this is this makes perfect sense.

Thank you.

Cool.

Well, thank you so much for joining me and sharing your insights as well as latest updates. So I look forward to meeting you again in one of the events and yeah, thank you.

Thank you for the meaningful dialogue. Yeah.

That's it guys. Thank you so much for watching. Do let us know your thoughts in the comments below and follow Dimitri as well as Even Bet poker Even Bet platform and the brand and I see you on the next one.