Mukesh Sharma's Blog (11)

Anyone actively running gambling campaigns in 2026 knows the conversation around traffic has changed. It’s no longer about whether you can launch ads, but how long they stay live and what kind of users they actually deliver. Regulations tighten, mainstream platforms quietly restrict reach, and what worked two years ago often fails moderation today.

This is why more advertisers are exploring ways to …

The online gambling market isn’t just growing—it’s fragmenting. New GEOs are opening, compliance rules are shifting, and player behavior is changing faster than most ad platforms can adapt. In this environment, casino advertising is no longer about “being visible everywhere.” It’s about being present in the right format, at the right moment, on the right network.

That’s why…

Last quarter, I watched an advertiser burn through $40,000 on a major sports platform, targeting what looked like prime inventory during playoff season. The clicks came in. The impressions were there. But conversions? Nearly flat. The issue wasn't the creative or the audience—it was the buying model. They paid for exposure, not outcomes.

That's the gap most advertisers…

There's a pattern most advertisers notice within their first month running online sports advertising campaigns—the traffic comes in quickly, but the value varies wildly. You'll see hundreds of clicks from users who browse once and vanish, while a small percentage returns…

Three months into promoting a casino brand across UK and German markets, an advertiser noticed something odd. Their cost per acquisition in Germany was climbing while UK numbers stayed predictable. Same creatives, similar bids, nearly identical audience setup. The difference? Regulatory interpretation and how platforms enforce compliance differently across borders.

This isn't…

I talked to a poker room manager last month who had burned through $40,000 in three weeks chasing what looked like premium placements. The clicks came in beautifully, thousands of them, but the registrations barely moved. When we dug into his analytics, the pattern was obvious: his …

I've been watching advertisers shift budgets away from the usual suspects lately, and it's not subtle anymore. Somewhere between rising CPCs on Google and Meta's ever-changing compliance hurdles, a whole segment of smart sports betting advertisers found breathing room elsewhere. Not because they wanted to leave, but because the math stopped working.

If you're running …

Last month, a betting platform pushed $40,000 into a live-match campaign. Impressions were solid. Click-through rates looked decent on paper. But deposits? Barely a trickle. The advertiser couldn't figure out where the disconnect happened—was it the creative, the landing page, or something deeper in the funnel?

This scenario plays out more often than most advertisers admit. …

Three months ago, I watched an advertiser burn through $18,000 in five days promoting a sports betting platform across Facebook and Google. The clicks looked solid, the CTR seemed respectable, but conversions? Practically nonexistent. The issue wasn't the creative or the budget—it was the complete misunderstanding of how …

Last quarter, I reviewed campaign data from over forty advertisers running gaming offers across different geos. One pattern stood out immediately: most weren't failing because of bad creatives or weak offers. They were bleeding budget on the wrong traffic sources. A sportsbook advertiser in tier-two Europe was spending heavily on display banners while their actual conversions came almost entirely from native placements. Another casino brand kept pouring money into pop traffic that brought…

There's a shift happening in how gambling brands acquire users, and it doesn't involve flashy banners or aggressive pop-ups. More advertisers are moving their budgets toward platforms where the audience doesn't feel sold to immediately. That environment is native advertising, and for iGaming, it's becoming less of an experiment and more of a standard channel.

The reason is simple. People don't engage with ads that scream "casino" the moment they land on a blog or news site. But they…