How Casino Affiliate Commissions Are Set
CPA, RevShare and hybrid deals are not pulled from a rate card. They are sized against your traffic source, your GEOs and your player quality. Here is the thinking behind the numbers, the three factors that move a CPA up, and why the payment mechanics matter as much as the headline rate.
Casino affiliate commissions are set against three things: where the traffic comes from, how the players behave after the deposit, and which market they deposit in. The deal type (CPA, RevShare or hybrid) follows from that, not from a rate card.
Most networks skip that step. They publish a grid of numbers, badge the biggest one as "top tier", and make it look like a starting point. It is a ceiling.
The first thing we look at is not your volume
Most networks ask "how many clicks do you send?" as the opening question, because volume is the simplest thing to price. We ask something different first: where does the traffic come from, and what does it do after the click?
A partner sending 500 clicks a month from a UK-focused review site will get a different deal from one sending 50,000 clicks via paid social across six countries. The traffic behaves differently, so the deal has to.
The review-site partner's players stick. They read a comparison, chose the casino deliberately, and deposit with intent. That traffic is worth more over twelve months than on day one, so RevShare is the obvious fit.
The paid social partner's players churn faster. But the volume is high, the ad spend is real, and the cash has to come back fast. CPA covers that: a fixed payout per first deposit, settled predictably.
How a CPA gets sized
A CPA is priced backward from what the casino expects to earn from that player over time. The market, the traffic source and the conversion quality all adjust it.
A UK player depositing through a content site is worth more to a casino than a LATAM player acquired via push notifications, and the CPA reflects that gap directly. Compliant Tier 1 traffic gets a number closer to the programme maximum (up to €450 CPA). Unproven traffic in a new geo starts lower and moves once the data lands.
Three things push a CPA up:
- Deposit quality. Players who deposit and play are worth more than players who deposit, grab a bonus, and disappear. If your depositors play beyond the first session, that works in your favour.
- GEO value. A first deposit from a Tier 1 regulated market (UK, Nordics, DACH) commands a higher CPA than an unregulated market, because the player's expected lifetime value is higher and the regulatory cost is already priced in.
- Consistency. Ten deposits a week, every week, is easier for us to plan around than 300 in one week and nothing the next. Predictable volume gets better terms because it carries less risk.
The number has to make commercial sense for both sides, or it gets renegotiated within a quarter.
How a RevShare percentage is set
Your RevShare percentage is applied to Net Gaming Revenue: what the casino keeps after player winnings, bonuses and processing costs are subtracted.
The percentage itself starts from a baseline and moves toward the programme maximum (up to 50%) based on the same factors as CPA: traffic quality, GEO mix, volume, and how long your players stay active. A partner whose players stay active for months will earn a higher share than one whose players disappear within weeks, because the casino makes more from them and is willing to share more of it.
When hybrid is the right answer
Hybrid is the deal type most new partners choose on our network. The structure: a reduced CPA to cover immediate acquisition costs, plus an ongoing RevShare tail. The CPA leg is lower than a pure CPA deal, the RevShare leg is lower than a pure RevShare deal, but the total modelled over twelve months against real player data usually beats either one standalone.
It fits best when a partner is scaling: spending to acquire traffic now while building a base of referred players that pays for months. The CPA covers today's ad invoice. The RevShare turns last quarter's players into this quarter's recurring income.
Your manager will model this during onboarding against your actual traffic, not a generic projection. If pure CPA or pure RevShare genuinely pays better for what you send, that is what we will recommend.
What happens after the deal is set
Deals get reviewed. Traffic changes, markets shift, and a structure that worked in month one might not work in month six.
Every partner has a named account manager whose job includes checking the deal against actual performance. If your traffic quality improves, your conversion rates climb, or you open a higher-value market, the terms should move with that. Better terms follow from better data, not from an ultimatum.
It works the other way too. If deposit quality drops or a geo stops converting, the conversation happens early rather than after the numbers have already forced it.
Payment mechanics matter as much as the rate
The rate is the number partners compare. The payment mechanics are what decides whether that number actually reaches your wallet.
Confirmed balances are paid out automatically once a month, within the first ten business days of the following month, in crypto. No withdrawal request. No approval queue. You set your wallet once and the money arrives on schedule.
If your balance does not hit the minimum threshold in a given month, it rolls over. Nothing is deducted, nothing expires.
The rate on paper and the money in your wallet are only the same number if the mechanics between them work.
The hidden maths in RevShare
A headline rate means nothing if the math underneath it is broken.
A high percentage on an aggressive deduction schedule pays less than a modest percentage on a clean one. Our NGR calculation is disclosed in your agreement. We do not bury admin fees or platform charges that quietly eat the base your share is calculated on. That matters more than a percentage point either way.
Another policy that changes the maths: we do not carry negative balances forward. If your referred players have a winning month and the casino loses money on them, your RevShare balance resets to zero on the first of the next month. You never open a month owing us money from a previous one. That is in your RevShare agreement, not a banner on a landing page.
See what your deal would look like
The numbers above are the logic. The actual deal is specific to your traffic, your markets and your volume.
Apply for a partner account and your manager will come back with a structure modelled on what you send, not a row from a rate card.
