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Understanding the Impact of Invalid Traffic: How Online Betting Companies Can Protect Their Ads and Drive ROI
We are honored to publish this byline by Richard Metcalf, Director of Business Development EMEA, TrafficGuard. Make sure to let us know your comments below the article.
The global pandemic has undoubtedly caused a massive increase in the number of active users that gamble regularly. A global statistic from Casino.org suggests that almost 26% of the world’s population gamble, and the global gambling market is expected to grow from $76.79 billion to an impressive $127.45 billion by 2025, according to Research and Markets.
Betting companies are having to distinguish themselves in such a highly competitive and evolving market by investing in digital campaigns and using premium ad networks. However, many of these channels may not be properly equipped to deal with invalid traffic and ad fraud, and as a result, could be losing large amounts of money every day to fraudsters.
The level of financial and competitor growth within the industry has created a strong attraction from fraudsters, and gambling companies can fall prey with little to no knowledge this is even occurring. And, with the betting industry only saturating further, companies cannot afford to suffer from low ROI and poor campaign performance.
Understanding the Risk of Ad Fraud
The risks associated with virtual gambling are unfortunately heightened with such lucrative rewards on offer and many betting companies deploy protection to help minimise the risk of fraudulent transactions or unethical behaviour. However, there is a real lack of awareness around ad fraud within gambling, and many companies don’t realise the level of impact it’s having on them.
Ad fraud is any traffic that is maliciously created and used to target companies’ advertising budgets, and is a subset of invalid traffic, meaning any advertising engagement that is outside of the target of an advertising campaign.
Here are just some of the ways ad fraud is threatening your ad campaign:
- Bots – Bots are programmed to emulate human behaviour and vary in levels of sophistication and can do anything from clicking and viewing ads to watching videos. Promo abuse bots that click on paid search ads and then run scripts to claim free bets or free spins are highly prevalent in online gaming. As these bots ‘convert’, delivering misleading marketing metrics, it means you are likely optimising campaigns using the wrong data and towards winning more bot traffic.
- Browser-Related Fraud – For example, location fraud, which involves manipulating users’ location information to match the advertiser’s targeting criterion, and domain spoofing, when bad actors monetise the traffic from low-quality sites by manipulating the domains and making it appear to come from high-quality sources.
- Misattribution Fraud – A large volume of clicks on both affiliate and mobile campaigns are faked from a mobile device, even though the user never clicked the ad. If a user with a similar fingerprint then visits the target website and installs the app, the spammer receives credit for the conversion/install and is paid commission.
In reality, the result of ad fraud is inaccurate advertising results and wasted budget. One globally-renowned online betting company that was running a Google Ads campaign found that 23% of its clicks were invalidated, which equated to 28% of its advertising spend.
Without any prior visibility or protection, 71% of the gambling company’s wasted spend was attributed to just one of its campaigns. If the company had the visibility and awareness it truly needed to be able to address the problem, there was an opportunity to save $115,000, a mixture of media spend and potential losses in bonus deposits.
All gambling companies that run Google Ads campaigns are equally as vulnerable as this online betting company, which makes it crucial for marketers operating within this industry to proactively put themselves ahead of fraudsters with increased visibility, accurate analytics, and real-time protection.
Protecting and Saving Your Budget
With confidence in your data and analytics, the saving potential for gambling companies is around 10%, 7% higher than that of other verticals. The solution to invalid traffic starts with knowing exactly how it is impacting your business, and how you can combat it. With trustworthy data that analyses every bit of traffic quality, you can easily make a business case to combat bots, browser fraud and misattribution.
With visibility into the scale of the problem, betting companies can then properly evaluate the right solutions and the partner needed to help solve it. Once you’ve identified a partner with the right skills, technology and expertise for you, they can make an immediate impact.
Elimination with Prevention
Ad fraud currently dominates many betting companies globally, but a change of hands is within reach. Luckily, stopping invalid traffic doesn’t have to be complex or costly. In fact, the money you save will almost always outweigh your investment into stopping it, ensuring you can focus solely on making new savings.
By combining proactivity with visibility, betting companies can make enormous savings and address invalid traffic with confidence and ease. With many betting companies globally only looking to scale their digital marketing further, now is the time to understand your advertising losses and prevent them to achieve maximum growth and success.
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The French online sports betting market, often described as one of the most tightly regulated yet least dynamic in Europe, is preparing to welcome a surprising new entrant: Vibrez!. The operator secured regulatory approval and is now gearing up for launch, marking one of the few truly new brand arrivals in recent years.
Regulatory Approval and Market Entry
In 2025, Vibrez obtained an operating license from the Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ), under the authorization number 0063-PS-2025-05-15-AGR-00. The five-year renewable license covers only sports betting, with no authorization for poker or horse racing verticals.
At this stage, Vibrez’s website (www.vibrez.fr) is little more than a placeholder page. But the license approval signals the company’s commitment to entering France in 2026, timed closely with another newcomer, Bet365, which is in the process of getting its license just weeks later.
Who is Behind Vibrez?
The operator remains shrouded in mystery. Unlike market entrants backed by household names such as FDJ, Kindred, or Entain, Vibrez appears to be an independent French-facing brand.
The licensing application was submitted via BCFR, the same entity linked to brands like DAZN Bet, Circus Bet, and Vbet in France. This strongly suggests that BetConstruct, a B2B software and platform provider with experience powering multiple operators, is the technology backbone behind Vibrez.
While the corporate structure offers some clarity, Vibrez’s strategic positioning and long-term ambitions remain uncertain.
Branding and Market Positioning: Hints of Community?
Even the usually well-informed French website lebonparisportif.com, which monitor the iGaming market in France, cannot say much about what this new bookmaker will offer, but they wrote a few guesses about in an article in French (“Qui se cache derrière Vibrez?”) that we translate some key suggestions here:
According to them, the brand name “Vibrez” (French for “feel the thrill” or “vibrate”) and the teaser slogan “prépare-toi à vibrer” hint at a potentially community-driven or experience-focused positioning. This suggests Vibrez may experiment with new betting formats, perhaps inspired by simplified or binary-style markets such as “Yes/No” propositions, aiming to differentiate from more traditional sportsbook offerings.
The French market, while sizable, leaves little room for pure replication strategies. To gain traction against entrenched competitors like Winamax, Betclic, and ParionsSport (FDJ), Vibrez will need to bring innovation, either through product design, gamification, or marketing strategies that resonate with younger demographics.
The French Market: A Rare Case of New Entrants
The arrival of Vibrez is significant precisely because new operators are rare in France. DAZN Bet, is the most recent betting site launched in France.
With two brand launches expected before the end of 2026, observers anticipate a modest shake-up in an otherwise mature and concentrated market. Whether Vibrez will bring genuine disruption or simply serve as a niche challenger remains to be seen.
What Comes Next
Vibrez has yet to announce an official launch date, though industry insiders expect the platform to go live in 2026, probably before the World Cup this summer, which should be a highlight in the sports betting world this year. Welcome bonuses are likely to follow the French market standard, capped at €100 in free bets due to ANJ’s strict promotional guidelines.
Until then, Vibrez represents one of the most intriguing mysteries in French iGaming: a brand with no legacy, no major international parent, but potentially bold ambitions to “make the market vibrate.”
The post Vibrez! A New, Mysterious Sports Betting Operator Gains ANJ Approval in France appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
In the second half of 2025, Greece emerged as Europe’s fastest-growing iGaming market. While several major jurisdictions slowed or declined, Greek market demand rose by more than 50% between June and December, standing out as one of the year’s clearest growth stories.
According to data from Blask, the surge was not the result of a single tournament or seasonal spike. Instead, it reflected a structural shift driven by a combination of sports momentum, regulatory reform and casino market dynamics — factors that can now be traced in detail through Blask’s newly released Market Explanation feature.
Continuous sports momentum without demand gaps
Greece’s growth was underpinned by a tightly stacked sports calendar that sustained engagement across multiple months. EuroBasket 2025 in late August, the kickoff of the Stoiximan Super League, UEFA Champions League matchdays under the new league-phase format, and the EuroLeague season featuring Greek clubs created a continuous rhythm of high-interest betting cycles throughout autumn.
Rather than short-lived peaks followed by sharp declines, demand remained elevated well beyond individual events. This is a pattern clearly visible on the Blask Index trend line.
Casino reform reshaped demand behavior
One of the most significant contributors came from the casino segment. Greece’s decision to raise RNG stake limits from €2 to €20 altered the mechanics of the market, allowing online casinos to absorb demand during sports off-peak periods.
As sports-led acquisition increasingly converted into casino play, operators reported double-digit iGaming growth. Market Explanation analysis shows that this effect persisted over time, confirming the shift as structural rather than seasonal.
Enforcement redirected demand to licensed operators
Regulatory action further reinforced the upward trend. In December, Greek authorities blocked approximately 11,000 illegal gambling domains. Instead of suppressing demand, the move redirected player interest toward licensed platforms, strengthening regulated market performance.
The impact was amplified by the adoption of IRIS instant payments, which reduced deposit friction and improved conversion from interest to activity.
From tracking trends to understanding causes
To surface these drivers, Blask has introduced Market Explanation — an AI-powered layer within the Blask Index that allows users to click on any country’s trend line and instantly see a sourced breakdown of the forces behind the movement. Sports calendars, regulatory changes, casino dynamics and macro factors are analyzed together, turning raw demand signals into actionable market context.
Greece’s 2025 performance illustrates how this approach changes market analysis. Rather than simply observing that demand is rising, operators, suppliers and investors can now see why it is happening — and which levers are shaping the trajectory of a market in real time.
The post Greece Led Europe’s iGaming Growth in 2025 — Now the Drivers Are Fully Explained appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
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The post GR8 Tech Delivers 1.6× Higher Deposit Conversion and 3× Reduction in Transaction Costs for Crypto Turnkey Clients appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
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