My first question to Richard Dennys, CEO of Game Lounge, was are you a naturally gifted leader or someone that constantly works at it? He alluded to a lot of hard work and making his mistakes less costly over time. I personally think he's got a natural gift for it plus he's mindful to not rest on his skills and improve. Richard is barely 1 year into his role as CEO of Game Lounge which is one of the biggest iGaming affiliates in the industry. He was previously CEO of Webgains where he brings the global affiliate marketing experience with him. I personally think that is an advantage for him to help Game Lounge continue to be a leading company in iGaming. I did want to give a quick shoutout to their newest project which is SaaS Genius which is a topic I'm passionate about as a SaaS co-founder of StatsDrone.

Meet Stefan Muehlbauer who works with Master In Cash affiliate program and is the founder of Affpal.net doing consulting for affiliate managers. He knows affiliate management well and understands what affiliate managers need today to be successful.

Meet Marco Braun who's the founder of MyTopSlot and an aspiring entrepreneur. This episode is not your ordinary one as it is an affiliate coaching episode. I give Marco my best tips as an affiliate coach on how he can cut through the noise and build a slots site in a competitive space. One of my recommendations is to consider a slots podcast as a means of generating faster income and building a trusted audience and dominating another channel that he can own.

Meet Julia Draghici, the co-founder of CPV Lab and CPV One that helps affiliates, media buyers and marketing agencies to track, manage, and optimize their marketing campaigns in one place with a very powerful ad-tracking platform. I'm excited to share this recording of Julia because we have similar apps that technically are competitors but we operate in different industries. We are both SaaS companies working in affiliate marketing where she acknowledges that SaaS industry shares and affiliates are secretive with data sharing and insights. She thinks this is something that should change to improve affiliate marketing.

Meet Bob Burg who's the co-author of The Go Giver book and is a sought out speaker. Bob exhibits a lot of qualities that my other guests have, which is they openly share information without asking for as much in return. All of those podcast guests all seem to share similar stories especially the SEO pros which is the more they share, the more their business and demand grows. On reflecting on the discussion I had with Bob, there are 2 other people I think about and I want to share how the 3 of these people connect in my mind. Tom Hunt of fame.so is constantly giving advice away on LinkedIn that also includes how to make a better podcast and the value you'll get by podcasting. Podcasting is a platform where you have to share value and create content. Carrie Rose of Rise at Seven, whom I've never met by the way, I've heard her share SEO stories where she would put herself in her client's shoes when solving their SEO problems. Not many SEO consultants do this and I think this is one reason why Rise at Seven has become some a prominent SEO agency. Bob Burg simply lives and breathes his philosophy. For those that are lucky enough to understand and believe what Bob teaches, this could be the most valuable takeaway anybody could get especially in affiliate marketing. It makes me realize that some of the best affiliate marketers focus on their users more. They just try to give more value as a means of the reason for their site to exist.

Meet Lou Viveros whom I was introduced through Matt Diggity. Matt posted that Lou was there in some of his M&A transactions and that is when I learned about Lou's work in both M&A as well as being an advisor to startups, SEOs and affiliate companies. As a startup, I've learned quite a few things from Lou in getting to know him over the past year and I've gained a bigger appreciation for advisors like him. Lou Viveros is now launching the SBOCoach.com program to help small business owners. Lou also is featured in the advisory section of The Affiliate Lab course by Matt Diggity.

Meet Rowan Ellis who runs XVARO and you could call him your fractional CFO for hire. Rowan doesn't just help companies get their books in order but he helps them with financial strategy. This can often lead to discussion around mergers & acquisitions (M&A) and in the affiliate space, those topics are somewhat normalized as everyone seems to think about exit strategies in affiliation.

Meet Dragan Berak who's the Head of SEO at Gentoo Media and was the Head of SEO Global at AskGamblers before it got acquired by GiG and now is part of Gentoo. Dragan got to see first hand how to improve a giant iGaming affiliate site in AskGamblers. I've had the pleasure to chat with Dragan at conferences before so I know he is very passionate about SEO. We both follow the likes of Lily Ray, Glen Allsopp and Eli Schwartz that have unique takes on the SEO landscape. If your affiliate site has been hit by any of the Google penalties in the past 12 months, I think you should listen to this episode with a pen and notepad and take some notes. If you want to get my takeaway to add some perspective of what I learned in asking Dragan all of these SEO questions, it would be to ask yourself this question: is this piece of content I'm doing, the absolute best it can be? Am I adding a unique take on this topic that nobody else has? If you can't answer this question, I think you need to revisit the purpose of your affiliate site and it has to be a bit beyond just trying to make money.

Meet Neil Walker who's the specialist behind Live Casino Comparer and his niche approach has lead to success. In fact, Neil is considered one of the leading experts when it comes to knowledge of the live dealer games space. While Neil doesn't profess to be an expert in SEO, he does know that his attention to detail in his content is part of the reason for his SEO success.

Meet Gali Hartuv who's the creator of Gali's Guide which is a newsletter that explores the world of VIP in iGaming. Talking about VIP in iGaming whether it is casinos or sportsbooks, is usually a forbidden topic. That is exactly what Gali set out to do which is change the status quo and start talking about an important business topic within iGaming that nobody was writing about. All the questions today centre around the operator side and how affiliates either can help influence VIP players and how both sides can work together to improve business. At the core of this topic is retention which is something considered out of the hands of the affiliates however there are new affiliate sites that can help be a part of this ecosystem.

Meet James Oliver who's one of the co-founders of ParasiteSEO.com which is a unique SEO tool that ... helps you with parasite SEO. In this podcast, James explains what is parasite SEO and what are the best strategies and tips when it comes to leveraging this SEO tactic for your affiliate sites.

Meet Adam Rowley who's the MD of RavenTrack which is an iGaming affiliate program platform. Adam has experience as an affiliate, an affiliate manager, operator and now sits in a unique position of helping affiliate programs manage their affiliates and get better with their data. The key conversation here is all about customer retention and player value. Why are people not having enough of these convos? We'll we are bringing this one to you and the insights are ones you won't want to miss.

Meet Lily Ray who's the Vice President, SEO Strategy & Research at Amsive. I asked Lily what she thought that affiliate sites should be doing today to avoid the wrath of these Google core updates and to stay one step ahead. She is very active on X (Twitter) and LinkedIn and she's got a pulse on the world of search as well as studying the winners and losers in the affiliate marketing space.

Meet Ben Austen who's the the Director-level leader specialising in RevOps with Find.co, a fast growing media company in affiliate marketing, iGaming, EdTech, CSR SaaS and crypto. Ben believes that RevOps is an important job that can bridge the gap between sales and marketing. It is the intersection of Business Intelligence with finance connecting all aspects of a company whether affiliate marketing, SaaS, sales or media. I think what Ben does is a really insightful look at the world of RevOps and I realize these jobs are not common in affiliate marketing yet but I think they will become more important as more people learn the nuances of this work.

Meet Cristian Ionescu who's the co-founder of Witanalytica and one of the analytics experts at his company. Cristian thinks that affiliate marketing as an industry can be doubled over and that we've not even scratched the surface in terms of what we are capable of achieving given that Business Intelligence in affiliate marketing is fairly new.

Meet Jabez Reuben who's an SEO that has his own SEO tool such as linkvalidator.io and he also runs The Blue Prints agency and Vistavo.co. In this episode, Jabez shared with me a lot of link building tips that I think are clever and in some cases easy to action. Yet I know a lot of affiliates don't take the time to do any of them. If you are a new affiliate or new to SEO, definitely follow all Jabez's tips on link building. They are definitely worth implementing on your sites.

Meet Steve Toth, founder of SEO Notebook and event planner for SEO IRL in Toronto, Canada. Steve has been sending out 1 actionable note every week for 5 years straight. His SEO newsletter is one of the most popular ones in the whole SEO community.

Meet Marcin Kumięga who's the Business Development Director at Voluum. Cool name for a company? I would say they are one of the most advanced adtech companies I've seen in affiliate marketing.

We have 10 different SEO experts that we've taking some of their best tips and insights.

Meet Sean Bianco, co-founder of GainChanger SEO agency and a true student of SEO and marketing. We cover a lot of topics in iGaming in this episode.

Meet Zach Measures who's Commercial Director EMEA for Everflow.io which is an impressive tech solution for affiliate programs, affiliate networks and agencies. When Zach asked what the purpose of the podcast was, I think this episode itself explains that. That is when we have these interesting conversations about affiliate marketing in relation to Business Intelligence. I said these convos are not taking place as much as they should but when they happen, nobody is documenting them. That is why we started this podcast. Zach has some amazing insights on QR codes for affiliates and operators to the importance of affiliate managers.

Fery Kaszoni is the founder of Search Intelligence and this is his 2nd time being on the podcast. Link building is already changing after many spam and helpful content updates. In 2024, Fery is doubling down on digital PR as the crucial form of link building that has to be done for brands to stay relevant today.

Meet Umar Faizan whom is the founder of Growth Winner. Umar came highly recommended from Mads Singers to have him as a guest and I'm glad it happened. In this episode, he shares how not enough SEOs and affiliates sites focus on their audience. They produce written content, video content and social media content that is either for them or their self-serving needs. It isn't until you learn more about your audience that you get to understand how Google wants to share results with users.

Meet Kira Khoroshilova who does international SEO which personally I cannot think of any SEO experts that would be my go-to for this skillset. Think about things beyond local SEO but rather localization, cultural nuances and the dreaded hreflang for your sites. Kira has her brand called Diary of an SEO and she speaks at many SEO conferences around the world.

First of all big shoutout to Michal Suski for setting up this interview with the one and only, Eric Siu! Eric Siu jumped on the show to talk about programmatic SEO and how it can be leveraged for affiliate sites. Except that we went into different interesting topics covering podcasting, entrepreneurship, investing in startups and of course the future of affiliate marketing.

Karl Hudson shares a scary insight that a lot of great SEOs he knows don't take the time to look through reports in GSC, aka Google Search Console. His post on LinkedIn on the subject grabbed my attention and I knew there are others that feel the same that GSC is under-utilized.

Meet CMC, well that is what I say when talking about Cordelia Morgan - Cooper. She's lived and breathed hiring and managing large HR departments in some major affiliate companies including Catena Media. Now as a consultant through CMC Consulting, she's learned a lot along the way and has solid advice not just for startups, but affiliates looking to grow their business.

Meet Michael Filletti who's the co-founder of Routy, or rather Routy.app. Michael is passionate about Business Intelligence and applying BI and analytics to affiliate marketing. His comments on data literacy in iGaming and affiliate marketing are very much real and it is through tools like Routy which aim to unlock valuable insights that would make anybody a data analyst for optimizing their affiliate business.

Meet Julian Goldie who's a rising star in the SEO world. There are 3 things that I wanted to chat with Julian today and we covered AI content, YouTube as a content channel and using AI tools to automate more and more of your business.

Jason Barnard is known as the Brand SERP Guy and runs his own SEO agency called Kalicube. You might be here because of his wisdom and experience in Google Knowledge Panels but it all comes full circle back to branding for companies and for yourself as a person. Without sharing all the key insights of this episode, it will change your thoughts about how Google looks at the internet today and what you need to do to get ready for any more disruptions. He is also the author of The Fundamentals of Brand SERPs for Business!

Meet Lukasz Zelezny of SEO.London who's a well known SEO expert whom speaks at numerous SEO conferences globally. I know Lukasz as more of a technical SEO but we touch on a lot of intangibles in SEO of why there is so much disruption for affiliate sites today.

Should you start a podcast? There are enough pros and cons but the short answer is yes! Podcasting is a powerful channel for sales, personal branding and helping put your business on the radar of your potential buyers. Whether you're a SaaS founder or an affiliate company, podcasting is powerful.

Should you consider AI when producing content? Absolutely says Andrew Ansley of ContentSprout.ai

Meet Jon Bruford who's the co-host of The Gambling Files Podcast. He's nearly 20 years into the iGaming space as a content editor. He's got a lot of content insights that would be useful for any affiliate.

Meet Phil Fraser who runs the Business Sounding Board service as a business coach and is also the host of the Leeds Business Podcast. That podcast is amazing and I highly recommend you follow and listen to a few episodes of Phil's business podcast that talks about entrepreneurship and mentoring entrepreneurs. Phil has run many affiliate marketing businesses with successful exits and he shares his take on not just what he does but common mistakes he sees business owners make today.

Meet Olga Zarr who's an SEO consultant who is super into using AI for anything SEO related. Despite that, she does believe that you'll always want and need a human element in your content, in your affiliate sites. Plus see what she had to say about Craig Campbell to start things off.

Meet Steven Khanna who's a content creator and Head of English Markets at WhitePress®. Steven may only have a few years of SEO under his belt but he's got a great grasp of the current state of SEO including the numerous disruptions in Google search and the various Google updates that have rolled out and absolutely steamrolled a ton of affiliate sites. What's the core takeaway of this episode? 1. There will always be evergreen content and link building strategies. 2. Digital PR is leading the way for success 3. There's a massive need for advanced affiliate tools similar to others in the market like Senuto for what they do for SEOs.

Meet Fintan Costello whom runs The Gambling Files podcast and has had a successful career in iGaming leading up to an exit to the Gambling.com group. I took a page out of his podcast playbook and setup this episode without any agenda or planned questions and just talked. We covered a wide range of topics from affiliate marketing, data in the iGaming industry, investing, exits, M&A strategies and even how to create a good company culture.

Meet Mark Wright who won The Apprentice show in 2014 and used the £250,000 investment from Lord Alan Sugar to create an SEO agency called Climb Online. 10 years later, Mark has sold his SEO agency for many millions of pounds. There are many amazing insights from Mark in this interview. He talks about the value of the mentorship from Lord Sugar and shares his wisdom of being really good at one thing before moving onto other projects. The key takeaway from this episode is how he had success growing an SEO agency and what helped me make more sales. That is something that many SEO experts struggle with.

Meet Dustin Howes whom is the first person I think of when I think about affiliate marketing. Dustin has made a name for himself by hosting the Affiliate Nerd Out podcast, he runs Performance Marketing Manager which helps educate and train affiliate managers and he is also the co-founder of Affistash which is a tool for affiliate managers to help them prospect affiliates.

After I read all of Eli Schwartz's book called Product-Led SEO, I was hooked and had to ask him some questions about applying his strategies towards affiliate marketing and affiliate sites. Eli will change your world view on SEO and make you think more in terms of product and reshape how you look at search engine optimization practices.

Craig Campbell inspired me to get into producing videos and doing podcasting. I remember Craig telling me that video was a powerful tool for SEO but I didn't realize that it was a significant part of his sales and affiliate funnels. In this episode we also talk about masterminds and why he runs a mastermind group along with the benefits of being in one.

Tom Hunt is the host of my favourite podcast, Confessions of a B2B Marketer. He is also the founder of bCast which is a podcast host and he runs Fame.so which is an agency that helps B2B companies become famous in their niche with podcasting. I wanted to ask Tom questions about his B2B experience in how it can apply to B2C affiliate marketing. If you are thinking about launching a podcast, follow Tom, consume his social content and learn more about what he does at Fame.so

Why should you consider being in a Mastermind group? Meet James Dooley who's an SEO, affiliate, entrepreneur and investor. He credits masterminds as being the key ingredient to his success in business. He explains that you'll gain more knowledge in a mastermind group than you would attending any conference.

Meet Mads Singers. He is the founder of the SEO Mastery Summit, Aristo Sourcing and Mads Singers Management Consulting. I saw a recent clip of him on Instagram about making better business decisions with time management. That is when I realized that Mads isn't just another SEO but something more. What I got out of this podcast as the person asking the questions, I hope you get just as much value as I did.

What does SEO in affiliate marketing look like in 2024? I've had the luxury to interview these amazing SEO experts to ask a lot of questions. Questions like what SEO tools do you use, how would you build an affiliate site on a minimal budget, is it too late to do affiliate marketing and what strategies would you advise for affiliates for 2024 and beyond. These SEO experts include Matt Diggity, Kyle Roof, Victor Karpenko, Gabriela Covey, Sean Chaudhary, Fery Kaszoni, Michal Suski and Koray Tugburk Gubur.

Koray is building an SEO empire as he isn't just another SEO consultant but has an SEO course that is being recommended by some of the biggest names in SEO. In this episode we learn more about topical authority and how it applies to affiliate sites especially for 2024 SEO trends.

Bring on 2024 with this best of compilation of Affiliate BI podcast guests to date covering last year. This episode represents the future of affiliate marketing and your guide to affiliate marketing for 2024.