So I’ve been digging around a lot lately about how people are running ads for online iGaming promotion in 2025, and I figured I’d share my two cents here since I wish I had found a thread like this last year when I was completely lost.
When you’re first starting out with anything related to iGaming promotion, it feels like every other post or guide is telling you to use Google Ads, or to jump into social platforms, or to burn your budget on programmatic ads without even explaining what that really means in real-life results. It can be overwhelming because there are so many “top channels” floating around, and honestly, not all of them are worth the hype.

The pain point I ran into
What tripped me up at first was trying to follow everyone’s advice at once. People said Facebook ads are dead for iGaming, others swore by TikTok but never shared the struggles of getting content approved, and then there were these huge claims about affiliate networks being the “gold mine.” I tested small budgets across different platforms, and most of it just bled money without the kind of engagement I hoped for.
I think the biggest issue is that nobody tells you how each channel behaves differently depending on the audience. What works for someone promoting poker in Europe might fail completely for someone pushing sports betting in Asia. That was my painful lesson.

My personal test and insight
Out of curiosity, I set myself a little experiment at the start of this year. I gave myself a fixed budget and tried out three main channels:

• Search ads (classic but expensive if you’re not careful)
• Social platforms (tricky with policies but doable)
• Affiliate traffic networks (messy but sometimes surprising)

Here’s what happened.
Search ads did give me clicks but the competition in 2025 is brutal. If you don’t have a very niche targeting approach, you’ll drain cash fast. I would say search is useful if you have something very specific to promote, but for a broad campaign, it’s too pricey.
Social platforms are a mixed bag. Instagram reels looked promising but approvals were a headache. TikTok was hit or miss, but I noticed that creative, more natural-looking short clips worked way better than polished ad-style videos. The “homemade” vibe connected better with people scrolling.
Affiliate networks were the wildcard. Some traffic sources were clearly low quality, like bots or junk clicks, but there were also networks where I got surprisingly engaged leads. The trick here is testing and cutting out the bad sources quickly.
What I realized from this little test is that there isn’t one “magic” channel. The best channel is honestly the one you’re willing to put in time to understand. Each needs its own learning curve.

A softer hint toward a solution
If you’re just starting and don’t know where to focus, my suggestion is to avoid spreading yourself too thin. Pick one or two channels, run very small tests, and be patient enough to watch what works. I think the mistake I made early on was chasing every shiny “top advertising channel” headline instead of just picking something manageable and digging deeper into it.
If you want a simple breakdown of channels and how people are approaching them this year, I found this guide to online iGaming promotion really handy. It’s not the kind of thing that tells you what to do, but more like a reference point to compare your own approach.

Wrapping it up with my POV
At the end of the day, iGaming advertising in 2025 feels less about finding the “top” channel and more about figuring out what you can actually handle. Search is powerful but expensive, social platforms have reach but come with policy walls, and affiliate networks can be hit or miss depending on how well you filter.
So if you’re in the same boat as I was a while back, my advice would be simple: don’t rush, keep your tests small, and remember that what works for one person might not work for you. It’s more about experimenting and tweaking than blindly trusting someone’s list of “best channels.”
That’s just my experience though. I’d love to hear if anyone here has had luck with new or underrated channels this year because I still feel like the landscape keeps shifting every few months.