Influencers on TikTok and YouTube as a source of gambling traffic: 1xSlots Partners

Anastasia, Influence Manager at 1xSlots, explains what’s going on in the influencer space and why bloggers have become such a powerful driving force for growing audiences on social media.

Interview.- Year after year, marketing teams are growing and expanding their specialisations. There are no exceptions here — trends set the rules. One of the most popular roles in the past two years has been the Influence Manager. Our PR department is no exception.

We spoke with Anastasia, influence manager at 1xSlots, to find out what’s going on in the influencer space and why bloggers have become such a powerful driving force for growing audiences on social media.

 Why have TikTok and Instagram become one of the key channels for attracting players? How are they different from classical arbitrage?

In my opinion, TikTok and Instagram through influencers are primarily about trust. If you carefully craft the brief and seamlessly integrate the ad into a blogger’s content, you can attract a higher-quality audience for a smaller budget. On top of that, these platforms allow you to build long-term communities: warming up interest through content, encouraging repeated visits. When an influencer personally engages in the promotion process (especially if they’re working on a rev-share model), trust in their content grows dramatically.

 Why do users trust bloggers more than standard advertising?

It’s all about the effect of “real-life experience” and personal recommendations. If an influencer hasn’t been caught scamming before, and their audience is genuine and active, people believe they wouldn’t promote something useless. This type of promotion creates FOMO: if the influencer tried it and won, maybe I’ll get lucky too. But it’s important to understand — every market has its own mentality, so the approach needs to be adapted accordingly.

What formats do you most often use when working with influencers?

Mainly live content and additional stimulation through giveaways. But the format always depends on the influencer and their audience. We work with casino and slot reviews, live game streams, short hype-driven challenge videos, and lifestyle integrations: vlogs, entertainment, travel.

How do you find and select influencers?

Honestly? Through trial and error. We always look at GEO (the percentage of the audience from the target region), follower count, engagement rate (ER), and reach. We also check for fake followers — especially in Latin America, where it’s very common. If in the CIS region a 50 per cent fake audience already looks bad, in LatAm you might see accounts with up to 80 per cent fake followers. The test is simple: 1 million followers but only 30 likes on a reel — a clear red flag.

We also pay close attention to the influencer’s content itself. Here, experience, intuition, and “trained eye” matter the most. If at the very first stage something feels off, it usually means something really is wrong.

How do you integrate casino ads into influencer content?

We often use giveaways and always provide influencers with unique promo codes — usually no-deposit and “tasty” enough to get subscribers to try 1xSlots.

As for making integration “invisible” — honestly, that’s almost impossible. No matter how smooth the lead-in is, the audience will still know the influencer is promoting a casino. The key is to make it look organic. That’s the foundation of successful advertising.

Can you share some cases and results?

I won’t reveal all the details, but we have collaborations we’ve repeated several times. With some influencers, we even co-create scenarios for reels and stories, brainstorming new bonuses and promotions to maximize audience engagement.

Of course, there are failures too. For example, cases where influencers took payment and disappeared. We learned our lesson — now we never pay 100 per cent upfront and vet partners more carefully. There are also situations where an influencer’s ad simply doesn’t resonate with their audience, even if we bet on them. But that’s normal — there are no breakthroughs without setbacks.

How do you see the future of influencer marketing in igaming?

The future belongs to micro-influencers. They usually have highly engaged, quality audiences with a strong level of trust. If you choose the right ones, the results can be excellent.