Why More Affiliate Traffic Does Not Always Mean More Growth

During the AffPapa Conference Madrid, our host Surya Palli spoke with Gor Chatyan, Head of Managed Services & Marketing at PartnerMatrix.

The conversation looked at affiliate fraud, shaving, player acquisition and one mistake that can cost operators a lot of money: trying to scale traffic before understanding the market properly.

Recorded as part of the 4th edition of The Real Roadshow 2026, here’s what stood out.

Affiliate fraud is not always just an affiliate problem

Surya started with a simple question. If fraud linked to affiliate traffic is rising, what are operators getting wrong?

For Gor, there is no single answer. But one common problem is a lack of market knowledge.

Operators sometimes enter a market and start working with affiliates before they really understand who they are dealing with, how the traffic should behave or what kind of checks are needed.

That can become a bigger issue when the focus is only on acquisition.

Traffic may be coming in, but if KYC, fraud checks and player screening are weak, the operator can end up paying for traffic that does not create real value.

Big bonuses can bring the wrong kind of traffic

Gor also pointed to bonuses as one area operators need to be careful with.

A large bonus can help bring in players, but it can also attract people who are only interested in taking advantage of the offer.

If the operator does not have a strong setup behind it, the bonus can create more fraud instead of more growth.

The bigger point here is that more traffic will not fix a weak acquisition model.

Sometimes it only makes the weakness more visible.

Does affiliate shaving actually happen?

Affiliate shaving is widely discussed in private conversations across the industry, so Surya asked Gor about it directly.

Does it actually happen?

Gor did not avoid the question.

“Let’s be honest. Yes.”

The problem is not only about whether every shaving claim is correct. It is also about trust.

If an affiliate starts believing that players, conversions or revenue are not being tracked properly, the relationship with the operator can break down quickly.

That becomes even harder when the operator is new and has not yet built a reputation with affiliates.

A third party can sit between the operator and affiliate

This is where Gor explained PartnerMatrix’s affiliate management model.

The idea is to have a third party between the operator and the affiliate. That person can look at traffic, help set KPIs, analyse performance and work with both sides.

As Gor explained, the focus should be on:

“The quality of the traffic and quality of work between these two parts.”

For operators, this can make it easier to work with affiliates they do not know yet.

For affiliates, it can create more confidence when they are working with a new operator.

The main value is that both sides have someone looking at the performance without being fully on one side of the relationship.

Trust becomes much harder when the operator is new

Established operators already have a history in the market. Affiliates may know how they work, whether they pay on time and how reliable their reporting is.

New operators do not have that advantage.

An affiliate may wonder whether the tracking is correct or whether they will be paid properly. At the same time, the operator is trying to understand whether the affiliate is bringing real players and good-quality traffic.

Both sides are taking a risk.

That is why transparency matters so much in the early stages of an affiliate relationship.

Throwing more money at traffic does not fix a bad setup

Towards the end of the conversation, Surya asked Gor what he would advise operators building affiliate programs in 2026 and beyond.

His answer started with understanding the market.

“You should understand correctly your market and the behaviour of your players.”

This is where many new operators can go wrong.

They enter a market and start spending more on affiliates, bigger bonuses and stronger CPA deals because they want to grow quickly.

But if the product is not right for that market, spending more will not solve the problem.

Players might still come in, but they may leave just as fast.

Germany and Mexico are not the same market

Gor used Germany and Mexico as a simple example.

The same product cannot always be taken from one market and copied into another.

Player behaviour is different. Regulation is different. Acquisition channels can be different too.

So an operator cannot realistically build one setup and expect it to work in every country.

The product needs to fit the market, and the affiliate strategy needs to fit it too.

That kind of local understanding takes time.

Know the player before trying to scale the affiliate program

This was probably the clearest lesson from the conversation.

Before asking how to get more traffic, operators need to understand who they are trying to acquire.

How do those players behave? What offers do they respond to? What makes them stay? Does the product actually fit what they are looking for?

Once those answers are clearer, affiliates have a much better chance of bringing useful traffic.

Without that understanding, operators can end up spending more money on acquisition while the real problem is somewhere else.

What stood out to us

1. More affiliate traffic does not automatically mean better growth.
2. Operators need to understand the market before trying to scale acquisition.
3. Large bonuses can attract the wrong kind of traffic if the setup behind them is weak.
4. Affiliate shaving remains an important trust issue.
5. A third-party affiliate management layer can help create more transparency between both sides.
6. New operators need to work harder to earn affiliate trust.
7. Player behaviour should shape the acquisition strategy.
8. A product that works in one market may not work the same way in another.

What stayed with us after this conversation was that affiliate problems are not always caused by affiliates.

Sometimes the traffic is fine, but the product, market setup or acquisition strategy is not ready for it.

That is why scaling an affiliate program should not start with a bigger budget. It should start with understanding the player and the market first.

If an affiliate program is not performing, what would you check first: the traffic, the affiliate, or the operator’s own product?

As part of the 4th edition of The Real Roadshow 2026, this conversation was recorded at AffPapa Conference Madrid and is brought to you by Evoverse, providing custom crypto casino source code solutions, and Wicked Games, creating slot games that slap.