Anyone tried gambling advertising tricks that boost ROI?

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how tricky gambling advertising gets when you’re targeting competitive GEOs. Some places feel like you’re running ads in a crowd where everyone is shouting louder than you. That’s what pushed me to ask around and experiment on my own, because I kept wondering whether small changes in my setup could actually improve ROI or if the whole thing was just luck and timing.

At one point, I honestly thought I was wasting my time. I’d put together what looked like decent campaigns, but as soon as I moved into hotter GEOs, everything that used to work somehow didn’t land the same way. Traffic felt more expensive, conversions dipped, and I was stuck in this loop of tweaking bids, creatives, and targeting, yet still not seeing enough movement. It felt like trying to squeeze water out of dry sand.

The frustrating part for me was hearing others say things like “just optimize more” or “test new angles.” That’s forum advice 101, but when you’re in the middle of a campaign bleed, the last thing you want is vague guidance. I wanted actual examples from people dealing with the same category — gambling advertising — because it behaves very differently compared to regular verticals. Player intent, risk appetite, regulations, competition, all of it plays into how well your ads perform.

So I started paying closer attention to what people were doing in threads about competitive GEOs. A lot of what I found wasn’t groundbreaking, but it made me rethink the order in which I was testing things. For example, I always assumed creative angles were the big game changer. But after talking to a few others, I realized that sometimes traffic quality matters more than the creative itself. Even the strongest angle won’t help if you’re getting users who weren’t suitable in the first place.

That pushed me to experiment with narrowing down entry points instead of widening them. I stopped chasing every placement I could get and instead focused on traffic sources that looked slow at first glance but delivered users who stuck around for more than just the sign-up. It wasn’t glamorous, but it felt steadier. One thing I noticed is that when I stopped trying to out-bid competitors and instead worked on filtering out the audiences I didn’t want, the campaign suddenly cleaned itself up.

Another thing that caught me off guard was how timing changed results. In certain GEOs, users react in completely different patterns than I expected. I used to schedule everything globally, but when I shifted to smaller windows, especially moments where local activity spikes, the conversion rate jumped. It wasn’t magic, just better alignment with user habits.

I also played around with small ad variations. Not big overhauls — just slight shifts in tone, color, or the kind of value I highlighted. Some versions tanked instantly, but others performed way better than expected. The ones that did well usually felt more “real” and less like a polished casino promo. That made me think that maybe people in competitive markets are already numb to classic ads, so anything that feels slightly different gets their attention.

After a mix of trial and error, the biggest shift happened when I started combining targeting tweaks with calmer creative approaches. Instead of trying to stand out loudly, I tried to stand out quietly. It sounds odd, but softer visuals and simpler messages sometimes outperformed the flashy stuff. I’m not sure if that’s universal, but in my tests, it helped lower the cost per acquisition.

While digging around for similar experiences, I found this breakdown that talks about different approaches and what others tried in similar GEOs. It wasn’t some magic blueprint, but it helped me think about the bigger picture rather than just tweaking random elements. If anyone’s curious, here’s the link I found useful while comparing experiences:  gambling ad tactics

After all this testing, I still feel like gambling advertising is unpredictable in some ways, but definitely not hopeless. Competitive GEOs make everything feel tighter and more expensive, but the right mix of timing, filtering, and tone can make campaigns feel less painful. The part that helped me the most was stepping back and watching how users behave rather than focusing only on what my competitors were doing. Sometimes the answer isn’t to compete harder — it’s to sidestep where everyone else is crowding.

So yeah, I’m still learning, and I’m sure I’ll tweak things a hundred more times. But I’m finally seeing that ROI can improve even in those tough GEOs if you look at the pieces of the setup instead of expecting one single trick to fix everything. Curious if anyone else had similar experiences or found something totally different that worked for them.