Glossary, 21 terms
The words your contracts count on you not knowing.
Plain-language definitions of every term that decides how iGaming affiliates get tracked, measured and paid. Each entry covers the mechanics, a worked example and why it matters for your deals.
Money, deals and compliance
The terms that decide how much you earn and what gets deducted before you do.
FTD (First Time Deposit)
An FTD, or First Time Deposit, is the first real-money deposit a referred player makes at an iGaming operator. It is the standard conversion event that turns a registration into a paying customer and, in most deals, the moment an affiliate starts earning.
GGR (Gross Gaming Revenue)
GGR, or Gross Gaming Revenue, is the total amount players wager minus the winnings paid back to them. It measures what the operator wins from play before any bonuses, fees, or costs are deducted.
NGR (Net Gaming Revenue)
NGR, or Net Gaming Revenue, is Gross Gaming Revenue minus deductions such as bonus costs, payment processing fees, gaming taxes, and platform or admin fees. It is the base figure most RevShare deals actually pay a percentage of.
RevShare (Revenue Share)
RevShare is a commission model where the affiliate earns a fixed percentage of the net revenue, usually NGR, that their referred players generate for the operator, paid every month for as long as the players remain active and attributed.
CPA (Cost Per Acquisition)
CPA, or Cost Per Acquisition, is a commission model where the operator pays the affiliate a fixed one-time fee for each referred player who completes a qualifying action, in iGaming almost always a first deposit above an agreed minimum.
Hybrid deal
A hybrid deal is an affiliate commission structure that combines an upfront CPA payment per qualifying first-time depositor with an ongoing RevShare percentage on the same players' net revenue. It trades some of each model's peak value for cash flow now plus a long-term tail.
EPC (Earnings Per Click)
EPC, or Earnings Per Click, is total affiliate commission divided by the number of clicks sent, expressing how much each click on a link is worth on average. It is the standard yardstick for comparing offers and placements on equal terms.
Admin fee
An admin fee is a percentage deduction an operator applies when converting GGR to NGR, covering platform, processing, and licensing costs. It reduces the revenue base a RevShare commission is calculated on, so the same headline rate pays less.
Negative carryover
Negative carryover is a RevShare clause where a negative NGR balance in one period rolls into the next, so the affiliate earns nothing until the deficit is recovered. Without it, each period resets to zero.
Brand bundling
Brand bundling is a contract practice where an operator group calculates an affiliate's RevShare across all of its brands as a single pooled NGR figure, instead of per brand. A negative balance on one brand then reduces, or wipes out, commission earned on another.
Sub-affiliate
A sub-affiliate is an affiliate recruited into a program by another affiliate. The recruiter earns an override, a percentage cut of the commissions their sub-affiliates generate, paid by the program on top of, not out of, the sub-affiliate's earnings in most structures.
KYC (Know Your Customer)
KYC, Know Your Customer, is the identity verification process regulated operators must run on players, typically checking identity documents, age and sometimes source of funds, before allowing deposits, play or withdrawals. For affiliates, KYC is the checkpoint between a tracked signup and a conversion that actually pays.
Tracking and attribution
The plumbing that connects a click to a commission, and where it breaks.
Smartlink
A smartlink is a single tracking URL that routes each click to a different destination based on rules such as the visitor's country, device, language or the offers currently available. One link, many possible landing pages.
Postback
A postback is an automated server-to-server request that an operator or network sends to an affiliate's tracking platform when a conversion happens, such as a registration or a first deposit. It carries the click ID so the conversion can be matched back to the exact click that produced it.
S2S tracking (server-to-server)
S2S tracking, short for server-to-server tracking, attributes conversions through direct communication between the operator's server and the affiliate's tracking server, using a click ID instead of browser cookies or pixels. Nothing in the user's browser has to survive for attribution to work.
Click ID
A click ID is a unique identifier generated for each individual click on an affiliate link, passed to the operator and returned in conversion postbacks. It is the thread that connects a specific click to the registration, deposit and revenue that follow.
AI and search
The vocabulary of the agent era and the AI-shaped search results page.
AI agent
An AI agent is software that uses a language model to pursue a goal autonomously: it plans steps, calls tools or APIs, reads the results, and adjusts until the task is done. Unlike a chatbot, it acts rather than just answers.
Agentic workflow
An agentic workflow is a multi-step process in which AI agents carry out defined stages of a task, plan, act, verify, hand off, with human checkpoints at the decisions that matter. It is the structure that turns a capable agent into a reliable process.
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization)
Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the practice of structuring and writing content so that AI systems, chat assistants and AI-powered search, cite or draw on it when generating answers. Where SEO optimizes for ranking, GEO optimizes for being the source.
AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)
Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is optimizing content to be selected as the direct answer to a specific question, in featured snippets, voice responses, and AI assistant replies. The unit of competition is the question, not the keyword.
Zero-click search
A zero-click search is a query that ends on the results page, with no visit to any website, because the answer appears directly in a snippet, knowledge panel, or AI-generated summary. For publishers, the impression happens but the visit never does.
Page updated July 22, 2026.
Terms are easier when the ledger does the math.
Adfilius shows validated FTDs, deductions and carryover as numbers in your ledger, not surprises in your invoice.
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