“Down $48K Until a Miracle Happens!!”, reads a recent Instagram from the well-known gambling influencer, ‘Lady Luck HQ’.
In the video, Lady Luck herself, Francine Maric, grins ear-to-ear, as several slot-spins take her from a loss of £36,324 (US$48,000 USD) to a win of £50,140 (US$66,250).
Influencer marketing is now a permanent fixture of most industries.
And iGaming is no exception.
A deluge of gambling influencers operate with massive followings. And gambling-harm charities such as GambleAware are concerned this is normalising problem-gambling for a younger generation already addicted to scrolling.
Hit Me With Your Algorithm
Influencers are, by their very definition, in the business of influencing.
Yet, their algorithmic success often directly hinges on extreme behaviour.
Fitness and gambling influencer, ‘Yogi’, for example, gambled away his US$2.3 million (£1.72m) house with a simple coin toss, amassing over two million views on Meta’s Instagram alone.
His Youtube channel candidly portrays his extensive time on online slots.
The first five minutes of one video I watched–simply titled I lost everything– depicts him viciously punching his streaming armchair moments after claiming he lost US$200,000 (£151,413), including US$30,000 (£22,714) he had convinced a friend on the phone to lend him moments before.
This delirious online world of high-stakes and big losses has proved significantly appealing to the iGaming industry, and become a central pillar of its marketing strategies in the recent years:
Big Losses
“We live in an age of instant gratification and quick results, where attention spans are shrinking and snappy, visual content is king,” Suzanne Jiggens, the Marketing Director of UK-based online casino, Temple Slots, told the iGaming industry last year.
“The rise of content platforms like TikTok and YouTube Shorts perfectly embodies this and it will only continue to evolve, with more and more platforms adopting similar strategies.”
This may be a dynamic, highly visible and profitable avenue for regulated platforms to promote themselves. But at what cost?
“[Influencers] are brushing off really big losses and almost normalising it” top gambling commentator Ash Gardner, told 7 News Australia last year.
Regulatory Environment
In the UK, influencer and celebrity gambling-marketing faces significant restrictions, thanks to 2022 legislation designed to protect under-18s and other vulnerable individuals from the associated harms of this kind of marketing.
Gambling adverts face a blanket ban from being appealing to under-18s; meaning things like cartoons, video-game references, or youth-orientated clothing styles must not be featured.
Marketers must also take into account the personal profile of any persons featured in their adverts – including the major demographics they appeal to.
This curtails the ability of an influencer whose main audience is under 18s, for example, from being featured in a gambling ad.
Elsewhere in Europe–notably in Italy, Belgium, Poland and the Netherlands– there is a total ban on influencer-promoted gambling posts.
In Brazil, home to the world’s fifth largest iGaming market, The Science and Technology Committee moved to enforce a complete ban on gambling advertisements this February – including influencer marketing and promotion.
Opacity
Influencer gambling promotions are often murky business.
A major 2024 study on social media gambling advertising by the University of Bristol analysed a total of 1,663 ads posted by the four major gambling brands on social media between July 29 and August 4 in 2024.
They found that 81 percent of these advertisements were what they termed ‘organic ads’ posted on Instagram, X, TikTok and Facebook.
Organic ads fall under the banner of content marketing: Advertisements designed to be shared amongst friends and followers online, often with no clear relation to the service or product being advertised.
In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) states that ads that are not clearly identifiable as advertising may be deemed deceptive.
Misleading
In the UK, the use of hidden ads or ‘misleading practices’ could land content creators a substantial fine as enforced by the Advertising Standards Authority.
But content marketing accounted for 52 percent (703 ads) of all ads analysed in the study.
And now, with major platforms taking steps to curtail paid-for gambling advertisements, these figures are likely to increase.
X recently banned gambling from influencer promotion and paid partnerships.
And while other major platforms like Instagram allow such advertisements, they face restrictions.
Crackdowns such as these might unintentionally encourage even more opaque ‘organic’ content, further blurring the lines between advertisements and social media posts. And make embedded advertising harder for users to recognise.
Vulnerable
In 2025 the global influencer market value was projected to reach over US$32 billion (£24.03bn) – a 35 percent increase from the previous year.
Given the sheer breadth of this global industry, and how marketing strategy is central for the gambling industry, one thing is clear: Influencer marketing isn’t going away anytime soon.
Companies and influencers alike must proceed with caution, carefully considering the associated ethical risks and the legal frameworks that they’re operating within as well as responsible advertising protocols.
And if they seriously wish to prevent harm amongst the most vulnerable, they must ditch the performative grand-standing and commit to working in a responsible and highly transparent way.
