Opinion: Egaming's unfulfilled marketing potential

With a full year of Point of Consumption (PoC) obligations under their belt, UK-facing operators are now rolling out plans for 2016. In a year which includes the European Championships, Olympics and the Ryder Cup, revenue expectations will be set accordingly.

Some marketing budgets were reduced in 2015 to ease the impact of PoC, while others have increased. Ladbrokes has set itself a target of 1.3 million actives, but how do they, and the industry as a whole, optimise performance and increase market share?

In terms of where operators go next, one of the many strategies they need to adopt is going right back to the drawing board. The output of my recent industry analysis showed customer engagement approaches for new sign-ups to be extremely varied.

Illustrating the case

One company, which I’d rather not name, seemed somewhat indifferent when asked if there was any chance of receiving a welcome email, while the verification processes ranged from seamless to arduous.

CTA’s and incentives are often overlooked and one particular well-known brand could be applauded for using every conceivable means to communicate with the customer. However, the frequency were grounds for a harassment case in the making.

Potentially this scattergun approach yields some benefits as the brand is continually front and centre, but it also gives way to a variant of banner blindness. In terms of receptiveness, well-crafted and thought-out quality beats quantity in the engagement stakes time and time again.

It’s the norm that the majority of databases are inactive, recognising and interpreting this into a meaningful action plan to address this must be a business requirement.

The approaches operators take when a customer has signed up is varied and will naturally differ. What should be universal is applying significant effort to understanding the customer on very personal levels and applying a common sense, and human approach to gaining their ongoing loyalty. Whether this is labelled as CRM, the journey or experience – the terminology is secondary.

Every customer counts

All too quickly a lapsing customer or, as in my case, one who has lost the full extent of their initial deposit, is banished far too hastily.

It’s incredibly presumptuous and flawed to think a customer who has exuded all of the obvious traits of being the perfect recreational customer – the exact profile of which every operator will state they set out to attract – is likely to have ceased betting.

Understandably businesses predominantly invest most of their time monitoring obvious sections of their database. The inability to profile, segment and target, especially the bread and butter mere minnows, is a failing.

Perhaps operators have overlooked some of the basic business practices with focus and investment centred on more cutting edge approaches.

It should be a given that there is a place for both, with iteration being a continuous effort. For instance, personalisation has been muted for some time but is scarcely out of the starting blocks. However, there are some interesting initiatives underway.

New methods

Petr Stetka, head of real-time marketing at Gala Coral, spoke recently of their adoption of multivariate testing. They recognise the requirement to achieve the full view of the customer journey and present it in a personalised and simplified manner.

Other interesting industry examples include the bet-slip retargeting efforts of Betgenius and William Hill’s ‘bet suggestions’.

I find it difficult to subscribe to the rhetoric that industry entry or improvement in market share is insurmountable due to the dominance of big brands. It’s also no longer justifiable to solely bemoan the nigh on identical products and services operators subscribe to as the principal reasons behind the lack of differentiators.

Customers have a greater voice than ever, their expectations are set high, and, with that, opportunities are born. And industry forward thinkers are proving there are no shortages of ways to create edges.

Vast opportunity

Operators, like many businesses in other sectors, are simply facilitators for entertainment. They are middlemen, providers of our enjoyment and the efforts they expressly make are, by and large, totally inconsequential to that experience.

From marketing to personalisation, or just getting the basics right, the gambling industry needs to address so many areas to ensure stickiness.

It’s fascinating to look at the ways in which data, personalisation and technology will combine in the years to come to provide experiences well beyond the current capabilities.

In the short term there are also many viable and quicker routes to make a more immediate impact on performance which mustn’t be ignored. The opportunities are vast and in many cases a business’ sole limitation may only be its own creativity and imagination.