Bookies prepare for record-breaking football season
The Premier League gets underway this weekend and operators have been sharpening their elbows in the customer acquisition war
As CFOs continue to count their company’s World Cup profits, marketing and product teams have wasted no time in ramping-up their strategies for the new football season ahead of tomorrow’s big Premier League kick-off.
In what is expected to be a season that breaks all betting records, bookies have unleashed a charm offensive to keep World Cup momentum going and build upon customer numbers ahead of December’s Point of Consumption (PoC) tax.
Coral Interactive, which arguably stole the World Cup show with a series of eye-catching special offers, has for the last two weeks been best price on every team to win their respective leagues across England’s top four tiers and some of Europe’s major divisions, such as La Liga and Serie A.
“We have been running the Top Price On All Major Leagues for more than 10 days now, with the aim of attracting existing and new customers to the Coral website and mobile betting app in advance of the start of both the Football Leagues, and now the Premier League,” Simon Clare, Coral PR and broadcasting director, told eGaming Review.
“The World Cup went really well and we were delighted with our offering and marketing campaign, and we are expecting a significant halo effect when the football starts in earnest this weekend,” he added.
New customers
A hatful of other operators have also been rolling out the welcome mat to new customers with Paddy Power, BetVictor, Betfred and Boylesports all offering enhanced odds to new sign-ups, the latter going double the odds on teams to win the Premier League.
BetVictor is offering an enhanced opening weekend Premier League treble at 5/1, rather than the true 5/4, to new customers only and will push the special via a TV ad campaign over the next 24 hours. The ad will also highlight its recent best price bookmaker award from odds comparison site Oddscheker.
“It is fair to say we are in great shape ahead of the 2013-14 campaign and very much looking forward to another record breaking week with the return of the Premier League,” BetVictor online PR director, Charlie McCann said. “And hopefully we’ll get a couple of results going our way,” he added.
Meanwhile the likes of 888, Paddy Power and BetBright are focusing on customer retention and the use of LVT increasing tactics with offers of free bets should customers meet minimum staking requirements throughout the season.
888, for instance, has been asking customers to nominate three Premier League strikers and will award a free £5 bet each time one of those selected players scores a goal, as long as the customer has staked a minimum of £10 on that particular goal scoring match.
Pushing mobile
Fresh from reporting a 105% increase in mobile stakes, Ladbrokes has conjured up a new feature for its Mobenga-powered mobile product which it hopes will increase the number of margin-friendly accumulator bets for the new season.
‘My Accas’ provides customers with an in-play view of an accumulator’s status, giving customers a one-glance view of all legs of their accumulators as they unfold – a feature Ladbrokes says will “transform the experience on an exciting Saturday afternoon”.
“It’s simple to use, will quickly facilitate bet adjustments according to the match action and we’re confident it will go down a storm with loyal and new customers alike,” David Williams, Ladbrokes head of consumer PR, told eGR.
In terms of offers, Ladbrokes appear to be standout in offering money back should just one leg of a four or more team accumulator let a customer down. The offer, which is available online and via mobile only, trumps that of major rival William Hill which refunds bets for a single failure on accumulators of six selections or more.
Brand exposure
Unibet is running a ‘Kick Off’ competition where customers can win cash prizes and trips to football matches of their choice. Winners will be those who accumulate the most points allocated via a system which rewards frequent bettors of bigger priced selections.
Although not yet live with any special offers, William Hill will be hoping its recent tie-up with broadcaster BT Sport, which complements its current Sky Sports deal, will give the brand more exposure to football fans.
And in addition to the above, the close season has seen a flurry of sponsorship deals between online bookies and Premier League football clubs. William Hill with Southampton, bet365 with West Bromwich Albion and Marathonbet with Tottenham Hotspur, to name a few.
And it’s not just operators ramping up their marketing strategies. Earlier this week eGR reported that affiliate Oddscheker had switched ad agencies ahead of a new TV advertising campaign next month.
With this expected to be the last Premier League season to start pre-PoC, the marketing war is well and truly underway but just how aggressive operators will continue to be in the post-tax era remains to be seen.