As the Brazil World Cup lives up to the hype, betting- and football-related coverage might seem ubiquitous for those in the industry. But when it comes to attracting and retaining punters during and after the event, content-rich offers and targeting profiles are what enable operators to differentiate themselves, Bettorlogic chief executive Andrew Dagnall tells iGaming Business.

by Jake Pollard

As the world goes Brazil- and football-mad for the next four weeks, betting will dominate much of the igaming airwaves and there will be much talk of mobile betting, tailored offers, special promotions and enhanced user-experiences.

For all that, it is difficult to pinpoint exactly how online bookmakers will make a difference with punters, attract more of them than their competitors and, most importantly, get them to bet.

If the clients are novices, there will be the added challenge of getting them to bet regularly once the event is over, or possibly even harder to accomplish, after their team has been knocked out.

For Bettorlogic chief executive Andrew Dagnall, it is an appropriate analogy as he points out that the hardest thing for a betting operator to achieve is differentiation.

Making a difference
Some like Paddy Power do it via high profile, irreverent or humorous marketing, others like William Hill and Ladbrokes have major marketing budgets they can use, while the likes of Bwin have major sports sponsorships with brands like Manchester United or Real Madrid.

There is very little differentiation between operators other than the experience of users. Odds of 2.3 or 2.4 will not make much difference, you have to differentiate yourself through the offer and experience you provide to the customer, Andrew Dagnall tells iGaming Business.

Bettorlogic provides bet stimulation technology to online betting operators and recently signed up three major European operators in Betclic, Bwin and Betsson as well as the Hong Kong Jockey Club.

It will supply those companies with its Livelogic solution to increase volume by suggesting additional bets based on the action of customers, in-play updates that react to match situations to help stimulate customer interest.

The mechanics of what Dagnall’s company does revolve around inputting transactional data into our database and targeting punters by analysing their betting patterns after events like goals scored or during the second half of matches.

That can enable us to forecast activity for three months ahead, manage the experience and build a real profile. We then place the customers into a group, that social community that gets talking and exchanging information and foments activity. It’s a way of replicating what it was like in the bookies 30 years ago, he explains.

If the web has to a large extent removed that human contact, online communities are the closest thing to it, and if operators can replicate the social interaction of the local bookmakers they can benefit from the resulting action.

Moving onto data and betting patterns, Dagnall says operators can make use of the betting information at their disposal by promoting pre-match offers tied in to in-play offers.

100% bespoke
There is a wealth of data that shows clear betting patterns. Punters are creatures of habit, we know how and when they bet, the profiles are there. What is true is that we have to trigger the technology so it generates the action. This is done through CRM teams that can execute targeted messages.

Dagnall adds that the betting experience can be comparable to that of Amazon, when punters bet on an event, they should be getting a message saying why not bet on this other event/market as well.

The other important factor is that if punters don’t win they tend to give up and Dagnall says if you enhance their experience and remind them of what they’re good at it makes them feel better, enhances their experience and leaves a positive impression. How much they win doesn’t matter, it’s the fact of winning that counts.

What Dagnall describes above and promotes is, in many ways, the theory, but what of the practice? How much do his products add to betting volumes and how quantifiable are its effects on players and operators revenues?

Dagnall says he doesn’t know if punters follow through because his clients don’t divulge the information, but he knows 60-70% of them look at the data they receive.

We do know from our web analytics the sort of traffic that bet stimulation generates and from one client that turnover increased by 10-12% for those sports that we cover. Most clients won’t tell us exactly how much it generates as it could affect our agreements with them he explains.

The confidentiality aspects of business deals will always be there but as Dagnall adds, his company is building customer profiles, betting behaviours and in two or three years time betting will be completely personalised. My profile will be totally different to yours and things like streaming, offers and bet notifications will be 100% bespoke.

Of course Dagnall wants to be right in his prediction but his statement doesn’t seem far-fetched when one looks at how Facebook, Amazon or Google market and advertise to their users.

For the online betting sector, companies like Bettorlogic will be enabling delivery, ease of access and user experience in increasing detail.