REPORT SPORTS BETTING. Featuring: Bet IT Best Betgenius INTRALOT Kambi Sports Solutions Optima Information Services SBTech Sportradar Titanbet

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1 REPORT SPORTS BETTING Featuring: Bet IT Best Betgenius INTRALOT Kambi Sports Solutions Optima Information Services SBTech Sportradar Titanbet

2 Live Betting Solutions from the market leader Get a free test account now! Contact sales@betradar.com. Betradar s Live Betting Solutions offer complete match administration with profit maximising Live Odds and are optimised for all types of business. In total, our round-the-clock coverage amounts to over 18,000 live events each month across 18 sports. Our Live Odds Service via XML feeds is your fully automated and integrated in-running trading service for direct use, requiring only very limited resources to offer a broad variety of live betting sports and markets. Our Live Scouting Service, meanwhile, is your perfect information source to operate your own in-running trading. For more information, please visit our website or contact us today: sales@betradar.com

3 PAYMENTS REPORT 4 Head of content: Alun Bowden Tel: +44 (0) a.bowden@pageantmedia.com Report editor: Drew Nicol Tel: +44 (0) d.nicol@pageantmedia.com Head of production: Claudia Honerjager Sub-editors: Eleanor Stanley Luke Tuchscherer Mary Cooch Group commercial manager: Sam Compagnoni Tel: +44 (0) s.compagnoni@egrmagazine.com Publishing account manager: Debbie Robson Tel: +44 (0) d.robson@egrmagazine.com Publishing Executive: Charlie Robson Tel: +44 (0) c.robson@egrmagazine.com Content sales: Tel: +44 (0) subscriptions@egrmagazine.com CEO: Charlie Kerr Contents 06 The world s first online sports betting broker Nico Jansen explains how the business approach of Bet IT Best can combine bettors needs and bookies wants to result in a perfect match for both parties 16 Watch your behaviour! Iain Hutchison, commercial director at Betgenius, discusses how personalisation comes, at last, to the online gaming sector 09 Sports betting and in-play future trends SBTech CEO Itai Zak discusses the future of sports betting development and how SBTech s technology solutions can ease the process for operators 20 B2B experience adds value to operations Ben Simchon Chanoch, of INTRALOT, explains how to gain a competitive advantage for organisations addressing regulated markets 14 Why a one-stop shop is a sure bet Erik Lorenz, managing director, sales, at Sportradar, explains to egaming Review why an all-inclusive offering is essential for betting and gaming operators 23 Keeping up with global trends Jacob Curciel, founder and group CEO/CTO for Optima Information Services SLU, discusses the firm s progress across international markets egaming Review is published monthly by Pageant Gaming Media Thavies Inn House, 3-4 Holborn Circus London, EC1N 2HA, United Kingdom ISSN Printed by The Manson Group 2015 all rights reserved. No parts of this publication may be reproduced or used without the prior permission from the publisher 26 De-commoditising the sportsbook egaming Review catches up with Kamil Gajewski, of Kambi Sports Solutions, to discuss what features make a sportsbook successful 29 Marketing maze for sportsbook operators Russell Yershon, UK head of sportsbook for Titanbet, explains the challenges and opportunities of marketing and customer retention for sports betting operators

4 4 Introduction Odds in your favour The sportsbook vertical has enjoyed another year of all-round growth in most regulated regions. Industry players have pointed to an increase in media coverage of less mainstream sports and the impact of social media as contributing directly to the growing base of regular sports betting customers. For operators and service providers the focus continues to be on the expansion of mobile offerings. Gaining visibility in the crowded mobile arena needs innovation, which continues to be the buzz word as operators seek ever-more ingenious methods of attracting and retaining customers in a highly competitive marketplace. Offering features such as in-play betting and streaming, as well as leading edge CRM, remain key customer retention battlegrounds. However, operators continue to push their software providers to offer more streamlined and efficient solutions to gain and retain the attention of increasingly demanding customers. In this egaming Review Sports Betting Report 2015 we analyse how sportsbook requirements differ across geographical regions and whether or not personalisation will be the next must-have feature. We also study emerging trends in betting habits and what operators can do to leverage customer data to see maximum returns on marketing strategies. egaming Review also speaks to leading industry figures to discuss what makes a sportsbook successful in 2015 and highlights the challenges and opportunities facing those in all aspects of the online sports betting sector. By Drew Nicol Report editor

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6 6 Nico Jansen CEO Bet IT Best Nico Jansen is CEO and founder of Bet IT Best. The idea of Bet IT Best had been in Jansen s mind for a while (since 2006). Although feedback for the idea of Bet IT Best was more than positive during his Stanford University time, it took him until 2012 to become an entrepreneur by founding Bet IT Best. Featuring: Bet IT Best The world s first online sports betting broker Nico Jansen explains how the business approach of Bet IT Best can combine bettors needs and bookies wants to result in a perfect match for both parties egaming Review (egr): What is a sports betting broker? Nico Jansen (NJ): A broker is an individual or party that arranges transactions between a buyer and a seller. To do this, a broker needs to know the wants and needs of each side of the table and have the tools and resources to reach the largest possible base of buyers and sellers. A sports betting broker offers services to the customer buy side within the sports betting industry (the punters), and the sell side (the bookies). The customer side is interested in high odds, fast and reliable clearing and settlement of bets and cash, huge variety in offered bets, state-of-theart and mobile solutions to actually participate in sports betting, securely managed player accounts and easy to use registration and verification processes. Bookies, on the other hand, are inter alia interested in age verified and identified players, secured and reliable legal framework, reduced costs of operations (player handling, player identification, cash settlements) and, of course, maximum revenue per customer. egr: Is that similar to existing odds comparison sites? NJ: The existing model of an odds comparison website is focusing on only one specific aspect of the whole equation: which bookie offers the highest odds on a specific game? However, customers still have to register on each and every website including processing age verification, player identification, putting money in the account and dealing with a new website and processes of each and every bookie. These entry barriers prevent a lot of punters from regularly exploring new bookies. egr: How does Bet IT Best fit into this system? NJ: Keeping these parts of the equation in mind, we have taken the idea of an odds comparison website to the next level. Our service covers each and every part of the equation. The punter registers at our website, which they are already familiar with as they are using our sports news and/or livescores services. The punter runs the age verification and identification process once, puts money into their account and they re ready to go. For the bookies, we are offering fully processed, age verified, identified and known players to the bookies, ready-to-play. This means we have mitigated both the know-your-customer (KYC) and account setup costs for the bookie, which decreases their overall costs substantially. In addition, we know which sports, clubs and even specific players our customers are interested in, so we can provide user-specific and user-addressed bets to our bookie customers. This also decreases the costs per bet, as we can specifically address exactly those bets customers are interested in. As all of our customers are already age checked, verified and have money in their account, all of these customers are literally just one click away from fully exploring the offered bets of the bookies connected to our system. Clearing and settlement of all these bets will be processed with our stockexchanged proofed system between Bet IT Best and the bookies system. This will result in an increase of revenues for the bookies linked to our system. Decreasing costs while increasing revenues results in a win-win-situation for the bookies who just have to connect to our existing system to participate at these benefits. While the bookies just need one interface to participate in all of our services, our punters just need this one Bet IT Best account to cover all bookies linked to our system. Your one account to cover them all! As we are the first company ever to offer this kind of service to the online sports betting world, this finally makes us the first online sports betting broker.

7 egr: This is not a new idea for the industry. Why will your model succeed where others have failed? NJ: Of course we are fully aware of the failed approaches from two London-based companies, which focused on sports betting via telephone. The business model of Bet IT Best differs on one central point from this model: our business approach is fully scalable as we are an online sports betting broker. Therefore, we are not bound to the natural and technical limits of telephone calls, such as managing high amounts of calls, ensuring correct caller identification and verification, chargebacks due to misheard or incorrect information, etc. Once our customers have finished our know-your-customer process, they can use our services whenever and wherever they want. As bookies are fully integrated within our solution, communication between our systems happens on state-of-the-art and fully secure interfaces. Within our system we also resolve each and every regulatory requirement. That s why we are officially granted to offer our services as an online broker of sports bets to thirdparty operators. Prior to taking the bet we share all relevant customer information with the bookie, so the bookie will always be able to run its own KYC process in order to flag any issues such as existing player To survive they must fully understand and adapt to the needs of online sports betting customers, which is where our expertise comes into play Nico Jansen Bet IT Best bans or cool-down phases prior to taking the bet. As we solve these issues, and many more in addition, we will become a valuable sports betting market member for the players and the bookies. Therefore we will succeed within the market. egr: You are specifically marketing to bookies? Is your brand already established? NJ: We are already well known by our customers for our cross-platform sports news aggregation and livescores services. We can now offer this established industry knowledge, the native technology and all of our sports betting interested customers to the bookies. Just by setting up the interface and connecting to our services, the bookies fully participate in all of our services, resulting in decreased costs and increasing revenues. egr: What are your next steps? NJ: Our sports betting brokerage system is already up and running and we have already been able to connect some bookies to our system as well. We are doing some intense test-scenarios and full stresstests of our system to grant a 24/7 reliable service for all of our customers. In addition, we will expand our services by natural growth of the existing services and acquisition of additional service providers, which have already been identified, resulting in a stronger one-stop shop overall power of Bet IT Best for all of our customers. By launching our set-up and ready to fly marketing campaign we will finally enter the market as a sports betting broker by the end of Q2 or beginning of Q egr: Have there been any drawbacks of your business plan while making your idea live? NJ: There is no specific drawback of implementing or getting our services live, as we always prepare at least two ways of setting up a service, or implementing new features to our services. In terms of regulatory issues, everybody is facing an interesting market in Germany. Nobody knows when or if these regulatory issues will be solved in the near future, or if this will be a long-term issue. egr: How do you predict the industry will develop in the next three to five years? NJ: Our industry will continue to be an interesting market to be part of. Especially if you take into account that a huge player will enter the world of online sports betting, this will result in an intense market recalibration and market share shift. Within the near future one of the biggest telecoms companies, Deutsche Telekom, will enter the market of online sports betting. With pockets fully loaded with cash, a huge customer base of 142 million age verified and identified mobile customers, which are well-known by customer payments, the market of online sports betting will erupt like never known or seen before. Established and sizable market players will dramatically lose their market shares and the whole market will recalibrate. To survive they must fully understand and adapt to the needs of online sports betting customers, which is where our expertise comes into play. 7

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9 Featuring: SBTech Sports betting and in-play future trends SBTech CEO Itai Zak discusses the future of sports betting development and how SBTech s technology solutions can ease the process for operators Only a few years ago, sports betting covered football, tennis, basketball, horse racing and greyhounds. You had to go to your local betting shop in order to place your bets and you had to accept whatever prices that one bookie had. Now it s a whole different world, with sports betting available on a wider range of sports, more often, at better prices and via multiple channels. New developments in online and mobile technology have brought sports betting to everyone s fingertips, making it easier to bet than ever before. But far from grinding to a halt, sports betting and in-play are growing faster than ever. The race is on to offer more, more often, at better prices, faster, easier, more accessible, but where will this growth take sports betting and in-play in the near future? What lies ahead? We ve already seen sports betting expand to cover more sports than just the traditional ones. You can now bet on a whole range of sports from around the world, from tennis, golf, ice hockey, cricket and basketball to volleyball, winter sports and the Olympics. It s also increasingly more common to find betting opportunities on non-sports such as political campaigns and popular TV shows. This is expected to continue with the development of more bet types on more events, both sporting and non-sporting, which will, in turn, bring in new player segments and provide more revenue streams. But it s in-play betting that is expected to see the biggest growth in the coming months and years. We ll start to see live betting on more events, covering more than just the usual in-play sports, offering in-play betting on other popular events and non-sports too Itai Zak SBTech Today s society is all about instant gratification. We want everything yesterday and this is true especially in sports betting where players want more action on the sports they re watching right now, and settled instantly too. This is why we ll start to see live betting on more events, covering more than just the usual in-play sports, offering in-play betting on other popular events and non-sports too. The quality of the in-play offering will also increase. Many sports betting brands already offer some form of in-play betting so the emphasis will shift towards the quality of that offering to meet the demands of today s players who want to bet on more up-to-theminute action, such as who ll score the next point in a tennis match or Itai Zak CEO SBTech Itai Zak is the CEO of SBTech, a leading online betting and gaming technology and service provider. Zak joined SBTech in 2011, bringing more than 15 years of experience in various senior positions in the online gaming industry and is in charge of driving the company s strategy and vision through the operational and commercial management of the more than 300 employees in the SBTech group 9

10 10 Featuring: SBTech who ll be awarded the next corner. The expectation will also be for these bets to be settled quickly too. In-play betting Another development we expect to see ties in with an increase in the quality of in-play, and that s live streaming. Many players bet while watching the event on TV, and indeed watching the event increases the player s likelihood of placing live bets. Smart sports betting operators will strive to offer their members live streaming coverage of the sports action in an effort to encourage both increased betting and brand loyalty. If players can get their live bets and watch the match in one place it will have a significant effect on lifetime value. At the very least, we ll see more in-play details reflecting the live action, such as play-by-play and match s visualisation graphics covering each booking, corner, shot on target, substitution and more. This provides much more involvement than a simple score update. Accessibility The increased capabilities via mobiles and tablets will continue and have opened up the world of sports betting to new player segments. Sports betting is now more accessible than ever before with a new type of sports betting fan emerging. It s essential, then, for sports bookmakers to offer their entire sportsbook via mobile devices and we ll see this trend emerging as more operators continue to develop and improve their mobile capabilities. The user experience across all channels will see a great deal of development in the next few months to years as we strive to offer a more streamlined sports betting experience regardless of the device via which punters choose to bet. Mobile betting will be more accessible across more devices, with better touch screen capabilities, more personalised offers (including the ability to pinpoint geographical location for regulatory purposes) and increased coverage of live events. Online betting will also offer a more userfriendly experience with relevant deals presented, based on member activity and preferences. We ll see an overall improved service thanks to fewer live delays and shorter suspension times with the aim of giving punters greater control over when and how they bet. The way forward for land-based sports bookmakers will be expansion into online and mobile in the best and most cost-effective way. We ll see more landbased operators making the move to online and mobile as they partner with fully capable and experienced companies, such as SBTech, which can help them successfully navigate the common pitfalls of such a progression, and enable them to join the industry frontrunners for increased revenues. Our solutions Sports betting is now more accessible than ever before with a new type of sports betting fan emerging. It s essential for bookmakers to offer their entire sportsbook via mobile devices Itai Zak SBTech We ll also see many operators looking to offer a more seamless sports betting experience across multiple channels, with members needing only a single account to access the entire sportsbook in landbased betting shops, online or on mobile. SBTech s latest solution, Chameleon360, offers clients a fully comprehensive system that covers all three channels and can be managed and controlled via a single console. Not only can existing land-based betting shops upgrade their entire system, which is often outdated and incapable of keeping up with the latest developments in sports betting, they re also preparing for a move to online and mobile in doing so, with the new system offering full control across land-based, web and mobile. And a hugely popular online casino can be easily integrated into the system to expand into new revenue streams. The costs associated with keeping up with the above-mentioned trends may seem prohibitive, but seeking out an experienced partner will ensure this is not the case. SBTech s solutions are designed with cost-effectiveness in mind thanks to the elimination of risk management, trader and odds feed services costs. Operators can choose which elements of the system they wish to maintain control over, leaving the rest to SBTech s fully capable team, for a solution that s dynamic and fully tailored to suit the needs and capabilities of the client. Sports betting and in-play have come on in leaps and bounds in recent years, but there are plenty more new developments and revelations to come. SBTech are determined to maintain position at the forefront of the industry, serving to drive innovation rather than be dictated by it, and our growing repertoire of brands will continue to benefit from our dedication to providing a top-notch sports betting experience across land-based, web and mobile.

11 WE SPORTS BETITBEST.COM OUR SERVICES WILL STEP UP YOUR GAME! Sports News Livescores Sports Betting Broker Players We offer age verified, identified and money in account players! Technology All our offered technologies are native applications and state of the art in all responsive levels! Win-Win-Situation Reducing your costs, while increasing your revenues, that s our service! You want to know more about our services and how we will step up your game? Get in touch! Explore our broad solutions on our website or contact us today at info@betitbest.com 2015 Bet IT Best GmbH. All rights reserved. All trademarks referenced and / or cited herein are the properties of their respective owners.

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14 14 Erik Lorenz Managing director, sales Sportradar Group Erik Lorenz joined the Sportradar Group in October 2008, coming from German Football League (DFL). As managing director, sales, he is responsible for the operational and strategic sales and marketing activities for Sportradar s core brand Betradar. Featuring: Sportradar Why a one-stop shop is a sure bet Erik Lorenz, managing director, sales, at Sportradar, explains to egaming Review why an all-inclusive offering is essential for betting and gaming operators For betting and gaming operators looking to take advantage of the seemingly unstoppable rise of inplay and mobile betting, the time has never been better. Not only are multiple distribution channels providing ease of access to online betting, but changing consumer behaviour is becoming more mobile-based and always online. And, of course, the potential for substantial profit is steadily increasing according to GBGC s Global Gambling Report Ninth edition, global online gambling will reach US$50bn in 2017 with mobile devices contributing almost $12bn in gross gambling yield (24% of the interactive market). Most of this is being driven by a perfect storm of the latest technology from automated feeds to fully managed platforms and significant advances in mobile capabilities that are enabling consumers to place bets from any location and at any time during an event. This doesn t mean there aren t any challenges. Along with an increase in product complexity, we re seeing new approaches to local and global taxation and ever-changing regulations. There s also the ongoing challenge for operators to lower their operational costs, retain their customers in the face of intensifying competition, and be adaptable so they can take advantage of new ways to exploit this massive growth in mobile betting and gaming. For example, if you re a sportsbook operator, do you have the technology and is your infrastructure perfectly synchronised with your data provider s feeds to give your punters the best chance to place bets in real time with immediate settlement? Being able to provide immediate and accurate information is essential. And as today s bookmakers can offer literally thousands of live betting markets on sports events around the world, the operator who has a truly holistic, cost-effective solution is the one that will stay ahead of the pack. Our increasingly connected world requires solutions that are as perfectly synchronised as they are cost-effective, and as reliable as they are innovative. The dynamic growth of in-play betting demands nothing less. Take for instance the monthly coverage that Betradar provides: literally 18,000-plus live events in 18 sports around the clock, every month and with over 350 different odds types. We are also the only supplier in the market that controls the entire chain of its in-running offer from the data collection at the venue right through to the Along with an increase in product complexity, we re seeing new approaches to local and global taxation and everchanging regulations Erik Lorenz Sportradar compilation and delivery of odds (including all necessary risk management tools). It is this level of focus and dedication that has helped Sportradar become a global leader in understanding and leveraging the power of sports data and digital content. It s also why our strategy is to be the industry s unique onestop-shop provider. To put it simply, we are in an industry that requires constant innovation and highest reliability. This, we believe, can best be provided through integrated turnkey sports betting solutions that work seamlessly together. We constantly strive to develop cutting-edge solutions and services that are driven by technological innovation and a deep understanding of our clients business needs. All of this is offered under the Betradar brand name where we have become the leading provider of live data services to the betting industry, offering products to suit every business from data collection through to fully managed trading services.

15 The advantage to any operator of having all of this under one roof is clear. There are four solution pillars that we at Sportradar (and within our Betradar brand name) believe are essential for a successful bookmaking operation: Flexible betting solutions: For us they must provide everything needed to create and manage your sports betting offer. This is especially important in today s increasingly competitive market where it is essential to keep operational costs as low as possible. At Betradar our Betting Solution comprises all the necessary services to run a successful bookmaker operation, such as fixtures, results, odds compiling, trading tools, in-running services, front-end content solutions (including statistics, live scores and live data visualisation), live streaming and innovative gaming solutions. Our comprehensive Live Betting Solutions, in particular, are designed to be as secure and reliable as possible, especially as our roundthe-clock coverage amounts to over 18,000 live events each month for 18 sports including over 60,000 live tennis matches a year. And speaking of our Managed Trading Services, it s all about externalising labour-intensive tasks and dealing with them efficiently and cost-effectively. Our experts in global betting markets work for our clients and enable them to completely or partly outsource their trading to minimise their financial risks while increasing turnover and profitability. Live Channel: While part of our overall Betting Solutions, we feel it is important enough to stand on its own. For us this is all about providing a customisable, live streaming solution for online, mobile and retail sports betting offers. It s an ideal method to bring the excitement of live events directly to your punters while increasing your turnover potential. We currently support over 5,000 live events per month. This means we can support live sports during on- and off-peak hours with full data and odds coverage that s backed up with a 24/7 media rights portfolio. Content solutions: As with social media, when it comes to punters, good, fast and relevant information is king. At Betradar, our solutions (to get a little flowery in my language) are designed to help a business bloom through live data visualisation tools such as entertaining and bet-stimulating live match trackers, sports data widgets, pre-match and live statistics, and There is no doubt that gaming has skyrocketed in the past years especially on mobile devices. It s proven to be a fun, alternative way to reach new customers Erik Lorenz Sportradar live scores. With the right content that is relevant and entertaining further betting activity can be stimulated (also because they re encouraged to stay longer on your site). Gaming solutions: There is no doubt that gaming has skyrocketed in recent years especially on mobile devices. It s proven to be a fun, alternative way to reach new customers, provide real betting markets, speed up bet cycles, and enable quick-stake recycling while increasing revenues. At Betradar our focus is on providing a range of unique Virtual Sports Betting products (such as Virtual Football, Virtual Tennis and Virtual Racing Horses & Dogs) that are extremely close to the real thing and which can be run from any platform to reach as many people as possible. And that s a significant difference. As a proven expert in providing real sports data to the sporting industry, our Virtual Sports Betting products are closer to reality than games made by companies whose sole business is creating games. For us, the products may be virtual but the stakes feel real. When these four pillars are combined, the potential to reach punters is unlimited. That s why we believe Betradar is truly unique. But it s more than just providing solutions and services, it s about engaging with our industry to fully understand what they need to support their business objectives and I believe this was reflected by our great reception at the ICE Totally Gaming 2015 trade show in London this February. It s also about being passionate about the games we cover and why Sportradar s business is strongly focused on protecting sporting integrity. Our Fraud Detection System (helps discover any anomalous changes to odds across nine sports, over 200 competitions, and over 65,000 fixtures per year) and Fraud Prevention Service (providing interactive education workshops and e-learning modules for those wanting to raise awareness and upgrade defences against match-fixing) are used by sporting federations and law enforcement agencies around the world to stamp out match fixing. No lone provider of a single product can provide such a comprehensive and consolidated offer to the sports betting industry. But as a truly unique one-stop shop, Betradar can. And that s a sure bet. 15

16 16 Iain Hutchison Commercial director Betgenius Iain Hutchison joined Betgenius in 2005 following the acquisition of Connextra, where he was formerly managing director. In 2005, the combined business employed just 20 people. Now Betgenius has grown to over 350 people on the back of software innovation and sound strategic direction. Iain s most recent achievement has been successfully launching the new Betslip Retargeting solution which has produced impressive results. Featuring: Betgenius Watch your behaviour! Iain Hutchison, commercial director at Betgenius, discusses how personalisation comes, at last, to the online gaming sector egaming Review (egr): What do you mean by watch your behaviour? Iain Hutchison (IH): We are all acutely aware these days that our every click or page view is being monitored, our s are being machineread, or our calls are being recorded for training purposes. Perhaps we have all abandoned an e-commerce purchase only to be remarketed to again by or banner advert where the exact same book, CD or gadget appears, as if by magic, while we are reading a news article or browsing another shopping site. Betgenius proprietary Ad Serving Technology, Connextra, has been recently enhanced and integrated into the advertising eco-system to enable Betgenius to introduce abandoned betslip targeting for sports betting, lotto and gaming marketeers/operators. egr: Why are betslips important? IH: Believe it or not, we have established that many punters use the betslip as a calculator to work out how much a particular bet will return them. It is for that reason that we have seen substantial interaction with betslips (there is also a high rate of abandonment) over a weekend for some of the larger sportsbook operators. This proves that this is a hugely rich seam of data that is not being captured by the bookmaker. The data is normally only retained by their transactional platform when the bet is struck. This analysis also proves purchase intent and it is precisely for this reason that we aim to harness the power of this tracked behaviour. There are undoubtedly many reasons for abandoned bets but, anecdotally, we think a concern could be value Iain Hutchison Betgenius egr: How does this work? IH: Technically, it is quite complex in the backend but deployment for the operator could not be more straightforward. We have created a new generation of tracking tags that are placed on every page of the operator s website, both on mobile and desktop. We listen to the betslip to identify the stake values entered. We pinpoint the event and selections chosen by a user during a session and we run an on the fly look-up of these to match them to teams, race meets, or players that feature in the bookmaker s sporting events feeds and check this event is still set to start or is in running. egr: What happens if the price has changed? IH: This is an interesting question and addresses why we have built the technology to compare price changes in real time. If the price on a horse has shortened since the selection was last placed in a betslip, we can for example, display a red downwards arrow and the reverse for a longer price. We think that, at this stage, we should be agnostic to price changes but we are also testing real time price comparison to the market price. egr: Why do people abandon bets? IH: There are undoubtedly many reasons for abandoned bets but, anecdotally, we think a concern could be value. If a user has doubts about price, he or she may browse away to an odds comparison web site like bestbetting.com. We can automatically show where the operator is best priced against one or more of their closest competitors and display this better value message. If they are not better value, it will not display the line-up.

17 egr: How do you find these recently active betslip users? IH: We integrated Connextra into the advertising exchanges last year and have been successfully buying sportsbook acquisition campaigns. In fact we had 33 concurrent ad campaigns running for operators over the World Cup. We identify the right users by monitoring when we see a Connextra cookies associated with a publisher who is offering their inventory to us via an adexchange. Using this mechanism we decide on whether to bid for a user. If that user has a betslip cookie we will pay an enhanced price to win the bid; if not we will discard. This massively improves targeting and reduces wastage traditionally found with blind media buys. egr: What evidence is there that this works for acquisition? IH: We ad-serve multiple creative messages randomly to the same user group and initial tests show that these ads perform better in terms of driving new first depositing customers than acquisition messages. When we ran this test, the betslip adverts did not have any free-bet message while the others did, which really demonstrates the power of this marketing technique. We are now running a fairer test with an inducement with even better results. We believe there is also a huge opportunity to drive up existing customer lifetime value by remarketing to existing customers and our Data Management Platform (DMP) enables us to create hundreds of different segments of users and target them with relevant content and dynamically bonus them accordingly. egr: Aren t operators worried about data leakage? IH: Our DMP has been built to provide silos of data. Each operator gets their own workbench and all tags relate to that workbench. We are compliant with data protection regulations which are some of the most stringent in the world. Above all, it should be remembered that we have less information than an operator would typically give their affiliate provider or broadcast management solution. egr: Are there any other insights into this rich data? IH: We believe that there is a compelling reason to start to measure the turnover that could potentially have been attracted had users not abandoned, perhaps due to value concerns. Historical data analysis could easily show this. We aim to leverage the Betgenius historical odds database to examine this and feed back to our clients trading teams. We can also identify winners easily by mapping selections against our results database to help clients build strategies to promote recycling or, by contrast, we could identify users who consistently place value bets in their betslip before they become sharp customers and get an edge over the bookie. egr: How long before Google and Facebook offer similar services? IH: It s hard to say. At present you cannot retarget using Google s DBM (Demand Side Platform) and Doubleclick Ad Server does not harvest the betslip data. Facebook do not permit live odds or cookie-based ad creative on their platform. This gives us a niche that leverages one of our core competences and we understand betting better than most and have the evidence to prove this method pays. We believe that there is a compelling reason to start to measure the turnover that could potentially have been attracted had users not abandoned, perhaps due to value concerns. Historical data analysis could easily show this Iain Hutchison Betgenius 17

18 The Art of Sports Betting One Solution Online On Land kambi.com

19 Whether it s on web, mobile or retail, Kambi provide the ultimate fully managed sportsbook solutions. Technically way ahead of the game, our innovative global sports betting platform gives clients the complete package everything from odds pricing to exceptional customer intelligence and risk management. Our innovation and unique insight provide a quick, slick, exciting user experience that simply has no equal. Experience, pedigree and technical know how creating a tier one sportsbook is an art form.

20 20 Ben Simchon Chanoch Group betting director INTRALOT Ben Simchon Chanoch joined INTRALOT nearly two months ago as the group betting director. Previously he worked at Playtech as the head of trading and basically built Playtech s trading operation from scratch. He has more than 11 years of experience within the online betting sector, having worked with leading online bookmakers as BWIN, Bet Victor (Victor Chandler) and Winner.com. Featuring: INTRALOT B2B experience adds value to operations Ben Simchon Chanoch, of INTRALOT, explains how to gain a competitive advantage for organisations addressing regulated markets More and more sports betting operators are looking into outsourcing the back-end of their betting operation to companies providing whitelabel B2B services. The rationale behind this strategic choice is often sound. Being able to offer and trade a competitive, as in thousands of events per month, pre-match and live product involves significant capex investment and opex outlays. Software and IT infrastructure, obtaining third-party informational feeds, developing pricing algorithms, on top of creating or sourcing and retaining the human expertise required for pricing and trading within the industry s very narrow margins can be financially very stressing. Nowadays many operators choose to concentrate their resources in marketing their products and servicing their customers. Effective marketing strategy and implementation, for both above and below the line campaigns, coupled with efficient customer relationship management have proven to be the main drivers for sales growth, customer acquisition and customer retention. Outsourcing the back-end activities of sportsbook content and trading to white label providers, allows operators to take advantage of the lower costs realised by the provider s economies of scale and to release financial resources for marketing activities. The trend towards giant-sized sportsbooks, due to the desire to appear competitive accentuated by the practice of outsourcing book management to white label B2B providers, has accelerated the process of commoditising betting offerings. The reality is that many sportsbooks appear to be very similar both in terms of content, pricing and punter-focused risk Nowadays many operators choose to concentrate their resources in marketing their products and servicing their customers Ben Simchon Chanoch INTRALOT management practices. This in turn further enhances the perception that marketing effort and expenditure is the only potential differentiating factor between competing operators. In such an environment, is there anything that an operator can do to try and differentiate its offering and value proposition at the sportsbook level? Are there any actions that can be taken to enhance sportsbook attractiveness and increase customer retention while at the same time allow the bookmaker to squeeze out a better margin while effectively managing the risk? We at INTRALOT firmly believe that there are lessons to be learned by looking at three categories of operators. The first category comprises the more successful among the large operators who have both the in-house resources and the expertise to individually address multiple target customer markets. The second category comprises smaller operators who are nevertheless very successful in their particular markets (commonly a single, often regulated, market). And thirdly, there are lessons to be learned by looking at how the most successful of the operators who operate in closed monopolistic markets (often lotteries, concessionaires or businesses which manage the operation on their behalf) administer their books. This last group of operators, more often, operate low payout books having to compete with grey operators operating high payout offerings with much lower, if any, regulatory and tax burdens. One can identify some book management traits, common to many of the operators falling under one or more of the above categories, which differentiate their books from the average, garden variety white label type of sportsbook. Lack of excessive focus on book size. There are limits, especially if one addresses a single jurisdiction or geographical market, over which the law of diminishing return on investment kicks

21 in while risk potential unnecessarily increases. This is certainly true for the pre-match offering but even for live betting there is a marketspecific saturation point over which one cannot reasonably expect significant returns. There are limits to the useful book size, depending on the particular customer market, beyond which quality makes much greater difference in perceived customer value than quantity. Focus on betting content quality and book coverage with respect to target market preferences, maturity and betting trends. Practice of customised pricing and trading for local interest events, rather than following market consensus, including: Early betting market pricing Driving the market and pricing outside the market Judicious spread of the over-round between favourite and outsider to indirectly manage expected turnover and potential risk Expertly limiting number and rate of odds changes based on an appreciation of player maturity, event significance and promotional considerations Managed relaxation of player wagering and high-risk bet restrictions Last but not least, alignment of marketing and promotional practices with the above It is important to note that these practices are used to judiciously enhance the book quality and risk management practices for a locally important subset of the sportsbook rather than to replace the industry standard practices of pricing to the market and liquidity-based trading. What the above trading and book management practices have in common is that they require both a deep understanding of the characteristics of the target customer market and a significant level of expertise in acquiring and using this knowledge to increase both turnover and profitability along with customer acquisition and retention. These practices can differentiate books and operators from the average run-of-the-mill bookmaker and provide a competitive advantage in the specific market. They can be considered as an expert process of customisation and localisation which, of course, depends on the availability of a sufficiently large and competitive book to start with. It is obvious that it will often be the case that many bookmakers will not be able to invest in the required skills, expertise and tools required to manage such a localisation process for the same reasons they opted to obtain their sportsbook along with managed trading services from a B2B provider as a white label. We believe that operators should seek out those B2B partners who are able to provide them with more than a standard white label solution, i.e. a service solution individually tailored for the particular operator and the market to be addressed. In seeking out such a partner, operators should aim to: Obtain an expertly managed localisation solution both in terms of sportsbook content and in terms of profitability and risk management Receive complementary services for strategic planning, sales channel management and aligning marketing and promotional practices with book management. Investigate commercial models which can engage both the operator and the B2B provider in a partnership-like relationship, sharing common performance targets. We believe that the B2B market will soon move towards individual market-tailored solutions. Operators first to take advantage of this will gain a significant competitive edge against me-too books. 21

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23 Featuring: Optima Information Services Keeping up with global trends Jacob Curciel, founder and group CEO/ CTO for Optima Information Services SLU, discusses the firm s progress across international markets egaming Review (egr): Optima Online offers IT gaming and sports betting solutions to clients all over the globe. How do their requirements change in each region? Jacob Curciel (JC): Each region requires refined analysis regarding regulations, the content offer, promotions and the product offering alongside the different modes or trends encountered with the various casino game suppliers. Each B2B operator with our software customises the offer to all their own partners, and this includes the front-end design and functionality, promotions and casino products. This is one of the many benefits of our platform. Our partners are always offered our help and support in a very dynamic and efficient way, but it is not a requirement for Optima to participate in every engagement of a new website launch. This is also true for any new casino game delivery to all the B2B operators serviced by them. There are considerable differences between the demands in Africa, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the UK and South America, and we develop specific products regarding the requirements of our partners who have themselves to service the B2B and B2C demands in their own businesses. We deploy those particular products and system components directed by the choices made by our partners appropriate to the regions in which they operate. All of this is made possible by the high modularity Each B2B operator with our software customises the offer to all their own partners, and this includes the front-end design and functionality, promotions and casino products Jacob Curciel Optima Information Services SLU and distinctive customisation which is a feature of the MGS platform. egr: Optima is licensed in Spain. Is Europe your biggest client base? Which of your offerings is most popular here and why? JC: Horse racing is very important in the UK, where we have many very important customers. It is one of our strongest offers, and allows our partners to compete successfully with the bigger operators. Our casino and payment integration system, shared wallet, allows promotion of multiple casino suppliers using a single bonus system. This is also very popular alongside our EPOS retail system, which is renowned worldwide. Our new ishop system, which we presented at ICE 2015, has already established remarkable high excitement and success in Africa. egr: Optima has recently signed deals with companies in several emerging markets. How difficult was it to secure these and what are you hoping to achieve in these areas? JC: We have recognised there is great potential in the emerging markets, and we know we have the product required to lead the sports betting there. We hope to be the platform of choice in those areas, and we are currently investing strategically to that end, without any loss of focus upon our strength presence in Europe and the UK specifically. Securing new deals has not been easy. Our competitors have been notably aggressive in their bids, and this has required extended effort on the part of our commercial and management team, working alongside our product team, to prepare the compelling offers that would meet all our partners Jacob Curciel Founder and Group CEO/CTO Optima Information Services SLU Jacob Lopez Curciel is founder and group CEO/CTO for Optima Information Services SLU. The company develops and commercialises the MGS suite, the internationally renowned egaming and betting software system. Curciel was previously the group CIO/CTO for the international bookmaker Stan James PLC. 23