Month: April 2021

TGS will assist operators across several states with identity fraud solutions, as well as supporting online sports betting and casino operators’ marketing efforts.

It said it would offer its TruValidate product suite to these operators.

Read the full story on iGB North America.

Sergey Kobitskiy details some of the top innovations underway within real-time marketing and gamification. Founded in 2018, Smartico has built industry-leading platforms which help gaming operators globally to enhance UX, increase revenue and improve retention.

Recent times have challenged operators to shift their focus from acquisition and towards customer retention. 

Appealing to customers in itself comes with its own challenges. Creating loyal customers however, is an entirely different ball game.

At Smartico, a personalised experience is at the forefront of their real-time marketing and gamification solutions, helping operators to tailor to a wider audience. 

We spoke with CEO Sergey Kobitskiy to understand what underpins a successful retention and engagement strategy.

Personalisation is a luxury, but one that consumers are growing to expect. In the entertainment industry, platforms such as Netflix personalise the experience for users by showing ‘recently watched’ content and making tailored suggestions.

Kobitskiy says on gamification: “When planning real-time retention strategy, we’re trying to cover as many possible situations the player might be in.”

This makes financial sense, as personalised content within gaming platforms has been found by Smartico to increase engagement by up to 60%.

In a world that moves so fast, people’s capacity to get bored quickly is greater than ever. This means optimising gamification techniques while providing a steady stream of new content is key to long-term engagement.

Key touchpoints

With a number of high-profile partnerships with the likes of ProgressPlay and Delasport, Smartico’s marketing solutions are gaining momentum within the gaming industry.

As technology advances, so do the opportunities to enhance player engagement. 

The difficulty comes in maintaining this level of engagement. Encouraging consistent gameplay comes from comprehending different user needs.

Recognising the key touchpoints within the customer journey is what creates a truly personalised experience. As this will differ on an individual basis, fully integrated AI is critical in driving this process.

Kobitskiy explains the power of real-time marketing on the user and particularly its role in an esports context:

“We can take the sportsbook as example, automatically personalising the communication with the players based on their favourite league, or based on a game of their favourite team that is about to start, sending them notifications or offers for bets on their last team which they won with – or offering them a specific bonus on a specific game they love. ”

In this sense, real-time marketing is essential to draw in the player and shape their unique experience. 

Smartico recognises the points of interest for each user, sending them push notifications accordingly. 

The push notifications will not recur, meaning players will not feel overwhelmed or fatigued by repetitive messages. Rather, the AI will establish new opportunities to engage the user.

“Our strategy is to engage with personalised content and relevant information at the right time (and not to over engage) – this is a real boost in customer experience”, says Kobitskiy.

Working in real-time, personalised marketing promotes points of interest such as new games, bonuses and promotions, or notifications of low balance.

“Personalised marketing is a key feature nowadays when the market has such a variety of brands to offer to the player, and personalising messages not only with their first or last name is a good strategy in making your players feel special, but also get what they are looking for and in the right time”, he adds.

Building loyalty

With so many brands offering new and exciting games, acquisition is arguably the more straightforward part. People are likely to test the waters on a number of different games, but how do you ensure longevity?

Smartico’s gamification software improves retention by focusing on positive reinforcement. Achievements, progress, and comparison to other players are all features which motivate consistent play. 

This, paired with enough challenge to encourage a healthy sense of competitiveness, builds long-term users.

“They feel part of a community, where they can see their progress compared to other users. As they play more, complete achievements and earn badges, they climb up the levels until the perks and benefits are too high to miss out on”, says Smartico’s chief executive and co-founder.

When receiving points for various missions and achievements, customers feel gratified.  For operators, this maximises value for consumers and drives them to play more consistently.

Additionally, as users gain points throughout the game, the possibilities for how they spend these is up to the operator. This degree of flexibility allows commercial products to be highlighted, while enhancing UX by maintaining that level of personalisation.

“Through gamification, you can incentivise a specific behaviour and the operators can actually ‘guide’ the players to do what they want, or lead them to a certain game they want to push by creating missions or giving out badges for that game”, he adds.

In this way, operators can use these software solutions to enhance UX and increase commercial revenue.

For both users and operators alike, the journey moulds towards individual preferences and needs.

Committed to the ongoing development of marketing and gamification solutions, Smartico is paving the way for itself to become a recognised industry leader.

Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed, but IMG Arena did confirm that FlightScope, which focuses on golf and tennis, will be fully incorporated into its business.

IMG Arena said it will invest both funds and resources to introduce FlightScope’s technology into other sports in its portfolio, including football, basketball, volleyball and major US sports.

In addition, IMG Arena will use FlightScope’s technology to introduce additional products and services to federations and rights-holders under the new pillar of IMG Arena Rightsholder Solutions.

Based out of Gliwice, Poland, FlightScope will continue to be led by Jacek Gronek and Wojtek Szumilas. Gronek will join the IMG Arena leadership team as vice president of Rightsholder Services, while Szumilas will now serve as head of technology.

FlightScope’s approximately 160 employees will also be retained under the terms of the acquisition deal.

“The integration of FlightScope Services technology is a fundamental part of our growth strategy and provides the foundation for the launch of our new Rightsholder Solutions,” IMG Arena managing director Freddie Longe said.

“The acquisition allows IMG ARENA to enrich our innovation in fan engagement via the development of data and audio-visual content, while creating new content and commercial opportunities for federations and rights holders across our portfolio.”

Gronek added: “FlightScope Services joining the IMG ARENA business is a natural union born out of synergies in product, customer base and, most importantly, culture and vision.

“It will enable us to leverage our knowledge, strengths and resources to deliver an enhanced range of best-in-class services and technologies across multiple sports.”

IMG Arena has worked with FlightScope since 2013, jointly developing a data collection system to record the data on golf’s European Tour.

Ireland-based Thimba Media paid $1.8m (£1.3m/€1.5m) to purchase the assets, which it said are online casino product comparison portals across predominantly locally regulated markets including Sweden, the UK and Latvia.

Thimba Media said the assets are expected to generate net income in excess of $580,000 over the next 12 months.

“This acquisition is another major step toward our goal of becoming a large affiliate company and realising our goal of sustainable and accelerated growth both organically and via our systemic M&A strategy,” Thimba Media chief executive Chris Russell said.

“Our next target will be a US focused acquisition in late 2021.”

Thimba Media chief marketing officer Ferdia O’hAodha added: “At a time when the majority of our competitors are looking at the US market, we are looking at value investments across locally regulated European markets providing us with strong returns to grow our business.

“In addition to having strong agreements in place with some of the largest casino operators in Latvia and Sweden, the assets also have extensive reach in the CIS markets.”

Kilburn will not stand for re-election at Everi’s 2021 Annual Meeting of Stockholders on May 19 2021, which will be his last day as chairman.

Kilburn first became a board member in 2005 and began serving as chairman in 2008. He oversaw 11 acquisitions in the last 15 years, including that of Multimedia Games.

Read the full story on iGB North America.

The legacy Betgenius and Genius Sports Media brands have been discontinued, with solutions and product development under Sportstech, Video, Sportsbook and Media & Engagement moving forward.

Genius Sports said that the new consolidation reflects the convergence of its capabilities in sports technology, live data, video and betting products to power connected fan experiences.

The business cited its recent NFL deal as an example of how it could use all of these capabilities together.

 “As we enter a new era as a public company on the NYSE, the time is right to consolidate our offering under the single Genius Sports brand,” Genius Sports chief executive Mark Locke said.

“This unified approach will help strengthen our value proposition, serve our partners’ needs and articulate our vision of creating personalised fan experiences via the convergence of sports, betting, advertising and streaming.”

Genius Sports expects to complete its merger with NYSE-listed special purpose acquisition company dMY Technology Group II shortly, having first announced details of the deal in October last year.

Following the merger, the business will trade on the NYSE under the symbol ‘GENI’, going public with a $1.50bn (£1.08bn/€1.26bn) valuation.

Genius Sports in January revealed it would form a new holding company, Galileo NewCo, for the proposed business combination.

Ferri has been in the gaming industry for 15 years, having held roles at businesses including Inspired Gaming, Evolution Gaming and GLI.

Before joining Maxima Compliance’s Barcelona office, he spent more than three years as director of igaming strategy and new products at BMM Testlabs.

“Maxima Compliance has grown impressively over the past couple of years by offering its customers a world-class service they can’t find elsewhere,” Ferri said.

“I’m thrilled to be joining this innovative company and will work to ensure that its remarkable growth story continues.”

Maxima Compliance chief executive Antonio Zanghi added: “Filippo brings years of gaming experience to the Maxima Compliance team.

“As our first CCO, he will oversee commercial operations across the company at a time when we are quickly expanding globally. His expertise is going to be an important addition to the business.”

The governor, together with state senate majority leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and assembly speaker Carl Heastie, announced their agreement on the budget yesterday (6 April).

Under the budget legislation, the state will issue a request for applications and must select at least two platform providers, who will work with a total of at least four operators or skins.

Cuomo’s office says that once it is fully phased in, legalisation of the vertical will provide more than $500m (£361.7m/€420.8m) in revenue for the state, with the possibility of becoming the largest sports wagering market in the US.

With the current largest market, neighbouring New Jersey, bringing in $46.2m in February 2021 and a record $82.6m the month before, this suggests the state of New York will receive at least half of mobile betting revenue if it expects to take in more than $500m.

The governor’s office said that once fully phased in, the programme will provide $5m annually to youth sports and $6m to combat problem gambling, double the resources currently available.

The remainder of the new revenue will be dedicated to education, it said.

Read the full story on iGB North America.

In the first episode of iGB Affilipod Conor and Robin welcome the founder of affiliate compliance specialist Rightlander, Ian Sims, to the show for a discussion on best practices for affiliates to safeguard their businesses, the possibility of an affiliate licensing regime for the UK, and considerations for affiliates looking to enter US markets.

Flutter offered Fox Bet this option when it agreed to purchase a further 37.2% stake in FanDuel from investment consortium Fastball for $4.18bn (£3.03bn/€3.52bn) in December 2020. That acquisition took Flutter’s stake in FanDuel to 95%.

At that time, Flutter said it “intends to offer to Fox Sports the option to purchase 18.5% of FanDuel at fair market value in July 2021”, though it has since referred to the stake as being 18.6%

However, in its new lawsuit, Fox said it agreed it had the option to acquire the stake “for the same price that Flutter paid for that interest in December 2020”.

Under the December 2020 price, FanDuel as a whole would be valued at $11.80bn, and the 18.6% share would cost $2.09bn.

Read the full story on iGB North America