SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
The digital world is “very different from the retail world” for gambling, explained GiG’s Ashley Hardy and Nicola Fitton in a recent webinar about omnichannel titled ‘Digital transformation – the journey’.
Held as part of the SBC Webinars series, the pair discussed why retail operators should look to a partner which can get your brand to a better ‘commercial’ place, and faster.
Expanding on the intricacies of operating in the online (or digital) world, as opposed to the retail space, Hardy and Fitton highlighted the extra complexity for “simple customer lifecycle flows such as registration, depositing and withdrawals”.
Hardy, GiG’s Director of Product, was keen to stress the importance of “early discovery” within the company’s approach to omnichannel.
“A lot of discovery needs to go into building a true solution, understanding how different casinos operate, how they manage their customers’ internal processes and then identifying gaps to innovate and bridge these two worlds,” shared Hardy.
He said that there are many components to the product, but those most essential to the user’s journey are dual registration, shared loyalty rewards, access to a shared wallet and moving money online by depositing on the website or via “the cage in the casino”.
Meanwhile, Fitton – Director of Media Managed Services – expanded on how this enhanced user journey becomes a reality for players attached to a new GiG omnichannel customer.
“Firstly, we implement good foundations for the company to grow from; this is important as laying these early on will ensure you are building on strong and efficient KPI’s,” she said.
“We start by focusing on top of the customer funnel, ensuring both volume and value are considered when executing the acquisition strategy – with a keen eye on lowering CPA’s.
“We have an experienced customer success team who focus on UX/UI and the conversion flow to ensure that we maximise on all marketing ROI. Then, as you move through the customer flow we focus on bonus cost KPI, rewarding the right player at the right time.
“All of this is then underpinned with the business operations team and ultimately ensuring that your players, brand reputation and licence care are also taken care of.”
Understanding how the casino (or retail sportsbook) operates is key to working out which parts of the internal setup will be handled by the omnichannel platform provider, and those further outsourced to third party ‘specialists’.
“The operator needs to understand where their strengths lie and what they need from a partner, then find the right one to compliment them,” continued Fitton. “They should consider what internal set-up they currently have and what they want to be outsourced.
“For instance, we offer business operations which include payments, KYC, risk and fraud, CS etc. I see some partners who want to outsource these functions to multiple 3rd parties, but it can sometimes actually be counterproductive to split some of these operations, as when working together these teams offer a much more collaborative offering and, most important, a much better customer experience.”
Hardy echoed the importance of close collaboration with its partners to “tap insights” into how their land-based businesses work, adding that his excitement for the future of ‘omni’ reflects the huge opportunity for innovation in the space.
“Being a platform provider, it is important that we always think about scalability and build products in this way,” he concluded. “The land based casino is a large and old industry.
“However, most casinos use their own systems when it comes to managing their customers and operations, so we are finding ways to be able to be flexible with the products we build, in order to be able to meet the needs of these providers as quickly as possible.”
To watch ‘The digital transformation journey’ in full, click HERE.
