SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
Adam Day, Senior Director, Commercials & Head of Sales at Bayes Esports, talks to SBC News in detail about the customer journey, and how the company can help those of all shapes and sizes achieve their ultimate ambitions.
SBC News: Bayes Esports possesses a range of products to help elevate an operators’ offering through various stages of their journey. Could you begin by talking us through these and how they can help drive them to fresh heights?
Adam Day: The first things to consider are the key components to providing a complete esports offering. Content is just one aspect – acquiring official data rights to match data. Distribution is another: How do you build a network, both internally and via partners, to distribute that content?
Having the content, and being able to reach customers is fundamental. But then you need to be able to serve the most relevant products that actually drive engagement, utilization and ultimately, revenue.
Our different product sets allow us to reach different types of customers and work alongside them as they evolve their business. This can be a betting operator just starting out in the world of esports, to a more sophisticated, mature business that’s got their own in-house traders and data scientists.
A younger betting operator may want to take our Live Odds marketplace so they can begin monetizing esports content faster than building everything in house.
As the company matures and they want more control over their margins, they can begin acquiring a trading team to develop their own odds. In this case, we can provide probabilities that are built by our dedicated data science team, who bring years of experience in the complex world of esports data modelling.
These types of customers may not have the resources or they may not want to invest in building their own odds models. However, by using our advanced machine learning models they can still reduce risk and turn a profitable outcome.
As betting operators become more advanced in the esports sector, be it through a developer team or esports traders, they may have their own odds models but will still need access to the official live data from the rights owners. They may also want access to tools to build a more engaging experience, such as widgets, video streams, and stats.
No matter where a betting operator falls on this journey, Bayes Esports has the tools to enhance the betting experience. Our expansive portfolio of tournaments and markets ensures our customers can reach maximum turnover with their esports portfolio.
SBCN: Should such a company be making its first steps into this space, what would you identify as the key factors to consider to ensure success?
AD: It’s important to have esports experts on hand due to the complex and dynamic nature of the industry. Despite maybe having well established traders or developers from traditional sports betting backgrounds, esports is a whole other beast to tackle.
Whether it is game patches, metadata changes, or new game titles, being able to adapt quickly will be imperative. If your markets are not managed correctly, your revenue could take a big hit.
To maximize your esports turnover, you’ll also want to reach a diverse audience with the smallest investment. It’s too challenging to have a separate integration for each game title and tournament so that is why it’s so important to find the right partner, like us. With our leading content ecosystem in esports data, you can deliver a diversified esports portfolio, and start growing your esports audience.
Lastly, understand what data is driving your betting products. About 70 per cent of esports betting is live vs pre-match, which is unique to the esports target group.
With official live match data you can ensure a continuous betting cycle throughout a match and ensure reliability of the results. This opens the door to more engaging opportunities catered to the young audiences.
SBCN: Related to this previous question, how can Bayes Esports’ products help those, either starting out or that have a longer history within the space, when it comes to acquisition and retention?
AD: When you watch an F1 race, a lot of what makes the sport interesting is the data that the fans follow. Without lap times, historical stats, aerodynamic insights, and more, it’s just cars driving in a circle. If the same is applied to esports, what keeps the audience engaged is the data that can be viewed alongside the match.
In the last year, we have launched audio and visual tools such as videos and widgets to assist sportsbooks. These tools will attract users to their websites, generate excitement leading up to tournaments, keep users engaged much longer, and foster a community within the esports ecosystem. This ultimately drives better viewership and revenue streams.
SBCN: As this builds-out, what options are available to enhance an operators’ offering further still? And what benefits do these bring?
AD: Offering products for the whole customer journey means we can help build a roadmap with a customer and work with them side by side on how to evolve as they build their own business. They can choose what services they want based on their capabilities and the amount of control they desire.
As they build out their esports portfolio, they may want more control over the margins on major tournaments, so choose to create those odds in house. However, they may only have the time, investment, and capabilities to cover a small fraction of tournaments or game titles.
Bayes Esports’ marketplace can fill in the gaps to provide the services for a well-rounded esports portfolio. They can go from taking odds to probabilities to live data as they expand their own trading teams. Ultimately, to help them monetize even better.
SBCN: What future innovations can we expect Bayes Esports to bring to the market?
AD: Over the next year, we are focusing on expanding our products and services, so our single integration adds more value along the entire commercial value chain. For example, Bayes Live Odds will be enhanced even further so our customers can access multiple odds feeds, and access optimal margins across a vast range of tournaments, titles, and markets.
Add to that our visualization tools such as video and widgets, and our customers genuinely have the ability to take their esports sportsbook offering to a completely new level.
