Increasing regulation around player acquisition has shifted the focus from attracting new players to ensuring that operators retain the players they have, said Uri Admon, CEO of Captain Up, at this week’s CasinoBeats Malta Digital.
With countries around the world placing closer scrutiny on the ways that gaming companies target their audience, Admon explained that it is more important than ever to use gamification as a tool for retention.
He said: “I think we’re in a fascinating period now because in general, regulators are aiming for good. And they’re forcing the markets to change all of the time. When this is happening, we’re seeing constant shifts in innovation and adaptation because the markets are changing.
“At the minute, we’re seeing much more strict regulations based around user acquisition. For example, marketing and acquisition is becoming super expensive. I love user acquisition because you spend money, and in return, you get users.
“But with this new regulation, I think all operators will see that the cost for user acquisition has become so high that now is the time to shift the focus towards retention.
“When you look at retention, you really look at the important parameters like player lifetime, lifetime value, engagement etc. And suddenly, it moves from looking at how many players you will acquire, but rather how many of those players will stay? With this new regulation, the focus is shifting.”
Joining Admun on the Gamification panel, sponsored by Digital Chain, delegates also heard from Ross Parkhill, MD of Rhino Entertainment; Andy Braithwaite, CCO of Unibo; David Flynn, CEO at Swintt, and the panel moderator Karolina Pelc, Strategic Advisor at Basic Strategy.
Retention was also a key focus for Parkhill, who explained that gamification was a means of ensuring that they could remain ‘top of mind’ when players were looking to gamble.
He added: “I always feel that for gamification, you should have a focus on what you’re trying to achieve. At Rizk, that focus was on retention. We could make sure that players could be rewarded so they would keep us in mind. Around gamification, we’re very lucky as an operator because we actually have games on our site. So there is a motivation to come and play, people want to gamble, ultimately they want entertainment so they are already coming to our site.
“Gamification for us almost became a marketing tool, and a way of keeping us top of mind. Players are going to gamble, and maybe they’ll play at Rizk because they like something or because they get something back.”
Taking somewhat of a different approach, Braithwaite argued that gamification can ‘soften the blow’ of losses when playing slots by ‘giving something back’ to the player.
Describing losses in slots as ‘ruthless’, Braithwaite pointed out that using such gamification features can make sure that players gain a form of entertainment while playing, explaining that gaming should be considered enjoyable.
He said: “Gamification is absolutely everywhere if you look for it. We tried to take a pragmatic approach and built a system based on what a casino manager needs. All of the gamification pieces that we do are all based in a particular area, all of which takes place within the game and its provider agnostic.
“From the operator perspective, we need gamification because going for that cup of coffee results in 10% of the time you actually get a cup of coffee, and then 2% of the time you get 3 gallons of coffee. Slots are ruthless now, I think slots have gone too far. Players are being rinsed by these high volatility slots – one player gets a win while 99 leave disappointed.
“You have to add some value to that, you have to soften the blow. If you’re playing a game and you’ve got it on autoplay, and there’s a mechanic like spins that is distracting you from your balance dropping, but then gives you something after the loss, players are more likely to enjoy it. We make enough money, we should put some investment into giving something back to them.”
But while gamification may be a useful feature for some, Flynn explained that regulations in countries such as Sweden create a barrier to ensuring that players benefit from the ‘enjoyment factor’ that is central to so many games.
Giving an overview of Swedish regulations, he explained why Swintt plans to use gamification as a tool to benefit charitable causes and boost player enjoyment: “The real challenge is working out what is an incentive to make people play. In Sweden, we’ve been working to try and assess how much of our typical product offering can we put into that market place, and at the minute it seems to be very difficult to deliver any of it.
“Giving a player a badge to say ‘Congratulations, you’ve just achieved something’ is an incentive to play.
“When it comes to social gaming, for example Candy Crush, you could easily spend 5,000 euros on in-app purchases and that is absolutely fine. But you just can’t give someone a badge in the real-money online gambling environment. Social gaming is just a completely different question I guess.
“But I think that one needs to realise that there are elements of entertainment that you can give to players that really do give them a much better experience, rather than just focusing on limiting their enjoyment through gambling. There are several different examples of countries which limit the enjoyment factor for players, which is really disappointing.
“We’re looking at gamification as a tool to incentivise charitable donations. Our goal is to ensure that through gamification, you can deliver an enjoyable player experience – the player might not always win money, but they could be doing good through charitable causes. But at the minute, Swedish regulations won’t allow that.”
The three-day CasinoBeats Malta Digital, delivered in association with Gaming Malta, concludes today. The event features 40 virtual exhibitors, numerous networking opportunities, 140 leading speakers, and countless business opportunities for 3,000 senior decision-makers from operators, suppliers, affiliates and other industry stakeholders.
Alongside the exhibition, networking and conference – the content from which will be available on demand to delegates after the event – visitors also gain access to the full range of entertainment on offer, including free-play slots, daily competitions and a selection of prizes such as iPads and cash.
Find full details of CasinoBeats Malta Digital, including information about how to register and the discounts available on company group passes, at the event’s official website: https://sbcevents.com/casinobeats-malta-digital/
