PRODUCT NEWS
15 MARKETING LAUNCHES UKFOCUSED BINGO NETWORK
15 Network will contain up to six brands including two of its own
15 Marketing, the company behind Oh My
VIEWPOINT
SIMON HAMMON
acting chief of product, Net Entertainment
The importance of progressive jackpots in a successful game portfolio has been a widely discussed topic among the gaming community for some time, but it came to prominence again in September last year when a world record breaking sum of €11.7m was won on one of our video slots, Mega Fortune, on Betsson.com. Since then, the jackpot on Mega Fortune has fallen again, after building up to €6.9m in the space of just four months, while another of our progressive games, Hall of Gods, has recently paid out its second jackpot of €7.6m. We found that the higher the jackpot accumulated a significant change in player behaviour took place. This occurred when the jackpot reached a very specific level, which in turn saw a sharp increase in player activity.
Bingo and Bingo Happy, has launched a new “?exible” UK-only bingo network that will contain up to six brands including two of its own. Lights Camera Bingo, which has been live for more than six months and promoted via a £500,000 TV advertising campaign last year, and Show Reel Bingo, are the ?rst two sites on the new 15 Network. Show Reel Bingo offers players a ?rst in the bingo space after 15 Marketing secured a deal with ?lm subscription service LOVEFiLM. If players deposit £10, the site offers a 200% bonus plus two free cinema tickets worth more than the initial deposit. Both sites have been developed by 15 Network founder and owner Ben Starr who told eGaming Review that four other partner brands would join the network in the next six weeks, while he is also “on the hunt for other brands” to leave existing networks and join in the future. The four partners set to join 15 Network consist of “existing brands that are creating new brands”, according to Starr. “They are all major players,” he said. The network uses software that no other network or operator currently uses globally. The software has been developed by bingo experts and QSB Gaming, but is operated, run and modi?ed whenever necessary by 15 Marketing itself. “The network will add liquidity, more rooms, promotions and jackpots, but we will look to keep the number of sites on the network to between eight and 10 maximum. It will hark back to the days of 2006 with great UK customer and telephone support all based in the UK and not in India and it will be very hands on and very tailored to players and partners,” Starr said. He added that if it is successful he is considering launching a second network with a “slightly different offering”. 15 Network will compete with leading bingo networks Dragon?sh and Virtue
Fusion, which have hundreds of skins between them. “A huge percentage of players leave the traditional networks within two months, but we haven’t seen that with Lights Camera,” Starr said. “We’ve created a network that provides our partners with maximum ?exibility – a standalone experience but with the liquidity of a network. Spend per player per month is higher than the two other networks.
The network provides UK-based customer
support, which Starr said is “more personal”, alongside “tailored promotions”. “We offer customer service staff who are based here and not abroad, and don’t bombard players with hundreds of emails and bonuses, which means we keep players longer and have higher lifetime revenues. According to Starr the network will “follow the Dragon?sh model”. However, it will only charge customers a percentage of their revenue, with instant games, emails and customer service, for example, all tied into one fee. “We might be making less pro?t, but it’s more important to remain as competitive as possible,” he added. The unique proposition we are offering is a free trial, a 200% bonus plus if you deposit £10 you get two free cinema tickets worth more than that initial £10 deposit. The deal has been done with LOVEFiLM, owned by Amazon. We’ll get LOVEFiLM branding on our homepage. The LOVEFiLM offer is the top offer for affiliates. Normally you would have to send thousands of players to LOVEFiLM to get this offer, so we’ve done well to get it,” he added.
Crucially, we deduced that
players were not just attracted temporarily to play Mega Fortune while the big bucks were adding up and threatening to fall. Our analysis shows that when the record online slots jackpot fell and the number of game rounds inevitably slowed down, its ‘rest position’, i.e. the average number of rounds played on Mega Fortune, was significantly higher than beforehand. A greater number of players then contributed to a new jackpot cycle, which subsequently grew by €7m in just four months. By the time the prize reached €11m new player acquisitions had increased by several hundred a day. Directly or indirectly, these new players were getting involved to try and get their hands on the eight-figure payout.
CORRECTION
Nickie Shute is the founder of BallsupBingo but not the principal. BallsupBingo was sold in its entirety to Take That in 2008 and has not existed as a separate entity since then. BallsupBingo is one of Take That Ltd’s domains. Take That Ltd owns euro-millions.com and not euromillions.com. Take That Ltd does not own Lotto.com. We apologise for these errors in our last issue, eGR94.
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