iGB Intelligence reports Social Gaming report | Page 19

PART 2 - SOCIAL MEDIA AND SPORTS BETTING

That feeling of togetherness Alpago mentions is
now almost exclusively being conducted on mobile. In
fact, more than 80% of Twitter’s users are now using
portable devices to access Twitter, usually via the
app, which correlates with the inexorable evolution
of sports bettors into mobile sports bettors. Many
leading operators report that mobile is now clearly
the primary channel as desktop continues to take a
back seat – particularly with sports bets. Ladbrokes

recently announced that mobile accounts for 71%
of sportsbook stakes, which was almost identical
to the 70.4% recorded at Coral for Q1 2016. And it
was a similar story at rival Paddy Power, where its
mobile sportsbook represented 66% of online stakes
and 76% of sportsbook revenues in 2015. For today’s
sports bettors, the likes of Twitter, Facebook and
Instagram are usually never more than a few taps of a
smartphone screen away from a betting app.

Case study
WantMyBet
Described as the eToro of betting (the social trading
operator says it enables its traders to win, be
followed and generate ‘copy’ trades. eToro claims its
model is fundamentally different to other financial
platforms because it wants its users to win),
WantMyBet is the brainchild of entrepreneur Olly
Joshi.
In essence, it’s a social platform enabling people
to find sports betting advice, leave tips of their own
and place bets with sportsbook partners (Ladbrokes,
Boylesports, Betway and William Hill) without leaving
the site, making it an alternative breed of affiliate.
The goal from the outset was to build a product
as simple and as user friendly as possible, while
avoiding esoteric jargon that could intimidate
or deter betting neophytes. Meanwhile, the
leaderboard displaying tipsters’ wins, average win
amount, top returns and how many followers they
have accumulated helps foster a competitive and
community spirit among tipsters. “People love to be
proved right,” says Joshi. “If you predict anything
through a crowd and it comes in you feel good and
you have that social gratification. As human beings
we are quite competitive and we want to rise to the
top, but if you don’t quite make it and slide back
down that spurs you on even more.”
Another priority was to allow users to bet directly
from the site, drastically reducing the length of
the conversion funnel. Gaining access to betting
partners’ backend technology to facilitate this type
of affiliate arrangement was a “pretty long slog” but
necessary in terms of UX. “We really tried to think
about it from a user’s perspective. I don’t want to

make 10 million clicks, go to a bookmaker’s site
and then find the selections all over again to place a
tip in the same way tipsters’ links on Facebook and
Twitter just drop you on the Ladbrokes landing page.
So I have to sign up, which I might not want to do. Or
I could get bored and click elsewhere. Then I have to
find the markets and bets across different leagues.
“When a user shares a tip with us, providing they
have already signed up and have money on there,
they can literally place a bet with one click. They
can also deposit and check their balance from our
site.” Despite limited marketing spend, apart from
a launch video that went viral and at one point was
tending on Twitter in the UK, WantMyBet is still
averaging about 400 new signups per week. The user
return rate is some 65% while an average session
time is six minutes, which is particularly high for a
social platform. “It shows that people are engaging
with the content.”

iGaming Business Social Media & Mobile Betting Report

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