Africa is a location on the cusp of an iGaming revolution as increased mobile penetration has unveiled the potential of a myriad of markets across the continent.
Ahead of the upcoming SBC Summit, Christopher Coyne, Co-Founder and CEO of 888 Africa spoke to iGaming Expert about how international operators can tap into the market, as well as how regulators can respond to the gaming surge to ensure fairness and player safety.
What do you believe operators can do to tap into new players in the African market?
To win in Africa is some of the same as to win in iGaming around the world. Operators must present a quality brand that has meaning. The product offering has to be quality, and the user experience has to be simple and consistent. The customer experience must be customer-first as best as it can be. A service presented in the local languages and that is 24/7 will appeal.
But more than the paragraph above, operators need to be hyper-local. This means several things, but certainly it means that payments need to be localised on a site, and the marketing content needs to be locally-framed covering themes, messaging and tone. Ambassadors, influencers, and social media marketing should also be set up to have peak impact in that local market.
How much have you seen the African market evolve in recent years, specifically when it comes to tech capabilities and bandwidth?
African iGaming has some first rate operators across markets now, and more so today than three to five years ago. Betway and betPawa are brilliant operators and Betika, HollywoodBets, ElephantBet and Sporty have a lot of positives amongst them. Strong operators professionalise the sector, and with this we’ve seen strong growth rates present.
Increasing mobility across populations – meaning more people with access to phones with web services on them – and improving relative wealth across countries has helped power the growth that has come over recent years. Regulation has been a spur of growth too.
Which markets in Africa do you believe will be the most emerging markets to watch in the coming years?
I think the next super-sized market to present will be Egypt. I can see much more regulation coming to Egypt in the coming years, opening up the market for more operators to be licensed there. I’m not so positive about the French African markets because the regulators tend to be volatile in these countries and the conditions to operate can be very changeable. The regulated English and Portuguese markets will go well, as a broad statement.
How challenging is it to transcend different markets across Africa?
As I’ve already covered, Africa is many different markets, not one homogenous thing. Africa is 54 countries altogether and there will be more than 30 licensed iGaming opportunities across Africa in the next short while. There is no winning one-size-fits-all model here, the best way to compete is to have a very solid and quality core proposition, including technology that is then hyper-localised market by market.
It is incredibly difficult to transcend different markets across Africa and for this reason 888 Africa is active in six markets three years on from our launch. If it was much easier to transcend markets in Africa then I’m sure we would be active in a dozen markets or more by now, it’s just very difficult so we’re building up our markets steadily.
What advice would you give to regulators in Africa when it comes to tackling the black market and ensuring player safety?
This is a massive question. The black market operators in Africa will not ensure player safety and or deliver customer care, not in the way licensed operators should or will. Licensed Operators – and 888AFRICA only operates under License across Africa – should do more to report black market Operators to the governments and authorities and governments/authorities should be doing a lot more to block and barricade these black market Operators from African iGaming.
One thing to say is that whilst this problem is very real for Africa so too is it a real thing for all major geographies around the world. I’m based in the UK and there is a material problem with the black market here in Britain. If Britain, the US, Australia and other major iGaming markets cannot beat the black market then it is perhaps no surprise that Africa is struggling with this challenge.
How important do you believe the SBC Summit is when it comes to the development of emerging markets?
It can be very important, in my opinion. Bringing lots of the right people together and having the right conversations and debates all around the world is a hugely positive thing as the torchlight is switched on emerging markets.
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