With SBC Summit North America on the horizon, Prove’s Head of Sports Betting and iGaming, Tom Hill, and Strategic Business Development/Executive Team, Paul Busby, highlight the services Prove provides for its customers and what they’re looking forward to at the event.
What makes SBC Summit North America stand out as an event?
Tom Hill: “The SBC Summit North America is where the key names in the industry come together to strategize, learn about emerging opportunities, and expand relationships. We’re attending the SBC Summit North America this year with the goal of helping operators solve some of their most pressing problems (new registration abandonment, proxy betting, two-factor authentication) that directly impact revenue and player experience.
“I’ve recently seen an influx of questions on identity verification and 2FA for sports betting operators after being quoted as an expert by publications such as Legal Sports Report and SportsHandle, so I’m excited to be able to offer my expertise to attendees and have these conversations in-person.”
Paul Busby: “An incredible number of executives attending, all focused on the broader development of the industry. Great networking, speakers, and content.”
What would you highlight as the biggest opportunity in the US gaming industry over the next couple of years?
TH: “There’s no question that we are in a watershed moment in the industry with respect to new markets. The first wave of states have embraced digital gaming, generating tremendous state revenues in the process. The next cohort of states are following suit. Specifically, what happens in Florida and California will be critically important as well as how recent new markets such as Ontario perform. It is also exciting to see the growth and resources going into horse racing and free-to-play spaces.
“The sports betting and iGaming experience via the mobile phone will continue to be the key for a new generation of bettors that have lived almost their entire lives with smartphones. Today’s population has an increasingly short attention span, so all businesses need to constantly adapt to optimize for the desired outcomes, or risk falling behind their competitors.
“A major opportunity exists for both established players and upstarts in the US gaming industry over the next couple of years with respect to capturing market share by providing best-in-class products. New betting options, new states, and a new wave of potential players coming to the market every year represent an unprecedented opportunity but will require innovation, modernization, and a commitment to promoting responsible and safe gaming.
“At Prove, we are focusing on ways to accelerate onboarding for bettors who are eager to sign up for new accounts, whether that be for sports betting, iGaming, horse-racing, or free-to-play contests. It is impossible to go on social media, attend live events or watch games/TV without being subject to marketing from this ecosystem. But driving traffic and downloads is only part of the job. Prove’s solutions drive conversion of that traffic into loyal patrons.”
PB: “The ability to embrace a tidal shift of new consumers looking to actively participate in US sports betting. How will the industry and regulators embrace the change to reduce onboarding friction and consumer engagement, while navigating local regulations, reducing fraud, and staying focused on responsible gaming.
“Prove is the world’s largest network of portable identities, with over 700 million keys under management. Businesses use Prove to modernize how they acquire and engage customers in order to enable the highest pass rates with the least amount of fraud.
“Consumers choose Prove to remove friction and secure their digital transactions.”
What industry innovation will capture the most attention in the next 12 months?
TH: “In order to provide best-in-class digital experiences, operators will need to up-level their digital verification technology. Companies that invest in innovative ways to onboard customers as quickly as possible while still maintaining compliance and risk controls will gain a competitive advantage in the next 12 months.
“Free-to-play in particular is a rapidly growing segment with a ton of potential to completely reshape the way a variety of events are enjoyed
“The mobile phone will continue to revolutionize the iGaming and sports betting industry just as it did to the banking and e-commerce industries. Operators will continue to find new and innovative ways to engage with bettors to improve user experience and increase loyalty and revenue. Whoever can most effectively balance the betting experience while also mitigating risk will be in the best position to obtain and retain the most loyal players.
“2FA has been a hot topic recently as well and there is exciting tech that can satisfy those requirements.”
PB: “Prove’s market-leading customer acquisition product – Pre-Fill! Over 1,000 enterprise customers use Prove to reduce friction from their digital businesses, which accelerates revenues while reducing operating expenses and fraud losses. More than 20 billion transactions are authenticated on our platform annually across many industries, including banking, lending, healthcare, e-commerce, and payments.
“As the world relies upon the internet for daily life, our mission is to accelerate digital trust. At Prove, we believe that security, privacy, and control do not need to be compromised to make digital transactions easy to use and accessible.”
What core challenges do you help solve for your customers/partners?
TH: “As operators race to enter new markets, they face a set of core common challenges. How do they comply with regulations that vary state by state without losing revenue to onboarding abandonment? How do operators prevent proxy betting? Prove’s solutions have the capability to solve these problems while improving user experience.
“Our solutions provide real-time insight to protect player accounts, but without adding any unnecessary friction to the experience. As a result, Prove enables the immense marketing spend deployed by operators to show a higher ROI by converting more of the traffic into loyal players.”
PB: “Frictionless onboarding in less than 10 seconds – Sports Betting and iGaming platforms often suffer from high onboarding abandonment rates. Our solution – Prove Pre-Fill – increases onboarding completion rates and reduces fraud by auto-filling forms with verified customer data.
“Reduce risk & fraud while improving customer transaction experiences – Regulations complicate customer experiences, and companies are trying to balance policy adherence and risk/fraud management while also providing a streamlined customer experience. Our
solution – Prove Identity – augments risk-scoring processes with proprietary phone ownership signals, improving risk & fraud management while decreasing customer process hoops.
“Prevent fraud with intelligent identity management – iGaming and online sports betting companies often struggle with managing customer identities, leaving them vulnerable to incentive fraud, identity theft, and customer contactability issues. Our solution – Prove Identity Management – is a registry of tokenized customer identities that enables companies to recognize & authenticate customer identities across multiple use cases and channels while reducing fraud and increasing contactability.”
Who have you especially enjoyed working with over the past year (partner/client)?
TH: “We have worked with a number of operators for both digital and on-prem use cases, as well as the associated platforms they run on. The ecosystem is eager to solve the inherent issues around both onboarding new players and safeguarding existing players.
“There is a remarkably refreshing attitude in this space, as on the whole there is a desire to modernize and leverage new technologies. Certainly part of that is looking for a competitive edge, but the discussions are very much “player-first.”
PB: “Penn National Gaming, BetMGM, FanDuel, Caesars Entertainment, and Flutter Entertainment.”
What are you hoping to learn from the conference at SBC Summit North America?
TH: “Two sessions I won’t be missing: The leadership innovation panel with Jon Kaplowitz, Richard Schwartz, Matt Prevost, and Bobby Soper, moderated by Cathryn Lai. That is a ton of star power for one session!
“Also, Life after Launch, focusing on compliance standards as Cameron Conn and Eric Weiss have unparalleled knowledge and insight.”
PB: “The evolving regulatory framework, new innovation.”