SBTech is sponsoring Betting on Football 2018, the fifth edition of the largest international football and betting trade conference at Stamford Bridge, the home of Chelsea FC.
Ahead of the 20-23 March event, we spoke to the company’s CEO Richard Carter about what he is looking forward to at #bofcon2018, which innovation he expects to capture the most attention in 2018, and who he is backing to lift the World Cup trophy in Russia.
SBC: What are you looking forward to at Betting on Football?
RC: With the World Cup on the horizon, Betting on Football is a key event for SBTech as we finalise our preparations for the world’s most important sports tournament. We are looking forward to hearing the views of a wide range of industry leaders, and the sessions discussing approaches to engaging players during the World Cup and beyond are sure to offer a wealth of valuable insights.
In terms of speakers, we’re particularly looking forward to hearing one of our newest clients, Niels Erik Folmann, CEO of at Danske Spil A/S, as well as Chris Harrison, Industry Head- Performance Markets at Google.
As for events, the tracks entitled World Cup and Beyond, Global Market Profiles and Betting on Innovation are our highlights on the Wednesday and on Thursday, the Customer Journey forum is unmissable.
Above all, Betting on Football is a superb networking opportunity where the leading lights of the industry can get together to exchange ideas and discuss the future of football betting on all channels.
SBC: What are you promoting at Betting on Football?
RC: One of the new products we’re most excited about is Action Betting, a mobile-first feature which provides timely and carefully calibrated live bet suggestions through call-to-action notifications, whenever an incident of proven interest to the specific customer occurs.
When a direct free kick in the final third is awarded, for example, the customer can place a quick bet on whether a goal will be scored from it. Action Betting is the result of intense focus on intelligent personalisation and enhanced UX, and we’re confident that it will be a huge hit right across our global network of regulated operators.
SBC: What industry innovation will capture the most attention in 2018?
RC: Live Betting has been one of the key drivers of acquisition and player value for many years, and the time is now right for it to evolve. Bettors are demanding not only the same range of pre-live and live markets, but also specialised betting formats that take the experience to the next level.
That’s why we created Pulse Bet, which we launched at ICE. It offers progressively rising payouts on in-play selections, so if a player bets on a goal in the next 30 seconds, he’ll win more if a goal is scored in the final 10 seconds of that period than if it happens in the first 10 seconds.
Pulse is a truly ground-breaking feature that enables customers to live and breathe every play, judge the tempo of each event and place more immediate bets on all the leading sports and it’s already creating a massive buzz in the industry and especially with our partner operators.
SBC: How can your company help to improve the customer experience ahead of the World Cup?
RC: The key to delivering the very best player journey during the planet’s biggest betting event is offering the maximum number of opportunities and the greatest degree of control. That’s why two other new SBTech features – Add2Bet and Create Your Bet – are central to our strategy for all the action in Russia.
Add2Bet allows players to use the cash out value of an open bet as the stake for a new double, treble or acca, enabling them to add new selections without depositing any additional funds.
Create Your Bet, meanwhile, provides suggestions for combinable markets on a single event, making it easier than ever before to create football accumulators with the potential for far higher payouts.
These enhancements to our market-leading sportsbook will provide the most complete betting experience at Russia 2018, boosting turnover and margin for all our tier 1 clients.
SBC: Who are you backing to win the tournament, and why?
RC: They say you’ve always got to watch the Germans, and Joachim Löw’s clinical side are my favourites to lift the trophy. They’d become the first country to win back to back World Cups since Brazil in 1958 and 1962, which would be an amazing achievement.
Thomas Muller and Sandro Wagner were both outstanding in qualifying, leading Germany to victory in all 10 of their World Cup qualifying games. And with Barcelona’s Marc-André ter Stegen a very reliable performer between the sticks, they should be very hard to beat. Add in the quality of Manchester City’s Leroy Sané and İlkay Gündoğan in midfield alongside Real Madrid’s Toni Kroos and you’ve got an incredibly balanced and solid side.
Then again, if you’re looking for an outside bet, perhaps it is finally time for the Belgians to come of age, and I’m sure we’ll see Romelu Lukaku, Eden Hazard and Marouane Fellaini running riot in Russia.