Understanding local trends and customer preferences are a vital consideration when launching in a new market.
This is even more important in the context of today’s highly digitised and diverse payments environment as a plethora of transactional experiences all find their place within the modern payments ecosystem.
In a recent discussion with leading casino industry media outlet CasinoBeats, Tiago Pereira, Head of Portugal at LeBull, a Portugal-based betting operator, highlights the importance of payment considerations for betting firms when making new market launches.
“It is essential to be on top of new payment trends when entering a region, mostly for ease of use and confidence for the players,” Pereira remarks.
“Traditionally in Portugal, as an example, Multibanco and MBWay have been statistically the main channels of payment, but in the past couple of years we have seen an ease of use (mostly in confidence) with mobile specific payments like Google Pay and Apple Pay.
“This trend indicates that users today are much more likely to trust the same payment method they use for mobile gaming as for gambling, evolving from the traditional payment methods.”
Pereira’s focus on Portugal is not just because of LeBul’s podium position in the market. Pereira will also be speaking at the SBC Summit in Lisbon later this year, appearing on a panel discussing the use of data in responsible gambling.
Payments are a vital aspect of the gaming experience, particularly for online operators. The global betting market is as competitive now as it ever has been, with various companies of varying sizes vying for market share.
Offering as broad a range of payment methods as possible can prove vital in ensuring a competitive edge for operators. For customers with strong preferences, payments can be a deciding factor when they choose which bookmaker to place a bet with.
Even more important is ensuring payments are made quickly, seamlessly and securely. If this is not the case, customers will often be more than happy to switch services.
In a discussion with Payment Expert for the Canadian Gaming Business magazine earlier this year, Jared Beber, CEO of Canadian bookmaker Bet99, emphasised the importance of payments to the customer journey, ahead of the Canadian Gaming Summit (CGS) in June.
“Payment methods are crucial to any operator’s goal of starting new customer relationships,” he said. “Streamlined payouts play a pivotal role and in many instances can trump other factors including promotions, sponsorships, and brand ambassadors.”
Much in the same way that payments is a sector that betting cannot ignore, betting is also one which should be on the agenda for payments firms, from early start-ups to established industry players.
Looking at just one market, the UK, the latest figures from the country’s regulator, the Gambling Commission, revealed total gross gambling yield (i.e. volume) of £1.46bn in Q1 2024 alone.
This volume depends heavily on smooth payments, and the third party partnerships which fuel this in many cases. In the wider fintech context, betting firms are also becoming increasingly drawn to emerging technologies, like Open Banking and Artificial intelligence (AI).
“The buzzword at the moment is without a doubt, Artificial Intelligence,” LeBull’s Pereira tells CasinoBeats. “We are starting to see AI trickle down into sports betting and casinos and overall it could be very positive for the user experience, especially for new gamblers as they are being presented with what AI believes they want to see.
“Machine learning will be, without a doubt, the trend in the next few years in all things IT related. AI will remove the guesswork from CRM and cross selling and everyone is rushing now to be up to date.
“We just recently implemented an AI engine in our casino homepage at Lebull.pt and are currently testing the results. It monitors gaming activity and presents information on the games based on usage and not just human intuition.”
Gaming firms are just some examples of stakeholders using AI – the technology is being rapidly adopted across various other sectors, in some cases to even greater extents – but its use shows the ever-growing potential of AI, and its significance as an investment opportunity.
Payments and gaming are sectors that should pay close attention to one another, as Pereira and Beber’s comments show. Betting must ensure it is ahead of the trends for compliance and customer service, whilst payments and fintech need to ensure the opportunities the sector poses are not passed by.
Tiago Pereira will be appearing at the SBC Summit, taking place at the Feira Internacional de Lisboa from September 25-26. Taking place simultaneously is the Payment Expert Summit, where speakers will discuss a range of hot button payments and fintech topics.