With iGaming and sports betting continuing to grow within the Colombian market, operators are searching for the correct tools to stand apart in the region.
As a leading supplier with a strong footprint in Colombia, CEO of Sirplay Bart Esposito detailed to SBCAmericas how best to capitalise on the thriving market.
Could you explain further how Sirplay ensures that its product stands out in the growing Colombian market?
There is an “easy” way to stand out in a market and that is to hear it cautiously in order to deeply understand it. If we should explain it with a metaphor, we could say it is like when you have to reply to a question and part of the answer lays in the question itself. Sirplay’s products are not just our products, they are products made for and by Colombian bookmakers and bettors. They are designed to reply to the specific requests of the Colombian gaming market and that’s why we are sure they stand out among all the others betting software present on the market.
SBC: Can you reveal some of the markets that are most popular amongst Colombian punters?
Bart Esposito: Colombian bettors surely favourite soccer over the other sports. Indeed, it covers the 85% of the volume bet, with the majority of the bets placed on the Spanish, the Italian and the English leagues. The other 15% is divided among basketball (NBA), tennis (ATP and WTA), baseball, cycling, and boxing. We can say that the European soccer leagues gain more interest among Colombian bettors because of their popularity but also because they have a more stable outcome than the South American leagues where anything is taken for granted.
When strengthening in the Colombian market, how important is a mobile-friendly product?
The mobile gaming market is in constant growth globally and neither the Colombian bettors are immune to this trend. The market volume of online gaming was forecasted to reach 51.96 billion U.S. dollars in 2018 and if we match this number with the fact that in 2017 more than two-thirds of the world’s population owns a mobile phone (with a constant annual growth of 4% in unique mobile users), it’s easy to realise of how much important is to provide a mobile-friendly betting software. As a matter of facts, we have even reached the 65% of mobile betting users ourselves.
In Colombia, just a fifth of the population owns a credit card for betting operators how big an obstacle is this?
That’s true. The level of credit cards penetration is still low in Colombia and it represents a big problem for online betting operators, but as gaming solutions expert we knew about this issue and we managed to find a solution. Indeed, most of the bets are now paid in cash, behaviour that doesn’t go along very well with online betting. That’s why we decide to introduce prepaid cards as a new payment method combining cash payment and online gaming activities. In this way, Colombians bettors can charge their online gaming accounts just like they would do reloading their cell phone plans.
How do you anticipate the Colombian market will grow in the coming years?
The Colombian market is surely only at its beginnings and it will not stop that fastly. In these few months, we have seen a constant increase that goes from 18% to 24% per month. If we should find an explanation for this growth we should surely thank the recent online gaming regulation letting also professionals like doctors, lawyers, engineers approach this world.
