In 2024, innovation is a cornerstone of the iGaming industry. New technologies are continually changing the way in which brands operate with their customers, allowing sportsbooks and casinos the opportunity to deliver a more elevated experience.
One technology that has emerged as a force to be reckoned with is automation. We’ve seen discussions centered around how automation can enable sportsbooks and casinos to deliver a more personalized experience for their players. But according to Intelitics CEO and Co-Founder Allan Stone, automation can also play a pivotal role in improving operational efficiencies.
Creative content
For Intelitics, one of the most popular use cases is the creation of content. “Technology exists where you can input the information of a match-up, and it’ll generate automated odds and content around that game,” Stone explained.
Automation is starting to become more commonplace within marketing teams, both within iGaming and elsewhere. But for this technology to have a long-lasting impact, brands must have a clear idea of how it can be used to streamline daily processes.
Content generated by AI can used to inform the creatives that are displayed on a particular webpage, which can shape promotions and even highlight particular markets.
“Contextual automation is where you use different content to inform the creative on page. For example, if someone’s looking at review of an upcoming match, then the adverts on that page can be specifically tailored to that fixture. Marketing teams should use the context of that content to shape the creative elements of their adverts,” Stone said.
Historically, design teams have had to manually create static adverts to be displayed on their websites – with numerous iterations created to meet the various player preferences. As you can imagine, this process was often time consuming.
The introduction of HTML5, combined with automation, has meant that designers’ expertise can be utilized elsewhere. Marketing teams are able to “pull apart” the various creative components of advertising assets and upload those to a database which can then be used to “mix and match” to suit different regulatory requirements.
“If you look at some of the technologies that exist now with HTML5, a lot of the heavy lifting is already done in terms of generating new creatives across all the markets that an operator is live in,” Stone added.
“If you’re an operator, and you’re active in multiple markets, then you will have several different requirements that you must meet for each jurisdiction. In Ontario, for example, you cannot offer bonuses; New Jersey you have different disclaimers that you must include, which is different again to what must be included in Ohio or Pennsylvania.”
Creative automation shouldn’t just be used to tailor advertisements to different regulations. In fact, Stone explained that this technology can be used to personalize creatives based on a user’s device, the page they’re visiting, the team that they follow or even their previous betting behavior.
But despite the developments in automation, there is arguably still more work to be done to create a truly personalized experience for bettors. Stone suggested that the iGaming industry may find it useful to draw inspiration from other industries on how to achieve this.
“What’s interesting is that we’re now seeing a shift towards adding additional layers of sophistication to those advertising campaigns – similar to what you see in industries such as e-commerce.
“In retail, if you look at a pair of shoes on a website, every single advert that you see for that brand from then on features that product you had been looking at. It’s not just an advert for the brand itself, it’s much more personalized. For iGaming, there is a growing opportunity to add that level of personalization; we just need access to that data that can inform that automation.”
It’s all about efficiency
For commercial teams, automation may also have its own advantages when it comes to value extraction. From his experience, Stone has found that many brands have been using AI-led automation to identify different forms of content that have led to an uptick in player conversion.
This information can then be used by data analysis teams to identify where their brand should be investing, what content they are producing, and how best to improve their overall campaign messaging.
This, he explained, can have a knock-on effect for efficiency. For Intelitics, there are three main areas where automation can create a more efficient business.
“Automation is going to create workflow efficiencies; your teams can be deployed to other, more important elements, as opposed to spending their time just creating static images. They can be much more conceptual,” he said.
“From there comes capital efficiency, in terms of being able to shape where you choose to invest. Your adverts will be much more engaging, and more targeted to your intended customer base. You’re going to have higher engagement on ads, which ultimately leads to a greater return on investment.
“When you have a higher engagement with adverts, you can tailor and automate more of that player conversion funnel. It’s then more likely that you can extract value much more quickly over time. That’s the third area.”
What next?
Automation clearly has its up sides for iGaming brands looking to streamline their businesses. But for the Intelitics CEO, there is still a long way to go before AI plays a leading role in iGaming marketing strategies.
“Brands are already leveraging AI to get insights into the efficiencies of marketing spend. The adage is ‘50% of my advertising is wasted. I just don’t know what 50%’ – AI can tell you exactly what 50% is wasted,” he concluded.
“At the end of the day, AI is more efficient at sifting through the volume of data that is available for operators to be able to be to unlock those growth parameters.”
