eSports
Five in a Boat strengthens games expertise with industry PR specialist hires and new client wins
Leading communications agency Five in a Boat has today announced the appointment of Jack Langley as Senior Consultant and Girl Gamer’s Diane Hutchinson as Junior Consultant as part of its ongoing focus and commitment to the video games and esports sector.
Coming from a journalism and cross-sector agency background, Jack has worked exclusively in the gaming industry for a number of years both agency and client-side for companies including 505 Games, Gearbox, Wargaming, Kalypso Media and Square Enix Collective. As part of his work, Jack was responsible for launching titles like Control, Bloodstained, World of Tanks: Modern Armour and Matchpoint.
Diane is best known for being on the other side of the PR fence, running the video game website GirlGamers UK, and could often be seen at press events and industry shows. Diane has been in the video games industry for twelve years and is looking forward to being part of the Five in a Boat team.
Both appointments come as part of a strong period of growth for Five in a Boat, which includes the expansion of its games business, with new client wins including Atari and Arctic7 as well as an expanded remit with leading games publisher and developer Jagex. The agency is not only now responsible for the whole of Jagex’s corporate communications, but also its 3rd-party publishing arm Jagex Partners – which includes supporting its live titles and future projects such as Space Punks, Melvor Idle and This Means Warp.
On his new appointment Jack Langley commented: “I’m very pleased to have joined Five in a Boat during a period of such exciting growth, and I look forward to helping scale the business and support in consolidating our credentials within the games industry and beyond.”
Adding to this, Diane said: “I’m incredibly excited to be joining the great team at Five in a Boat and to be working with some of the best game studios in the industry.”
Jules Herd, Founder and Managing Director of Five in Boat, said: “The last 12 months have been absolutely crazy – in a good way – as we have continued to navigate and thrive in this new world. Games have swiftly become a core part of our business and so I could not be happier to have Jack and Diane with their combined experience on board to help us at this pivotal time. I am super excited about what the future holds both for Five in a Boat and for our clients and look forward to sharing more updates over the coming months”.
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Chad Kinlay Chief Marketing Officer TrafficGuard
Influencers, Content and eSports: Unleashing the Power of Dynamic Strategies in the eSports Ecosystem
The sports betting industry is undergoing significant growth worldwide with restrictions loosening and new markets emerging. New opportunities create fierce competition among sportsbooks, and this has led to them devising increasingly expensive and aggressive advertising campaigns.
Public figures and influencers have become a popular go-to for sportsbooks promotions, such as Michael Jordan partnering with DraftKings or Jamie Foxx with BetMGM. Big names are costly, and sportsbooks haven’t realised the ad spend used on these campaigns is going to waste. Without the right precautions in place, up to 22% of ad spend is lost to fraud according to Juniper Research.
The big budgets behind high-profile brand campaigns need to translate into real user engagement. To achieve this, sportsbooks must ensure their digital channels are optimised to capture the surge in interest these campaigns generate. Without proper management, this potential can be lost to inefficiencies like invalid traffic, diluting the impact of their investments.
Ad Budgets Going to Waste
In today’s competitive landscape, sportsbooks need to make every click count. In 2023 alone, The American Gaming Association estimated that over $1.9 billion was spent on advertising campaigns in the US. With such a large amount of spend in play, it’s crucial that sportsbooks see as big a Return on Advertising Spend (ROAS) as possible.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns are vital for sportsbook growth but can be disrupted by invalid traffic (IVT). IVT includes both malicious activity, like fraudulent bots, and unintentional actions, such as users repeatedly clicking on ads without intent to convert. These interactions inflate impressions and skew campaign performance data, leading to higher customer acquisition costs (CACs) and inefficient allocation of ad spend. Effectively managing IVT ensures that ad budgets drive genuine engagement and measurable growth.
Investing into influencers and celebrities also forces sportsbooks to bid on brand keywords to prevent their competitors stealing potential users searching for them. Up to 29% of PPC budgets are spent on this bidding according to Wordstream. As competition for brand keywords increases, PPC budgets are depleted without generating any new net revenue.
As campaigns become more expensive than ever, sportsbooks can’t afford to let profits fall to ad fraud. Instead of cutting budgets, sportsbooks should focus on analysing their campaign strategy.
Problematic Navigational Traffic
Navigational traffic is also presenting a significant challenge to sportsbooks alongside ad fraud. Navigational traffic refers to existing customers clicking on branded keywords to log into their accounts. While this seems convenient and harmless enough, this behaviour drastically inflates CACs. Like ad fraud, this can skew the effectiveness of PPC campaigns. By utilising paid search results instead of organic links to navigate to the site, costs are driven up without contributing to new user acquisition.
In addition to the challenges posed by navigational traffic and ad fraud, the competitive landscape for first-time depositors intensifies the need for strategic bidding on Google search. Brands investing heavily in influencers or sponsorships of major sporting events to generate awareness and drive potential users to search for them. However, without securing top placements in paid search results, these prospective customers may be intercepted by competitors before reaching the organic search listings. This creates a critical juncture where the effectiveness of a brand campaign hinges on converting that intent-driven traffic into first-time depositors, ensuring marketing spend achieves its goal of meaningful user acquisition.
First-time depositors are a critical metric for sportsbooks, and this issue directly impacts the cost efficiency of acquiring them. High CACs make marketing budgets less effective, reducing overall ROI.
Shoring Up Your Defences
Before launching costly ad campaigns, sportsbooks should adopt a multi-faceted approach to address ad fraud. IVT typically goes unnoticed, so to prevent this sportsbooks should monitor and analyse their campaign traffic for any suspicious activity. It is possible to identify IVT by looking out for signs such as irregular spikes in traffic from unknown locations or high pageviews. Fraudulent traffic can then by highlighted and removed.
The advancement of technology has made ad fraud more difficult to identify, and legacy fraud tools fail to detect IVT. They don’t analyse traffic at the impression level or consider the context of the business advertising. Sportsbooks can leverage ad-verification platforms to compensate for this. This allows sportsbooks to analyse and report suspicious traffic in real-time. Fraud can then be blocked before it has a chance to harm budgets.
Sportsbooks can also deploy tactics to reduce the impact of navigational traffic on CACs. Methods include encouraging existing customers to use mobile apps or direct bookmarks to log into their accounts instead of paid search campaigns. This decreases their reliance on PPC campaigns for navigation and protects budgets.
Keeping Profits in Sportsbooks’ Hands
Influencer and celebrity campaigns have proven to be a popular and useful tool in reeling new users and profits. However, if sportsbooks don’t have the essential precautions in place, they risk losing these profits to advertising fraud.
To make the most of their advertising efforts, sportsbooks need to prioritise their traffic. Implementing sophisticated tools to analyse traffic and filter out fraud will allow sportsbooks to protect their interests and focus on driving future growth. This way, they can secure their position in an increasingly competitive landscape.
Written by: Chad Kinlay, Chief Marketing Officer, TrafficGuard
A driven, open-minded, creative senior marketer with a strong sense of dedication and commitment. With over 15 years of progressive international experience in marketing and communications management, Kinlay has a credible history of commercial success.
8Bit Creatives, India’s leading esports consulting and talent management agency, has announced its partnership with NODWIN Gaming, a leader in new-age youth entertainment, gaming, and esports, as the exclusive Talent Partner for DreamHack India 2024.
With this partnership, 8Bit Creatives will leverage its significant reach in the Indian gaming, esports and youth communities through its prominent and talented roster of creators. These creators will create content leading up to the festival and also host meet-and-greet sessions.
India’s biggest gaming festival, DreamHack India, is set to take place from 15th to 17th November at the Hitex Exhibition Centre in Hyderabad, marking its fifth edition. For half a decade, the India edition of the global festival has become one of the most anticipated events of the Indian gaming ecosystem. Bringing together a plethora of events, including esports tournaments, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) events, cosplay competitions, music concerts, and stand-up comedy, DreamHack India is the celebration of gaming, esports, pop-culture, and entertainment.
8Bit Creatives, CEO and founder Animesh Agarwal said “DreamHack India is one of the most prominent events in the Indian gaming and esports calendar and we’re proud to be the exclusive talent partners for it. This is further recognition of 8Bit Creatives’ ability to meaningfully engage the gaming and youth audiences across the country. Our belief in working with the right creators who create experiences that resonate with the youth audiences distinguishes our offerings and we can’t wait to share what we have in store for DreamHack India 2024 with our audiences!”
This is not the first time that 8Bit Creatives will partner with DreamHack India. The organisation was also the talent partner for the event in 2022.
Commenting on the partnership, NODWIN Gaming, Co-founder and MD Akshat Rathee said “Our vision at NODWIN Gaming is to create unforgettable experiences for the youth, and DreamHack has proven to be the ultimate platform to realise that vision, bringing together gaming, entertainment, and community in an immersive celebration. We’re thrilled to have 8Bit Creatives as our exclusive Talent Partner for DreamHack India 2024. It’s especially exciting to welcome iconic creators like Mortal, who joined us in our very first edition, back for this landmark fifth year, alongside fan favourites like Snax, Kaashvi, Thug, and Payal. These creators bring a unique energy that connects deeply with our fans and elevates every moment. Their presence underscores our commitment to crafting electrifying experiences year after year, building on the momentum of events like BGMS and past DreamHack editions. Together with 8Bit and this powerhouse lineup, we’re setting the stage for an unforgettable event that will bring fans and creators closer than ever before!”
8Bit Creatives’s content and esports division S8UL became the only organisation in the year to win ‘Content Group of the Year’ award for the third consecutive year at the Esports Awards 2024. Additionally, they are the only organisation from India to ever win an Esports Award in any category. Earlier this year, gaming content creators from 8Bit Creatives including Naman Mathur, Payal Dhare and Animesh “Thug” Agarwal were invited for a meet and greet session with the honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi.
The organisation has been at the forefront of India’s gaming and content ecosystem with its extensive range of services, including talent management, campaign curation and execution, brand activations and more.
The post 8Bit Creatives partners with NODWIN Gaming as the exclusive talent partner for DreamHack India appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.
1 November 2024 – Esports has experienced explosive growth in Q3 2024, doubling turnover compared to the previous quarter. The average bet on cybersports increased by 17.6% quarter-on-quarter. SOFTSWISS, a global tech expert with over 15 years of experience providing innovative iGaming solutions, shares the SOFTSWISS Sportsbook Q3 2024 report.
The top five sports by Gross Gaming Revenue (GGR) remain consistent: Football, Tennis, Basketball, Table Tennis, and eFootball. For the second consecutive quarter, eFootball has outperformed Counter-Strike 2, indicating a shifting interest within the esports sector. Nevertheless, football continues to dominate, contributing nearly half of the total GGR.
The average live bet grew by 10% quarter-on-quarter, a positive development for operators as live bets hold 78.6% of turnover. The SOFTSWISS Sportsbook team is actively enhancing the live betting experience, aiming to capitalise on this trend and provide operators with even greater revenue opportunities.
The average bet grew by 9.7% quarter-on-quarter in Q3 2024, and the number of bets increased by 18.7%. GGR saw a modest growth of 1.5% quarter-on-quarter.
Despite the large number of projects launched for the UEFA Euro 2024, month-on-month statistics show that with the right promotional strategies, projects continue to operate successfully even after such massive events.
Alexander Kamenetskyi, Head of SOFTSWISS Sportsbook, adds: “Aligning a launch with a major sporting event can be a successful strategy, but football is not the only sport that can be leveraged in this way. The growth of cybersports presents new opportunities; for specialised projects targeting specific audiences, esports events can also serve as an effective starting point.
We continuously focus on product growth and development, enhancing features and user experience to drive further engagement and profitability for our partners.”
The SOFTSWISS Sportsbook is expanding its global presence. The product team is on track to secure certification in Brazil, conducted by an authorised testing laboratory. Furthermore, for the South African market, the SOFTSWISS Sportsbook has recently integrated a Horse Racing Module. This addition offers operators new business opportunities by covering over 2,400 international and local races monthly. The solution engages players with race cards, silks, and multiple bet types while providing operators unique skins and configurations to align with various brand identities.
The SOFTSWISS team is working on The iGaming Trends Report 2025, which offers a deep dive into key industry developments based on over 50,000 media headlines and insights from industry experts. Covering areas like regulation, marketing, technology, and business growth, this report provides a data-driven perspective on the trends shaping the upcoming year. The SOFTSWISS team shares the possibility of joining the waiting list.
All SOFTSWISS products will be showcased at the final major industry event, SiGMA Europe, at stand 2145.
The post SOFTSWISS Sportsbook Doubles Esports Turnover in Q3 2024 appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.
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