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Extendy. How much does it cost to operate an online casino?
When thinking about launching their own online casino, many arbitrageurs consider a white label solution as the best option. With so many platforms on the market to choose from, it’s no wonder that many may feel deterred by all the work involved. Fully-fledged, high-level operations are offered only by a few white label casinos. What’s more, attempting to launch an online casino by one’s self essentially involves building a new business from scratch with all the risks and pitfalls that accompany it.
In this article, we will discuss all that goes into launching and operating an online casino based on one of our experience, the main departments and tasks involved, the number of employees needed at the start, and the costs involved in employing teams of iGaming professionals.
Payment Processing / PSP
Deals with player payment processing – from connecting payment methods to quickly resolving issues with deposits.
While part of the team monitors deposit drops, the other works ‘on the front line’ 24/7. This involves handling all player requests, and financial reconciliation. The Payment Processing department also ensures the necessary number of payment methods and their proper functioning: searching by GEO, signing, testing, integration, routing (switching payment methods), and communicating with payment account managers.
Included in the tasks of the Payment Processing team are helping to avoid signing unreliable payment methods, ensuring quick onboarding and annual payment method verification, quickly resolving deposit issues, and thus avoiding additional chargeback fees.
The department includes monitoring managers, inbound request handlers, business developers, lawyers, account managers, and technical specialists. To set up a PSP team would require at least 5 employees, with the cost of the team starting from €9000 depending on the location.
Payments, Risk & Fraud
Handles KYC, regulates payments, conducts checks when necessary, and identifies and combats fraud. While the team primarily uses automated solutions in their daily tasks, a significant part of the daily work is performed by employees.
Payment verification is carried out in several stages. Identifying fraud sometimes resembles detective work – one needs to study the overall behavior of different groups of players and look for patterns. Fraud is constantly evolving which also means employees in this department will be continuously analyzing, adjusting and tweaking processes to prevent fraudulent clients from returning, and to prevent various risks, including license complaints.
The department’s work affects direct potential losses from fraud, which can be quite substantial. A few months back, thanks to the quick work of the Payment, Risk and Fraud’s team, we were able to promptly identify and prevent a potential case of abuse of funds which could have cost us several hundred thousands of dollars.
When setting up a Payment, Risk and Fraud team, you could expect small volumes of FTDs (First Time Deposits). This means you can start off with a team of 6 employees which would cost around €9000 a month. Training employees and finding employees who are well-experienced in identifying unusual fraudulent schemes can prove to be particularly difficult, so these aspects should be taken into consideration.
CRM
Responsible for tournaments and gamification, this department’s key functions are player retention and upselling. The functionality can vary depending on which CRM system is used: more advanced solutions allow you to set up more flexible chains of actions and bonuses, quickly connect new GEOs, introduce player missions, and much more. However, such systems require more experienced employees to launch and manage activities for different segments of players, including VIPs.
When setting up your online casino, you could be looking at recruiting three CRM managers for one brand, and, depending on the location and the managers’ experience, the cost could begin at around €8000. Once again, it is important to consider the few experienced specialists on the market which could mean the price could be even higher.
Game Management
Responsible for negotiating with game providers and discussing promotions with game studios. The game management department also handles the placement of games on the casino site while taking the GEO into account. For instance, players in different countries will likely prefer different games. Localisation and dedicating proper prioritization to players will help increase casino revenue.
Specialists with a deep understanding of games and the markets might be hard to come by, and the cost of one manager when setting up a brand could start at around €2000 depending on the location.
Content
Responsible for player communication. This includes explaining tournament rules, drafting marketing material about upcoming tournaments and campaigns, drafting notifications, email newsletters, Gamble Addiction & Anti-Money Laundering policies, payout rules, various terms and conditions, and much more.
Discrepancies in the terms and conditions of ongoing tournaments can lead to thousands of support requests and even more serious consequences such as discrepancies in payout limits indications, followed by player complaints and license revocation.
When launching your content department, each language team can consist of 3 content writers who are native speakers of the language they are writing in, with each team costing around €5000 per month.
BI Analytics
One of the most important departments in an online casino, its main aim is to help the business make the right decisions. BI is critical for marketing, VIP management, CRM, antifraud, payments, and much more. The analytics team processes huge amounts of data from various sources, allowing other departments to monitor important metrics, evaluate efficiency, and optimize work.
Building an effective BI Analytics department can take up to a year and costs start from around €300,000 per year. The main expenses are the employees, software, and hardware. We should point out that investing more in the employees, or choosing rather to invest in the software aspect will have an effect on the level of automation but will not significantly impact the final cost.
While “Ready-made solutions” usually provide access to an analytical solution, there still needs to be someone who will manage it. Therefore, an operational team with high expertise is needed. Its size can vary from 5 to 20 employees depending on the tasks and solutions used. On average, the cost of the team’s work, including software and hardware expenses will be around €25,000 euros per month. An analytics team can start out with three employees, and can cost about €14,000 euros per month.
Support
This is the first point of communication for players, and the quality of the department’s work directly affects player retention and loyalty. Properly written player communication scripts, case resolution algorithms, and team training help with this.
Support agents work 24/7 to help solve various problems encountered by players regarding fund deposits and withdrawals, player and payment verification, and account settings. Customer support agents also explain tournament rules, promotions and campaigns, as well as casino features such as bonuses, missions, etc.
An effective customer support team usually includes between 20 to 70 customer support agents, depending on the level of automation and the GEOs involved. As the number of GEOs grows, finding enough employees with the required language skills and suitable experience can be a challenge. When setting up a customer support team, you need to consider starting out with at least 6 people, and the cost of this team would be around €7000.
Call Center
Partially complements support functions in solving new player problems but also performs other important business tasks, such as reactivation. A properly set up call center could mean a return of up to 20% of players.
Another function of call centers is collecting feedback and passing it onto the product team. For example, optimizing bonuses could result in players receiving more attractive rewards and an increase in deposits for the casino.
A call center department can start off with two employees, and can cost around €3000 per month.
VIP Management
Working with VIP players is key in casino operations, ensuring retention of high-paying clients and revenue growth. VIP managers develop a VIP management strategy and set metrics to classify clients as VIPs, such as average bet size, frequency of play, or deposit amount.
The main principle in working with VIPs is to provide a highly personalized service through creating exclusive promotions and bonuses based on the VIP players’ preferences and actions on the site. Unique bonus calendars need to be developed for each product the client plays: casino, sports, live.
The VIP manager should have a good sense of the player, a desire to solve problems, and have a sense of empathy, as well as be able to upsell bonuses, games, and other offers to the client.
The department also handles objections, resolves complex cases, and legal issues together with lawyers and other departments such as Risk & Fraud.
When starting out, a VIP department can consist of two managers, and should cost around €6000.
Conclusion
When launching an online casino, you’ll be looking at a minimum of 30 professionals and a minimum monthly cost of €63,000. This amount is based on CIS countries and only includes the net salaries of department heads and employees, mainly at mid-level. When hiring on the international market or head-hunting the best industry professionals, you could be looking at double the cost per team, and possibly higher.
Extendy is a white label solution that offers turnkey operations without additional costs for partners. We look forward to discussing the possibilities of launching your online casino brand. Reach out to us by filling in an application on the website if you want to discuss the possibility of cooperation and launching your casino brand with us.
The post Extendy. How much does it cost to operate an online casino? appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.
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All British Casino Joins Forces With WST For UK Championship
All British Casino has become a partner of one of snooker’s greatest tournaments, the Victorian Plumbing UK Championship, for the first time.
WST is delighted to announce this new partnership ahead of the 2024 Victorian Plumbing UK Championship which will run from November 23rd to December 1st in York.
It is part of the sport’s Triple Crown Series alongside the Masters and the World Championship. The UK Championship was first staged in 1977 and many of the all-time greats have their name on the trophy.
Ronnie O’Sullivan won the title for an eighth time last year, beating Ding Junhui in the final. A stellar field of snooker’s biggest stars is once again expected at the superb York Barbican venue for the event which is televised by BBC, Eurosport and many other broadcasters worldwide.
WST’s Chief Commercial Officer Peter Wright said: “We welcome All British Casino on board for the Victorian Plumbing UK Championship and we look forward to working with them on this outstanding event. Our sport is growing worldwide and this tournament will reach a vast global audience.”
Jan Wienk from All British Casino said: “We are excited to connect with snooker for the first time as we know it is a globally successful and rapidly developing sport, which matches our ambitions as a brand. The UK Championship has an incredible history and tradition, and we are thrilled to have the opportunity to partner with this event which brings so much entertainment to people worldwide. We look forward to seeing the incredible skills of the players as they compete for the trophy.”
The qualifying rounds of the Victorian Plumbing UK Championship run from November 16th to 21st, with the 16 qualifiers to join the top 16 seeds in York.
The post All British Casino Joins Forces With WST For UK Championship appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.
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Growe Partners Named Best Affiliate Program. Once Again.
Growe Partners, an affiliate program, which has skyrocketed its performance in the iGaming industry in just a year, has received yet another recognition as the Best Affiliate Program at the SiGMA Europe Awards 2024.
The ceremony took place in Valletta, Malta on Nov, 12th, and the victory was achieved through a combination of public votes on the award page and evaluations by a distinguished jury panel.
In just a year Growe Partners has rightfully reserved a place amongst industry leaders, who have been in the game for a lot longer, and as they say themselves — they are not going anywhere. Today Growe Partners is a network with over 32 thousand partners, operating in more than 10 locations worldwide.
“This achievement reflects our commitment to investing in our people, our partners, our ideas, and continuously implementing new innovative approaches. We are proud of the strong team we have built, which is always on the lookout for ways to develop and better themselves. And whose dedication resulted in this victory.
With winning this award we would like to once again emphasize that everything is possible in our industry if you set the right goal and work hard for it.” , — commented Dima Mariievskyi, Head of Growe Partners.
The post Growe Partners Named Best Affiliate Program. Once Again. appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.
Colorado
Jackpot.com Launches in Colorado Providing Consumers Mobile Lottery Access Across the Centennial State
Today, Jackpot.com, the online platform and app that allows individuals to safely and securely order official state lottery tickets and scratchers from their mobile phone and other devices, announced its launch in Colorado. On the heels of the Colorado Lottery’s 40th anniversary last year, the Centennial State will feature both draw games and Scratchers (digital scratch off games).
With Jackpot.com, Colorado players can instantly buy tickets for nationwide games such as Mega Millions and Powerball, as well as their favorite state lottery games, including Cash 5, Pick 3, Lucky 4 Life, and more. The innovative platform purchases tickets on behalf of its customers from an official state lottery retailer, displaying a scan of their ticket and transferring winnings under $600 in real-time to their account. For prizes greater than $600, Jackpot.com securely delivers the ticket to the winning player so they can collect the winnings from the Colorado Lottery.
“At Jackpot.com, we remain committed to growing the safe and secure access to the lottery across the country and we could not be more excited to add Colorado as our seventh state,” said Jackpot.com CEO and co-founder, Akshay Khanna. “Last year, the Colorado Lottery reached $4 billion in proceeds and they give back millions of dollars each year to state parks, schools, and various projects. They’re also notably invested in responsible gaming, which has been a staple at Jackpot.com since its inception. We can’t wait to become part of the Colorado community and provide an accessible and reliable lottery experience for players.”
Not only will Colorado residents have access to their favorite state lottery games, they’ll also have access to Scratchers – the digital scratch ticket offering focused on expediting the convenience and the processing times of scratch-off games. Jackpot.com will launch with five of the most popular scratchers in Colorado, including $3,000,000 Supreme, Casino Ca$h Chips, $250,000 ORO, and more. Customers simply have to “scratch” their device screen with their finger or mouse to reveal their scanned ticket and potential winnings. Jackpot.com delivers the industry’s fastest online lottery scratch card experience after undergoing a comprehensive business process review by Gaming Laboratories International (GLI), which ensures its method for ordering and processing lottery scratch tickets is accurate and functions as expected for both Jackpot.com and the player.
This year marks the Colorado Lottery’s fourth consecutive year generating a new sales record, amassing over $900 million in revenue. This year’s success translates to more than $196 million in funds allocated to beneficiaries throughout the state. Since its first ticket sale in 1983, the Lottery has allocated over $4.2 billion to good causes across the state.
Jackpot.com has continued to raise the bar for responsible gaming through the integration of modern conveniences and safety guardrails, one of the key distinctive features of digital lottery platforms. The company has significantly invested in responsible gaming protections by allowing customers to set spend limits, setting default limits on daily deposits, providing access to local and national responsible gambling resources, self-exclusion, self-suspension and automated notifications that offer help should problematic behavior be detected. Jackpot.com is the only lottery courier service to launch with iCap certification from the National Council on Problem Gambling.
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