Omnichannel capabilities can revolutionise your customer strategy by connecting retail and digital gaming experiences into a single and coherent brand offer. It’s a “making the whole greater than the sum of the parts approach”, where delivering a seamless customer experience can have a powerful impact.
At the recent SBC Canadian Gaming Summit – our CEO Colin-Cole Johnson shared his expertise on the panel ‘Omnichannel marches on: are the bricks and mortar crowd catching up?’. We decided to delve deeper on the subject and share more about what Omnichannel means to Bede.
The main benefit operators gain from using omnichannel is the ability to unify their gambling experience for their customers – but what are the benefits of bridging retail and digital? How does omnichannel differ in the igaming landscape as opposed to various other industries?
‘We’re not selling a coffee, fast-food or grocery deliveries. We’re offering entertainment experiences and need to responsibly encourage dwell time and multiple transactions’
Cole-Johnson said.
Operators in the igaming industry must look at using omnichannel from a different perspective. There is a strong chance that if you are running a land-based casino or lottery, then your customers are playing digitally with a different brand. So, how do you win that share of their wallet?
One of the key ways to do this is through adopting a customer management approach and prioritising this over the traditional channel management approach. And that doesn’t mean cannibalising retail to the benefit of digital, as with the right Omni approach all channels should be rising.
Customers have an expectation that brands are joined up in exactly this way, especially when targeting younger audiences where the strength of the digital experience in every channel is critical to succeeding with an omnichannel strategy.
‘You see this with Starbucks; Starbucks holds 1.5 billion dollars or more on customer wallets at one time – which made me wonder, why? You don’t really see a lot of people using that feature. But it comes from their gift cards, that converts you into their app, that converts you to their loyalty points, collecting the gold stars. That’s how Starbucks do it.’`
Those products that can put real people at the centre and utilise the right toolsets to drive a high-level of engagement from customers in multiple channels will likely win out. This in-turn will equal high wallet-share for the brand, irrespective of channel.
But what makes a strong customer experience? On top of the core product being played there are obvious aspects such as Personalisation that everyone is now recognising. That can be extended into offering unified player wallets, integrated loyalty schemes, customer relationship management and marketing that seamlessly flows players between channels, all creating the core foundations for a successful omnichannel offering. If you’re not making the customer experience easier and more enjoyable, don’t expect it to work.
‘If you put another wallet in place, that you have to deposit into, customers may not want to use it – they have a bank account already – you’re creating a bit of friction with players who maybe don’t want it. We see that in lottery, with things like Direct Pay, and subscriptions – remove that step, especially for customers who are retail orientated, keep it simple’
Of course, it’s arguably harder now to get a customer to visit a physical location, we see the evidence of this happening across the retail sector, so embracing the digital channel to help drive retail activity is now more significant than ever. So, you must look to harness digital offerings that will get people connected to a venue(s) and connected to others who visit said venue(s). This in turn will create relationships between your digital and land-based offerings.
‘Younger players want to participate & connect with other players. Digital products today can be a bit soulless and lonely in their experience. If you help build that connection, it will appeal to a younger audience.’
Ultimately, it’s imperative to really understand your customers, their experiences, and how to make the player journey even more enjoyable – look at your predictions about your future customers, and their needs. The demand for Omni experiences in our iGaming industry are only going to continue trending upward, so let’s talk about how Bede’s market leading product and software can help you.
