Brand recognition: Betway CEO on the power of prestige sponsorship deals

Despite having been established back in early 2006, it’s only in the past five or so years that Betway truly started flexing its marketing muscle with the deployment of eye-catching TV and digital ad campaigns, as well as striking high-profile sports sponsorship deals. Indeed, any sports fan in the UK can’t fail to have noticed the Betway logo permeating through the world of football, horseracing, snooker, darts and even esports.

Meanwhile, its distinctive and amusing ads, dubbed ‘For the love of the game’, have been a familiar fixture around live sport for the past two years. This multi-vertical operator is certainly no shrinking violet when it comes to brand exposure – even if all that sponsorship and advertising doesn’t come cheap.

Steering the Malta- and Guernsey-based Betway ship is Anthony Werkman, who has been entrenched in the online gambling space since the turn of the century and who assumed the role of CEO last November. The South African should also know a thing or two about the marketing side of this privately held operator after serving as Betway’s marketing and operations director from 2015.

Anthony Werkman, CEO of Betway

For him, having the brand closely associated with prestige races like Cheltenham’s Queen Mother Champion Chase or inking six-figure deals with the likes of Swedish esports organisation Ninjas in Pyjamas is all part of his plan to expose the Betway brand to the complete gamut of sport fans.

EGR Marketing hears more from Werkman about the power of sports sponsorship, engaging with Millennials and why he believes taking Betway’s affiliate programme in house was a prudent move.

EGR Marketing: Betway’s seven-year partnership with creative agency Above+Beyond recently came to end. Looking back, how did Above+Beyond help with Betway’s brand exposure, particularly with the ‘For the love of the game’ TV campaign?

Anthony Werkman (AW): During the last seven years we worked very closely with Above+Beyond and we are very proud of that work. Both parties have evolved and grown, and we have moved into new markets and new countries, so I think we have reached the point for new, fresh ideas that could be localised to our new markets. ‘For the love of the game’ is probably the pinnacle of the relationship – this was a really strong campaign, we are really proud of this piece, and will look to evolve it further over the coming years.

When we walked into the Cheltenham Festival on the Wednesday the first thing that hit us was the Betway branding and ‘For the love of the game’. It just works really well to highlight our brand to new and existing customers. Going forward, there is a strong level of continuity that we will bring into a new agency as we go about further expanding Betway around the world.

EGR Marketing: How important is TV advertising for Betway in 2018 and beyond?

AW: TV advertising has been a big part of the marketing mix over the last couple of years. But it’s not a standalone channel – it has to work very closely with other marketing channels like our digital channels, social media and sponsorships. It obviously gets us very close to our audiences at key times around sport and allows us to engage with them. This is very important for brand building and getting our brand out there at the right time and in the right places.

And the World Cup is a wonderful opportunity to push the brand forward and engage with customers. It’s a massive global event over four weeks. For sportsbook operators like ourselves, with which football is our number one sport, it’s a natural overlap that works very nicely. As well as being an acquisition campaign, the World Cup is also a strong vehicle for our existing customers. It gives you an opportunity to get your marketing mix working nicely because there is always some lovely content around a World Cup. We are very excited about it.

EGR Marketing: What works best – standout odds or offers on the World Cup?

AW: What customers want is entertainment around the offering. There is a space between the betslip and the event, so it’s about offering engaging content, insights from our content team, data-rich products and giving the customers as much information and an experience that is above the other operators.

EGR Marketing: Betway has a shirt sponsorship deal with West Ham United, which is quite rare for the English Premier League as most shirt deals involve Asia-facing brands. What are the benefits for Betway?

AW: We have had our relationship with West Ham for a couple of years now and we are very proud of that relationship. They are part of the Premier League which is shown in 200 countries around the world and we see the impact of this on our global business. West Ham plays a very important role in our overall sponsorships.

Betway became a sponsor of West Ham United in 2015

For the Cheltenham Festival we had some of the West Ham players trying their hands at horseracing commentary, which was shown live on ITV Racing on Betway Champion Chase day and [shown on ITV Racing] and Patrice Evra’s piece was also picked up very strongly by print media and social media. We’ve also had the players engaging with the esports team Ninja in Pyjamas, who we also sponsor. We had [Michail] Antonio and [Javier] Hernandez playing against members of the CS:GO team, which was a great bit of content that we were able to push because of the sponsorship. As sportsmen, they love to compete and get pitted against one another.

EGR Marketing: How much competition is there between online gambling brands these days for sports sponsorship deals?

AW: It is a very competitive space out there at the moment in terms of finding sponsorship opportunities, but we stick to our guns with the type of sponsorships that we want to do. When we set out in the beginning, we had a very clear strategy with our marketing. Sponsorship was a big part of that strategy and we have a long-term view on where we want to take Betway. We also sponsor the Queen Mother Champion Chase [at the Cheltenham Festival], snooker’s UK Championship and have sponsored the Premier League Darts.

These are all very traditional British sports, and this allows us to bring the brand to people who have very different tastes in sport and to come across as a very authentic operator. These sponsorships have worked really well for us over the years and have outperformed our expectations. And, again, it enables us to deliver engaging content to customers.

EGR Marketing: How is Betway reaching out to and engaging with younger gamblers – the Millennials – and how does sponsoring Ninjas in Pyjamas and ESL esports events help?

AW: Betway targets an adult demographic and we find that the audience that bets at Betway is a sophisticated one. If you look at esports, it’s probably a sport misunderstood by a lot of people. At the end of the day, it’s two teams fighting it out to win. You have huge audiences that watch and an adult demographic very keen to bet on the result. In the delivery of the esports product, we have a portal specifically for gamers so that they don’t have to trawl through 101 sports to find their game – it’s all in one place.

When you look at esports punters, there is a particular way that we will market to that demographic, as well as offering a product that’s very esports-centric. It gets them closer to their games and it gives them content. It is up there with some of our fastest growing sport and you can see the growth in the crowds that go to watch the tournaments. So, our sponsorships of the ESL and Ninjas in Pyjamas are working very well for us.

EGR Marketing: Last year, Sky Betting & Gaming axed its affiliate programme, other operators slashed partners, while Betway took its programme in-house. Why did you do this and how does it assist with compliance and raising standards?

AW: The requirements of the Gambling Commission make it very clear that operators are responsible for all their third parties and the actions that they take, and within that are obviously affiliates. Bringing them in house and managing them at close quarters means you are able to take full control over which affiliates you work with and they are quite clear on the responsibilities they have to operate in the UK and globally.

But we will take action with any affiliate who crosses those lines. It’s about managing affiliates in what they do. There are a number of very skilful affiliates who want to understand the rules of the game and want to express their creativity within that. We believe that working closely with the right affiliates will give us a marketing arrow to add to our quiver.

EGR Marketing: So have a few ‘bad apples’ tarnished the industry’s image?

AW: I do think that is the case. As operators, we need to look at our game when managing those affiliates and holding them to account and not letting them do anything they want. About two and a half years ago we told our affiliates that they may not market using email or SMS lists without sharing those lists with us first. We wanted to make sure they weren’t marketing to self-excluded customers. It’s a very different world now for affiliates and we need to work together with a very clear control over how and what they do.

EGR Marketing: Betway reported revenues of €173m in FY2016, but an operating loss of €37m due partly to a heavy marketing outlay. Did you overspend on marketing in that year and did that investment pay off in 2017?

AW: As I said earlier, we set about a marketing plan a couple of years ago and this plan is performing better than expected. I’m very happy to say that in 2017 our numbers are looking very positive and are in the black. So yes, these campaigns have paid off very well – and continue to pay off – as we look to expand in the UK and around the world on a model which works very well for us financially, and from a responsible point of view. It’s one that has great opportunities for the future.

EGR Marketing: What are the key marketing trends for the next 12-24 months?

AW: I think two key themes are going to run through marketing in the next two years. One is responsible marketing and the other is GDPR. Both elements are going to challenge gambling operators and their marketing teams – and should do so. All marketing should be responsible, and we have very clear requirements from the GC and the ASA. From a data protection point of view, GDPR is very important and ensuring that the customer is aware of the data being collected about them and that it is done securely and that the rights of the customer are protected.

Within that, I think there will be more growth in the mobile product as people move from the old-fashioned desktop, as well as more customised, individually-created, automated in-play betting opportunities which will become more available as the data streams cross the different sports and provide a raft of markets around in-play. Our own #betyourway is an example of this where we have seen large growth recently and we expect that to continue. At the same time, that gives opportunities for all our different channels – sponsorships, TV advertising, affiliates, social media – to push content and push the message. It’s very exciting times ahead.