Take your social media marketing strategy to the virtual stage

When the outbreak of coronavirus forced governments to implement lockdown restrictions, industry professionals found other ways to network. The new rules made it harder to communicate in-person, and with conventional trade shows across the board facing cancellation, companies sought alternatives. Key among them was enhanced social media marketing.

The importance of social media to our industry can be divided into two main categories. The first is B2C promotional activities including, for example, game developers partnering with streaming influencers to showcase their content. Several major slot providers have used influencers, such as the well-known Swedish brothers CasinoDaddy, to host an exclusive live stream of a new game on platforms like Twitch and YouTube Live.

Given that casino games do not tend to be popular among millennial and gen Z players, streamers can be a fantastic way to engage that emerging generation of tech-savvy gamblers. Titles with visually exciting gamification features, or the potential for big wins, work particularly well in that context.

Having said that, no matter how many followers an influencer has, if the game they are promoting is not of a sufficiently high quality, then it’s unlikely to attract a significant number of new customers. Streamers are a fantastic way of boosting great games, but they cannot be used to compensate for sub-par content.

One area that gets less attention is B2B-focused social media. The cancellation of in-person networking events and trade shows as a result of Covid-19 has made B2B social media marketing more important than ever before. Testament to that are figures demonstrating an increase in Facebook traffic of around 10% during the lockdown period. Social media will therefore be integral to the industry’s success in 2021, and is a great way for companies to demonstrate the efficacy of their solutions and locate potential clients.

For B2B businesses looking to drive brand awareness, social media marketing is often among the most cost-effective options. LinkedIn has stepped in to replace offline exhibitions and postponed networking events, as have video conferencing applications such as Zoom, which became 10 times more popular during lockdown.

For this to work, however, it’s essential to build a fully integrated marketing strategy around your attendance at the virtual events that are becoming more and more common. That means undertaking a pre-event promotional campaign over a period of months, spanning both social and traditional media. The objectives of such an exercise should include positioning, and raising awareness of, the key sales and business development executives who will be representing your company at the event in question.

Social media and digital marketing campaigns alone will therefore never be enough to fully replace face-to-face conversations. Instead, success will come to those who can safely deploy old-school business development techniques conducted in-person alongside a targeted online strategy.

With a passion for creating new products and 19 years working in the igaming industry, Soft2Bet’s CEO, Boris Chaikin, has a wealth of experience in building and managing teams in areas such as marketing, customer support, CRM and general operations. Chaikin has previously held the roles of marketing director and general manager at the B2B sportsbook and platform provider OffsideGaming during the decade he spent with the company.