Developer insight: Moving lottery to a digital landscape

Lotteries are hugely popular all over the world, which is no surprise due to their desirable potential winnings, low ticket prices and great contributions to communities. This is enough to attract a wide range of customers.

While many lotteries are traditionally retail-based, some have been providing digital channels, such as responsive websites and mobile apps, for an additional stream of revenue. Online is a great way of enhancing established lottery services, extending the brand experience, as well as making it easier for digital-savvy customers to play.

Yet, there’s still a large proportion of operators that don’t offer mobile lottery, whether due to legislation or other reasons. This means customers are unable to register or purchase tickets online, and have to do it in a shop. However, with the growing legalisation of remote gambling and mobile use for other services, lotteries need to be open to moving their operations online if it’s possible.

Window of opportunity

The Covid-19 pandemic has shown how important digital services are when countries are in lockdown with limited retail footfall. Even if online purchases can’t be made due to legislation, lotteries can still create websites and apps to provide a great experience and offer value to their customers.

While developers need to follow app design standards for their specific platforms by default, they should pay close attention to iOS app development, particularly for container apps. Apple now requires container apps to provide as much native user experience as possible.

When creating a lottery app, whether it’s a full gaming or results-only product, it needs to be intuitive to onboard customers seamlessly. This will enable customers to engage with the brand remotely without any obstacles.

Lottery operators can make their apps as engaging as possible, adding interactive features and products to draw customers in and offer a fun gaming experience. For example, in addition to draws, operators can offer quick win games, gamified features, as well as providing content around responsible gambling, previous winners, charity and community activities.

In addition, developers need to review navigation, what the main customer journey is and how they can structure any secondary features. Personalisation, transitions, animations, loading screens and other elements that aren’t always considered could also bring the product to life and add to the overall experience. It’s also important that the app has all content embedded in it without redirecting the customer to a browser.

If online gambling is prohibited, lottery results apps are also a great way of extending the customer experience beyond the shop. Brands can offer features to help customers pick numbers, save them, and find the nearest shops to place a bet from. Providing value to customers will be a key factor for onboarding them and ensuring they continue using the app.

It’s imperative that apps include as many native or app-like features as possible from the start, particularly for iOS apps. While Google hasn’t made any announcements yet, we recommend following suit for Android apps. Focusing on clear navigation, app structure, embedded content and games, as well as a great design will help create a great lottery app.

Moving lotteries to a digital landscape will provide an additional revenue, as well as helping operators reach more customers. It’s important to continue to modernise products, particularly with the growing mobile use. It not only future-proofs the brand, but also allows existing customers to engage with it at any point.

Jennifer Winter is the marketing manager at Degree 53, a UX, design and development services specialist in online gambling products. She is responsible for the company’s marketing activities, including content creation, UX reviews and PR.