Data: Betting brands struggled for visibility ahead of World Cup

Even before the first ball was kicked in Russia, it appeared that the established bookmaking brands were finding it difficult to generate traffic from World Cup-related keyword terms ahead of the tournament’s opening game in Moscow.

Britain’s bookies will be looking for another bonanza this summer, given that the tournament in Brazil four years ago broke records across the board, but it would appear that the betting brands are going to be sharing a lot of that bonanza with the affiliate websites. Indeed, Oddschecker dominates the football market. That’s because the comparison website is very much leading the market across the top 364 football keywords.

It is neither surprising nor new to see Oddschecker leading this market, but what is notable is how the brand has managed to increase the gap between it and the leading operators. Our analysis suggests that Oddschecker now generates 39,289 organic visits from these keywords. By comparison, the next seven most visible brands combined generate just six more visits than this.

The sheer volume of position-one rankings that Oddschecker holds underpins its strength in the organic search market. The brand has 208 position-one rankings of the football-related keywords that we analysed – 57% of the market. The second-most visible brand, Sky Bet, has just four, and although Ladbrokes has 34, these are for low-volume keyword terms.

Beneath Oddschecker it really is something of a goal-line scramble for visibility with the established bookmaking brands of William Hill, Ladbrokes, Coral, Sky Bet, Betfair, Paddy Power and bwin all driving similar levels of traffic from a very similar number of keywords.

Indeed, it appears to be the affiliates are achieving stronger rankings for higher-volume terms. Just Bookies, for example, achieves a very similar level of traffic to Paddy Power, but does so from just 58.8% of the keyword set, compared to 87.6% for Paddy Power.

Ahead of the tournament, it was notable that the bookmakers have also been slower to move into positon when it comes to keywords relating specifically to the World Cup tournament. When we look at the 52 top keywords that make specific reference to the tournament, we see that a number of notable brands are absent from our top 10.

Whilst the likes of Sky Bet, bwin, William Hill, Ladbrokes and Betfair are present, there is no sign of brands such as Paddy Power and Coral. In their place we find affiliate brands, not competing operators. Again, this isn’t because those brands aren’t ranking for the keywords in this market. Four of the brands behind Oddschecker rank for every keyword, and all of them rank for at least 80% of them.

Ten days before the opening game, Oddschecker ranked in position one for 40 of the 52 ‘World Cup’ keywords in our analysis. As search volume increased in the final days before the tournament, this put the brand in a strong position to capitalise on a significant seasonal peak in search activity.

How do the bookmakers fight back?

What we appear to be seeing in the sportsbook search results is a pattern similar to that seen in sectors such as travel and financial services, where brands offering a ‘comparison’ service are being deemed by Google as the most relevant, impartial and authoritative search result for the end user. So how do bookmaking brands drive traffic during this key trading event?

Brand and ATL advertising will obviously play a major role. Targeted TV campaigns offering match-specific promotions are a well-established tactic, and betting brands will be using these heavily as a way to drive online activity. Social will also be a key battleground, and we expect the usual suspects to push this channel heavily.

But when it comes to search, the time has come for brands to really look at the proposition they are offering to consumers. They may not be able to compete with the strength of Oddschecker, but in a market where there is often little to distinguish one brand from the next, the one that can develop a relevant USP that translates well to search could be the one that closes that widening gap at the top.