Q&A: Matthew Booth, Head of UK marketing, Betfair

EGR: What makes a great campaign?

MATTHEW BOOTH (MB): It needs to be carefully targeted, involve an innovative or original creative idea, and be delivered at a high standard across all the relevant channels. Results should not only be strong, they should also be able to demonstrate that pre-campaign KPIs and objectives were achieved.

EGR: What has changed in the world of egaming advertising since the advertising restrictions were lifted in 2007?

MB: Advertising has become more competitive with new entrants and existing advertisers marketing aggressively. TV, coupled with PPC, have been the biggest changes. I’m not sure whether brands have yet understood the impact of TV and cracked econometric modelling, but it will take a brave brand at the moment in the UK to exclude TV from their marketing mix.

EGR: Betfair spends millions of pounds on marketing every year, how exactly has this paid off and is it as easy to justify this spend now as it was in the past?

MB: We continually optimise our marketing strategies to ensure that our activities, and spend, are as efficient as they can be. Key to this are the tools we have to optimise customer journeys, before they arrive on the Betfair site, and while they are engaging with us. We use as much data as we can to make sure we are off ering the best possible experience, which is relevant to them individually.

EGR: Companies usually use a single agency to generate creative campaigns across various media. Why have you decided to hire Big Al’s Creative Emporium (BACE) and others this year?

MB: We’ve started working with Big Al’s as they have previously delivered a wide range of successful and innovative campaigns for high-profi le brands. In addition they specifi cally have a wealth of relevant experience within the egaming industry. However, there may be other agencies that have other specialist skills or knowledge that we also feel would be beneficial to utilise, particularly around the areas of online engagement and social media.

EGR: You’ve hired BACE to build engagement online ““ in what ways will you look to do this?

MB: Big Al’s will help us build online engagement by creating a strategy to help deliver interesting and engaging content that is relevant to our customers, with a key focus on social media channels. To help strengthen the brand we will look to continue to raise awareness right across our product portfolio, but particularly around our unique exchange proposition.

EGR: Brand ambassadors are key to Betfair’s online community engagement strategy. What exactly do they bring and how do you measure ROI on an investment like this?

MB: The right ambassador carries a real level of credibility. We want to use insightful opinion to help our customers make their betting decisions. Our ambassadors will also allow us to off er Betfair customers bespoke VIP hospitality experiences. It can, at times, be diffi cult to measure the ROI on these sorts of partnerships, but we have identified clear tangible methods of measuring success both to new and current Betfair customers.

EGR: Do you feel you’ve fallen behind in brand marketing terms in the last few years, particularly in in-play?

MB: In-play has experienced continued and significant growth, including the introduction of our revolutionary Cash Out Now feature in football and tennis markets.

EGR: Do you expect the UK to change its advertising regulations?

MB: We moved very quickly when Google allowed gambling advertising, as we did with TV. The next big changes are sure to be how social channels start to work with betting companies such as Facebook and Twitter. YouTube have brought in age verification as the first step.