Egaming industry predictions for 2019 - including company culture and user experience
ComeOn CEO Lahcene Merzoug and Degree 53 head of product Bruno Tonelli provide their top-three industry themes for next year
Lahcene Merzoug, CEO, ComeOn
Make it personal: We see an increasing demand among customers where they expect a full customised experience tailored to their needs. A few years ago that would have been impossible to cater for that demand as costs of keeping that level of service would be too great. Today with all data and smart tools at hand, we can truly give our customers the attention and customisation that they deserve. To personalize your communication, products and services will be key next year and the years to come.
Simplify everything: The reason the smartphone has innovated many industries is not always because it creates a better experience. Quite the opposite, the small screen and the way you input text can be quite frustrating sometimes. But still we answer our e-mail, do our online shopping and gambling on our smart devices to a greater extent year by year. We even often do so when our laptop and it’s full size keyboard, is laying there just 3 meters away on our dining table, why is that? It’s because we always strive to put in as little effort as possible and the smart phone is always just one dig in our pocket away. In the long run, consumers always seek to find the path of least resistance, we want things to be as simple as possible. We already in 2018 saw the success of our innovative brands Snabbare, Hajper, Nopeampi and Blitzino and we know that 2019 will be the year when simplified features, payment options and flows really makes an impact.
Take care of your employees: In a world where work takes an increasing part of our lives and where we are connected and reachable 24/7, we as employers need to take the mental health and wellbeing of our employees seriously. Will 2019 finally be the year when other iGaming companies join us to break this negative trend and turn their focus on what will be a bigger health issue than physical health going forward?
Bruno Tonelli, head of product, Degree 53
Cryptocurrency: A more in-depth approach from cryptocurrency companies and a bigger interest on the gambling industry will be shown. This will not only be on the KYC areas but also on building gambling platforms. Bitcoin is looking to build an eGaming platform using its currency. This might be the year we see some of those big guys out in the market.
Responsible gambling: Last year signed a sharp turn on RG topic. Italy put a full ban on gambling ads and other countries are thinking about it too. A few operators signed a whistle to whistle ads ban agreement in the UK while others are also considering it. There will be some sort of follow up either from the regulators to put new rules in place or from operators to use RG as a way to market their support/concern for customers. Potentially, machine learning and AI will be used more in-depth to track problematic customers behaviour.
User experience: Until a few years ago, the UX side of gambling was mainly focused on offering players as many things to spend their money on as possible. With the growing usage of digital products, such as Netflix, Amazon, Facebook etc – companies that make a smooth user experience and daily personalised services as core business, gambling will follow suit to satisfy their customers’ needs.