Opinion: Sportsbook automation is only part of the answer

In a few short years, the sportsbook trading function has changed beyond recognition.

Earlier this month I attended and spoke at Sky Bet’s ‘What are the odds on that? In-Play Football Trading’. It was a fascinating insight into the key trends effecting football trading and a reminder that while much has changed in the past five or 10 years, there is still much more change to come as bookies try to keep up with technological advancements and changing customer demands.

The time when in-play trading was done by five people trading one game with no models or spreadsheets is long gone. Back then, only the major games were covered and the offering was at best basic and at worst clunky.

Automation of the function means bookies can offer a huge range of in-play markets and drive turnover with minimum resource, giving customers access to events at any time of day, any time of the year. In turn, this gives time to drive innovation through product, and margins via granular risk management. Moreover, the skillset of a trading department is shifting towards being product focused for engagement and retention.

But the relationship between data suppliers and in-house trading teams is also evolving. Most bookies still like taking control of the big events themselves and exercise some control on their margins, so the relationship needs to be flexible. Manual football traders can spot things that happen in-play before fans and punters can, such as a regular penalty taker coming off and the impact this has on next goal scorer markets.

There is a huge amount of coverage which can be modelled, such as correct score, corners and bookings, but I don’t think we’ll ever fully get away from someone who knows the leagues, teams, manager and players inside out. It’s one thing getting the fixture coverage, but top fixtures need care and love to give the best experience to the customer.

The key to offering a complete services is achieving harmony between models and traders.

New challenges

There are other components of the in-play experience are changing, too, throwing up fresh challenges for trading teams.

Cash-out is, and will continue to be, another key area for bookies to attract and retain customers. What started with partial cash-out at bet365 has continued recently with Sky Bet’s cash-out bonus and innovations around this product will no doubt come thick and fast next year.

One of the key challenges our clients are having with cash-out is reducing market suspension times.

The way events are currently traded means bookies must limit their exposure by withdrawing the cash-out option several minutes before the end of the game. Without knowing why, punters are being denied the option to cash-out well before the end of an event and are left feeling robbed of their ‘winnings’.

Operators at the very least need to let customers know what is available and when. But if a game goes deep into injury time, they should still be able to offer cash-out rather than immediately suspending markets. This is something we have worked hard to solve.

Driving in-play success

The underlying requirement here is to give customers the same markets they enjoy pre-match in an in-play environment. As Sky Bet said, bookies need to give customers control to bet on what they want, when they want.

But how will this trend develop in 2017 and beyond? Here are a couple of predictions:

• The quality of live streaming is improving all the time and is becoming a key battleground between bookies in terms of growing in-play turnover. This will continue apace and the variety and depth of streaming coverage will grow
• Cash-out will be offered for 100% of the natural lifetime within an event, enabling bookies to assume a much more aggressive stance without experiencing a negative effect on margin
• More power will be given to the customer. In-game accumulators are a big opportunity and so are micro-markets, and I expect bookies to invest to get these products firing on all cylinders next year
• In-play betting will become quicker and more accessible, with the trend towards one or two-tap bet placement spreading across the sector. The recent launch of Bookie, the ‘Tinder of sports betting’, is a great example of this trend in action and expect similar UX innovations to emerge.