36 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2025 Loyalty Programs, strong mobile apps and web sites, incentives to drive online traffic to retailers, cross-promotions to incent retail players to go online and digital players to play at retail, Responsible Gaming messaging … these all deliver an immediate ROI even for lotteries that do not sell online. And they form the baseline for building out CRM programs and KYC initiatives which are really the key to long-term growth at retail and online. At the Virginia Lottery, Rob and the team worked hard to get players to register. Mark, Randy, and the digital team have done similar things in North Carolina. The NC Lottery was already selling draw-games online so eInstants became a seamless addition to their online portfolio. And then when Virginia and North Carolina did get authorization to sell online, they had a built-in registered player base which responded immediately. Sales in those two states grew right away and continue to increase today. The short-term ROI for digital engagement might be hard to directly measure but the overall results show it is there, and the ramp-up preparation for digital sales is critical. Customer Relationship Management is the cornerstone to Amazon’s success and all consumer marketing enterprises. Walmart, Starbucks, and casinos – businesses based on land-based operations and not online sales, have invested hugely in digital engagement with a strong effect. CRM is the key to sustainable success for Lottery just as it is for all consumer-facing businesses. NeoGames Studios retained its brand, was not rebranded as Aristocrat Interactive Studios. I assume that is a reflection of the brand equity of NeoGames Studios? C. Shaban: Exactly. The NeoGames Studios designs and produces online games that can be deployed on any online gaming platform, making them available to players in markets throughout the world. As we continue our integration, we simply want to preserve the value of that name recognition and its prominence as a game supplier that can be available to all online lottery operators. In January, we are launching a major update on the NeoGames Studios website to reflect the integration of Aristocrat’s huge treasure trove of content that is now a part of our portfolio. We brought 180 games from the NeoGames Studio to market in 2024, and more are planned in 2025. Our customers will now also benefit from the incredible brain-trust that comes over from Aristocrat’s game development assets and resources and will soon be able to select from Aristocrat’s industry-leading portfolio of gaming content being brought to the lottery market. Combining that with NeoGames seventeen+ years of gaming experience results, it is a win for our lottery customers and lottery players. Is there a concern that as eInstants become more and more exciting and fun that they come to resemble casinos-style games? C. Shaban: Aristocrat Interactive’s objective is to support our lottery customers, and we want to provide a variety of various products to meet the player demand and offer a diverse range of playing experiences. That would still include games that appeal to the core lottery player who prefers traditional games, and games for casual lottery players. We also are focused on developing games that appeal to the next generation of players who may have a background of playing longer-play Mobile games. We want to design games to excite all playstyles and preferences. So, to address your question Paul, the imperative is to be clear on the local regulations and comply with their directives and guidelines. Lottery operators hold themselves to the highest standards of integrity and compliance with the laws and regulations, so we want to align with the spirit and the letter of the jurisdictional laws and regulations. We also need effective geo-fencing and age-control systems and are committed to ensuring responsible play and consumer protection programs are also in place. Are most business decisions based on a best-practices approach that assumes some commonality to consumer behavior all around the world? There are commonalities in consumer behavior found everywhere. But the answer to your question is that the customer - the jurisdictional lottery operator – ultimately makes the decisions. Our job is to provide our lottery customers with technology, content, and support services, and with the benefit of our research and global experience we can provide counsel on how to proceed. But lotteries know what works best in their markets, so we aim to be their long-term partner of choice to support those operations, security, and growth. With this approach, we are proud that Aristocrat Interactive iLottery has never lost a customer. That said, our iLottery specialists do work to deconstruct the attributes of iLottery content and the different motivational drivers of the consumer to try to gain more granular insights to improve the games and tweak them to accommodate different local markets. And there remain huge opportunities for our industry to continue to grow the player base and overall business with further understanding of the almost infinite variety of playstyles and motivations. The games we develop can be tweaked to retain those underlying motivational drivers that may have universal appeal, while changing other attributes to appeal to local markets. The goal is to enable lotteries to maximize their appeal to a wider range of consumers, bringing more people into the joy of playing the lottery. With the objectives of the lottery digital team as our priority, Aristocrat Interactive is driven by continuous improvement of our industry-leading platform and the next generation of games, and marketing and operational support. As we kick off this new year, on behalf of my colleagues at Aristocrat, we are thankful for this opportunity and motivated to help drive iLottery growth in existing and new lottery markets. n “NeoGames was acquired by Aristocrat Leisure Limited for its depth and breadth of iLottery and iGaming expertise; and for its global team of digital professionals.” Walking the Talk: Investing in Sustainability — continued from page 23
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