56 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • MARCH/APRIL 2022 Data and the “Digital Mentality” continued from page 18 data is used to determine patterns and changes in play. “Sometimes a player will make purchases outside of their pattern of play. It’s important to review the behaviors leading up to that user activity to encourage responsible play,” he said. “Analytics tools help us focus on the correct data and take actions that are informed. Sightline sits at the intersection of digital and brick and mortar lottery. This position enables us to help our customers broaden the view and use of the data they’re collecting.” JUMBO has been in the digital business for almost two decades and has operated across the globe. “It’s incredible to look back on how the number of data points we utilize has grown over the years,” Richard Bateson said. “We started off small but the data has grown exponentially to effectively serve as guardrails for lotteries. We’ve invested heavily in data because we needed to understand what the best activities are to adapt and maximize the opportunity to increase sales or onboard a new player. For me as a marketer, I find these tools fascinating in that they allow me to receive a much more advanced view of the player. The result is that my decisions are much more focused on exactly what the player wants.” Brian Rockey oversees a lottery that doesn’t presently offer iLottery but has a robust players club. “We have a few hundred thousand players registered and active in our MVP Club and we interact with those players often,” he said. “When we do our segmentations and psychographic work, we try to delineate and identify the varying degrees of loyalty. This can be done by looking at lottery spend as well as what else the player does for entertainment. We know, for instance, that 40% of our players have visited a casino in the past year. So our question is ‘will they stick with us when casinos open in Nebraska next year or will we lose them, or lose a portion of their spend?’ We need to know how much of their daily activity we consume and determine what we can do to keep them as customers.” Drew Svitko moved the conversation to the next step. “Many of us are collecting data but not every lottery is selling online or accepting cashless payments,” he said. “So what can we do with all this data that we have collected to inform the rest of our business, the traditional retail side of the business? How does this data help those that aren’t selling online or perhaps aren’t accepting cashless payments?” Merv Huber said that the reality of the situation is that the majority of lotteries still don’t sell products online, including most of Scientific Games’ clients. “Most of the CRM programs we run are for lotteries that don’t have online sales,” he said. “They have loyalty programs and second chance programs. But we learn a lot about those players that are just entering tickets into the system. What games do they like to play? Are they hitting the responsible gaming limits that are set within the system? We know the retail behavior of many players from the record of their second chance game entries, or if they’re funding their digital accounts at retail locations. So we can gain a lot of valuable information from different digital activities, even from those who are not actually purchasing games online. Trevor Allison believes an important point is often missed when looking at data. “I think when most people think of CRM they’re thinking strictly retention,” he said. “But that thinking misses a big piece of what CRM can do, which is also capture User Experience and User Interface information. And if we can optimize UX and UI in the digital space, there’s no reason we can’t take that same information and transfer it to the traditional lottery space. INTRALOT is doing that now. A recent launch of sports betting for one of our customers includes applying the information to different parts of the lottery, not just digital. We now understand the player fully and we work to keep a balance between supplying them with promotional information and bonuses that will drive purchases and not annoy them.” Richard Bateson believes data leads to evidence-based decision making, which is what all businesses need, not just lottery. “I think it’s a misconception that if you’re not selling through iLottery you’re not transacting online and you don’t have a digital program,” he said. “Actually, some of the lotteries who are prohibited from offering iLottery have fairly advanced digital programs and capabilities. Whether it is understanding the player experience and interface or their use of CRM tools through a loyalty program, I’ve been quite impressed with how advanced the non-iLottery lotteries have become. They then use this data to make the same evidence-based decisions as lotteries with iLottery programs.” Brian Rockey runs one of those noniLottery states and he agrees that they have become creative. “Our data comes to us in different forms,” he said “We use coupons a lot, both at retail and through our loyalty program and we are able to gauge player patterns through the coupon redemption. We are able to reward players for purchases and see if we can drive certain consumer behaviors. We also have had a mobile app for many years and we are working to continue to add as many features as possible, short of selling through the app. Then we can learn as much about the app user as possible.” Drew Svitko steered the discussion to a final and very important component of the digital lottery world – responsible gaming, asking “We’ve determined that the data collected can be used on both the digital and traditional sides of the business. How can the data also be used to allow lotteries “The use of credit cards transforms the transaction from an anonymous cash purchase, in which nothing is known about the player, into a record and data-point that can help the player be more aware and manage play more responsibly.”
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NTg4MTM=