For years the Saturday morning walk to the bookies was something of a tradition. A thing passed down from Dad to lad as they strode down the high street to put a pound on City to win 3-1 on their way to Maine Road. But in recent years that tradition has changed. Almost reversed.
You see, over the last few years, it’s been the lads (well young adults) passing down a new tradition to Dads – mobile betting.
The industry has been revolutionised since the arrival of the smartphone, particularly the iPhone in 2007, and has seen mobile betting transform the way have a punt on a horse or our team on a Saturday afternoon.
Half-time now sees lads teaching their Dads to bet in-play, rather than head down for an overpriced stale meat and potato, whilst the ability to bet anywhere has seen the industry sky-rocket to $13billion placed on mobile bets in 2013 alone.
That figure is expected to rise to $62billion by 2018, and with more and more states in the USA legalizing online gambling it’s no wonder.
That’s not to mention the plans of bookmakers on UK shores as they look to progress alongside technology.
Push notifications have been particularly effective. A recent report showed that 4.3percent of iPhone users have an app downloaded to their device – so they’re reaching out to a huge market. The World Cup proved this, with a huge rise in engagement following push notifications sent out by the likes of Paddy Power and Coral.
Raymond Doyle, Mobile Marketing Manager at Coral said during a Q&A with Freebets.com, “We have seen some excellent results from our push notifications campaigns.”
He added, “Figures show a significant spike in turnover immediately after each push notification has been sent out. Due to the success of the World Cup (from the [record] volume of downloads of the Coral app), push notification will become more and more important to our mobile marketing.”
Where bookmakers can take mobile betting from here is even more exciting. Live streaming of racing and also tennis has been particularly popular with fans, and will be an important avenue for the industry to take as technology continues to advance.
The rate of knots mobile betting is already going at is phenomenal. Since 2010 the industry in the UK has seen revenue go from £41million to £100million in just three years, taking up 20% of the entire betting industry. Expect that percentage to keep ticking significantly for some years to come.
