Checkd Group looking forward to social media battle ahead of Cheltenham

The competition for attention on social media has never been as intense. In the great battle for online eyeballs, Twitter recently experimented with a set of changes that saw ads on mobile devices displaying at set points inside conversation threads. Social media platforms are having to come up with new products and fresh implementations of ad campaigns to help make good promises to investors of increased revenues.

In their own quest for improved results, operators need to get similarly creative. Any adult with a passing interest in sport and an active Facebook page will have regularly scrolled through an array of gambling ads, many of which feature anodyne, generic messaging that does little to engage.

Right now, in the UK especially, the focus is already turning to the Cheltenham Festival 2022. Its importance to the industry’s bottom line can be seen in Flutter’s report from last year describing a 59 per cent rise in customer acquisition during the Festival. After a year without racegoers, they should be back in the stands in March, which can only elevate the sense of excitement across the four days of action. How best, then, to engage on social platforms?

Vanilla messaging is no longer enough. Easily lost amid cluttered timelines, it is vital that operators can find a winning angle. In terms of football, that could mean a specific creative geared to a particular club’s fans, even down to Championship level. In racing, the goal is to engage racing connoisseurs and casual fans in different ways. A Tuesday afternoon meeting at Carlisle will have a niche audience, for example, compared to the far wider net that can be cast at Cheltenham. This is where paid campaigns, created by experienced industry hands, can offer an additional level of control over targeted messaging that is not necessarily present organically.

Last year at Cheltenham, one particular bookmaker client of ours paired a strong offer with a paid social campaign that was carefully lined up months in advance of the event. Ad copy was created for punters who it was known would respond to particular horses and a certain day of racing, be it Ladies Day or Champions Day. Additionally, another set of ads were tailored to a broader audience, which were more simplistic and emphasised the general race-day experience. Following on from that were retargeted campaigns to increase awareness of offers that remained available in the latter stages of the Festival, highlighting the advantages of placing bets through a particular brand.
Solid results
The results – a campaign which exceeded all expectations – spoke for themselves. While an organic media campaign allows an operator to ramp up the numbers of posts that are pumped out, it is a blunt tool and there is no guarantee that the intended audience will see them. With a paid campaign, you can guarantee a certain number of impressions within a particular time frame. The added level of control allowing a brand to be displayed to a selected audience at exactly the right time is extremely valuable in a social media environment saturated with bookie offers.

While the advantages of paid social campaigns are clear, it is also true that it is now more challenging than ever to produce paid in the gambling sector. There are a number of factors behind that. One is the level of increased competition between brands for audience attention and another is the compliance considerations. Working closely with account managers on social platforms, as well as the operator’s compliance team, is key to ensuring that campaigns stay within the necessary boundaries.

Getting the best bang-per-buck in a crowded marketplace also means that rigorous testing is vital. A number of creatives can be tested at any one time and while it can be immediately apparent which iteration is working particularly well, with others it can take a little longer for a clear picture to emerge. In all cases, the testing process is an important part of the journey in discovering what resonates with the audience.

While careful planning is a must, creative teams also need to maintain interactivity with an operator so that changes can made on-the-fly. During Euro 2020, for example, we found that ad copy tailored to home nations performed markedly better than equivalent copy that featured generic messaging around the tournament’s schedule. An operator providing that data quickly to a marketing team can reap the rewards.

As one of the industry’s biggest groups, Flutter stated that it saw €275 million bets placed during this year’s Cheltenham Festival. That figure will surely be eclipsed in 2022. Rival operators looking to stand out to maximise acquisition during the UK’s biggest meeting need to start acting smart on social, quickly.