SEO Tracker: Oddschecker sees lead cut at top of sportsbook rankings

Oddschecker remains the most visible brands in the UK sportsbook search results, but its lead in the market is being squeezed by a downturn in search volume that seems to have disproportionately affected the comparison service.

While the 10 leading brands in the market remain unchanged since we last looked at the market in January of this year, long-time leader Oddschecker has seen its visibility fall 29% and its previously commanding lead over Paddy Power reduced to just 3,052 clicks, thanks to drops in search activity for terms that were a significant proportion of the brand’s visibility from non-brand terms.

Search volumes have fallen by 18%, representing a loss of 154,380 monthly searches, since we last looked at the sportsbook market in January 2022. This has had an impact on the traffic levels of all brands in the market, but Oddschecker appears to have been particularly hit.

Much of the traffic loss was somewhat expected, due to the previous period covering the European Football Championships, which contributed a spike in interest for both football terms and terms specific to the tournament. With the next major football tournament now deferred until later this year, it has created a lull in search activity.

What has happened with Oddschecker

Part of the reason why Oddschecker looks to have suffered more than most is simply that it had further to fall. The brand has lost more than 20,000 estimated monthly clicks, representing a traffic loss of around 29% – more than the industry average of 18%. The reason for this is Oddschecker’s strong ranking positions for terms specifically focused on the European Championships football tournament – terms which, by definition, were highly seasonal. The keyword “euro odds” alone represents more than 10% of the brand’s traffic loss.

Terms such as ‘football odds’ and ‘champions league odds’ have seen lower search volume, but it is not just football where we see decreases in search volume, as searches for ‘grand national odds’ have gone down from 8,100 to 1,600, costing Oddschecker 1,569 clicks in position one.

As a brand with such a strong presence at the top of the rankings for both horseracing and football betting, it is perhaps not a surprise to see a loss of search volume felt more keenly by Oddschecker than by other brands.

Betfred falls away from top two

Another high-ranking brand to suffer a considerable drop in estimated monthly clicks was Betfred, which was the third most visible brand behind Oddschecker and Paddy Power in January.

In the last six months Betfred has seen a 58% decrease in traffic and is now the eighth most visible brand in the sector, with an estimated 13,682 monthly clicks.

At the time, we saw that an improvement in the company’s ranking for the term ‘betting’ was key to its increased traffic and, six months on, the inverse is true. Searches for ‘betting’ have gone down to 14,800 from 33,100, while Betfred’s ranking for the term has dropped from position one to position four. The combination of these factors has seen the estimated monthly clicks Betfred receives through this keyword decrease from 7,987 to 1,116, costing the company just short of 6,000 monthly clicks.

William Hill among brands to make gains

William Hill was one of the few companies that actually saw their visibility improve, going against the trend of the market as a whole. A noticeable improvement in average weighted ranking from 21 to 14 resulted in a 3,000 click improvement in traffic, meaning the brand is now the third most visible in the sector with an estimated organic traffic of 32,397 clicks per month.

Perhaps even more significant than the improvement in traffic on its own is where this places William Hill in the sector. While they receive roughly 15,000 fewer monthly clicks than Paddy Power, they are the same distance ahead of fourth-placed Betfair. The improvement in average ranking is also made clear by the increased number of keywords for which William Hill ranks in position one (54 compared to 40 in January), and a rise from position five to position two for ‘betting’.

Assuming that the market settles at this level, this puts William Hill in a strong position where they can start to look towards Paddy Power in terms of organic traffic, as they are no longer in a tight-fought battle to be the third most visible brand, as they were in January.

Gains and losses level the playing field

It is now the fight for the position of fourth most visible brand that is tighter, with Betfair currently occupying that position but a further four brands behind it. Betfair actually lost 6,532 monthly clicks between January and June, but as Betfred and Sky Bet both lost a greater amount of traffic, Betfred actually finds itself in a better position relative to its competitors.

Betfred and Sky Bet lost 58% and 39% of their organic traffic respectively, allowing Betfair to overtake them along with OLBG, who also saw an increase in traffic with a 16% improvement giving them 16,239 monthly clicks.

All of this leaves five brands competing very closely for visibility and Oddschecker and Paddy Power leading by a considerable margin, with William Hill halfway between and hoping to move closer to the two leaders rather than being sucked into the battle behind it.