Some sports bettors put their money on the line as a show of support for their favorite team. Others relish the rush of a healthy wager or the chance to stand out in a crowd. A dedicated few know enough about the games and players to make a consistent profit.
Successful sportsbooks must understand the sometimes-conflicting personality traits that drive their customers, says a new study analyzing America’s burgeoning market for legal sports betting.
Chris Grove (Photo via Las Vegas Review-Journal)
“There is no such thing as a monolithic sports-betting customer,” says the report by Eilers & Krejcik Gaming. “In fact, there are an ever-increasing number of distinct customer personas with unique wants and needs when it comes to sports betting.”
The report, The More You Know the Bettor: Defining U.S. Sports Betting Customer Personas, describes seven basic types of bettors, from “Casual Dabblers” who participate mainly to be part of the crowd, to “Superfans,” “Would-be Pros” and “Sharps,” the pros who beat the house.
Chris Grove, managing director of sports and emerging verticals for Eilers & Krejcik and one of the study’s authors, will discuss the findings Wednesday during a session of the Betting on Sports America conference at Meadowlands Exposition Center in New Jersey. The three-day gathering is sponsored by SBC (Sports Betting Community), headquartered in London.
Expanding wallets
Grove told CDC Gaming Reports that many sports bettors already are casino customers and tend to increase their overall spending on gambling.
“People expand their wallet, basically,” he said, pointing to results in New Jersey, which led the fight to expand full legalized sports betting beyond Nevada and was an early adopter of online casino gaming.
In March, the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement reported that online gaming revenue was up by $13.5 million, or 53 percent, from the year before. Sports betting, which was not legal in the state a year ago, yielded an additional $31.6 million.
While some of that comes from new players, “plenty of people who are interested in betting sports online are then crossing over to the related online casino,” Grove said.
He said as many as 90 percent of sports bettors are men, which challenges sportsbooks to develop a wider audience.
“It’s not just about women; you’re also talking about how we include a broader age,” he said. “How do we make a sports book experience more enjoyable, more interesting, more engaging for a wider group of people? I don’t pretend to have the answer to that question. But those are the questions operators are going to have to ask.”
Seven sports-betting personalities
Getting a better understanding of their current customers might help. The Eilers & Krejcik study, one of the first publicly available reports on the U.S. market, describes these groups of bettors and suggests ways to appeal to each:
- Sharps: Medium- to high stakes bettors at highest frequency, motivated mainly by profit; Sharps consider themselves professionals and win more than they lose; still, they can bring value to the sports book by attracting High Rollers and Would-be Pros.
- High Rollers: Highest-stakes bettors, with low to medium frequency, who bet for fun or ego; will gamble in other forms, most likely poker and table games; generally profitable to sports books; high-stakes betting make them valuable, but they are expensive to court.
- Would-be Pros: Low- to medium-stakes bettors at medium to high frequency; motivated by profit and lifestyle, but lack bankroll and dedication of a Sharp; will gamble in casino, preferring skill or edge-based casino games but willing to try chance-based game; generally profitable to sports book but likely to complain and require consistent promotions.
- Action Chasers: Medium-frequency, medium-stakes bettors who enjoy gambling in many forms, particularly action games such as craps; generally profitable to sports books with good cross-sell potential, but also higher risk of problem gambling.
- Superfans: Low-stakes bettors at low to medium frequency, primarily on favorite teams; generally profitable to sports book with limited cross-sell potential.
- Status Seekers: Low- to medium-stakes bettors at medium to high frequency; driven by public recognition, such as winning a bracket contest or touting wins on social media; generally profitable to sports book, with low cross-sell potential.
- Casual dabblers: Low-frequency, low-stakes bettors seeking novelty or going along with friends; profitable for sports book; although not likely to gamble otherwise, this group offers opportunity to cross-sell.
The report notes that bettors may exhibit characteristics of multiple personas and can shift easily from one to another.
Regulated market to triple
“This is not intended in any way to be the final book on what the American sports betting consumer population looks like,” Grove said. “It’s a starting point.”
The study says about 15 million Americans are active sports bettors in current regulated markets and predicts the base will grow to 45 million in the next decade.
“As we expand into that much broader market, what kind of new customer sets are we going to see emerge?” Grove asked. “That is a question to watch. The operators who are the smartest about answering that question are likely to have an advantage in the U.S. market.”
