There are few more competitive sectors of the global economy than the iGaming industry. Increasingly liberalization of gaming laws around the world, combined with ever faster streaming technology means has opened up opportunities for casino and gaming operators, but has also led to a fierce struggle for a share of the new markets.
With so many rivals entering the marketplace, how does any iGaming company stand out from the crowd? Marketing through affiliates, offering the best content, and eye-catching bonus promotions all have a role to play, but these factors are rarely enough. Increasingly, iGaming operators are realizing the importance of the role of critics in the modern industry.
Adding Value
There are hundreds of sites online that appear to offer reviews of casino sites, betting sites and games, but on closer examination, many of them do not perform a particularly useful role. This is partly because the online iGaming space has become saturated with review articles that are essentially promotional in nature, but also because of the way that search engines have evolved.
Search engine companies, most notably Google, are increasingly focused on content that adds quality to the internet, rather than cheaply generated articles, some even churned out by AI, that merely include a list of keywords or recycle other content, rather than adding value.
This means that there are diminishing returns for iGaming operators who pin their hopes on low quality affiliate content produced by people who don’t know the industry and haven’t done much research. At the same time, content written by industry experts, based on firsthand experience and in-depth knowledge, is increasingly valuable.
Fact Checking and Expertise
The way that search engines operate means that high quality reviews by experts are ranking ever more highly in search results. That in turn shifts the focus for iGaming operators from simple promotion to ensuring that they create a high quality product that will be well-reviewed.
One of the most important aspects of the iGaming critic’s role is fact-checking. Reviews of iGaming platforms that contain unverified, false, or misleading information are of little use to consumers and increasingly downgraded in search results. According to Dhalia Borg, the Head of Content at NewCasinos.com, using multiple sources to verify facts during the review process is essential:
“You shouldn’t rely on a singular source. It’s important to compare information, claims, and facts, to detect a pattern, and to see if there is any alignment across those different sources.”
Expert critics will establish the facts about an iGaming site through source checking and will use their experience to compare and rate how well a site performs across a range of categories, and this information will be of value to customers, which in turn can drive traffic to those sites.
Importance of Reputation
Another important role for the iGaming critic is to establish the truth about a site’s performance in the context of customer reviews. The rise of customer review companies such as Trustpilot has given consumers a form of power as they are able to directly publish their opinions about iGaming sites, as well as details of their experience, and this information is available for public viewing.
The problem is that these opinions and experiences are largely unfiltered and without background information. Customers who have lost money playing casino games may not be unbiased and in the case of disputes and complaints, the mere fact that a complaint has been made does not mean that it is justified. Yet the damage to an operator’s reputation can still be significant.
An experienced industry critic is able to investigate these issues and identify which criticisms and complaints may point to genuine problems with a site, and which are not relevant. For instance, one customer complaining about late payment of winnings may not be a significant issue, but if the site in question states that withdrawals are processed within 72 hours – considerably longer than the usual 24 or 48-hour processing time, then the complaint points to a bigger issue.
Increasingly, iGaming operators are finding that having their reputation influenced by the informed opinions of industry experts is preferable to relying simply on public rating sites.
Quality Product Still Matters
The role of the industry critic, however, can only go so far. Ultimately, an iGaming platform will stand or fall based on the quality of its product, and how well it performs across multiple categories.
These include the range and depth of its game library. The days of iGaming sites being able to offer a couple of hundred games from one or two developers are over. These days, players expect to be able to try thousands of games, and to be able to go from playing the latest slot game to live casino, bingo, roulette and scratchcards, all without leaving the same site.
The fairness of promotions is another crucial aspect of an iGaming site’s product. Bonuses that appear to be too good to be true and then turn out to have unfair or unreasonable terms and conditions can damage the reputation of a site, particularly if they turn out to be so unfair that they fall foul of gambling or advertising regulations.
There is also pressure on modern iGaming sites to provide a product that doesn’t look dated. Increasingly, iGaming sites look like video gaming platforms, with cutting-edge visuals, and a host of player features, as modern consumers demand more, driving up standards across the sector.
Conclusion
In the iGaming sector, industry critics have a crucial role. A critic cannot make an iGaming site successful or cause it to fail. The role of the critic is to promote quality and highlight failings, thus ensuring that iGaming customers can more quickly identify the best platforms and at the same time avoid the poorer performers. Overall, this is good news for the industry, as effective operators are rewarded while those operators whose product falls short have to work harder for publicity.
