Tim Axon Maxymiser – iGame Case Study – The Game Changer

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Tim Axon EMEA Head of Gaming at Maxymiser

Tim Axon EMEA Head of Gaming at Maxymiser, explains how multivariate testing across the conversion funnel has aided European igaming client iGame Group to achieve optimal customer conversion and enhanced player engagement.

With European igaming markets becoming more competitive and ultimately saturated, Tim Axon and iGame Group outline why it is crucial for operators to deploy consumer focused optimisation strategies throughout their acquisition and product channels led by in-depth  multivariate testing and personalised messaging. Both Maxymiser and iGame management believe that the future winners of the sector will apply consumer data led optimisation throughout their marketing, product and operational value chains.

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Game-Changer

The European online gaming industry continues to grow rapidly. But, as consumer access to gaming increases in line with the evolution of online and mobile technologies, industry regulations remain both strict and highly scrutinised. This is particularly the case in Scandinavia where competition is tough and in a highly competitive, highly regulated and highly restricted environment, private providers know that the only way to survive is to deliver an optimal user experience. The most proactive are deploying customer experience optimisation strategies built around multivariate testing and personalisation techniques, to ensure their services not only respond to customer needs, but also put them ahead of the game.

The Player

iGame Group is oa European sports betting and igaming provider. The Group, which was first established in 2005, operates some of Scandinavia’s most popular gaming sites and boasts more than 850,000 customers worldwide. Its primary markets are the Nordic countries but it operates sites right across Europe.

The Group’s services, supported in nine different languages, include poker, casino, bingo and sports betting, and are led by a range of well-known brands; iGame.com, Casinohuone.com and 24hPoker.com.

In its first six years, iGame functioned as a ‘turn-key’ operator, developing its portfolio using a combination of third-party licenses and outsourced solutions. However, in 2011 the company moved away from this approach and began to operate under its own gaming license. This shift became a turning point for the Group, giving it the flexibility to develop its own sites, systems and platforms, as well as providing a strong foundation for organic growth.

The liberation from turn-key operations has made iGame fully accountable for the selection of third-party partners – allowing it to develop its sites using the most advanced technology available. This, in turn, is helping the business meet ongoing objectives to deliver an easy, enjoyable and secure playing experience for its growing user-base.

In April 2013, iGame appointed Maxymiser, the global leader in unified customer experience optimisation, as its first official partner – with an objective to design and implement a structured Customer Experience Optimisation (CXO) programme to improve conversion rates across its European sites. The programme also set out to include personalisation and mobile testing as part of a long-term plan.

Game Strategy

“Online gaming is a tough industry, particularly in our core markets – the Nordic regions,” says Tommi Riisiö, Chief Marketing Officer, iGame. “The regulations in Finland, Norway and Sweden mean that our only way of competing is to make sure we have better services than our competitors. Optimising the customer experience is therefore critical. Our partnership with Maxymiser was designed to increase conversion of visitors to the sites, and to improve the sales funnel from registration to deposit. And it has very quickly delivered ROI.”

The company’s early campaigns focused on its flagship brand, iGame.com – specifically in the core Scandinavian markets. “iGame attracts users from all over the world, but we wanted to start by testing the global sites in the countries we know best, and evaluate which best practices can be transferred to our country-specific sites,” says Tommi.“In the medium term, we plan to run campaigns on our local sites in local languages, where we know the results will be different. Maxymiser enables us to understand those differences, and allows us to respond with speed and agility to develop services in line with customers’ needs.”

Winning Numbers

The first campaign, which was conducted on the iGame.com desktop platform, focused on the site’s crucial registration page. This, in itself, underlines the company’s unorthodox approach to CXO. Commonly, initial campaigns tend to focus at the start of the sales funnel, but iGame.com chose to begin with a more technical page in response to ongoing issues it had identified as problematic.

“The registration page is one of the most important parts of the site, but we were experiencing a number of problems with it,” says Tommi. “Users were failing to complete registration and were dropping out midway through the process. What’s more, our conversion rates appeared to be lower than the industry average. Having established that this was the best place to start our CXO programme, we worked collaboratively with Maxymiser to develop a campaign that explored a variety of messaging, layouts and presentations. The results were remarkable; the winning variant led to a registration conversion uplift of almost 10 per cent.

“But over and above the impressive increase in conversion rates, the campaign really demonstrated the value of working with Maxymiser. The campaign was complex – not least because we experimented with in-line validation messaging, which naturally required some challenging coding. Maxymiser’s knowledge and experience of the gaming sector meant that they were able to advise, build, manage and measure this sophisticated campaign quickly and effectively – and their familiarity with working on registration pages really shone through in the results during the initial campaign period when the pressure was high to prove ROI. The subsequent uplift was a great start to our relationship.”

The decision to start the roadmap at the registration page is in keeping with iGame’s innovative long-term CXO strategy, which sets out to establish and apply best practice for key pages right across its brand portfolio. “Our plan is to look at the customer on-boarding process, and test the various components of it across the different sites,” says Tommi. “We’ve already looked at the registration and landing pages for iGame.com’s desktop, but in addition, we’ve implemented campaigns in the cashier, and landing pages of two other brands. We’re also conducting some targeted messaging and personalisation campaigns on a fourth site.

“Once we have established the winning experiences from each of the campaigns, we will roll them out across our other brands. It’s a really efficient way of working, and with Maxymiser’s expertise and agility, it’s already helping to transform the user experience on many of our sites.”

A good example of this is an early campaign that examined the crucial landing page on iGame.com’s desktop site. The test set out to establish whether a redesign would improve performance in terms of completed registration and first deposits. “This was a very different type of test. Whereas the registration page is fixed and static, landing pages are more dynamic and are dependent upon variable aspects such as where a visitor is coming from or promotions available at the time. In the first instance, we chose to use a generic template for the test. The winning variant led to a registration conversion rate uplift of 14.2 per cent. Once again, this was a fantastic result,” says Tommi.

The CXO programme is not limited to iGame’s desktop sites – it has already been extended to its mobile platforms. “The campaign has been looking at the site-wide navigation of the iGame.com mobile platform – specifically targeting users who are not registered or who have never logged in via the mobile site. It’s a combination of mobile optimisation and personalisation – and it’s not only allowing us to improve the user experience, it’s helping us deliver against a major strategic goal: growing our mobile channel.” Says Tommi.

The campaign is exploring how the side menus can be optimised to provide clear calls to action to unregistered users, inviting them to sign-up, across every part of the site.

“The aim, of course, is to take them through the registration funnel and acquire them as mobile customers. Although the campaign has not yet concluded, evidence shows that the work we’re doing with Maxymiser is already significantly driving new registrations.”

The scale and breadth of iGame.com’s long-term CXO programme is a testament to the company’s belief in its partnership with Maxymiser – not least in its willingness to allow Maxymiser to place code in some of the most high security areas of its sites. “Registration, cashier and deposit pages are naturally protected by high levels of security – and this is really important to our customers. But by allowing Maxymiser to work in these high security areas, we’ve been able to create a platform for campaigns that are truly improving the user experience – and, in the process, generating strong conversion gains for the business. By working with Maxymiser, we’re getting a significant competitive advantage because they are able to work all the way through the funnel, right down to the cashier.”

A Game-Changing Experience

Just over one year into its partnership with Maxymiser, iGame’s CXO strategy has yielded significant benefits. “Maxymiser has taken the guesswork out of our development plans – it gives us real-world data to support our decisions. Our interactions with Maxymiser, as well as their agility and speed of response, have been really good – and we see a huge strategic value in maintaining the relationship,” says Tommi.

In the near future, iGame plans to explore dynamic personalisation. “We must ensure that our services are relevant to our individual users. Personalisation is therefore key. As a business, we not only need to understand how effective our sites are at converting customers, but we must also make sure that they respond to individual needs. Are we firing the right content to the right customers at the right time? Maxymiser will help us to explore these crucial questions and establish different dynamic areas where we can improve the user experience.

“At the moment, it’s early days for us with personalisation. But initial work with Maxymiser has already enabled us to gather deposit-related customer data, and we are currently considering how this can be used to help deliver individual experiences to our users.”

In the meantime, iGame will continue to implement its innovative roadmap in partnership with Maxymiser – and is confident that the positive impact it’s already having on user experience and the business’s strategic goals will be maintained. “The conversion uplifts that we have enjoyed to date are significant, and they’re having a noticeable impact on the bottom line. It’s good ROI. But beyond that, Maxymiser is helping us meet some of our major strategic priorities and giving us the confidence to develop our brands in line with customer needs. They’re working right across the funnel, and, in the process, they’re making a real difference to our business. ”

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Content provided by Tim Axon EMEA Head of Gaming at Maxymiser

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