Businesses looking for customer retention strategies should look no further than the iGaming sector. Online casino platforms have put more time, thought and effort into how to retain their customers than almost any other digital sector, and many other industries can learn from the techniques that they have employed.
Many industries are reaching points of maturity where acquiring new customers is not as viable as it used to be and the focus is instead shifting to how existing customers can be retained. This has led to many businesses attempting to cultivate longer-term relationships with their customers as a way to build competitive advantage against their peers. An industry in which this is more true than many others is iGaming.
The online casino industry is one of the most saturated digital industries in the world, and in some jurisdictions customers have the opportunity to choose from hundreds of different operators. Not only is there a large range of options for customers, but switching platforms can often feel effortless. In such an environment, good customer retention strategies are a major point of competition, and an excellent way for online casino operators to focus on longevity.
Operators of online casino platforms have therefore developed a broad range of relatively sophisticated customer retention strategies that they regularly employ and refine. These strategies often focus on keeping the experience as fresh as possible for users, and require a good level of understanding of what users are interested in and how they behave. Other industries and sectors can learn from these strategies, and some are already employing similar techniques.
Let’s take a closer look at some of the strongest customer retention strategies that the iGaming sector has developed.
Personalisation Is Trending Across Many Industries
One of the strongest customer retention techniques that the iGaming sector uses, and one that is becoming increasingly common across all digital sectors, is personalisation. The best online casino platforms have gotten good at understanding what players want, in terms of the games they play, and at making it easier for them to access those games.
By personalising the experience of playing at an online casino platform, operators reduce the friction that players experience, and get them to the fun bit, where they are actually playing the games, much sooner. But personalisation is about more than simply providing a unique dashboard; it’s about understanding customer behaviour and what might entice them.
By delivering tailored and relevant promotional messaging, online casino platforms can encourage customers to return, knowing that they will get a promotion for exactly the type of game that they like playing.
These sorts of customer retention strategies can easily be replicated in other industries. By tracking customer behaviours and ensuring that promotional messaging reflects the customers’ actual interests, businesses like online retailers or streaming platforms can deliver much more enticing offers to customers.
The important bit for businesses is that they should ignore demographic-related market research information and make use of the actual customer behaviour that they have tracked, and draw actionable insights from it.
Gamifying Loyalty Works Wonders
Loyalty programs aren’t new; they’ve been around for decades. But most traditional loyalty programs are increased primarily by spending money, eventually leading to discounts or special offers. Online casino operators have gone in a slightly different direction and added a dash of gamification to the loyalty program system.
When the loyalty program is something that players will slowly progress through, levelling up as they do the sorts of things they are probably going to do anyway, it adds an extra incentive for players to return again and again. Many loyalty programs in the iGaming sector offer missions, achievement unlocks, and provide benefits that customers will be excited to unlock. This works very well, especially considering that customers of the iGaming industry are, after all, gamers.
But this type of loyalty program doesn’t need to be restricted to iGaming. With somewhere in the vicinity of 3.7 billion people, almost half of the world’s population, playing video games, gamified loyalty programs can find homes in many different sectors.
The most important thing that businesses should consider when gamifying loyalty programs is to ensure that there is a sense of meaningful progression, and that customers are encouraged to not only do the same sorts of things they are likely to do anyway, but also to undertake new activities and explore the services that the business offers.
Gamified customer retention strategies work best if they are designed to make the customer’s journey more satisfying, without complicating it unnecessarily.
Get Customers Excited For The Future
Anticipation is a hugely powerful tool that the iGaming industry uses very well. Online casino platforms introduce new games regularly, update existing games with new content or rewards and generally ensure that the experience is changing and changeable. Offering tournaments, events tied to promotions and progressive jackpots are all tried and tested customer retention strategies.
While other businesses might not be able to convert these ideas one-to-one, the concept behind them can be used in almost any industry. As long as your customers are getting excited for what’s on the horizon, as long as there is some sense of anticipation to help bring customers back, then this technique is being employed.
Identify Customers On The Brink of Leaving, Before They Leave
Churn prediction is a big deal in the iGaming sector. As we discussed above, customers can have a huge range of options, and jumping ship to a new online casino operator can be relatively simple, with few drawbacks. As such, many operators monitor players not just to be able to provide them with more personalised services, but also to identify early signs of churn. When churn is indicated, this is the perfect opportunity to intervene and attempt to recapture that customer’s interest.
Other digital sectors with high rates of churn can benefit from similar customer retention strategies. If a customer stops using a certain feature that they used to rely on, that could be an indication of dissatisfaction with the service, and might be the perfect time to reach out.
A smart way to handle this sort of interaction could be to investigate why exactly a customer is not using the service as much, or why they might want to leave. This can generate more actionable insights than simply trying to offer discounts in the hope that the customer will remain for a little while longer.
If You Build A Community, Customers Will Come
One of the most powerful customer retention strategies in the toolbox of iGaming is tangential to the product offered: community. Online gaming often involves interacting with other players, and this is as true in iGaming as it is elsewhere. Even when players are more interested in slot games than games with other players present, sharing stories about big wins or close-run losses is a feature of all types of gaming.
When operators invest in giving their players a place to join as a community, they are allowing them to develop another reason not to leave for greener pastures. It is much harder to say goodbye to friends, even digital ones, than it is to say goodbye to a product.
This sort of strategy can, and is, being used in many other sectors. All it takes is for a business to create a forum for its users to discuss the products it makes and share stories about their experiences. These spaces inevitably turn into places where people share common interests and connect, making them less likely to want to leave for competitors.
