Why omnichannel gaming disappoints

Operators of both land-based gaming (casino, bingo or both) and online gaming are described as multichannel businesses. But the systems that underpin each channel are typically separate solutions, and attempts to integrate them seamlessly, the much-vaunted notion of omnichannel, are often underwhelming.

Background

Some land-based operators found themselves in a difficult position during the Covid-19 lockdowns of 2020. They were forced to pull down the shutters on their bricks-and-mortar premises without an igaming alternative to which they could direct their loyal customers.

This led to a sharper focus on multichannel strategy, and an inevitable complication of systems strategy. Operators found themselves with multiple copies of the same player, players had multiple wallets and limits, and it was difficult to understand how players were engaging at a group level, or how to reward them.

The goals of omnichannel

Profile portability. New customers can sign up on any platform, with mechanisms to link and convert existing profiles, a single KYC across platforms, and common profile attributes kept in step, so that an update made on one platform is published and acted on by the others.

Single customer view. Data from every platform is brought together to provide combined metrics and activity, giving a big-picture understanding of each customer.

Wallet. Funds can move between platforms through inter-wallet transfers, balances are visible across platforms, and restrictions such as deposit limits apply across wallets.

Safer gaming. Measures to protect players from harm take account of everything they do, in every channel: shared limits, combined markers of harm, and self-exclusion that applies everywhere.

Loyalty. Points can be earned in any channel, balances are visible across platforms, and points can be redeemed or transferred between them.

Marketing. Campaigns are targeted using a combined understanding of the customer, drawn from the single customer view.

Why it so often fails

Omnichannel rarely fails because it is technically hard. It fails because the people building each side do not understand the other’s domain, and because the providers of each channel’s systems do not work together effectively.

Different domains, different teams

Land-based and online systems are usually built and run by separate teams, often by separate companies. Even when the same organisation provides both, solutions are built by different teams, and costs and ownership are disputed. Each team knows its own channel well and assumes the other works in much the same way. It does not.

Perfect data and imperfect data

Whilst there are parallels with igaming, land-based is significantly more complex, with a large and varied number of business processes and imperfect data capture. Recording player activity in land-based can often be imprecise, or absent altogether. Many establishments still offer anonymous gaming, table play is rated by estimate, and machines drop data.

These concepts are often alien to those only familiar with igaming, where a player must naturally create an account and log in, with every transaction captured perfectly against their profile. Combine the two naively, and the single customer view treats an estimate as if it were a fact, or a missing visit as if the player stayed at home.

A much wider data model

An online data model is narrow and deep: accounts, sessions, wallets, bets and bonuses, every one of them precise. A land-based model is much wider. It has visits, cards, machines, meters, tickets, chips, fills and credits, ratings, markers, comps and hosts, many of them describing the operation rather than the player, and some of them estimated or incomplete. Mapping one onto the other either loses information or invents it.

Where the channels meet

Drawing lines between the equivalents shows where omnichannel is straightforward, where it needs care, and where there is simply nothing to connect.

Land-based	Online
Visit, from arrival to leaving	Session, from login to logout
Registration at reception	Account sign-up with KYC
Cashless wallet	Wallet
Buy-in with cash, chips or a ticket	Deposit
Cash-out at the cage or a kiosk	Withdrawal
Carded slot play and table ratings	Every bet, recorded
Self-exclusion, enforced by staff and security	Self-exclusion, enforced at login
Suspensions and bans, for cheating or behaviour	Account suspensions, for fraud or bonus abuse
Staff interaction on the floor	Limits, reality checks and automated markers
Points and comps	Points, bonuses and free spins
Hosts, direct mail and in-venue screens	Email, push and in-app messages
Cage, count room, fills and credits	—
Slot and table floor operations	—
Hotel, food and drink	—
—	Geolocation and device checks

Only a few concepts are true equivalents. A cashless wallet behaves much like an online wallet, which makes it the natural place to start. Self-exclusion means the same thing in both channels, but it is harder to enforce on the floor. Online, an excluded player simply cannot log in. In a casino that is not fully carded, it relies on staff or security spotting someone on the premises.

Most concepts are only partly equivalent. A visit looks like a session, but a session begins and ends precisely, whereas a visit may include long stretches of anonymous play. A deposit is a single digital transaction, whereas a buy-in may be cash on a table that is never linked to a player. Safer gaming online relies on limits and automated markers, while on the floor it relies on staff noticing a player and having a conversation. A suspension for cheating or behaviour is enforced at the door by staff, whereas online it is a flag on an account. Each needs a deliberate decision about how it will be represented on the other side, rather than an assumption.

And much of land-based has no online equivalent at all. The cage, the count room and the operation of the gaming floor are a large part of a land-based system, and an online operator never needs to think about them. Likewise, online has concerns, such as geolocation, that land-based does not.

In an ideal world

In an ideal world, a system would be built from the ground up with omnichannel in mind: a single system for all channels, with one profile and one wallet. That requires a collaborative group of experts from each channel, a unifying vision, and strong leadership.

Until then, start with the true equivalents, be honest about where there is no equivalent, and resist forcing land-based data into a model designed for online.