INSIGHT
BEACONS OF POTENTIAL
With forward-thinking companies such as Sky Bet already trialling wireless location products known as
iBeacons within football stadiums, iGaming futurologist Mark McGuinness sees these as a paramount
interaction and acquisition channel for operators going forward.
OUR INDUSTRY IS encountering
momentous change on a daily basis. In
fact, our digital lives are changing so
fast, we don’t even know it’s happening,
because the ways in which we connect
and communicate with the physical and
internet worlds is now blurring.
iBeacon technology is far from new,
it has been around for some years now –
however we have seen the mighty Apple
getting increasingly involved in this area, as
connectivity and customer interest grows in
real-time location-based personalised offers.
My interest in this area was piqued and
went onto my ‘watch-list of technology
applications’ when the US patent office
released a patent application filed by Apple
for an iBeacons Restaurant Ordering &
placement of wireless masts, perhaps due to
the barriers presented by physical structures
such as shopping centres or football
stadium, as well as poor connectivity and
availability if more than ten people are
connected t o the network at any one time.
Beacons are low-cost, easy to deploy
low-powered transmitters that can find and
notify other iOS devices of your location
using the latest Bluetooth technology.
The beacons could, therefore, be used as
a means to push messages to the phone
device for precision or location-based
marketing offers.
Of course, we’ve been there before with
Bluetooth, and it never quite progressed.
But now with advancements in the size
of tech – of the beacons, transmitters
“The next time a promotional model for a betting company
brushes past you in a stadium, she may not have any fliers
to hand out, but will instead be a walking mobile beacon,
pushing discreet, personalised gambling notifications to
your phone.”
Reservation System. The said patent was
for a unique system whereby a user of an
iOS device may be offered various options/
promotions for local restaurants. The
system allows for waiting times and seating
availability in real time, and remote and
in-restaurant ordering systems that allow
customers and restaurant staff to place
and change food orders before you get
there, so basically a variant of just-in-time
technology for ordering food to eat.
So what exactly are these ‘beacons’?
Like many mobile users when placing a
sports bet, we always encounter connection
issues with mobile phones. For example,
signal coverage problems are still common
even with the advent of 4G and discreet
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iGB Affiliate Issue 55 FEB/MAR 2016
and smartphones packed with so much
computing power – it could just transform
how companies communicate with
potential customers. Not only within
an indoor environment but also via the
actual journey a customer takes in the real
physical world.
Let us consider a large-scale
sports gathering which offers betting
opportunities, such as the forthcoming
Cheltenham Festival or London derby
between Arsenal and Chelsea, which
both attract upwards of 50,000 fans. It’s
very plausible to assume a significant
percentage of those would have iPhones
with the beacon compatibility. This may
allow gaming operators, not needing
to have mobile telephone numbers or
email addresses to communicate in the
traditional sense, to push prospective
betting information in real-time based on
location via the beacon tech at a fraction
of the cost of having promotional models
handing out leaflets or expensive static
or digital advertising hoardings which
don’t actually engage your potential
in-stadium customers. It’s even possible
to offer subscription-based content that
adds value to the customer experience, or
premium digital in-play betting content
during the match. Similar in-style to the
traditional football programme, this digital
micro-content could help inform betting
customers’ decision making and future bet
placement via the beacon technology.
So with an estimated 170-190 million
iOS devices currently capable of being
iBeacons, the technology is therefore a
potential game changer. In my view, the
gambling world is ready for a Tinderstyle location-based application service.
So perhaps the next time you see a
promotional model for a betting company,
she may not have any fliers to hand out,
but instead be a walking mobile beacon,
pushing discreet, personalised gambling
notifications to your phone’s mobile app as
she brushes past you in the stadium.
MARK MCGUINNESS
has more than 15 years’
experience in digital
marketing director roles
with both private and
public iGaming operators. He
is founder of www.esportsbet.com, a
resource for gamers and sports bettors
who wish to start betting on eSports.