We live in an increasingly digital society and it is no different in the world of sports. Esports are becoming an ever-larger part of a sportsbook’s offering and as a consequence, this growth has brought a whole new customer base to an operator’s platforms.

Speaking to SBC’s Content Director, Ted Menmuir, at SBC Summit Lisbon, Thomas Donson, Head of Trading at DATA.BET, outlined the contrasting needs of an esports customer and a more traditional sportsbook user.

“Esports is still very much a niche in the whole sportsbook landscape, however, going forward it’s becoming more and more mainstream,” explained Donson. “The clientele that we work with are becoming more mature, they’re getting more engaged and we’re developing tools to match their expectation in terms of a sportsbook

“Player props was our first foray into personalisation and [making] the betting experience more suited to an esports customer. There’s a big difference between a traditional sportsbook bet builder and what a player expects.

“It’s much more central to an esports bettor to have player props as a core offering of what they want to bet on. So, integrating top-class player props into a leading bet builder product is very important for us and being able to deliver a high-end UX that places it in front of the customer.”

Donson added that esports customers “don’t react the same way” and are more “social media driven”, which means that their allegiance to different teams and players varies compared to the loyalty shown by more traditional customers to a certain sports team.

An added challenge to operators presented by esports is that the developers of games are constantly evolving their products and changing the way the games are played. As a result, Donson emphasised the need “to stay ahead of the curve”.

He said: “Esports is incredibly fast-moving. [For] classical sports events, the rules don’t change and the method of a game being played never changes. Whereas with esports, the developers constantly change [games], they bring out new maps, new characters and new mechanics into the games.

“So from a technical point of view, we always have to be on top of what’s happening and talk to the developers and the providers to ensure we’re aware of what’s happening. We have to make sure that our statistics are on board and that the offering we give our customer matches their expectations.

“They’re not prepared to sacrifice on quality and we can’t just suddenly say to them that we need time to refine our product, we have to be ahead of it all the time.”

To hear more about the changing needs and expectations of an esports bettor, as well as DATA.BET’s risk management and player engagement strategies, click HERE to watch the full video.