In this interview with CalvinAyre.com’s Rebecca Liggero, Magnus Jern of DMI gives his insights on where gambling operators should focus to give their customers the best mobile gambling experience.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Most online gambling operators may have probably heard this famous adage that is widely attributed to Thomas Betram Lance, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget during Jimmy Carter’s Presidency.
Oftentimes, online gambling operators use this nugget of wisdom as a guide on how to run their businesses, especially when they are reaping the revenues they are expecting.
But Magnus Jern of DMI warns online gambling operators of relying too much on timeless words of wisdom to run their business, especially when it comes to replacing or fixing things to improve their products.
Jern observed that there are online gambling operators who had already stopped innovating their product, especially when they had already cashed in from their clients. There are other business operators who, according to Jern, are struggling a little bit in the mobile space because they’ve taken their online experiences and put them on mobile rather than really thinking about the mobile experience from the beginning.
“I think one of the interesting thing is that the online gambling industry was in gaming, in general, was very early into the mobile game and doing great stuff early on,” Jern told CalvinAyre.com. “But I think what we are also seeing is just the same way that a lot of the gambling and betting companies are very innovative in the online space from the beginning they probably made too much money easily that they stopped innovating to large extent.”
In order to give their customers the best gaming experience, Jern advices gambling operators to re-imagine their services completely for mobile, ideally throwing away everything they have and start over from scratch.
“That doesn’t mean rebuilding everything from scratch, it means rethinking. And then once they figure out what the service will look like in a mobile only world, if doesn’t have anything then you can rematch that with what you already have and build a great experience,” he explained.
Online gambling operators, according to Jern, should also make sure that the users are involved in every single step of the processs.
“But there is simply no excuse not to involve users and you should involve them in very early concept stages, you should involve them during development, at the every single step of the way, and it doesn’t have to be many, it can be five to six, it is enough in the situation. But unless they are involved, you’re going to fit.
Lastly, Jern said that gambling operators should know the latest trends being followed by the public, particularly the younger players.
“And this is the tricky part, because media pattern, especially among younger users, is changing completely. We are not watching TV anymore, we are not engaging the same things online, we are actually not even playing games to some extent in mobile as we did before. We are spending more time on social network, more time messaging clients, more time sharing photos and videos and YouTube and so on, and as a brand you have to be where the customers are,” he said. “And it’s tricky because you really don’t know how to get involved in this, how do you engage with the users in this space? You need to change the content, you need to change the conversation, but yeah, you have to get in there.”
