Hello viewers, Tim Pool here, editor of Gambling Insider. I'm with Will Armitage. I know it's been what is it about two years since you first met I think approximately so yeah pleasure is mine thank you loving the shirt oh ask you about affiliate topics today domain was free as you were saying when you were here.
But can you tell us latest updates what how's it going kind of markets finances that kind of thing no exciting times ahead for Bestodds we've been website live about 16 months now and finally hit that the threshold profitability melts my degenerate okay a team's yep you applause you can also fizz and I'm almost happy to try and actually scale and keep growing become a dominant player for our global ambitions of being a long-term leading affiliate brand. Step-by-step initially. Yeah. Obviously, there'll be some kind of organic growth there, but I know that we might have an update in the M&A department as well. Correct.
Actually, just released a couple of hours ago, we made an acquisition stateside in a business called BetPrep, which was a platform created probably about two and a half years ago by a whiz in the financial space. It was a trader. And a bit like Victor Kyan with Remington. He loved it so much. that he bought it but with this sense he actually built his own sort of research hub selecting products and tools and back testing all manner of features that he is a consumer to want to have himself right and this is all part of a big roll up and we're taking it out of this roll up and very much looking forward to integrating it and then repurposing it slightly to be towards the best odds brand an image and then build out a subscription model targeting the US audience with tools and research and props some picks and parlays and all manner of exciting things for the US better no matter where they are on that knowledge curve so exciting very exciting yeah obviously M&A happens a lot in iGaming a lot in betting but I think more recently more and more in the affiliate world I'm very keen to ask you about the news that kind of broke recently better collective and Katina media to the way I see it two traditional rivals I don't know if they're starting to merge into one I wanted to ask your thoughts as a kind of objective view it's funny as a sort of comparison parent of newbie in this space and as an independent brand you admire and look up to brands such as that and the deem super affiliates and the idea of potential is having a sort of super super affiliate it's a bit perturbing I have to say yeah I think one has to sort of forge one's own path and try not to be distracted by that but I think is that somebody who dibbles and dabbles with investing on the side as well I mean I'm intrigued as to the rationale behind it yeah and whether it's a Karatsu type investment this both sides investing the other i've heard nothing about the idea of katina investing on the other side of the better and if it's sort of very binary and one directional yeah what is the ulterior motive and purpose of that i i saw momentarily the ceo of better collective walking past and i couldn't quite grab him in time but i'd be intrigued as to what is the mindset of that and yeah are they thinking okay the share has been hit it's a value trade uh the operators sort of different modus operandi to ourselves and could this be a mega dance partner that the rest of the industry would probably be quaking in their shoes that if it transpires, we've got to up our game.
Yeah, absolutely. I want to talk about the US next because those two super affiliates, as you say, they're big in the US. And I know you guys are targeting a lot of market, a lot of traffic there.
I know you're operational in New York. When we last spoke, we spoke about micro-betting, which I've spoken to a couple of people this week about it here at ICE. I love the fact that you're of the opposite opinion to a lot of people on micro-betting. Do you want to maybe briefly... just remind us of your thoughts on that.
Yeah, so it's an interesting space. I sort of my career prior to moving to the affiliate space was in the online trading world, a company called IG. And back then we were at the very sort of forefront of I think called binary betting.
That then took off and became sort of huge in the sort of late noughties and early 2010s as a sort of major global product. When we first started it was the idea of what would the FTSE do over the course of a day? Within two years it was what was the FTSE gonna do in the course of the next minute?
and I think in terms of one's concentration span as a sort of humanity we struggle and this is just too intense the idea of a buzz every single play what's going to happen next I think the user will look at that and think ah novelty this is great I'm going to try it let's do this I'm going to put some money down have a crack and see what happens and you just get fatigued this is my hypothesis I could be proved wrong and who knows I could well be proved wrong I'd love being proved wrong normally but sometimes you just think actually analysed from other Tantella Industries, what's happening in those, how can you draw parallels to it? And I'd hazard that you look at this and think, oh man, do I really need to see what is the next pitch going to be for three hours or four hours of a game? It's too much.
I would hazard. how the numbers play out because I very much take that point on board and I've put that point to kind of proponents but they're still excited. It may well be that they're going to, there's a huge early profit maximization and then maybe just when things slow down, you know, they've kind of made that money already i know there's the concept of the tick tock tick tockification there you go i stumbled on of sports betting you know names like jake paul getting involved with that and you've got brands like simple bet um yeah like i said it'll be interesting to see the numbers um but obviously you you're i i wonder what what the ltv like you have a customer like that i'm just intrigued in whether can you can you then cross up because one spends a lot attracting a customer yeah the more valuable the customer the better for everybody you want them to last a long time They come in, explode, implode, gone. And yeah, some businesses have been very, very good in the digital space, harking back to the online trading industry. They've been geniuses at that.
They can acquire a user for X. They know the LTV is going to be short duration, but multiples of CAC, yippee-ki-yay, it works. But I think over there, there's been more demand for actual longer-standing relationships as well in customers. And I'm unsure. Yeah, sure.
Is that the key maybe debate and point in US? iGaming and sports betting at the moment, huge massive focus on acquisition, you know you've got these crazy bonus offers and bet like nothing and get $200 free bets. Is that the key, not problem, but is that the key maybe hurdle that US has to overcome in that too much of a focus on acquisition and not necessarily retention?
Correct and I think I would hazard in terms of the whole bonus piece, it is somewhat being tempered, you're not seeing the quite lunatic ones we saw last year also 15 16 months ago. They're not quite around now, but they're still spending a huge amount to acquire their customers. They don't know the landscape, they don't really know what the LTV is.
I mean there's all sorts of genius brains trying to ascertain it. But it's a conundrum for all those finance departments thinking, are we overspending for our customers at the moment? And that's where we think that as an affiliate it's a nice place to be because it's very auditable. And our drive is very much being that friend to as many sportsbooks whom we like to work with and driving valuable... customers yeah i'll uh give you a final question for a final word from from best odds on kind of us gaming uh us affiliate sports betting open the floor to up to 2023 what are you aiming for as a company but what kind of is there anything you expect to see change in the industry or will we see more pretty much more of the same this year i think i think 23 be much more of the same ads i think we'll have sort of 24 onwards is it going to be california is it florida is it texas the excitement and buzz around that because that will be sort of revolution for the time being for us as a business it's integrating bet prep becoming much more of a destination yeah give people that reason to keep returning to the best odds and keep that profitability going and potentially further overseas and hopefully lowering that tax rate in new york obviously obviously you can't do that yourself but yeah i'm trying the lobbyists are sort of i know they're trying to make it happen but it's a tough gig that it's a tough gig to say oh my god i made a mistake right hand up oh sorry hand up went too high it's hard to get people like regulars to reverse what they've done absolutely never easy well well uh fascinating as always to speak to you um and thanks very much for coming down pleasure cheers