Any casual sports fan can see that the industry of sports gambling is booming right now as more and more states vote to legalize it. So let’s just say an aspiring bookmaker has decided to capitalize on the current craze and they decide to open their own sportsbook. Needless to say, they are entering a booming industry that is on the ground floor and is about to take off.
The ultimate objective for any sportsbook is to eventually form a client base that contributes to the long term financial profitability of your business while mitigating any potential risks. It is difficult to quantify just how large of a bettor pool their business will need to form to get to a point where it can allow for the highest cash flow when first starting out, while also sustaining future profit projections. It is even more difficult to figure this out without having access to any sort of client analysis report on player behavior or any other tools that can help the bookmaker with the data analytics side of their business and give them the advantage they need to run a successful sportsbook.
Enter their Pay Per Head support which will provide them with software that the bookmaker can use to give them a number of client analysis reports that should be able to show the data and statistics that give the bookmaker a clear picture of their client base. The best part about this method of analyzing the client base is that it is simple, easy to use, and truly just a click away when they login to their Pay Per Head user account. This software will provide them with the most accurate statistical analysis of their customers, and give them the edge that they need running their sportsbook as efficiently and as risk-free as possible.
Delving Into the Player Activity Report
Before using the “sports performance” report to dig deeper into your player’s preferences, one approach is to use the “customer performance” report to identify the top winners and losers. With this information, you will be able to limit your sports performance research by player basis.
As with any type of data analysis research, make sure you write down “actionable” questions. Meaning questions which answer you can act upon. For example:
- In which sport does the top winner win the most?
- In which sport does the top winner lose the most?
- Which wager type does the top winner win the most?
- What wager type does the top winner lose the most?
*Keep reading to find out another way you can break down your player’s activity and gather important insights.
Once you have gathered all of this information, you can then use the other tools that your Pay Per Head sportsbook management provides you to encourage any player to play less of their most profitable sport or bet type (for example, by increasing the juice of that combination or applying a “max price” which removes that line if it is higher than -1000, for example.)
For any sportsbook, player activity and betting are what will drive the business. There will be certain, more predictable periods that are much more profitable than others depending on their customer’s gambling behavior, as well as the season and frequency of games being played. For example, March Madness, the Super Bowl, or the College Football Bowl season will be high volume periods for casual and professional bettors alike. To stay on top of the money and bets that are continually being placed during these high traffic periods, a useful and predictive statistic that the bookmaker will want to track is action by the bettor.
The action by bettor analysis will provide them with a breakdown of all the bets that a customer has placed, organizing them by the category of bet which can be a straight, teaser, or even a parlay, and in which type of game that bet was placed (sports, casino games, or even horse racing). The report will also be able to show the bookmaker the totals for their full pool of bettors to quantify the total betting action that is going through their sportsbook and which markets on the sportsbook are bringing in the most profits.
Preparing for the Variance Between Sports Seasons
As time goes on the bookmaker will want to use these reports to track all of the bets that are coming into their sportsbook throughout the year. This will assist them in getting through the slower periods throughout the year when betting action and cash flow is inevitably going to wane as well as prepare them for when the business will inevitably pick back up again. The spring and the fall are always going to be heavier in volume due to the amount of sports games that are available to bettors on a daily basis.
Identifying Your Client Base
Eventually, the bookmaker may choose to operate the type of sportsbook where a small group of high-risk high reward bettors is an adequate way to keep him profitable throughout the year. It may just be their preference to work more regularly with a broader group of casual bettors that can provide them with a higher daily volume of bets at smaller prices that can help the sportsbook sustain for future profitability and avoiding the chance for risks that heavy bettors can bring to a sportsbook. If a bookmaker does not know the type of bettors they have, they are putting their sportsbook at risk. If a bookmaker knows which type of bettor they want to attract, it will be easier to plan for the future of the sportsbook: the key is to always mitigate any potential risks as much as possible.
The biggest advantage that comes with operating a private sportsbook is that they get to be selective about which bettors they want to include in their client base. The most profitable long term plan is to construct their customer pool with a greater percentage of casual bettors, while allowing the professional bettors to take their business to other sportsbooks, allowing the bookmaker to be in control of the potential risk variance that is involved. A bookmaker should always want to be in control of the cash flow and in the long run, building a customer base of recreational, non-professional bettors is a recipe for success.
Building a Sportsbook With Long Term Profitability
Bookmakers can use these ‘player activity’ reports to identify their most profitable customers and help them to decide on the frequency of taking action from them. They can control the stop-loss by limiting their account with low enough limits and early line restrictions that they will take their business somewhere else. The bookmaker can also apply adjustments to bets such as increasing the juice, instilling a low max price, reducing parlay payouts, giving out free play bonuses among many more.
What the bookmaker wants to build is an environment that encourages bettors to place their action in the sports and bet types that make the most sense for the sportsbook to allow long term profitability and the reduction of potential risk or heavy exposure.