User Acquisition Strategies For Sports Betting Brands
- Brainz Magazine
- Jan 18, 2024
- 4 min read
User acquisition is a vital and challenging aspect of the sports betting industry, as it determines the growth and sustainability of your platform. Many small businesses and sports betting startups fail within their first year because newcomers don’t know how to attract users, let alone keep them interested.
To win over and retain users, your marketing strategy needs to be multi-channeled and diversified. The sports betting industry is extremely competitive, with a growing number of platforms battling for the attention and loyalty of potential customers. To succeed in this market, sports betting brands need to implement effective and innovative user acquisition strategies that can attract, engage, and retain users.
Let’s explore some of the best practices and tips for user acquisition in the sports betting industry.

Offer a Mobile App
Another way to attract and keep sports bettors for your platform is to have a mobile app that provides an easy, hassle-free user experience. A lot of betting sites are beginning to create mobile apps in order to keep their customers online while they are on the go. A mobile app can put you ahead of the pack and also build customer loyalty, retention, and lifetime value. According to a report by Branch, sports betting apps saw a 210% increase in user engagement in 2022, compared to 2021.
The design, performance, and usefulness of any application must be user-friendly to make it successful on the web. Optimize your app for discovery in the App or Google Play Store, too. Use keywords, descriptions, ratings, and reviews. Moreover, you should also carry out user retention tactics like push notifications, in-app messages, and fun rewards as well as social play to ensure your users stay involved. A huge selection of the betting apps on the market today offer exciting bonuses, special promotions, and more. Do some competitor research to ensure your app is up to scratch and will be competitive in today's marketplace.
Understand Your Target Audience
The foremost objective of any user acquisition scheme is to understand your audience and market. Each area, sports betting included, has a specialized group of people suited to it, but it’s thought that less than half of marketers actually understand their target audience’s interests, shopping habits, and hobbies. You can segment your audience into different types of users by analyzing user data, and then build personalized marketing campaigns specifically targeting their interests and trigger points.
Users can be grouped by the different kinds of games they enjoy, how frequently they are active, and various other interests. You may also use user feedback, optional surveys, and reviews to learn what your users value and expect from your platform. Ensure your audience participates in surveys and reviews by including a key in-game reward as an incentive.
Leverage Influencer Marketing
Using influencer marketing is a powerful and budget-friendly method to engage and influence your intended audience. Influencer marketing is about engaging popular and trusted people, usually ones with a large following on social media or other platforms that can promote your brand or product to their audience. Every person with a blue checkmark on their social media account poses for some brand or another and their followers (and your potential customers) look to them to figure out what’s hot and what isn’t.
For brands looking to boost their website metrics for brand awareness, credibility, and trust; or if they are looking to drive traffic, conversions, or referrals to their platform - influencer marketing can help. According to a study by Nielson Catalina Solutions, influencer marketing can generate up to 11 times more return on investment than traditional advertising.
However, there are a few things to consider before diving into this marketing option: finding the right influencer is key. They should be:
Relevant
Reachable (not too big)
Resonate with both the medium of choice as well as your target market or consumers on social media platforms.
Don’t forget to check in with what your audience likes or doesn’t like, or what may or may not be in season. Your influencer’s reputation can also impact whether users will buy a product that was recommended by them, so do a little research before jumping in.
Celebrities associated with scandals - however private - have lost a large number of followers and the brands associated with them have suffered in the aftermath. To avoid similar outcomes, do your homework. Find out all there is to know about your chosen brand ambassador. Once you’ve decided, you also have to set clear and feasible targets, measurements, and expectations; and offer influencers free rein for authentic creation as well as a payment or incentive to make exciting content that your audience will love.
Use PPC and Programmatic Advertising
Another effective user acquisition strategy for sports betting brands is to use pay-per-click and programmatic advertising to reach your target audience on various online channels. Pay-per-click advertising is an internet ad style. You pay a set sum whenever your ad gets clicked. It shows up on search engines, social media sites, or suitable web pages. Programmatic advertising means using software and algorithms to automatically buy and sell ad space based on data.
PPC and programmatic both can help you raise your brand awareness, increase the reach of your brand and web traffic, optimize ad performance budgets, as well as produce higher ROI. PPC and programmatic advertising have many large benefits for any sports betting business, such as:
Contributing to your business goals
Being measurable and trackable
Providing quick entry and flexibility
Giving you full control and customization
Working well with other marketing channels
Offering incredible targeting options
Providing a wealth of marketing data
To run a successful pay-per-click and programmatic advertising campaign, you need to define your target audience, keywords, budget, and goals. You’ll also need to create compelling and relevant ad copy and landing pages. You may need to monitor and analyze your ad performance, using tools like Google Analytics, and optimize your campaign accordingly.
To increase customer engagement, business owners should learn who their audience is and implement various tactics to reach them. By keeping an eye on upcoming marketing trends, businesses can support a brighter future for themselves and offer their customers a great product or service at the same time.