Do you think players care whether a brand does good or harms society?

Better World Casinos is a website that reviews brands and operators on their sustainability, ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) performance.

The idea is that if a player has the same user experience, value for money (same RTP), same bonus, same payout speed etc playing at two different brands, but one brands aims to do good for society (transparency, fair compensation, inclusivity, equality, no tax avoidance, reducing carbon footprint, donating part of profits to charity, etc) while the other does not, then a player might as well opt for the first, rather than the latter.

What do you think?

In my opinion, no.

Even blackrock is pulling back from the failure that is esg, and have made recent statements along those lines.*this is key since they are at the root of a lot of esg funding) The list of companies that concentrated more in such things, instead of taking care of customers that have or are experiencing failures grows every day.

When players look for a casino, they are looking for one that will treat them fairly, give good bonuses and a fair chance to win. The vast majority do not care what their carbon footprint is.

It is possible that some operators may gain some brand awareness in some markets due to being involved in charities etc, but doubtful that is a good source for new players beyond a bit of brand name awareness which may work for them when prospects read "other" advertising.

Rick
Universal4

If I were the player, I would probably choose the "caring" casino. When I occasionally visit a real brick and mortar casino, it always seems that the smoking section is the busiest. This leads me to believe that a large percentage of casino players wouldn't really care about which casino they would choose based on their sustainability, ESG and CSR performance.

However, I also believe that most large corporations wouldn't support such a cause unless they felt it would improve their bottom line and or improve their corporate image. Some may "talk the talk" but few will actually "walk the walk", in my opinion.


Good luck with your site.

Yeah, most players wouldn't really care about such things and probably wouldn't even be interested enough to learn about them. However, there might still be a small percentage of people who would consider this as something important.

A small part of the players will be interested. As there are so many players, it is a considerable amount of people that will care. If you focus on that and can attract them I think you have a good niche market with less competition.

Not at all!

Absolutely not. All they care about is playing and seeing how much money they can win.

If a brand is doing "caring" things are they :

A/ doing it with a reduced profit to owners / shareholders?
B/ by slicing odds, reducing freebies and offers to players?

All things being equal IF a brand really was doing good with no effect on what they offered players then I would consider promoting them.
But I doubt that most players would care.

However, I suspect that most ESG is just a cheap marketing ploy - and it's mostly done by reducing things in choice B - thus affecting players.

It's possible but I highly doubt it. Most players care about the games, mobile, banking options, bonuses, customer service ext...

I think most players don't care. For responsible gambling maybe but for any other charities or caring for the environment you are better staying home to gamble than driving to a casino. The rest is marketing.

You can get a pretty good idea of interest around this by looking at the SERPs. How many snippets do you see in gambling-related searches that say something like 'committed to carbon emission reductions, sustainable resources, etc etc etc etc etc'

None.

Because search engines 'know' no one searches that (admirable) stuff in the context of gambling.

Yes, there might be a few interested if you could get to them on social media or some other channel, but clearly no one is going to arrive on organic search (though if you could find a way to get the ideas in people's head, and they began searching, then it could snowball. Well, probably mini-snowball).

No, I remember a trend of Bingo sites pushing the fact that they donated X amount to charity. There was never any significant increase in players, in fact from the top of my head, they did not really perform.

Also, like basically what is mentioned, gamblers are just looking for what they want. I don't even believe gamblers are particularly swayed by bonuses. Possibly by no wagering bonuses, but if that is what they are actually looking for.

Thanks for your response!

That is what I suspect too and am trying to find out.

But things are changing. And maybe there are people that are willing to focus on the bottom line which is offering great entertainment in a non harmful way for people and planet. And maybe, just maybe (I know this is very controversial :p), maybe profit can take a second place?

thanks for your reply!

What about Toto in NL from Nederlandse Loterij. 40% of profit goes to charity

and Paf, the Finish operator?

They are successful and the reason they were founded was to raise money for charity

Most casinos do in fact focus on the bottom line, and that is profit.

And any operator, affiliate program, or any other business that donates a portion of profit to worthy charities is a good thing, but that in and of itself is rarely ever the sole motivation.

Rick
Universal4

I agree. And in this case these casinos will simply increase the percentage of the loyal audience (which doesn’t matter + which is important)

I don't think so, at least not for the majority of players.

However, if those players who do care about it represent a niche that's enough appealing to you and you decide to go for it, I would suggest conducting A/B tests to assess whether there's indeed a difference in decision-making based on the claims of brands doing good for society and also making very explicit how this can benefit the player, instead of assuming they already know it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by BetterWorldCasinos

Thanks for your response!

That is what I suspect too and am trying to find out.

But things are changing. And maybe there are people that are willing to focus on the bottom line which is offering great entertainment in a non harmful way for people and planet. And maybe, just maybe (I know this is very controversial :p), maybe profit can take a second place?

thanks for your reply!

What about Toto in NL from Nederlandse Loterij. 40% of profit goes to charity

and Paf, the Finish operator?

They are successful and the reason they were founded was to raise money for charity

---

Gamblers harm themselves and their families in the first place, because they are already hurt by life.

Gamblers are selfish creatures, who care about themselves and pay for illusion that they will be rich without work.

Yes, some gamblers can be attracted by ESG bullsh1t, as average consumers nowadays also are greenwashed.
For another gamblers/consumers, ESG might have negative impact, because petrolheads refuse everything green.

So if you have some data, that your visitors are wokes, it can make sense to promote ESG (it is of course better if they do not pretend doing anything for planet, because just writing that you are green is cheaper than planting some stupid trees that will be cut after some time).

ESG is just another onboarding vertical exactly like offering a bonus. If it does not cost more than it brings, it makes sense.

It is important to distinguish between what might work and what we wish that works. ESG is the most successful propaganda of last years. An illusion that gambler is doing something good might help him to spend more. For me it is a disgusting but brilliant idea.

We've seen a few sites in the past try similar things - there have even been a couple of sites a while back that was donating the rev share to charity. None of them really did that well, as far as I could tell.

At the end of the day it comes down to your rankings. I doubt very much that there's specific traffic for this kind of thing so you're talking about ranking for the generic terms and then seeing if players care.

its gambling we are talking about... I feel its not an industry where "customers" ie players actually search for CSR, sustainability and the likes. Already the fact u r playing somewhere in your mind tells u that green initiatives or whatever do not go hand in hand with gambling - or else why you yourself as a player would be gambling your money instead of doing something that actually contributes to the same initiatives casinos should support. I dont know if it makes sense but that is how I see it

Of course some people will care about this but the clear majority won't. Gambling is after all an escape for many and I imagine not many people are thinking about ESG and CSR when they come to play games or place bets.

Do enough people care to make it worth doing as a brand or worth promoting as an affiliate? I am not sure. What you might find is if some people do care and you can refer them to a site that fits with those views I imagine they might be valuable longer term loyal players, but that is only a guess.