Betr’s Joey Levy on Building Sustainable Relationships with Sports Bettors

Posted on: October 24, 2022, 11:06h. 

Last updated on: October 25, 2022, 01:01h.

Steve Bittenbender Read More

Expertise: Legislation, Sports Betting, Horse Racing.

LAS VEGAS – Joey Levy isn’t planning for Betr to be like FanDuel or DraftKings.

And that’s not just on the sports betting side of things. The cofounder of the microbetting startup believes everything about the sports betting experience needs to be reexamined, as he mentioned in the first part of our conversation at Resorts World Las Vegas earlier this month.

Part two of our conversation focuses on what Levy thinks of the current sports betting industry environment and where the industry will be a year from now.

If you missed part one, you can find that here.

Casino.org edited Levy’s responses for length.

When we come back to the Global Gaming Expo (G2E) next year, what do you see the US sports betting industry looking like by then?

Joey Levy: “Knock on wood, if we’re successful, you’re going to have people asking a lot more of these questions like, does what you see on Bet MGM or Caesars Sportsbook, is this what the ultimate product experience should look and feel like?

People are going to be asking questions because I think we’re going to gain a lot of traction, hopefully, with this new reimagined experience, and I think it’ll be generally good for the industry. There are other companies in the industry that are doing new, different things, too. It’s not just us. I think what Mojo launched with the sports stock market is super interesting. You have emerging fantasy companies, like Underdog and PrizePicks, that are doing some interesting things. So, generally, it’s good for the consumer and good for the industry if there are a variety of different game types, product innovation, and so I think you’ll see more of that.

“You’re also going to see a lot more questions and interest in how you pursue not just brand awareness. FanDuel, DraftKings, Caesars, MGM have done a really good job with brand awareness. Everybody knows those brands, right? They advertise like car insurance companies, except I don’t think they’re as funny as GEICO. They have brand awareness. But you have an industry where the house will always win. It’s inherently hard to establish brand affinity with the consumer when really what you’re asking them to do over the long run is to lose money on your site.

“How do you sustainably develop a relationship and develop a community with an audience? It’s really two things. One is build a product experience that actually enhances their consumption of sports, so that it’s for entertainment value. It’s not for winning money. Then two, build a cool media company or content. Everything Betr does from a distribution standpoint is all original content. You’re never going to see us just flood linear television with generic ads like these car insurance companies or sports betting operators that advertise like them. Distribution needs to be rethought, driven by creators to have more credibility and a better relationship with consumers.”

The younger generations of sports fans consume content way differently than their parents, especially through social media. I know that’s where Betr is going…

JL: “It’s not just a younger demographic. Millennials and the generation above them, everybody’s on social media, and now everybody’s consuming content differently. When Jake released his video announcing Betr, everybody across all spectrums saw that video. They found a way to get that. That’s what we’re all on now.”

You alluded to this earlier. I think DraftKings and FanDuel, in many ways, were disruptors in the industry after PASPA. Do you see them now as moving out of that disruptor mode and being legacy companies?

JL: “Yes, and I say that because I think they’re going to be successful. But again, I don’t think they or anybody else is from a product standpoint. From a distribution standpoint, the only one that I think has done an interesting, potentially good job is Barstool Sports. But on the product side, nobody has built something that the mass-market consumer can just pick up and intuitively interact with. This is like a foreign language to somebody who’s never bet on sports before.

“And I don’t think that they have the right incentives in place to go out and fundamentally change the look and feel of their consumer experiences because all they got to do is launch in more states as they open up. Their brands are already synonymous with legacy sports betting, which is what I think this will be called 10 years from now.

With Betr, I don’t know what Betr is yet. We’re a microbetting app today. I don’t know what we’ll be tomorrow or in the future. But everything we’re doing is for the mass-market casual fan to enhance their consumption of sports.

“We’re not looking for those whale betters. My point is, I don’t even know if we’re going to cannibalize their businesses or take over what they’re doing. They’re going after a smaller subset of consumer that is validated to spend a lot of money betting on sports, and they’re going to make a lot of money doing that. But we’re going after that incremental audience. We’re trying to go from the 3 million monthly active users in the industry today to the delta of 147 million gambling-age sports fans who aren’t engaged with betting on sports today because the product experiences just aren’t very good or intuitive for that.”

More from Levy coming on Wednesday.