John Chyriwsky, Head of Marketing at Fincore, says operators can enjoy significant success in a short space of time using third-party tech but some limitations can hamper long-term growth.
Why do so many online sportsbook and casino operators use white label platforms?
Because they are hugely effective at launching an online sportsbook or casino brand quickly, especially in regulated jurisdictions. The time to market is rapid – in some instances, you’re looking at just a few weeks from signing the contract to accepting your first player – and the cost is significantly less than developing a platform from the ground up.
What makes white labels so appealing is that you get everything in one place, from content to bonusing, rewards, payment, security, responsible gambling, compliance and customer support. This means the operator can focus its efforts on marketing its sportsbook or casino and building its player base.
Is it possible to achieve success with a white label solution?
Absolutely. There are plenty of examples of brands that have become household names in highly competitive markets using a white label solution. PlayOJO in the UK comes to mind for me.
So long as the operator can offer a compelling player experience via the white label platform, and so long as they have an attractive brand and can engage players at scale via their marketing activity, it’s possible to build a highly successful business. But there is a risk that the brand can become a victim of its own success.
This is because standard white label solutions have some pretty significant drawbacks that can have a negative impact on the player experience, especially as the brand gets bigger, which can ultimately see that player base dwindle.
Can you share some of these drawbacks?
Of course. It must be remembered that white label providers often work with tens of operator partners and this can make it tough for an individual sportsbook or casino to request updates and changes to the platform and player experience being offered.
There is often a development queue, and the queue can be long. This means the operator has to wait to fix issues or improve aspects of the player journey that are causing friction. It can also prevent them from quickly adapting to new player trends and localisation requirements – for example, onboarding specific payment providers can take months if the option required is outside of the platform provider’s roadmap. In such a competitive space, this delay can see players leave the brand for a rival.
With innovation a key factor for operator success, do white labels throw up challenges here too?
They do. If it’s tough for operators to implement fixes and roll-out updates, imagine how hard it is to bring never-seen-before features, functionalities, tools and experiences to their players. This usually requires an incredibly deep partnership with the white label platform provider as this sort of thing ventures into the realm of bespoke development.
That’s not to say it can’t be done, but it usually comes at a cost with the white label provider needing to be mindful of its other operator partners and not overcommit to bespoke development projects. In markets where operators need to offer strong USPs, this can become a pretty major issue.
Is a lack of a USP an intrinsic issue of using a white label platform?
It is. It’s really challenging for white label brands to have USPs because ultimately, they offer the same player experience as the other sportsbooks or casinos running on the platform – the major difference is often branding and perhaps a different welcome offer.
In most cases, all other aspects of the sportsbook or casino are exactly the same. This is where brands powered by proprietary platforms pull ahead of their white label rivals by developing and deploying pioneering products that can take months and even years for others to catch up to.
Why don’t more operators develop their own platforms?
Because it can be a massive undertaking that comes with significant risk. It can take years and tens of millions of pounds to take a platform from initial concept to being market-ready and in that space of time, an operator could have launched its brand via a white label for a fraction of the cost and built a successful business.
But there are solutions out there, such as our TRI Platform, that offer the flexibility of a proprietary platform with the option for total control and ownership – taking TRI and adapting it to an operator’s specific needs is a lot more cost-effective than building from scratch and they also get to partner with a team that has built and launched multiple platforms, so know how to deliver.
The issue for most operators is that by the time they realise they have outgrown their white label platform (this can happen surprisingly quickly) they think it's too late to jump ship.
And is it?
Yes and no. Despite what they say when you start working with them, a white label platform provider will never make it easy for an operator to migrate customers to another solution but ultimately it can be done. And when you consider the long-term limitations of white labels, it’s something that successful operators have to do.
Of course, it would be much better for them to use a solution such as Tri from the get-go so that they don’t become a victim of their own success, as so many white label operators do.
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