There is the casino world and there is the rest of the world.
The same thing goes for marketing trends.
Casino marketing has always been cutting edge and leads the world in areas like guest loyalty and analytics; however, the rest of the world continues to lead the way and set the pace for marketing trends.
Here are some of real-world marketing trends that can be adapted by the casino world.
1. Short Form Video: Popularized by platforms like TikTok, YouTube Shorts, and Instagram Reels, short form video continues to top the list of marketing tools for world marketers. Casino marketers that invest heavily in this format to capture attention and drive engagement will be riding the wave that has existed as a marketing trend for many years. As casinos continue to move away from traditional media towards digital and mobile, short form video will be the tool that works. Even small to medium sized casinos can use short form video with minimal equipment and staffing trained to develop engaging shorts to tell a story.
The opportunities to use short form video are endless. Telling a short story about your operation can be one of the easiest, most dynamic tools in your marketing toolbox. Everything from bringing your employees front and center to telling the story of new slot machines can be told with short form video. Outlets for short form video keep growing and desktop editing programs are easy to use and affordable.
2. Casino Influencer Marketing Keeps Growing: Casino influencers form a community of highly engaged guests. Casino Influencers can offer a more authentic and relatable voice, potentially yielding better results than traditional media. The field of casino influencers has grown over the years with strong following in all social media platforms.
I had the opportunity to interview Brian Christopher for the Faces of Gaming column with CDC Gaming Reports and was amazed at the depth of Christopher’s newly founded empire of influencer outlets. Starting as an actor in Canada, Christopher was an Uber driver and cater waiter until one day, for the fun of it, he visited Las Vegas and decided to video himself commenting on his slot play. After posting his videos, Christopher’s viewing audience grew until he has earned more from his videos than his work routine. Now, Christopher has casino slot room additions dedicated to his influencer realm, a slot machine themed after him, cruise ship vacations, and more.
Getting into the influencer market is following a hot trend. Finding an influencer that fits your market can start as easy as a google search. The value of an influencer is both in the awareness they are able to generate from their social media platforms and the crowds they can draw when making personal appearances at your property. When selecting an influencer, consider their appeal to your demographics and unique market make up.
3. Prioritizing brand values: Brands that align with the values and beliefs of guests are a growing real world marketing trend. Brand identity that reflects authentic values can resonate with audiences and foster loyalty. Your casino is most likely already doing that job. The issue is how many casinos present those results as part of a marketing process.
Every casino performs community service to some extent. Think about the number of volunteer hours your employees dedicate to causes in your market. Think about the donations you make on a monthly basis. The trick is to tell your market about it. With social media and digital marketing, the ability to blend your brand with social awareness becomes easier and can be more frequent.
Consider moving to broader goals by creating awareness of the green initiatives your casino creates when constructing a new project. Creating efficiencies in how you manage food sourcing from local farmers or supplies or even recycling efforts can add to your brand values.
4. The Native Advertising Trend: From Wikipedia, “Native advertising, also called sponsored content, partner content, and branded journalism, is a type of paid advertising that appears in the style and format of the content near the advertisement’s placement. It manifests as a post, image, video, article, or editorial piece of content.”
Although Native advertising has been around for a long time in the form of “advertorials,” the explosion of ad formats via social media, mobile, and digital has accelerated the creative uses of the format. Creative casino marketers can take advantage of the format to generate higher engagement rates for all forms of advertising.
5. Mobile Optimization: Mobile is still the king of marketing trends. Based on the clear fact that people use their phones for everything, getting your casino highly immersed in a mobile strategy for apps, reservations, information, sales, etc. remains a top priority.
6. Reshaping Marketing with Artificial intelligence (AI) Personalization: AI in the casino world is in its infancy. AI is transforming various aspects of marketing, from creating personalized content and automating tasks to offering data-driven insights for better decision-making. Several AI driven companies and products are beginning to personalize data that goes beyond traditional CMS programs. Think player tracking programs on steroids that can do everything from cloud information tracking to on-site, real-time access of customer data when offers can be made immediately.
AI programs can rate uncarded play and send offers while the player is still in action. AI personalization recognizes that every player is different and has the ability to create profiles that cut into waste and streamline the data.
In the brave new world of marketing trends, casinos are just beginning to launch into places where AI can change the face of casino marketing.
7. Social commerce gains momentum: Social media is blurring the lines between browsing and buying by integrating e-commerce to a growing number of platforms. This trend allows for a shopping experience, driving sales directly through social media platforms. As each social media platform increases their e-commence capabilities, casinos can take advantage of this growing trend to increase awareness and grow engagement.
Engagement and Profit
While casinos push the envelope towards increasingly sophisticated marketing protocols, the real world of marketing trends leads the way. Casinos can grow engagement and profit by following new trends from non-casino marketing sources to keep ahead of an ever changing curve.
