You’re fully locked into the Lions–49ers NFC Championship, the kind of game where even blinking feels irresponsible, when your dog lets you know that it’s time for an urgent outdoor adventure. So now you’re outside in flip flops, in the cold, wearing a jacket that was clearly chosen by a past version of you who didn’te believe in weather.
Your phone buzzes. “Lions 24, 49ers 23. 2:13 left. Detroit at the one-yard line.”
It is the kind of update that normally sends you into a full swiping frenzy, trying to figure out how to get the game on your phone, when all the while your dog is pausing every three steps to emotionally process the sidewalk.
Your brain immediately starts trying to remember how you were watching this game inside. Was it a streaming app? Cable? Someone else’s login that you definitely don’t pay for? It doesn’t matter now. That life is over. You’ve crossed into a new chapter and it’s cold and you’re wearing flip flops.
But then the alert keeps going.
“Watch the finish live for $0.99 or place a wager on whether Detroit scores and stream it free.”
Suddenly you’re not scrambling anymore. One tap drops you straight into the game. Another connects the bet to the exact moment that just made your heart rate jump. No channel flipping, no guessing which app has the rights, and no missing the play while you fumble through logins.
That tiny ridiculous moment on the sidewalk is the future of sports betting marketing.
It’s also what Mark Phillip, CEO of Are You Watching This?! and MetaBet, has been building for nearly two decades. Instead of asking how to push more offers at users, Phillip built the infrastructure that understands when a game actually becomes interesting, then makes that moment immediately usable for broadcasters, sportsbooks, and fans alike.
Phillip organizes the entire platform around three deceptively simple silos: curation, discovery, and monetization.
Curation answers the question fans always have, but rarely know how to ask: What should I be watching right now? Are You Watching This analyzes live games in real time, scanning scores, time remaining, momentum shifts, and historical context to identify when something crosses from “on” to “you need to see this.”
Discovery answers the next question: Where do I go to watch it? Instead of forcing fans to hunt through apps, channels, and streaming platforms, the system points them directly to the right feed at the right moment.
MetaBet is the third piece. The monetization layer lets sportsbooks and media partners turn that surge of excitement into action. That might mean placing a wager, unlocking a stream, or bundling the two into a single tap.
For operators, this represents a fundamental shift in how marketing works on mobile. The industry has spent years optimizing for scale, blasting promotions across apps and hoping something sticks. But fans don’t experience sports in bulk. They experience it in spikes of emotion. A final drive. A comeback. A season hanging in the balance.
MetaBet allows sportsbooks to step into, instead of interrupting, those moments. When a fan is already emotionally invested, the bet doesn’t feel like an ad, it feels like part of the experience. It also solves one of the most persistent problems in digital sports: access. Fans shouldn’t have to care which streaming service owns which rights. They just want to see the play.
As the U.S. market matures, the competitive edge will not come from louder promotions or bigger bonuses. It will come from timing, relevance, and the ability to meet fans exactly where they are.
That’s what MetaBet is enabling and it’s why the future of sports betting marketing looks less like advertising and more like being invited into the game at the exact second it matters.
