Know your customer (KYC) is a term used frequently in financial services to describe safeguards used to identify customers and protect them from fraud.
But knowing your customer also makes good business sense in terms of interacting with consumers. SuperBook, a premier sports betting operator, takes this adage to heart.
“We understand the American customer,” says John Murray, Executive Director of Race and Sports Operations at Westgate Las Vegas for Super Book. “We understand what the American customer is looking to bet on. We understand how the American customer wants the app laid out.”
The key to the utility of the app is SuperBook’s partnership with IGT, the provider of best-in-class content, services and solutions to the global, regulated gaming industry. Murray says SuperBook worked diligently, using IGT’s PlaySports platform, to make the app’s interface straightforward and accessible to information and features bettors demand.
And because “so many of our guys bet ourselves, we’re trying to give people a comfortable look,” Murray says.
IGT was able to develop many of the features SuperBook’s app includes by, again, knowing what customers want and need. According to IGT President of Sports Betting Joe Asher, it is always important to develop features that mesh with an operator’s goals, noting that online sports betting operators are “playing a different hand” than those that have brick-and-mortar casinos.
“The pure online operators have a different model,” Asher says, noting that IGT also provides services to FanDuel.
“It’s an easy-to-use, trusted platform,” Asher says of the PlaySports platform. “It facilitates third-party integration. You can integrate with a payment company, for instance. …The ability to integrate with various third parties is clearly one of the benefits of the platform, as well as the fact that it’s a longstanding proven platform that has been modified to speak to U.S. markets.”
Murray notes that one of the hidden features of IGT’s platform that might be overlooked is the company’s access to more than one hundred jurisdictions around the world, according the company’s sustainability report.
“We don’t have to worry if we can launch this day or that day,” Murray says. “We can go right into these states with no issues at all.”
The versatility of IGT’s platform allows customization of point spreads, moneylines, and any other wagering information SuperBook wants to implement to make wagering “a better experience for the user,” according to Murray.
“IGT has been really flexible about helping us get those things set up,” Murray adds. “And I like the fact that their senior leaders are here in Nevada. That makes them very accessible to us, especially because everything is so spread out these days. It’s a big factor for us, knowing the main people we speak to all the time are working right here in Nevada alongside us.”
Asher says it’s been heartening to see the progress SuperBook has made over the last few years, recently expanding into its sixth jurisdiction, Iowa, following past approvals in Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Jersey, and Tennessee.
“It’s been really great to see them expand,” Asher says. “They may not be one of the major operators that you see on TV all the time, but they’re carving out a niche. And of course, we’ve had a longstanding relationship with Jay Kornegay (SuperBook oddsmaker and Vice President of Race & Sports Book Operations), one of the top execs in Las Vegas and (CEO) Marc Lipparelli. It’s great to see the progress they’ve made.”
