Continuity gifting. which has been a tried-and-true marketing strategy in the casino space for decades, embraces a basic premise: Push players to make an incremental trip to the property to claim a gift reward.
Azam Husain, CEO of Seattle-based Casino Science, a data science and analytics solution company for the gaming industry, concluded after years of research evaluating the effectiveness of gifting programs that they can be of significant value to the property.
At the same time, Husain discovered that there was a lot of ROI being left on the table with traditional gifting programs, which is why he created InfiGifts, an omni-channel one-stop platform designed to revitalize player satisfaction and loyalty while delivering a rewards experience founded upon convenience.
Building upon the tremendous success of InfiGifts, Husain has announced a new program tailored to enhance casino loyalty rewards he calls “Casino Gifting Your Way”. It incorporates on-property distribution, hybrid, and direct-to-player fulfillment via an integrated app, kiosk, or portal.
“InfiGifts is the only gifting solution in the market today that supports all three gifting distribution methods,” Husain said. “No other gifting vendor in the space offers this.”
Husain’s research revealed that even though gifting programs serve their purpose, they can also become stale and can actually, in some ways, generate negative returns as a result of properties running gifting programs for many years.
“It is an artifact of the programs becoming stale, combined with players expecting that they are always going to receive a gift reward as an entitlement,” he explained. “To combat this, operators need to constantly update these programs with new processes, new technology, and new gifts to ensure these programs continue to be profitable for the casino.”
In conversations with casino operators over the past year, Husain recognized that they wish to evolve their gifting programs to make them more efficient in order to generate the highest ROI possible. The result was “Casino Gifting Your Way”, which essentially allows the casinos to revitalize their gifting options with updated products and branded items.
“It allows operators to realign gifting operations by using technology to deliver rewards,” Husain said. “This helps to eliminate the logistics of storage and staffing while essentially reimagining the potential of reward programs by using data science to help guide the gifting decisions at the property.
“Casino Gifting Your Way offers flexibility because it allows the casino to deliver gifting rewards to players the way they wish, but with options that empowers the property to evolve the program over time. This is accomplished by structuring the program into three different components: Traditional Plus Gifting, Hybrid Gifting, and Ultimate Gifting.”
With Traditional Plus Gifting, the gifts are sent to the property for storage and distribution. The gifts are distributed to the players on the event day according to the protocols of the casino. Any unused inventory can be returned. InfiGifts supports the event in the traditional way by sending the gifts to the property.
The second component is Hybrid Gifting. A small number of gifts are sent to the casino for distribution and are claimed using the gift technology. With this method, the players have their choice of a gift as well as their choice of delivery.
“The players can either pick up the gift at the casino or they can have it delivered directly to their home address,” Husain explained. “The nice thing about Hybrid Gifting is that the player has the option of selecting how they wish to receive the gift and what type of gift they want.
“If the player wants something other than what is being offered at the property, they can do that, too, using the gifts technology, and it will be sent directly to them at their home address. Hybrid Gifting incorporates traditional gifting of picking up on property, and also the added benefit of being able to select another gift.”
The third component of Casino Gifting Your Way is Ultimate Gifting. In this ultimate gifting model, all gifts are sent directly to the player’s home address. The benefit for the casino is no storage, staffing, or logistics activities involved. As for the players, they receive a unique gifting experience with many gift choices and tiered rewards.
“With Casino Gifting Your Way, if the casino wants to deliver gifting rewards in a traditional on-property distribution way, they can absolutely continue to do that,” Husain said. “When the property is ready and wants to evolve the experience for players with more gifting options, then they can move to Hybrid Gifting to get the best of both worlds.”
The need to support both on-property distribution and direct-to-player fulfillment is something Husain and the InfiGifts team learned over the past year as casinos evolve their programs to a reimagined form of gifting for players.
“The benefits of this program are enormous,” Husain said. “Casinos do not need to change what they are doing today. The program essentially future-proofs an operator’s gifting program, because if you are doing on-property distribution today we are still going to support you with it.
“Casino Gifting Your Way allows casinos to evolve their gifting programs at their own pace. The program offers a multitude of gifting options to players that essentially expands the catalog from which they have to choose in any given month. If it is direct, players have multiple ways to claim their gift options, either from the kiosk, from the app, the player portal, or through a casino attendant claimed experience.”
While acknowledging Casino Gifting Your Way is structured for all levels of players, it can be particularly attractive for the large-scale continuity gifting programs with larger player audiences.
Casino Gifting Your Way, Husain said, has been trialed at a number of properties, including Win-River Resort & Casino in Northern California and American Place Casino located in Illinois north of Chicago.
“We are really excited for what the future holds,” he concluded. “I am fond of saying that InfiGifts reimagines gifting for the casino. We are truly doing that now, and our competitors are certainly taking notice.”
