German Gambling Advertising Triples in Volume, Casino Promotions the Key Factor

Over the past five years, marketing and advertising of gambling activities has increased five times in Germany. A report and a study conducted by market research agency, Research Tools, suggests that this comes down mainly to heavy promotion of online casino sites by operators.

The study that led to these conclusions (and others that will be divulged in the remainder of this article) are based on digital records from AdVision, independent media observer. They have found that gambling operators have spent EUR 401m on German advertising for the fiscal year ending with May 31st.

Online Segment Investing Heavily

The advertising itself was bolstered by the online casino segment...

...which has increased its marketing spend by more than EUR 70 million on an annual level. Research Tool also noted that sports betting accounted for around 20% of total advertising volume over the year and that it is steadily growing from a much lower base than online gambling.

German state lottery companies spend much less on advertising than private-owned operators do...

…as televised lottery draws contributed to all advertising spend with around 10%. Class lotteries, in which draws are divided into a number of game phases have accounted to less than 5% of total volume.

TV Remains Number One

The annual average of brands promoting their gambling offers on a monthly level was 64...

...which is a significant increase from last year's 47. Twelve of those operators spent well above EUR 10 million with five of those brands accounting for around half of all spending. Kindred Group's Unibet and Malta-based operator, Wunderino, are the two brands whose spending has increased substantially during the year.

BildungsChancen Lotterie, which was launched recently, looks to raise funding for education and also invested in big way.

The most popular medium for advertising is still television – and by quite a margin. TV advertising accounted for 80% of total spending. Advertising focused on “fun and excitement, the chances of winning and the attractiveness of the winnings.” Sportbooks are best promoted with the help of sports legends – former German goalkeeper, Oliver Kahn, and legendary Argentinean, Diego Maradona, were two faces prominently featured.

New Treaty Coming Next Year

The study was focused on advertisements in 65 daily newspapers, 500 consumer magazines, 190 specialist journals, 71 radio and 45 TV channels and 500 website pages.

The Third State Treaty on Gambling was ratified in March by Germany's 16 federal states...

...the Treaty would permit operators to apply for sports betting licenses in the market and would run from January 1st 2020 to June 30th 2021. Schleswig-Holstein will still be allowed to run their own sportsbook under their regulatory regime.

Online casino and in-play betting will be banned under the terms of this Treaty which will also enforce a 5% turnover tax as well as EUR 1,000 monthly spending limit for players

...while Regional Council of Darmstadt in the state of Hesse, the body responsible for issuing sportsbook licenses, has introduced a strict rule that all operators will have to adhere to if they want to attain a sports betting license: to shut down any casino offering.

Measures for blocking of payments have been put in place by Niedersachen. PayPal, on the other hand, has already adjusted their terms and conditions in order to make sure that payments in unlicensed casino sites in Germany cannot be processed.

Source:

“Casino promotions drive rise in German gambling advertising”, igamingbusiness.com, August 23, 2019.