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We have prepared for you an interview with gambling expert Edward Ackins, who is also well versed in the crypto industry and advises many well-known online casino software development platforms. Ed is a Senior Member of the BitcoinCasinoTop project. Today the topic of our conversation is the future of poker.
Tell us how you first learned what poker is?
This is a very ancient story. When I was 9, friends came to visit my parents. When dinner was over, one of them offered to play poker and I was allowed to stay and watch. It turned out that my dad’s friend worked as a croupier at the Caesars casino, on Pacific Ave in Atlantic City, and was very good with cards. He was shuffling them very cool, throwing them from one hand to another, you know, for a child it looked like magic. It was a Saturday and everyone finished playing just before Sunday morning. After that, I asked my father to teach me how to play cards.
Wow, and after that you decided to connect your life with gambling?
No, I was too young for that. I liked playing poker then, but studies and basketball were in the first place. Then I went to NJIT to receive M.S. Applied Statistics and it was during my student years that I seriously returned to gambling. In order to help my parents pay for my studies and have the financial opportunity to spend time with friends, I needed to look for a part-time job and I got an internship at the Borgata casino as a Roulette dealer. You may be surprised, but at that time I was earning at least 1.5 times more than my classmates who worked as waiters in bars-restaurants, shop assistants or couriers.
But that was just the beginning of your journey, wasn’t it?
Yes, I worked there for several years, after that online casinos began to appear on the market and I started my journey as a live blackjack dealer in one of the first Evolution Gaming studios. After that I got M.S. Applied Statistics and I were invited to take part in launch of new online casino as a business analyst. After that, I performed similar tasks 3 times in 3 more casinos in different positions, such as CTO and CBDO. Now these brands are quite successful and well-known, but unfortunately I cannot name them because of the signed NDA.
And all this time you were far from poker?
You can say so. As I described above, I was well versed in roulette and blackjack games. In online casinos, a huge part of users play slots. As for playing poker, on gambling sites it is mainly played by old-school users. I think everyone remembers the old Video Poker game, square cards on the blue table, that’s the kind of games the guys play there. But this is not the kind of poker we are talking about today. It’s just a battle with the computer.
What percentage of the total traffic is made up of crypto poker players?
I can give fairly accurate numbers. It’s my specialty, remember? In my experience, only about 4% of gamblers play poker in classic online casinos. The statistic looks like this:
4% – video poker fans
63% – online slots
23% live table games (such as roulette, blackjack, dice, baccarat)
10% – novelties in the world of crypto gambling, such as crash games, Sweet Bonanza CandyLand and others.
If we talk about cross-platform gambling sites, where both casinos and sports betting are available to the player, then the number of poker players there is at the level of 1%. 72% falls on sportsbooks and 27% on other casinos of activity that I talked about before this.
Why do you think poker is not popular in online casinos?
As I said before, in an online casino you play poker against a computer. This is not very exciting and bad for user experience and player retention. They have no sense of competition, they cannot call themselves participants in the tournament, and share the table with their opponents. Indeed, in poker, in my opinion, the most important thing is an understanding of why it is called a sport. When you can use your card counting or bluffing skills to beat your opponent. When you realize that everyone who sits at your table initially risks the same amount as you. When the best player gets rewards like jewelry, like NBA players when they win a championship. These emotions are hard to replace.
Why don’t casinos develop the game of poker on their gaming platforms?
First of all, it is not interesting for them from the financial side. Poker is most often about small commissions. How much can you earn from a $1 million tournament? Maximum 5%. $50,000 for an event of this magnitude is not much. At the same time, try to calculate how much effort you will have to make in order to organize it, pay for software, equipment, and pay salaries to employees. Also take into account the commissions of payment systems and the cost of marketing activities to attract traffic. Only profile projects with a large community can earn on this, that’s why online casinos have nothing to do there, it’s simply unprofitable for them.
How popular are cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin in particular among users of poker sites?
In fact, cryptocurrencies are quite popular in all types of online gambling. People like that the use of cryptocurrencies gives them anonymity and the speed of transactions. This is a kind of engine for the iGaming industry as a whole. But to be honest, few of the top poker providers support bitcoin payments these days. We are all waiting for the US government to pass the appropriate laws on crypto regulation and all the brands can use this as their competitive advantage. I believe that in the future all gambling sites including poker platforms will process cryptocurrency payments.
Do you have a lot of experience in poker now?
I think yes. A few months ago I attended a live WPT tournament in LA and was impressed by its size. A bunch of participants, viewers, specialized media, huge prize pools, cool awards, individual ratings. It really is an entire ecosystem. I liked it very much.
Have you studied the niche of online poker as an analyst?
Certainly. Market analysis is my hobby. I see a lot of new big companies. It used to seem that PokerStars had a monopoly on this entire market, but now it does not. The number of active PokerStars players has dropped because their competitors have started spending more money on marketing. Now 888poker, WSOP, PartyPoker, bet365 and several other licensed operators share the main market share. This is also confirmed by the graphs of attendance and direct visits to the site.
It doesn’t look like things were going badly for PokerStars. Do you really think they perform bad now?
I didn’t say they’re doing badly. They have done a very difficult job, they have created a large poker community and acted as a locomotive that gave this industry the future. I respect this very much.
They will never be poor in this life. But time passes, new competitors appear and important decisions have to be made. And as you know, not all of them are correct.
I have a huge array of marketing tools, feedback from members of the industry, and insider information. I can justify my thoughts. Let’s point by point:
1. In total, PokerStars has about 645 thousand monthly users. Most of the traffic to the site comes from Brazil. It is very cool that they were able to conquer this market with their product because there is a huge number of people there. But it is enough to compare, for example, the GDP per capita of the United States ($70,000 USD) and Brazil ($15,500 USD) in order to calculate the LTV of the players.
2. They lost their audience in America a few years ago because they were too conservative. PokerStars also has separate sites with different metrics for each state in which they were able to obtain a license.
3. If we look at the WSOP, they have almost 2 times less traffic – 399 thousand monthly, but at the same time, the share of players from the USA and Canada is more than 80%.
4. There is a large Indian market, which almost none of these guys managed to successfully enter due to the fact that local poker brands are quite dense there.
I think we can now move on to the next question. When it comes to numbers, I can talk endlessly and it will be hard for you to stop me.
What would you advise gambling brands to do in order to be more successful and fully satisfy the needs of their users?
All of them must understand the problems of their customers and keep up with the times. The amount and format of bonuses, the variability of payment methods, the quality of support, the number of tournaments – all this can influence players when choosing a gambling site. If you can answer the question of what additional value you can provide to the user in order for him to remain loyal – you will solve this riddle. And of course – never spare money on marketing. Every day there are more and more social platforms and traffic channels. If you are a big brand you need to build your presence wherever it’s possible.
Tell us a little about what you are doing now?
I am now fully involved in the development of the bitcoincasinotop.com project. The main mission of this site is to collect all the best bitcoin casinos from around the world in one place and give players the opportunity to get acquainted with their full characteristics and rating based on our experience, expertise and real reviews from real players. We also plan to create our own forum and start a video blog with reviews of crypto casino brands. I am sure that soon we will become leaders in this direction and will be as useful as possible for the entire gambling community.
Are you planning to take part in some poker tournament yourself?
Yes, I’m sure you’ll see me this summer at the WPT at La Grande-Motte. This will be a great start for my future visit to France.
What else would you like to know about poker?
My dream is to visit one of the offline poker clubs that are quite popular in the USA. Like Laramie in WY or Kansas Star. When I talk about them, I imagine an analogue of cigar clubs with pompous visitors, a vintage atmosphere and, of course, a deck of cards on the table. I think it will be a cool new experience.
Thank you very much Edward for sharing your expertise with us. See you at poker tournaments!
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