This week on iGaming Talks, we’re delighted to have Christos Zoulianitis, Director of Market Strategy at Playson, joining us.
He’ll be sharing insights into Playson’s prominent role as a top supplier in the iGaming sector, their primary objectives, as well as addressing regulatory concerns, obstacles, and the company’s strengths.
TheGamblest: Playson has continued to secure its position as a leading slot supplier in the last year. Can you share some highlights from the past year?
Christos: Playson continues to surprise everyone in the gaming community with its achievements, and over the past year we have even surpassed our own expectations. The secret behind the company’s ongoing success is our people, who always strive to provide the best gaming content. At the same time, the positive working culture we have in place radiates over to our partners, as we listen to their needs and focus on building long-lasting relationships. Our leading position is not just based on last year’s achievements, but on many years of hard work to reach this level and release top notch games that make the difference in the market.
It is hard to choose which highlight of the past year to mention first. We had many successful game releases. Coin Strike: Hold and Win conquered most of the markets we operate in, 3 Pot Riches: Hold and Win became one of the top games even in markets we had least expected, while Energy Coins: Hold and Win and Diamonds Power: Hold and Win were also big hits. At the same time, we launched our promo feature, Short Races, and received lots of positive feedback from both the player community and operators.
TheGamblest: You were recently promoted to the role of Director of Market Strategy at Playson, after more than five years at the company. What is your vision for this new role and what learnings will you take from your previous positions at the company?
Christos: I started this year with new shoes on my feet. It was a great honour to be appointed to the position of Director after five fabulous years at Playson, where I have worked in a number of different roles. I believe working in the account management and sales department for many years gave me the understanding of how to work most effectively with my colleagues and what needs our partners have.
My vision as Director is simple, and that is for Playson to continue this successful journey into our fantastic industry, and in the years ahead to accomplish even greater achievements.
TheGamblest: What are your aims for Playson in the coming year?
Christos: Playson is already one of the most well-known game providers across the globe, and my aim is to build on that and reinforce its presence in some of our existing markets. I also want us to spread our wings into interesting new markets.
Another goal is to continue sharing Playson’s culture across the gaming industry, by making every existing or prospective partner a part of our community. That is what Playson is all about. We have developed a passionate community of gaming enthusiasts that have a common goal to develop the best gaming content with their technological innovations.
TheGamblest: What markets are Playson currently focused on and how do they fit into your wider growth strategy?
Christos: Playson is entering into more new markets every year, as we pursue rapid growth across many different jurisdictions. At the end of last year, we were granted the Gibraltar licence, so our main focus is to work with a significant number of market leaders that operate under this licence. We will also continue our expansion into the LatAm markets and Ontario, Canada.
TheGamblest: Regulation is becoming more stringent across the global iGaming landscape. What are the biggest challenges faced by suppliers in 2024?
Christos: The regulation parameter is becoming stricter every year, but I do not believe this is the main difficulty for most providers. We prefer to have a strict regulatory regime rather than none at all. I believe the difficulty instead is the multiple new changes that need to be applied during the game certification process. For Playson, our compliance team have proved many times how easily we can adapt to such regulatory changes, but this might not be the case for a smaller or newer provider that has less resources.
TheGamblest: Personalisation is a key strength of your offering to operators and players. Can you share more about Playson’s capabilities in this area and how you will enhance them going forward?
Christos: Playson offers multiple personalisation options for partners. We can run our promo features alongside their brand logo, or change design to fit various festivities, such as Christmas, Halloween, major sports events, and many other similar themes. In my opinion, our key strength is our games, as they have grasped the players’ interest for a long time and continue to do so, with every new game release.
TheGamblest: Playson has released a number of successful new mechanics in the last year, such as 3 Pots and Hit the Bonus. How do you decide on what mechanics will be successful?
Christos: We were very excited with the launch of 3 Pot Riches: Hold and Win when it went live last year. We received extraordinary positive feedback from operators and players. However, the launch of Clover Charm: Hit the Bonus, the game showcasing our newest mechanic within the Playson portfolio, is the most exciting.
Our research and development department always analyses the new mechanics that are introduced onto the market, while researching how existing ones can be improved to become more exciting for the players. Our main goal when creating a new mechanic is to offer the best gaming experience, and satisfy our players’ entertainment expectations.
TheGamblest: How do you ensure regulatory compliance while remaining profitable?
Christos: Playson is a provider that is not just compliant with each regulated market, but successfully attains a strong market share and grows each quarter while meeting the requirements of regulators.
Of course, our new game releases and exciting features ensure we remain profitable, despite big investments into compliance. We adjust the game client to meet the regulation standards or custom requests from operators, whether it is the bet rates, interface visual or functional changes, turning off game animations, etc and the same applies to promotional tools. So, our portfolio of products is not only versatile in themes according to player preferences, but also is very flexible technically-wise to meet the demand of regulatory bodies and our partners.
TheGamblest: How do you successfully maintain partnerships over a long period in such a crowded and competitive markets?
Christos: At Playson, we do not see our partners as simply our customers but make them part of our community. We take a serious approach when it comes to partner relationships, and ‘Playson & Friends’ events are one way we do this.
Most providers prefer to launch one big corporate party a year and fly over the C and D-Levels only. We decided to take a more local approach and run multiple events in the markets we operate by inviting all the members of each company. Our main goal is to bond with our clients in their local environment by showing our appreciation of working with them.
TheGamblest: Now that we’re nearing the end of our interview, our readers would definitely like to learn more about you. Having a rich experience in marketing, which companies have you worked at and which brought you the most valuable skills and knowledge, Christos?
Christos: I started my career in the iGaming world almost ten years ago from a small Greek company that has given me the main foundations of the land-based and online gaming sectors. My experience in marketing is closely linked to my own humble views of this world and skills of communication. I believe the main purpose of our existence is to communicate with each other, work together and build something great. Some of the world’s greater architecture was created simply because a group of people worked together to make it happen. The same thing should happen in the commercial world, where people come closer together by talking with each other to build great long-lasting partnerships.
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