Finland is preparing for significant changes to its monopoly online gambling sector in the next couple of years.
One of the elements of the change is that parliamentarians have tabled a proposal to prohibit casino bonus offers. Finnish gambling industry review website Kasinoilmankierratysta.fi has recently weighed in on the proposed regulations and they think that the new rules could cause great problems to the licensed gambling companies.
The requirement set forth by the proposal is that the operators must present the same offers to all the players. As a result, the law will not permit the operators to devise personalized offers or bonuses that depend on the play behavior. Consequently, this will lead to the complete disappearance of one very popular promotional tool that official operators all over Europe are using.
Markus Kanerva, who is the head of the Helsinki based web page Kasinoilmankierratysta.fi, has publicly expressed his opposition to the one pattern for everyone concept. He stated that the flexibility is very vital for the gambling companies when designing promotional campaigns. Most of the time, casinos carry out in-depth analyses of the player data to assess the level of risk and the engagement patterns.
As a result, operators are continually changing their approach trying to come up with new ways to encourage players by studying how they interact with the platform. If companies stop targeting individuals with offers based on their gaming performance, one of the most powerful marketing tools they have at their disposal will be removed. Throughout many European regulated markets, the tendency is for gambling brands to resort to data-driven segmentation to handle their customers. This approach enables them to reward their most devoted players and, at the same time, remain under the strict regulatory oversight.
Uniform Bonus Rules Could Disrupt Operator Strategies
What is even more surprising is that quite a few other elements of the proposal to be discussed in parliament have not provoked nearly as much concern. The draft limits the maximum wagering requirements for bonuses to 5 times the bonus value. This new proposed limit is considered quite player-friendly compared with the usual market-level casino bonus rollover requirements. Therefore, gaming operators are not too worried about the wagering limit itself.
The fact is the majority of the operators are not really concerned about the wagering limit. The major concern for them relates to the loss of the ability to segment players into different categories.
Introducing a policy that requires stocks to be identical for all users will shake up the conventional customer relationship management strategies. Because operators are not able to provide smaller promotions tailored to leisure players, they will be compelled to remove incentives even for high risk gambling patterns. Consequently, a rigorously supervised standardization could lead to the industry’s ability to protect vulnerable players being weakened.
Concerns Over Offshore Competition and Market Impact
Besides that, some detractors argue that rules of this kind would, by default, only serve the offshore gambling sites. Licensed operators would be the first ones to get deprived of one of their most powerful weapons of competition. The clients who wager large amounts usually anticipate VIP programs and personalized loyalty rewards. If those were to disappear, quite a few of them might decide to look for options outside the regulated ecosystem.
It is a fact that unlicensed platforms are very willing to offer personalized bonuses and promotions. These sites are still accessible to the Finnish users, even at this moment. Hence, some intellectuals are of the opinion that harsh marketing restrictions may be contrary to the main objective of regulation.
One of the key points in gambling policy discussion is channelization, among others. The idea is to direct gamblers to regulated and safe operators, instead of letting them gamble in the dark market. However, if the regulations are too restrictive, the licensed market may become less appealing. Then, it’s easy for foreign operators to attract the majority of players.
Experts in the industry argue that regulatory authorities should provide legal companies with enough areas of freedom to compete on equal terms. Operators without efficient promotional tools will, in all probabilities, have a hard time making a profit in the new system.
That is why some experts believe that Finland should not enforce the bonus restriction immediately as it will take the country more time to analyze the proposal. A healthy and successful market relies on marketing strategies that are constantly changing and improved with the help of customer data and the implementation of responsible oversight tools. Dr.
These sequences of regulated debates have been experienced by other countries in Europe. From learning of those markets, it has been revealed that stringent regulations may result in players shifting to the unregulated market. What happens in the other countries currently provides a framework to Finnish legislators for them to be able to avoid the mistakes already made there.
Eventually, several stakeholders in the industry are eager for the government to take into consideration the industry’s arguments before issuing the final regulations.
