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The Beginning of the End?!


Tillus

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"The Kindred Group’s poker product is the fastest growing licensed poker network in the industry. The Unibet Open live poker series took place in Copenhagen in May and had over 1,000 entries, building up a total prize pool of over EUR 500,000. In June, Kindred won the “Innovation in Poker” award at the prestigious industry event EGR Operator Marketing and Innovation Awards."

Sounds great, doesn't it?

Much of this is due to Unibet's initially unique approach when launching their standalone network (no HUDs, rake policy etc.), marketing strategies & good value for small stakes players (low rake, deposit boni, rewards via missions)

In the beginning of their launch Unibet did a lot to attract new players. While first deposit bonus has been lowered for a while now from €500 to €200 this isn't really the point, as small stakes players could hardly ever achieve the full amount of the prior bonus offer. Whilst the bonus was lowered, missions continued to offer great value for small stakes players (i.e. the foundation of any poker platform)  

Until recently. In the past months the value of missions has gone down continuously. I already posted my take on that matter in this thread: https://www.unibetcommunity.com/t5/General-Poker/August-poker-promotions/m-p/103681

Responding to a complaint from a player about the value of the Mission Freerolls, @JeppeL stated the following: "Doubt it (making missions harder), unless we get the same sentiment from a bunch of players. Until then, the Poker team has set the criteria how they see it being best for most possible players and according to previous feedback"

Until this month, I could still somehow comprehend how s.o. could justify these changes with the sake of considering 'poker ecology' in its broadest sense.

  But then they shot the sheriff imo this month with Mission2 ''You have received free spins, Hot Sync free spins''. First I thought it were free spins for this King Of Flips thing. But no, it's actually for a casino slot.O_RLY.jpg.84720a5560050c8dd6bacfc3ee842cab.jpg

There's just no f***in way you can anymore argue with poker ecology by replacing formerly poker boni/tickets with casino rewards. And I'm not talking about a loss of value here, which in theory probably isn't that relevant. Don't know if/how much decrease of value it is as opposed to a 1€ SNG/MTT ticket as these slots probably pay out about 92.5% when you bet in the smallest denomination. So, it might actually be the same value as Unibet gets fee back from the previous poker tickets. But of course we know this is actually about lureing poker players into the casino, getting them hooked on slots/casino games in general and letting them donk off their rolls in the online casino. This obviously tends to happen much faster than when playing poker, so lol@keeping the money in the system as long as possible (esp. that of losing players, which usually have tilt problems anyway and which is why they are doomed entering the casino from the getgo), with the benefit of Unibet reaping in all the profit and no winning players having a share of the money lost.

This doesn't come as a complete surprise however, when looking at the current numbers of the kindred group:kindred_group2017.png.82a0eee055e3827f9185ba450ae0cdda.png

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They are doing great since the past few years, all revenue numbers on the rise. Especially the quarterly % numbers of the poker branch increasing. Despite the revenue from poker constantly going up,  the percentage share of poker revenue with regard to the entire revenue has actually gone down since Q1 2016. With 2% the poker branch is basically irrelevant for the company, except for its marketing potential (Social Media, twitch, UnibetOpen) and the poker player base being seen as potential future customers for more profitable branches as casino & betting.

I don't know where these changes come from. Maybe the management is demanding more aggressive casino/betting marketing/advertisement within the poker branch to increase their entire revenue (as if the annoying casino buttons on the tables weren't enough already?!). But as someone who has been playing online poker for over 10 years now, this looks to me like ''we've now built up as solid base, let's go ahead and milk it for all it's worth''

Sure, some of you might think I am exaggerating and that this isn't as big of a deal. But these recent developments hint towards a direction which is troublesome to me as a poker player. Wouldn't mind a statement from someone of poker staff on this behalf.

Please don't turn Unibet Poker into a 2nd Amaya! Don't screw up the trust of the players and the positive developments of the past few years. I as a player, would like to see Unibet Poker grow and I am definitely sure that casino games within the poker branch is not the way to go.

What do you guys think? 

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I have to agree with this (sadly enough)

They try to get poker players into a more gambling environment. And that's not only for these free spins.

The amount of "flip" satellites is increasing aswell. This is pure gambling with a game that is close to a skill game. (I say close to, since it stays based on luck)

I don't mind about the value either. But the rewards should benefit the player as a poker player. Not as a gambler. (this was exactly the same with the moving on up flip, where only 200 players got a reward, based on RNG)

I actually have to be honest, that I like the mission freerolls a lot. And in the end they are good value (compared to what it was in the past)

Edit: @Tillus forgot to add that your post is amazingly well written :) 

I see now that the circumstances of ones birth are irrelevant... It is what you do with the gift of life that determines who you are.
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@DavidP_Unibet Mentioned on 2+2 that the missions will be having a lot positive changes not to do with casino, I wasnt that keen on this months missions but will wait to see what happens next month.

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showpost.php?p=52786606&postcount=22796

You can exchange UO tickets again all is unicorns and rainbows in Unibet land.
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After seeing those numbers, I think that, everybody from UNIBET (all the employess) got huge bonuses as rewards for a great half year. Why should they change their vision if everything goes in the right direction?

Have you ever seen a recreational complaining about anything related to a gambling business (including UNIBET)? (ok, maybe they had complaints if the site was down and couldn't play, but other than that?!)

The only ones that are complaining are the regs... but guess what, nobody from this business likes regs.

If you mention here a real gambling site that likes regsI'll be more that happy to see.

Good luck all!

 

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I dont see the problem , as long as there are enough recreational players who likes to gamble on both sportsbet and casino.

Poker players who likes to gamble , there are a few of them .  That will only increase the profit of Unibet and us regular players can enjoy the benefits . 

 

 

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@startelver wrote:

I dont see the problem , as long as there are enough recreational players who likes to gamble on both sportsbet and casino.

Poker players who likes to gamble , there are a few of them .  That will only increase the profit of Unibet and us regular players can enjoy the benefits . 

 

 


I think if the value of the missions drops as a permanent thing it will be a problem.

last september it was 11e in direct value of tickets.

this time 1e and spins and freerolls.

All the rec players I know on Unibet will come back at the beginning of the month to try the new missions, they wont if its for freerolls and spins.

You can exchange UO tickets again all is unicorns and rainbows in Unibet land.
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hey @Balonas I appreciate anyone who takes part in the discussion and you obviously have a valid point. If there weren't any winning regs, losing players would go broke less quickly and thus the poker site would make more money. As casino games are unbeatable anyway, we can leave this out. When it comes to betting you are a 100% right I guess (sites not likeing these players). By that I mean consistantly winning players or players who place surebets. Don't know how Unibet handles such players. Their sportbookreview.com rating went from B+ entering the rating in '08 down to C- in 2014 and has been upgraded to B early this year. Some operators set the betting limits super low or have a bookie confirm any bet (and mostly decline), or super hard cashout requirements are imposed (like clearing x-times the deposit amount with the new very low betting limits) or some shady sitessimply close the acc. and at times even seize funds (not saying Unibet does this often, but they seem to lack a bit of transparency when money is being withheld). I don't really do sportsbetting so somebody else might have a more profound evaluation of this.

When it comes to poker however, I think your view is too one-sided. They obviously don't 'love' regs but they don't hate same per se, because they need them in a way. Especially a site like Unibet had to work a lot with affiliates at the start of their standalone client to get a decent player base. Not all of these players are winning players ofc but some are gonna be regs who are winning anyway and receiving additional rakeback in some form or the other. But these players help immensly filling the tables and we all know that recreationals don't like to wait for a game. Same goes for tournaments, where the funplayer has his eyes on the (top) prize and without multitabling regs some MTTs on unibet wouldn't even start and the GTD would be much lowever, which means the tournaments looks much less attractive to recreational players.    

As to all Unibet employees receiving huge bonuses, I doubt so. Obviously this depends on the rank of the employee in question. Generally, market-placed companies have some kind of a pyramid-system with regards to boni. That is, the lower levels of employees receiving little to nothing (maybe a watch or a mont blanc pen and sh1t) and the boni for high-ranked employees, esp. in the management being exponentially higher. I mean we are talking about a company that is on the stock market, so obviously their goal (or that of the management) is to increase shareholder value and thus increasing the value of the company, the money of the shareholders, their own boni and not primarily sharing with their fellow employees. Often it's exactly the opposite, increasing shareholder value by cutting personnel costs, dismissing/saving employees, lowering wagers, outsourcing etc.

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The entire idea behind all the casino stuff being implemented is cross selling with other products, either to get players from other sections, or to get more budget to acquire more players and make bigger promotions for poker. I'm pretty sure that the main goal of the poker team is to grow the poker product as much as possible, not to maximize revenue or to transform everyone into a casino player. And to do that you need funding.

Also I've seen suggestions before idk if here or on 2+2 to add casino spins as rewards and it looks like they listened. 

Personally I'm not a fan of any intrusive casino stuff making it's way to poker, since it makes the game less safe for people that have gambling problems (and this becoming a trend everywhere), but I understand the reasons why they have to do it sometimes, and getting casino players into poker is obviously amazing if it happens. 

If a promo doesn't work or if many people don't like it I assume they will change it, so I'm curious to see what will happen with this.

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@Tillus wrote:

 

Their sportbookreview.com rating went from B+ entering the rating in '08 down to C- in 2014 and has been upgraded to B early this year. Some operators set the betting limits super low or have a bookie confirm any bet (and mostly decline)

 

LOL at sbr being a reliable source, didn't those clowns have a few A+ bookmakers go broke in the past?



 

We're gonna win on so many levels! We're gonna win, win, win. You're gonna get so tired of winning, you're gonna say: "Mr. President please, we don't wanna win anymore, it's too much!" And I'm gonna say: "I'm sorry, we're gonna keep winning because we're gonna make America great again!"
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@WuDu wrote:


@Tillus wrote:

 

Their sportbookreview.com rating went from B+ entering the rating in '08 down to C- in 2014 and has been upgraded to B early this year. Some operators set the betting limits super low or have a bookie confirm any bet (and mostly decline)

 

LOL at sbr being a reliable source, didn't those clowns have a few A+ bookmakers go broke in the past?



 


I think they had too good terms and bonuses for players and there for got busted :D

Just caught my eye that nordicbet, betsson and betsafe are all in different ratings although same firm and software so i don´t what is up with that?

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Impressive background check on things and connecting some dots there. You definately can make that deduction from that information provided, but it could be unintended as well.

If it is unintended then they should make changes to such policy as it is a contradiction to responsible gaming policy. While it doesn't matter to majority, it can cause a few problems here and there. It's evident that slots are much more hooking mentally than something slow paced like live casino or poker.

If we suppose that it is intended, then one must ask that can you blame the companies for doing that. The companies / businesses run in modern economy are forced to have growth for the stake holders, also the money base experiences constant inflation (big or small) and majority of businesses are run by debt. Now I don't know is that so in the gambling business, it seems very lucrative with not much necessary operative costs in relation. But it's also a area of business that has a very high competition. So I understand if businesses do that, but it obviously is not very nice to the common player who might not be aware of such concepts and possible psychological hooks. You never have to accept or use an offered bonus/reward, but to offer possible traps as loyalty is bad, rather no rewards at all. That would be bad reputation.

Like mentioned as a player you would rather have loyalty rewarded within the gaming area you are playing in or at least have a choise do you want to test something else.

Maybe they can answer on this thread have you deciphered a not so positive company policy from the players POV.

This is not a real problem for me as I only play Unibet poker for some freerolls and spend my money on slots and live casino. The impressive case built here just demanded a response as a reward. :)

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Really good read and interesting analysis. Not a big fan of having casino rewards myself as I ban myself from online casinos (including Unibets) because I do indeed have an addictive personality. 

If the intention is to increase growth in their poker sector I'm all for any idea they come up with, though. They said there is going to be an MTT overall hopefully ready for October which I hope happens. I do trust they are overall trying to improve the whole poker experience.

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I'm glad you made this post as this is an important topic and it gives me the opportunity to clear it up. I'm going to try to address each of your points but I can start by categorically stating that the following is not even close to our agenda; ''we've now built up as solid base, let's go ahead and milk it for all it's worth''. Your points are valid and I can see how you have got from A to B but it's a conspiracy which I'd be happy to counter. For that I need to give a bit of context and some history, so apologies now if my post gets lengthy.

Poker is a small fraction of this company; indeed, the competive side of me finds it frustrating that no matter how quickly we grow, we can't currently outgrow the Sportsbook and Casino products and we remain at around 2-3% of the overall company. However, that just means that Unibet as a whole is doing well and that's good for all of us. However, there is no pressure on us to milk our playerbase or to accelerate the growth of Poker. If anything, the wider company is pleased and probably pleasantly surprised with how well Poker is doing in it's own right. I'd like us to be bigger than 2% of the business but if we stay at that level because Casino and Sportsbook is growing so quickly then I'll remain happy as it means we're still doing well.

Also some background on the Poker product and it's reason for existing. Back in 2012 (before my time, I joined in 2014) the situation was as such; Unibet would spend money on marketing to attract new poker players and those players would sign up and leave almost instantly (normally due to predatory games, etc). The company saw two options; kill the Poker product completely or try to do things in the right way so that Poker actually proved worth having. This decision-making went all the way to the CEO and as someone who is very much in favour of having a Poker product, he gave the green light for Unibet to take a risk. It's worth noting that this was a big risk. Unibet left the player pool of a network and went alone, trying out a philosophy that those here very much believed in but which hadn't been tried elsewhere and wasn't guaranteed to be successful at all. This decision was taken because those here (CEO included) believed that it was important for Unibet to have a worthwhile Poker product, not because they saw it as a sneaky way of potentially cross selling players into Casino in the future.

I mentioned on 2+2 in August that casino spins would be added to the September Mission and did my best to explain what NMPfan has essentially said above. If the Poker, Casino and Sportsbook teams each agree to cross sell players then Poker has the most to benefit, and it's not even close. Their player pools are huge compared to ours. We run betting freerolls, free spin freerolls communicated only to Casino players and also get to contact Sports and Casino customers with Poker news and offers. In exchange for that we have to give something in return, we can't just close our playerbase off to their products. This also benefits Unibet in general. If a player plays more products here then they are less likely to move to a competitor and might find an extra reason to stay with us which they weren't aware of before. Some players also asked for free spins to be included in the client (specifically buying sports bets and spins with bonus points, something we haven't been able to implement yet).

On to the value of Missions themselves. We spend x% of our revenue on retention each month and this figure hasn't decreased over time. That x% includes loyalty system, freerolls, tournament overlays, Missions, monthly promotions like King of Flips, social media giveaways, Twitch promotions, etc. While the overall % hasn't decreased over time, we do shift money from one thing to another over time. We would be pretty bad at our jobs if we just always left things as they were and didn't respond to trends and data we saw from our side. The number of players taking part in Missions had remained stagnant over the past year, despite overall play numbers growing. The long term solution is a different form of Mission which is more personalised and which occurs more frequently, but that is a few months off still. Robin has made some changes to Missions this year and the result has been more players engaging with them but we're always looking to improve them. If adding Casino spins causes less players to take part in Missions then we wouldn't keep offering them. I should also add that these spins have no playthrough requirement and have something like 97% RTP. On average these spins actually hold more EV for players than some low value tickets we could offer as an equivalent. 

I can assure you that nobody has ever given us orders to send our players into Casino or to 'milk' the playerbase. We currently have three main areas of focus, one of which is ecology. That would be a waste of time if the ultimate plan was to send everyone to Casino anyway. I'm part of this team because I want to help grow a Poker site which does something positive for the game and if I was told that I had to do something which went against my principles tied to that then I would be looking for a new place to work. I hope the explanation above is clear but of course feel free to quesiton me over anything that isn't. Things can always improved but I can assure you that the intentions are benevolent and that including Casino as part of the Poker client is a massive benefit to the growth of the platform. 

“Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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Very decent Explanation @DavidP_Unibet
Thanks for taking the time to write such complete response.

While I also feel where @Tillus thoughts come free, I feel we shouldn't exaggerate.
Yes it can be a bit annoying to get an offer for free casino spins, if you are or were a bit of a degen.
But as you have the option to let yourself ban from these kind off games, I don't see the big problem.

Let's not forget that these casino players or sportsbettors hop onto the poker tables aswell occasionally.
They certainly makes the games much softer for all the regular pokerplayers...

Oh btw, the king of flames promo is ❤️♥️❤️ rigged tho! :happy:

 

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This explanation provided was good and it's nice to know that it's not an intended model.

I am pondering something between the finer nuances of things here. There seems to be quite a few players who have banned casino from themselves acknowledging that it's an area of gaming that can cause them problems even in this thread. Promotions are just promotions and missing on those is fine and it's a personal decision you have chosen to avoid something. What needs to be addressed is however that do poker players who have banned casino from themselves miss out on some loyalty rewards? It's important can it be perceived as a true loyalty reward or more of a promotion of something if something is not given in instead. I'm just asking because I don't know, it at least should be something Unibet should acknowledge. This carries beyond poker to all areas of gaming sectors and their loyalty rewards. :)

The solution obviously is a more personalized loyalty reward system.

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@DepchZ wrote:

This explanation provided was good and it's nice to know that it's not an intended model.

 

I am pondering something between the finer nuances of things here. There seems to be quite a few players who have banned casino from themselves acknowledging that it's an area of gaming that can cause them problems even in this thread. Promotions are just promotions and missing on those is fine and it's a personal decision you have chosen to avoid something. What needs to be addressed is however that do poker players who have banned casino from themselves miss out on some loyalty rewards? It's important can it be perceived as a true loyalty reward or more of a promotion of something if something is not given in instead. I'm just asking because I don't know, it at least should be something Unibet should acknowledge. This carries beyond poker to all areas of gaming sectors and their loyalty rewards. :)

 

The solution obviously is a more personalized loyalty reward system.


 

Personally I think that the loyalty system (Challenges) can be considered 'loyalty' and something the player can expect based on their regular play. In that regard, there is a good argument to say that loyalty should only ever include poker rewards or cash.

Anything else I would class as a tool Unibet has to try to incentivise or reward certain groups of players. We might use those tools (such as missions, double trouble or monthly promotions) in different ways each month and if we really lost our minds then we might decide to scrap them altogher. I think getting used to something that's always there and being entitled to something are two different things though.

“Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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@DavidP_Unibet wrote:


@DepchZ wrote:

This explanation provided was good and it's nice to know that it's not an intended model.

 

I am pondering something between the finer nuances of things here. There seems to be quite a few players who have banned casino from themselves acknowledging that it's an area of gaming that can cause them problems even in this thread. Promotions are just promotions and missing on those is fine and it's a personal decision you have chosen to avoid something. What needs to be addressed is however that do poker players who have banned casino from themselves miss out on some loyalty rewards? It's important can it be perceived as a true loyalty reward or more of a promotion of something if something is not given in instead. I'm just asking because I don't know, it at least should be something Unibet should acknowledge. This carries beyond poker to all areas of gaming sectors and their loyalty rewards. :)

 

The solution obviously is a more personalized loyalty reward system.


 

Personally I think that the loyalty system (Challenges) can be considered 'loyalty' and something the player can expect based on their regular play. In that regard, there is a good argument to say that loyalty should only ever include poker rewards or cash.

Anything else I would class as a tool Unibet has to try to incentivise or reward certain groups of players. We might use those tools (such as missions, double trouble or monthly promotions) in different ways each month and if we really lost our minds then we might decide to scrap them altogher. I think getting used to something that's always there and being entitled to something are two different things though.


If you mean the missions in the poker room I must disagree on that definition of being a loyalty. They provide incentive to complete the tasks but it is not directly loyalty from playing poker at the tables for example. In other big rooms it's directly some points or rake back to the player playing. Maybe you meant some other poker challenges that I'm not aware of since I'm a casual player to poker. I'm planning to start spending more money on some tournaments and sng:s though at Unibet. This case was just very interesting to me overall and I got curious regarding all the nuances and stuff what goes on behind the mind of the company doing these things. There is no quarrel here, just out of sheer curiousity (I possess an inquisitive mind and it's not something to always like, I don't bring it out always though and usually just leave it be publicly).

 

To not leave everything at critcism only here I must point out that the community challenges here definately fit to a loyalty reward category for active and general players playing at Unibet. So there is reason to be happy from that alone as well (always look on the bright side of... etc.). :)

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Thanks alot @DavidP_Unibet for your elaborate response.

I was ofc purposely painting a very dark picture with my OP trying to get a discussion started (not trying to present Unibet/kindred as the impersonation of evil, nor start a conspiracy or anything). So far I have usually been complimenting on the things Unibet did that I appreciated a lot (their HUD-free approach, refundings at server downtimes or lately the big refund wave when that big 50K mtt was buggy), so I felt I should also express when I see a development that I don't like. To be fair, I missed out on your point of the betting freerolls for instance, which (can) get sports bettors interested into playing playing poker and yes, this way of cross selling players was there first (apart from casino hotlink on poker tables), so It's a valid point. cow.jpg.92cc0f2931686612e11931317be8469a.jpg

 About the whole milk the cow phrase, which apparently rubbed you the wrong way: this was not only meant to be provocative (well, to some extend yes sry :Cheeky:) or stating a definitve truth. I was having the past developments of other poker sites on mind, when it comes to implementing more and more casino incentives into their clients, which I personally never liked. Partypoker underwent this way back in the day, and as someone who has been observing the development of pokerstars in the recent years, I might be hypersensitive when it comes to this. I know u can't really compare unibetpoker to stars which was poker only from the beginning, but watching this ship gradually sink from the POV of a pokerplayer was and is sad thing, and I simply don't want unibet to go this way and I'm happily being proved wrong. I mean ask me 8 years ago what the most trustworthy & ethical pokersite is and I am definitely saying stars. Right now I am saying that about Unibet also, and I know having a casino bonus as a poker reward once isn't gonna flip the script. But is it a one-time thing, is it gonna stay like that or is there even coming more stuff like that?! How am I supposed to know that, of course I don't. I just want the players to have second thoughts about changes and I love that Unibet has a platform where such topics can be discussed and where officials actually respond to the players concerns, if a paranoid freak like me comes around :Laugh:

However, ''including Casino as part of the Poker client as a massive benefit to the growth of the platform'' i  just dont see the logic behind it. How can you assure that? I see the cross-selling from betting to poker and vice versa through the betting freeroll, but there? You don't have to download the client to play casino games and i guess most ppl don't?! And I'm pretty sure you're gonna have a hard time finding the poker hotbuttons on casino tablegames, so how is this not going to be a one-sided thing?! Am I missing something here?

Cheers,

Tillus

 

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@DepchZ wrote:

@DavidP_Unibet wrote:

@DepchZ wrote:

This explanation provided was good and it's nice to know that it's not an intended model.

 

I am pondering something between the finer nuances of things here. There seems to be quite a few players who have banned casino from themselves acknowledging that it's an area of gaming that can cause them problems even in this thread. Promotions are just promotions and missing on those is fine and it's a personal decision you have chosen to avoid something. What needs to be addressed is however that do poker players who have banned casino from themselves miss out on some loyalty rewards? It's important can it be perceived as a true loyalty reward or more of a promotion of something if something is not given in instead. I'm just asking because I don't know, it at least should be something Unibet should acknowledge. This carries beyond poker to all areas of gaming sectors and their loyalty rewards. :)

 

The solution obviously is a more personalized loyalty reward system.


 

Personally I think that the loyalty system (Challenges) can be considered 'loyalty' and something the player can expect based on their regular play. In that regard, there is a good argument to say that loyalty should only ever include poker rewards or cash.

Anything else I would class as a tool Unibet has to try to incentivise or reward certain groups of players. We might use those tools (such as missions, double trouble or monthly promotions) in different ways each month and if we really lost our minds then we might decide to scrap them altogher. I think getting used to something that's always there and being entitled to something are two different things though.


If you mean the missions in the poker room I must disagree on that definition of being a loyalty. They provide incentive to complete the tasks but it is not directly loyalty from playing poker at the tables for example. In other big rooms it's directly some points or rake back to the player playing. Maybe you meant some other poker challenges that I'm not aware of since I'm a casual player to poker. I'm planning to start spending more money on some tournaments and sng:s though at Unibet. This case was just very interesting to me overall and I got curious regarding all the nuances and stuff what goes on behind the mind of the company doing these things. There is no quarrel here, just out of sheer curiousity (I possess an inquisitive mind and it's not something to always like, I don't bring it out always though and usually just leave it be publicly).

 

To not leave everything at critcism only here I must point out that the community challenges here definately fit to a loyalty reward category for active and general players playing at Unibet. So there is reason to be happy from that alone as well (always look on the bright side of... etc.). :)


I mean Challenges (click in the profile section of the poker client and have a look). It pays out depending on your play at cash game and SNG tables or your buyins for MTTs. Anything on top of Challenges I don't personally class as loyalty because everything else changes on a month to month basis. As a customer elsewhere I expect loyalty to be consistent and based directly on what I do. If you are planning to play more MTTs at Unibet then you might be interested in another thread I'm going to start tonight...

“Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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@Tillus wrote:

Thanks alot @DavidP_Unibet for your elaborate response.

I was ofc purposely painting a very dark picture with my OP trying to get a discussion started (not trying to present Unibet/kindred as the impersonation of evil, nor start a conspiracy or anything). So far I have usually been complimenting on the things Unibet did that I appreciated a lot (their HUD-free approach, refundings at server downtimes or lately the big refund wave when that big 50K mtt was buggy), so I felt I should also express when I see a development that I don't like. To be fair, I missed out on your point of the betting freerolls for instance, which (can) get sports bettors interested into playing playing poker and yes, this way of cross selling players was there first (apart from casino hotlink on poker tables), so It's a valid point. cow.jpg.8b3bcbe27e99a74737bd4f8922c9a7b1.jpg

 About the whole milk the cow phrase, which apparently rubbed you the wrong way: this was not only meant to be provocative (well, to some extend yes sry 😏) or stating a definitve truth. I was having the past developments of other poker sites on mind, when it comes to implementing more and more casino incentives into their clients, which I personally never liked. Partypoker underwent this way back in the day, and as someone who has been observing the development of pokerstars in the recent years, I might be hypersensitive when it comes to this. I know u can't really compare unibetpoker to stars which was poker only from the beginning, but watching this ship gradually sink from the POV of a pokerplayer was and is sad thing, and I simply don't want unibet to go this way and I'm happily being proved wrong. I mean ask me 8 years ago what the most trustworthy & ethical pokersite is and I am definitely saying stars. Right now I am saying that about Unibet also, and I know having a casino bonus as a poker reward once isn't gonna flip the script. But is it a one-time thing, is it gonna stay like that or is there even coming more stuff like that?! How am I supposed to know that, of course I don't. I just want the players to have second thoughts about changes and I love that Unibet has a platform where such topics can be discussed and where officials actually respond to the players concerns, if a paranoid freak like me comes around :laugh:

However, ''including Casino as part of the Poker client as a massive benefit to the growth of the platform'' i  just dont see the logic behind it. How can you assure that? I see the cross-selling from betting to poker and vice versa through the betting freeroll, but there? You don't have to download the client to play casino games and i guess most ppl don't?! And I'm pretty sure you're gonna have a hard time finding the poker hotbuttons on casino tablegames, so how is this not going to be a one-sided thing?! Am I missing something here?

Cheers,

Tillus

 


You're welcome and I really am glad for your post, I think any post that calls for debate is a positive.

I get that you were painting the darkest possible picture and I didn't mean to come across as if you'd rubbed me the wrong way, I was merely typing away passionately! As a player I'd probably question a change like this too, given the recent history of the poker industry. I'm glad that we've done enough over the last few years that players are at least willing to hear us out.

On the last point; the Casino buttons and free spins in the Mission aren't there primarily to appeal to Casino players (although they do), they are there for us to cross sell players to Casino. One reason we do that is because players trying all products has an added benefit for Unibet in that those players stay with the company for longer. However, the main reason I am interested in doing that is so that we are in turn allowed to cross sell players from Casino into Poker, and that has a huge potential pay-off for us. There is a project on the horizon which will allow us to communicate Poker offers to low stakes casino players but we're only allowed to do that if we are also making efforts to cross sell the other way. That is a huge amount of players who could potentially try out Poker for the first time (go back to your comparisons of the size of Casino compared to Poker at Unibet). If only a small % decide they want to try out Poker then we will receive a lot of new, casual poker players. I want to grow Unibet Poker and those potential new players cause me to get excited. 

 

“Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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I should also add that most companies are only interested in cross-selling into Casino, not out of it. We've been able to demonstrate that there is value to the company in cross-selling both ways and Poker on this site will benefit from it.

“Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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@DavidP_Unibet wrote:


I mean Challenges (click in the profile section of the poker client and have a look). It pays out depending on your play at cash game and SNG tables or your buyins for MTTs. Anything on top of Challenges I don't personally class as loyalty because everything else changes on a month to month basis. As a customer elsewhere I expect loyalty to be consistent and based directly on what I do. If you are planning to play more MTTs at Unibet then you might be interested in another thread I'm going to start tonight...

OK, Thank you very much for taking time to explain these things to me. I'm also sorry as my questions were based on the original topic but my questions that arose derailed it to a bit of a sub thread of it's own.

 

I don't know how I had missed the shop / challenges section. I was looking for the bonus shop elsewhere and just didn't pay much attention to the profile page even though I have a few profiles created. I'm sure I'm not the only one more casual to poker to have missed that. The challenges do look like that they are related to playing poker at the tables and make it not necessary to astray from what you really want to play to get points as opposed to the missions that might force you to take a broader look of the games.

 

Overall I think Unibet has answered the questions under this topic well and it's good for everyone to read who has questions regarding ethics and loyality in the poker side of the game. I hope poker keeps growing there as well.

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