Bet-at-Home thrives thanks to marketing drive

Bet-at-Home has paid tribute to its revamped marketing strategy, saying greater spend during the football World Cup helped to bring in new customers and drive EBITDA to a record high in the third quarter.

EBITDA in the three months through to the end of September amounted to €13m (£11.4m/$14.8m), higher than the previous two quarters combined (Q1 €9.3m / Q2 €1.6m).

Frankfurt-listed operator Bet-at-Home put this growth down to increased marketing spend during the Fifa World Cup, which ran from June 14 to July 15.

Marketing expenses in Q3 totalled €13.5m, which in turn helped grow the firm’s registered customer base from 4.8 million in Q3 of 2017 to just under five million.

Gross betting and gaming revenue in the quarter came in at €37.6m, up from €31.9m in the corresponding period last year. However, for the year to date, the company is slightly behind where it was at last year on €104.2m, compared to €108.7m.

Looking ahead to the remainder of 2018, Bet-at-Home said in a statement: “From the current perspective, and assuming an unchanged regulatory and tax law environment, the management board expects gross betting and gaming revenue increasing to €150m in the fiscal year 2018.

“Furthermore, the management board assumes EBITDA to reach a level between €36m and €40m in 2018.”

The results will come as a boost to Bet-at-Home, which in July reported a double-digit recline in revenue for the first six months of the year. At the time, the firm put this partially down to its inclusion on Poland’s blacklist.

Prior to announcing its first-half results, Bet-at-Home was hit by another blow when it was fined a total of €410,000 by the Kansspelautoriteit, the Netherlands Gaming Authority. The regulator found that the firm had targeted Dutch citizens without holding a gaming licence in the country.