How do you judge this promotion

[gerilege]

I am not a casino marketing expert, but strongly connected to other business processes, and something happened to me which I did not understand at all.
I recently got a promotional email from an accredited casino about x free spins (5<x<30 ) on a new slot. I haven't played there a while, so I downloaded the client and opened up the game, and found that the spins were set up as 1 line selected, 0.01c/line (total bet 0.01, so x free spins worth 0.01*x). That was a relatively high variance slot, so I was not surprised that all x spins went without a single win.

Does this make any sense from a business point of view? Does such a promotion bring back a customer, or impress an active customer? Does a customer really want to play a new game after such an introduction? I have the feeling that a promotion like that makes more harm than good, but I am not so much deep in the casino industry, and there might be reasons I am not aware of.

Please share your opinion, as a player or as a casino representative, I am really interested and would like to learn. Or just add a comment, what do you think.

[AudiManinBoro]

I receive a couple of them from time to time, there is one casino in particular that seems to delight in sending out utterly USELESS incentives to play there. Sure id like FIVE free spins at 1 pay line at 1 penny a spin in your fabulous casino. Erm actually no thanks i wouldnt. goodbye

[love2winalot]

Hiya: imhop, here is what is wrong with most promotions from online casinos.

I will use real Casinos in Vegas as an example. There are 2 goals. Get a person into the Casino, that has money. And then get that person to gamble with that money.

Thus, all local Casinos offer Free check cashing. This gets you in the door, and puts money into your pocket. Then a lot of them will do one of 2 things. They will give you a $5 match play coupon for BJ, or other table game. The idea being you May stay there and use some of your own money and start playing. Or, they give you free tokens, to use in a token spinning wheel machine that you may win a free hat, or shirt, or match play token or something.

Online Casino promos get you in the door, but almost always the player is Broke. Once you lose the free chips, most everyone logs out and leaves. Why? How many of us actually leave money in an E wallet, moneybookers, neteller, ect, Just in case we want to deposit it into a casino at a moments notice? I don't. My money is in the Bank, and it only stays at money processing places during deposit/withdraw periods.

[winbig]

I would be insulted if a casino offered me free spins and they turned out to be for .01 a line @ 1 line. This is a complete waste of time to even load the casino let alone play them out.

Please name and shame.

edit: I can't find the thread, but I found a thread mentioning Belle Rock's "Gift Crap" promotion back in 2006 that was exactly the same - 1c a line, 1 line. Did I get the casino right? Note: You had to deposit $50 to get those free spins.


http://www.casinomeister.com/forums/...tml#post291359

[PenDragyn21]

I judge that promotion guilty of being crap.

[Pocketdiggers77]

I think River Belle ran some bullshit promotion like this a while back. They caught absolute hell for it. I think theres was gamble x number of $$ and get 50 free spins on this slot. they failed to tell you the spin value. Yeah most of the free spin promos I've seen are complete rubbish.

Here is the RiverBelle thread and I guess it was 100 free spins on gift rap at .01/line

http://www.casinomeister.com/forums/...ree-spins.html

PD

[Wildfire7]

I have come across many of these free spin promotions. If I ever see a promotion with free spins in the title I wouldn't bother with it as I know it will just be on minimal lines with a low coin size.

The headline for the promotion can easily grab the attention of the less experienced player. 100 free spins sounds more attractive than a fixed amount of free credits.

The more amount of paylines on a slot means the value in the offer will shrink further. 0.01x100 on a 5 line slot is much better value than 0.01x100 on a 30 line slot. Thats why all these free spin promotions are usually on 20 line or more slots.

It is also a bit misleading to promote free spin offers, then finding out that only 1 line can be played. But the promotional headline of "Enjoy 100 free 1 line, minimum bet spins with us" is not the best way to entice new players. Mind you neither is the reality, when the player finds out what their lame duck of an offer really is.

If the end result for the players first experience with the casino is one of disappointment, then the offer could well do more harm than good from a business point of view, as the player may choose not to return.

Mike

[bernynhel]

If I had to re-download a site, no longer installed on my PC, in response to a free spins promo only to find x free spins limited to one line/cent per spin, I'd be 10 kinds of mad! Immediately after taking a screen-shot of the un-played free-spins, closing the casino and deleting the software, again, from my PC, not only would I let the casino know my feelings in a no-holds barred email reply to their promotional one, extra-particularly, graphically nasty in nature and post a similar, yet toned-down but, nonetheless, tellingly expressive thread on CM but I would name names, if not in the Thread title, definitely in my first post including the screen-shot of the un-played free-spins and a screen-shot of the evil, IMHO, email promo which lured me to the aforementioned madness. To the OP: I know you don't know me, but in regards to the degree of any of the above, it would, definitely, have to be to the nth. Just ask anybody.

This wouldn't happen to be a Belle Rock Entertainment Ltd promo, would it? They also love informing one that they have been awarded gifts that happen to be match promos and that they have been chosen to receive a chance to win one of five $100 (or whatever) bonuses if they deposit and play and should be chosen in a random drawing. In six years guess how many I've won? Hint: ZERO!!! Or is that the Jackpot Factory Group??

[gerilege]

Thank you for your feedback.
This casino is not part of a group, but I think they have some weird promotion strategy. Some of you will find out who they are if I mention that they ran a "100% match bonus up to 3 EUR" promotion a few times in the past, and they use different platforms for download and no-download. What makes it more strange, that on some other occasions they also offer 100% up to 100.

[gerilege]

Ok, now I feel that it is not unjustified to name the casino after the latest offer I got. Original letter is in Hungarian, here's a rough translation.

'Dear player

I hope you enjoy playing in Unibet casino. To give you a chance to try out more exiting games, we give you €3 bonus.
What should you do? Transfer €3 to your casino account until 9th of February, and you will automaticaly get €3 to your bonus account.
(sniff)"

This is at least the fourth time I receive this wonderful promotion, and I have never made a deposit in the past which was less than €100. Do you think this one and the previous 1c/1line free spin offer will make me want to play? Unibet promotion department, please think before you write.

For the sake of completeness, I wrote to the promotional department when I received this €3 offer the first time probably a year ago.