Cumulative WR versus zeroing out - pros and cons (rep friendly)

[jstrike]

I'd like to field some opinions from players on this sticky situation (pun intended) that's come up with the little "hobby" site I built, which I won't name here.

We have a 30x WR on bonuses (including on the deposit amount, if it's a deposit bonus). Certain games (roulette, blackjack, craps) count 20% towards clearing it, while the rest of the games and poker count 100%. It's a little unusual in that it clears a penny at a time as you play, so you can always withdraw winnings if you're willing to forfeit the part you haven't cleared. In other words, players don't have to wait until the whole thing is cleared to withdraw, which somewhat makes up for the relatively high WR multiplier.

Now, here's the problem. By default, the WR accumulates from one bonus to the next. With deposit bonuses, I've gotten in the habit of just clearing it as a courtesy to players, so they don't have a reason not to re-deposit. This is good for them and good for me. But recently I started playing around with new things... a cashback bonus and a no-deposit bonus. And the problem with these is, especially for the cashback bonus, it would be suicide to clear the WR on it every time a player zeros it out. It was a 50% cashback, which is ludicrous I know and it's mostly a failure. Luckily most people haven't heard of it, and I'm going to stop offering it soon. But in the meantime there are situations where players have fairly big leftover WR from these things, and then leave the site and don't want to redeposit because obviously they don't want to have to clear it. But if I promise to clear it every time, it's a lose/lose situation for me... basically it becomes the same as giving them a 50% cashback with no WR at all every other time, since half the time they can just double up and the other half the time they'll lose it with no penalty. And that's not what I wanted to do -- there's another, 10% option with no WR, but a lot of people ignore that one and go for the bigger bonus.

So I'm dealing with either players who take a cashback and win back their losses, or ones who take a cashback, lose it and never come back. Either way it makes it impossible for the house to ever win. I feel like it's pretty generous to always clear WR on deposit bonuses as it is... I know some sites like Intercasino don't even do that. But on cashback bonuses it's a different animal because, also, this cashback works regardless of other bonuses they've already taken on deposit.

What I'm wondering is, how do you feel about cumulative WR on no-deposit and cashback bonuses? I feel like it's fair, from my point of view, but would it drive you away from playing again at that casino? Would you rather play at a casino that didn't offer any cashbacks at all, or only offered a low one, than a casino that offered a big one with those kinds of cumulative restrictions?

I'd love to hear any and all points of view on this, from players or casino reps... I'm in a bind and not sure if I should just back out of this or keep trying it.

 

[Jufo]

You said that the player is always able to cash out the non-bonus portion of balance anytime while completing the WR for the bonus? If the bonus balance has already gone to zero by busting out the whole balance and the player makes a new deposit then where exactly is this bonus balance that the player is left to fullfil? Are you saying that the new deposit is converted entirely into bonus money that cannot be cashed out? I am sure players don't like that.

Players can increase their EV by busting on a bonus balance early. If you force them to complete the whole WR with their subsequent deposits, you are trying to get them to give you back that EV they already earned. Why do you expect them to give it to you voluntarily, ie. it's mathematically better for them to not come back until you remove the WR from their account.

Also, WR carrying over needs to be informed to the player very clearly so that they won't get tricked on their next deposit with a bonus locked balance.

 

[jstrike]

You said that the player is always able to cash out the non-bonus portion of balance anytime while completing the WR for the bonus? If the bonus balance has already gone to zero by busting out the whole balance and the player makes a new deposit then where exactly is this bonus balance that the player is left to fullfil? Are you saying that the new deposit is converted entirely into bonus money that cannot be cashed out? I am sure players don't like that.

Players can increase their EV by busting on a bonus balance early. If you force them to complete the whole WR with their subsequent deposits, you are trying to get them give you back that EV they eadned. Why do you expect they want to give it to you voluntarily, ie. it's mathematically better for them to not come back until you remove the WR from their account.

Also, WR carrying over needs to be informed to the player very clearly so that they won't get tricked on their next deposit to a locked balance.

Basically it's not a WR on the bonus itself - it's a withholding on the whole account. Let's say you get a $10 cashback bonus. There's now $10 "withholding" on your account, which gets cleared at the rate of $0.01 for every $0.30 you play (or every $1.50 you play one of the 20% games). If you bet $10 on, say a live poker game, and double up, you can take out your $10.33 right away - your winnings plus the $0.33 you've cleared - but only at the cost of voiding the $9.67 uncleared in the bonus. This definitely raises a player's EV since they didn't even deposit to get the bonus, so it's a chance to win for nothing.

On the other hand, if they lose that $10 bet, there's going to be $9.67 locked up on their next deposit that has to be played through 30x before they can withdraw it.

That's not true for regular deposit bonuses, where the WR gets waived if they zero out. Just these ones where it's basically free money to play with, and the deposit is already gone (and maybe they already got a deposit bonus on it too). In other words we're giving them free chips to win with, but it seems fair (to me) that if they can withdraw their winnings right away, they shouldn't be allowed to cancel the WR if they lose the chip. But then again, even though it is a fair deal (the bonus is optional, after all), maybe it's just having like...a negative psychological impact instead of a positive one? That's what I'm wondering.

 

[Jufo]

That's not true for regular deposit bonuses, where the WR gets waived if they zero out. Just these ones where it's basically free money to play with, and the deposit is already gone (and maybe they already got a deposit bonus on it too). In other words we're giving them free chips to win with, but it seems fair (to me) that if they can withdraw their winnings right away, they shouldn't be allowed to cancel the WR if they lose the chip. But then again, even though it is a fair deal (the bonus is optional, after all), maybe it's just having like...a negative psychological impact instead of a positive one? That's what I'm wondering.

Well, it's a fair deal yes, but at the same time you cannot expect the players to not think about their best interest and not deposit any longer if the next "fresh" deposit gets tied to a WR. Yes, in my opinion the effect is negative if I feel like I am being punished for making a fresh deposit (ie. be forced fullfill previous bonus). On the other hand some player may opt to fullfill the WR voluntarily if he expects better offers later on so it might also be a mathematically calculated move.

I think not carrying WR over would be fairer. To compensate that you could demand the entire WR to completed for any cashouts to be allowed from any non-deposit bonus or cashback bonus. After all if it's entirely free money, it's not unreasonable to expect whole WR to completed in order to cash out.

 

[jstrike]

I think not carrying WR over would be fairer. To compensate that you could demand the entire WR to completed for any cashouts to be allowed from any non-deposit bonus or cashback bonus. After all if it's entirely free money, it's not unreasonable to expect whole WR to completed in order to cash out.

Yeah, I think that's very good advice. Even though it might work out to the same number of playthroughs in the end, it's better to load that up in front as opposed to asking the player for it later, and maybe turning them off from depositing again.

Gotta think about how to separate them, I guess it's just as long as any cashback or no-deposit bonus is active there would be a hold on the account. But it's a good idea.

I have to do the math on it but I think it's actually worse for players the way you're suggesting, than it would be for long-term players who took things the way they are now. But ...psychology, right? Lol. This is why I'm a programmer and never should have gotten on the management side of this or anything else.

 

[Nifty29]

I agree with Jufo. Holding over WR from bonuses stinks and the majority of players like myself would baulk at it.

My advice:

1. Make bonuses and winnings non-withdrawable until WR is met. You could reduce the WR to soften the blow.

2. Stop offering cashback on deposits where a bonus has been claimed. Very few casinos allow it. Either they get their bonus upfront, or afterwards, but not both.

3. Stop carrying over WR.

4. Clearing WR etc on a per account basis is fine with a tiny operation, but will be unworkable after some growth. The bonus issue needs to be sorted now so that it works regardless of how many players you have.

 

[zanzibar]

How about

5. Stop offering bonuses and save yourself the time, aggravation, and money spent dealing with "bonus abuse".

I am surprised that no casino that I have ever seen has used this strategy as a point of differentiation in an ultra-competetive and almost homogeneous market. Do something different and advertise it, tell people why you think its better (no locked deposits, withdraw at any time etc).

The benefits I see:
- No confusion or traps for players.
- Experienced (and possibly high value) players who know the pitfalls of bonuses are likely to be attracted.
- Money saved on your side in development, accounting and staffing costs.

The drawbacks:
- Players who only play with bonuses won't play there.
- You lose the ability to trap players with bonuses that smooth out short term payout variance.

Seeing as no-one else is doing it, I figure the benefits would outweigh the drawbacks as you would be positioning yourself totally differently to the hundreds of "me-too" casinos out there.

 

[jstrike]

Thanks for the advice!!! This is exactly what I was hoping to hear. I swear, turning to the community here produces such better ideas than sitting in conference weighting all these things...

I agree with Jufo. Holding over WR from bonuses stinks and the majority of players like myself would baulk at it.

This is what I was worried about. So it's like I'm shooting myself in the foot, offering a bonus and not getting any love. I have to say too, in my completely unscientific experience, most bonus players don't show much loyalty anyway after the bonus is over. So your point's well taken, I think I'm going about this all the wrong way.

My advice:

1. Make bonuses and winnings non-withdrawable until WR is met. You could reduce the WR to soften the blow.

After looking at it, I think this is too hard to do because of the mixed bonus situation. I don't want the deposit-based bonuses to be non-withdrawable, I think that's too harsh and I like being a place where the bonuses might not be 1000%, but on a 50% or 100% bonus you can get your winnings back out whenever you want. It's unusual, but I want players to feel safe that I'm not trying to hoard their deposits or put them in a no-win situation. As it is, the most of the bonus players on the site break even over the bonus... but that's why it's "bonus play", I'm not trying to use it as a hook to take people's money, I'm trying to use it to build loyalty so people think, well, those guys are nice.

I've walked a fine line in the time I've run this project because I want to be liked. I don't, actually, feel great about taking anybody's money when I have an edge. This is a really, frankly, terrible position for someone who owns a casino, and it might explain why the project is still in the hole and hasn't turned a profit yet. But seeming fair and being fair are also different things... I mean a rollover WR is actually fair, but seems unfair. And maybe my stance about non-withdrawable bonuses is too old-fashioned or hung up... but the truth is I'd almost rather have no bonus than a non-withdrawable one. But I'll get to that in a bit...

2. Stop offering cashback on deposits where a bonus has been claimed. Very few casinos allow it. Either they get their bonus upfront, or afterwards, but not both.

This was something I thought was more common. I got the idea from another casino, I don't remember which one. It seemed like a nice extra perk for loyalty. But looking back...I don't know if it makes sense.

3. Stop carrying over WR.

4. Clearing WR etc on a per account basis is fine with a tiny operation, but will be unworkable after some growth. The bonus issue needs to be sorted now so that it works regardless of how many players you have.

It is definitely a pain to keep track of. Right now there are just under 2000 players on the site, and my brother and I still pretty much know what all the active players have taken, know their styles of play and go in and manually do it if one of them zeros out a bonus. Right now, it's few times a day usually. But I can see that around 4-5000 players it could start to get hard to keep track of that way.

How about

5. Stop offering bonuses and save yourself the time, aggravation, and money spent dealing with "bonus abuse".

I am surprised that no casino that I have ever seen has used this strategy as a point of differentiation in an ultra-competetive and almost homogeneous market. Do something different and advertise it, tell people why you think its better (no locked deposits, withdraw at any time etc).

The benefits I see:
- No confusion or traps for players.
- Experienced (and possibly high value) players who know the pitfalls of bonuses are likely to be attracted.
- Money saved on your side in development, accounting and staffing costs.

The drawbacks:
- Players who only play with bonuses won't play there.
- You lose the ability to trap players with bonuses that smooth out short term payout variance.

Seeing as no-one else is doing it, I figure the benefits would outweigh the drawbacks as you would be positioning yourself totally differently to the hundreds of "me-too" casinos out there.

I actually really like this idea, and I would have no problem differentiating us that way if everyone thought like you. Really, I don't like bonuses, I never take them at other casinos, and like I mentioned before they don't really bring in the kind of players you want at the tables. On top of that they use up a lot of my time dealing with questions and people scrapping for bits and all kinds of potential for abuse, and I mean no-depo bonuses are rife with that, and since I started a no-depo bonus we've had umpteen different attempts to sign up more than once to get the bonus, and exactly zero people who deposited after they played their bonus out.

The problem is if you start running ads that say, like, "absolutely no bonuses," I think most people would just not understand that. There's this convention in casino advertising that you have to offer the biggest most ridiculous bonus -- whatever the terms are -- to get people's attention these days. I haven't done anything over 200%, and even that was uncomfortable because of the way the site's structured. And for me it would be natural to have no bonuses at all. But I worry people would just react negatively to that.

Anyway, I think that's the direction I'm heading in... I'm going to do 10% cashbacks with no WR, and I've pulled the 50% cashback bonus. I'll probably cancel the no-deposit soon unless something changes drastically in the kind of players we're getting from it... that's great if I were trying to impress somebody by how many signups we had in a month, but it's not doing anything for the bottom line. So maybe I will take this advice, and make us the first casino with no bonuses at all, if I can just figure out how to frame that so players appreciate it's in their best interests in the long run and it doesn't upset them...

Thanks for the great rundown of points and advice, you guys are the best. You should be running this thing, not me :notworthy

 

[zanzibar]

You can reward players in other ways - like you said a regular cashback or even a comp point rate that is well above the others in the industry. I just figure that as you're a smaller operator your time could be far better spent on things to make your site better rather than being tied up dealing with bonuses.

I take your point that saying "no bonuses" might turn off some players, but its about how you frame it. Don't stick it front and centre on the homepage, but you could do your standard promotions page that everyone does and advertise the cashback and comps. And then add a section that explains why you don't offer bonuses and why you believe that is better for players. Make the casino about the games, the service, and the experience instead of the deals. The more I talk about it the more I think I should open my own one!

 

[jstrike]

The more I talk about it the more I think I should open my own one!

Take mine! Please! I haven't had a day off in a year and a half!

 

[binshakindown]

I don't like bonuses

because of the strings attached. I will take a no deposit bonus, but if I bust out I do not want it sticky. Since probablity and statistics is super complex to many depositers, simple is easier and more better. Some folks are bonus experts and can quickly determine if it is good or bad. I am just simple I guess and don't want to be stuck with the terms of the bonus the next time I inject new money into the casino. It may be better to give your loyal player a bonus after they lose their "no bonus taken deposit"

Also, you can be a nice guy and still be fair to yourself. You are in the business of making a profit by entertaining folks and this is nothing to be beating yourself up over. You won't be doing your players any favors if you have to close up shop. A person can run a profitable business and not have to sacrafice integrity, etc.

Of course, just my two cents.

 

[binary128]

I am surprised that no casino that I have ever seen has used this strategy as a point of differentiation in an ultra-competetive and almost homogeneous market.

Cough.

Chris

 

[binary128]

The problem is if you start running ads that say, like, "absolutely no bonuses," I think most people would just not understand that. There's this convention in casino advertising that you have to offer the biggest most ridiculous bonus -- whatever the terms are -- to get people's attention these days. I haven't done anything over 200%, and even that was uncomfortable because of the way the site's structured. And for me it would be natural to have no bonuses at all. But I worry people would just react negatively to that.

Josh,

Agreed - I view this as a "Marketing challenge". You need to effectively "convince" the Player that your "No Bonus Deal" is better for them than the "Bonus Deal" thing that they are so used to. Unfortunately, to do so takes words (and even worse, MATH). People don't read, they "browse".

(ChopleyIOM and I discussed this a bit awhile ago. One of the unavoidable advantages of the SUB - it extends play time.)

In addition, if you are using any Affiliates, then convincing them that a "No Bonus Deal" is better, or even good, is a huge (and perhaps not winnable) challenge. Pick an affiliate site - after the name of the Casino is the SUB deal. (With an exclusion nod to thePOGG.)

Chris

 

[jstrike]

Josh,

Agreed - I view this as a "Marketing challenge". You need to effectively "convince" the Player that your "No Bonus Deal" is better for them than the "Bonus Deal" thing that they are so used to. Unfortunately, to do so takes words (and even worse, MATH). People don't read, they "browse".

(ChopleyIOM and I discussed this a bit awhile ago. One of the unavoidable advantages of the SUB - it extends play time.)

In addition, if you are using any Affiliates, then convincing them that a "No Bonus Deal" is better, or even good, is a huge (and perhaps not winnable) challenge. Pick an affiliate site - after the name of the Casino is the SUB deal. (With an exclusion nod to thePOGG.)

Chris

Hey Chris, long time. Thanks for the advice. It's great to have an industry veteran weigh in on this, uh, relatively inconsequential little problem of mine (and your other suggestions in the past).

I'm afraid you're right about affiliates. I mean from what I've seen, affiliate marketing leans hard on ranking sites by the "size" of the bonus, even if the player's not really getting a fair deal or what they expect from that "size". I guess it's a little like selling breakfast cereal. If they can find a way to say something has less than zero calories, that's what they're gonna tout first. Everyone knows nothing's got negative calories, but plenty of people are eating that cardboard crap anyway, hoping for a miracle. And you and I (and lots of players here, it looks like) know better, but for some reason that doesn't stop the marketing train. And I think I know why that is... it's the same reason I feel like I need to put something that can have an exclamation point after it in every tweet or email I send out about the casino. It's like if you're not offering something newer and better than the next guy, you're history.

Right now, though, all our referrals come from players - no "real" professional affiliates - and they only get an extra bonus based on actual first-time deposits after a 1x playthrough, not clickthroughs or signups or anything like that. That part at least seems to work pretty well. A pretty good number of referrals tend to be real players, so it's good for the referring player and good for us.

But as I'm watching this, uh, slow motion marketing disaster unfolding with my no-deposit and cashback, I've noticed... there definitely is a sweet spot of players who can do that math and figure out why a certain bonus is at best unnecessary... and they seem to differentiate pretty well between these. For the most part, the no-deposit has just led to a lot of abuse, to the point that now I feel like I'm running a zoo. I'm seeing stuff like six signups from Indonesia on the same day from slightly different IP addresses who all take the one-time bonus and (obviously) never come back. So far after like 5 days of this I've got about 22 people who took the bonus and none of them deposited. The cashback thing is better...in a way...because at least it's going to loyal players who've already deposited something and I'm happy giving them something back as long as it's not going to break us. It's a much more sophisticated player who takes that one and figures out ways to complicate it (help tickets like, "please give me a cashback bonus for all my losses in the last 24 hours", when it only officially applies to the last deposit and the player's already withdrawn twice in the last day - but he's a good player - so what do I do? Give him most of what he's asking for 'cause I'm a softie, I guess...)

Here's a little blunt disclosure... when I kicked this thing off with the idea being to appeal to "nerds" (and I think you even called my site a "nerd casino" once), a honcho at one of the last standing Costa Rica casinos told me I was being an idiot. And he might've been right. But he told me that, in his words, smart people aren't the market I should be aiming at. They're not the people who lose a whole bunch to the casino. They're just looking for an EV+ situation or a bonus they can take advantage of, and I should focus on marketing to people who aren't smart enough to figure out why bonuses are a lousy deal. And at the time I rejected that advice and thought it was pretty rotten to say something like that about your customers. And I still don't want to aim "low", I want to run a fair game and feel good about what I do.

And I think this is a conversation we need to have -- and by "we" I'm like, loosely including myself in an industry where you're a professional and I'm a total amateur. But we need to have an honest discussion in the industry about why 1000% bonuses and crappy terms aren't good for anybody and why it's a death spiral to try to out-bonus the next guy while throwing more and more fine print at the TOS, and it undermines player trust, and it's not good for anybody. And while we're at it we should talk about how a lot of people who do gamble online shouldn't be gambling at all, and how they're not the players we want. I want people who don't care if they win or lose $1000 and are playing for fun, not someone who's betting their rent or trying to make $25 a day switching IP addresses to cheat our bonuses.

I'm not sure really where that conversation starts, but I think marketing's gotta change and people have to wise up to the reality of what bonuses do to players, and I know you agree with that.

 

[zanzibar]

Cough.

Chris

Ok so I looked your profile up and I'm assuming you mean Pinnacle Sports. I like what I see there, but I still think my comment stands in as far as 1. it seems primarily a sportsbook and 2. there is no promotion of the "most bonuses are bullshit and thats why we don't offer them" angle. But thumbs up and I'll looking into adding it to my site.

In addition, if you are using any Affiliates, then convincing them that a "No Bonus Deal" is better, or even good, is a huge (and perhaps not winnable) challenge. Pick an affiliate site - after the name of the Casino is the SUB deal. (With an exclusion nod to thePOGG.)

Well I run an affiliate site (you would probably know it) and I'm the one suggesting it! And yes, bonus offers are displayed prominently on our site. Unfortunately players have become conditioned to expect them from casinos. It's a bit of a chicken and egg problem - the main differentiating factor between so many casinos for so many players is the bonus offer and the games. Many don't look much deeper than that until after they have a problem. So we try to educate people on site that bonuses are not always as great as they appear to be.

I'm afraid you're right about affiliates. I mean from what I've seen, affiliate marketing leans hard on ranking sites by the "size" of the bonus, even if the player's not really getting a fair deal or what they expect from that "size".

I think this is a fair comment in general and it annoys me too. You see sites advertising 3000% bonuses with cashout limits and insane playthrough requirements as good deals. And people believe it. However it doesn't apply in our case. Send me a PM, I'll let you know how my site ranks bonuses (its a bit more sophisticated than that) and you can tell me about your casino.

 

[me_and_ed]

You can reward players in other ways - like you said a regular cashback or even a comp point rate that is well above the others in the industry. I just figure that as you're a smaller operator your time could be far better spent on things to make your site better rather than being tied up dealing with bonuses.

I take your point that saying "no bonuses" might turn off some players, but its about how you frame it. Don't stick it front and centre on the homepage, but you could do your standard promotions page that everyone does and advertise the cashback and comps. And then add a section that explains why you don't offer bonuses and why you believe that is better for players. Make the casino about the games, the service, and the experience instead of the deals. The more I talk about it the more I think I should open my own one!

I like the increased comp value, VPL use to have Casino US at 5x the industry standard comps but only offered a bonus for first deposit of the month, rarely did I ever have less than $200 mth in comps, it was a great program.

 

[binary128]

Josh, hey. Yeah, long time (or it seems so).

I might have told you before - Galewind has a bonus casino product. It's not deployed right now (it was at Heroes), but we've got it. So, I've given some thought, on and off over the years, to this whole thing with bonuses.

First, let me state that our bonus system is an "after wager" bonus. (Others have described it as a "reward" bonus.) Therefore, we don't have (and I don't agree with the use of) non-deposit bonuses.

(I'm also well aware of the impact that an "after wager" bonus has on the typical "bonus hunter". That impact is not positive - ChopleyIOM and I have talked about this a bit. An "after wager" bonus does not ring ChopleyIOM's bell because what he is looking for is extended game play. He recognizes Galewind Software's "abnormally high RTPs", but a 2% (or more) increase in slot RTP does not equal a match bonus for extending play time. Chopley, jump in if I'm off the mark here.)

Second, our bonus never expires. If you deposit $100, get a $100 bonus, and play through your $100 deposit - the bonus is still there, with the remaining WR as it was when you left it. Deposit another $100, meet the WR, you get the bonus.

So, it may cost the Player less than $100 to get the $100 (they make some money), or it may cost them more than $100 to get the $100 (they lose some money).

I've concluded that the WR should be "reasonable" (20X deposit?), that all games (except Craps and Roulette) apply equally, and forget about using, or enforcing, "robot exclusions", "pattern betting exclusions" or any of that. You can then calculate how much money you can expect to lose on the bonus. I'll include some weird numbers just as an example.

10% of Players are going to make money on their original $100, PLUS they get the $100 bonus.

50% of Players are going to lose some money (from $1 to $99) on their original $100, BUT that is made up with the $100 bonus.

40% of Players are going to lose all of their $100 before meeting the WR. Of those 40%, half are going to deposit again and win the bonus. Half are not going to deposit again but leave the Casino.

I have no idea what the real numbers are, but the examples above cover the possibilities.

IMO, the greatest practical use of bonuses is as "comp bonuses" for long time (or losing) players. In this case, just give them some amount of money with a "sure to be met" WR (like 10X the bonus amount).

So, that's what I've thought it through to. That is, bonus programs should be deployed in such a manner that you know you're going to lose some of the money but you're not going to be taken to the cleaners. Expect APs, expect "robots", expect "2-tier players". Just factor it in.

The problem - if you're a small operation, or just starting out, then you're going to get nailed with a higher percentage of APs, "robots", "2-tier" players, etc. (In other words, you're going to lose money.) So, you need to have a budget to absorb this. It's a "long term" strategy, and proceeds under the assumption that your product, your Casino, will retain some percent of players every month and thus grow.

@zanzibar - if you go to Pinnacle's home page and click the orange tab labelled "Promotions", you'll see the words that they have decided to use to describe their marketing strategy. There aren't a lot of words (people don't read), but those words are just one click away, and the header goes right to the point.

Their casino has been running since September 2004 without any bonuses.

I agree with your statement about affiliates and bonuses - it is a chicken and egg thing. I remember (about 4 years ago) when Pinnacle approached a Sportsbook affiliate about promoting them. It was a total failure because of 1 reason - Pinnacle did not have any bonus to promote. That was it. Pinnacle is one of the most highly respected Sportbooks in the world, but without any bonus to promote, an Affiliate hook up failed out of the gate.

Chris

 

[jstrike]

Chris, (I'm taking notes) - is an "after-wager" bonus only given if the player zeroes out, like a cashback? Or on deposit?
Also, you're saying the WR is 20x bonus+deposit?

I'm not sure if the calculations I did on this awhile back are wrong, or what, but I was originally offering 30x WR (d+b) on Blackjack and getting absolutely slaughtered by robot players. They were just playing tens of thousands of hands at 10¢ each and averaging a 99.5% RTP. You mentioned Roulette and Craps, but I actually think those games are less dangerous to the house than Blackjack - I'm not sure why so many casinos don't clear WR based on those. The edge for perfectly played blackjack is the slimmest in the house and I had to start counting it (and Roulette and Craps) at 20% clearance (effectively 150x WR) to end the robot war.

 

[binary128]

Chris, (I'm taking notes) - is an "after-wager" bonus only given if the player zeroes out, like a cashback? Or on deposit?
Also, you're saying the WR is 20x bonus+deposit?

I'm not sure if the calculations I did on this awhile back are wrong, or what, but I was originally offering 30x WR (d+b) on Blackjack and getting absolutely slaughtered by robot players. They were just playing tens of thousands of hands at 10¢ each and averaging a 99.5% RTP. You mentioned Roulette and Craps, but I actually think those games are less dangerous to the house than Blackjack - I'm not sure why so many casinos don't clear WR based on those. The edge for perfectly played blackjack is the slimmest in the house and I had to start counting it (and Roulette and Craps) at 20% clearance (effectively 150x WR) to end the robot war.

Josh,

An "after wager" bonus is a bonus that is given after the Player has met the WR. That is, they do not get the bonus immediately added to their bank with the purchase. The only funds available for them to meet the WR are the actual purchase deposit. (That's why it is a problem for Players that are looking for the bonus to extend their playing time.)

If you're working with the "bonus tool", spend some time on the beatingbonuses web site.

The "bonus scenario" I laid out in my previous post assumed that you either had the funds available to absorb the losses from the robots, the APs, etc., OR that you had enough of a base customer list to offset these losses. If neither of these conditions is true, then you're right - you're going to get slammed.

I "auto exclude" Craps and Roulette because of the "Pass/Don't Pass", "Red/Black", "Odd/Even" low risk way to burn through a WR. But you're right there too - the robots are going to be coming in for BJ, JOB, any/all of the high RTP games.

But don't take any notes on what I've got to say concerning Bonuses. All of what I have to say is theoretical, and is based on having one, or both, of the conditions I mentioned above - a lot of cash to absorb initial losses, and/or a large and established base customer list.

I'll again suggest - beatingbonuses.

Chris

 

[Jufo]

Josh, even though I have never played at your site, I understand from your posts that it contains a lot of unique content that you have invented yourself. Therefore when it comes to designing promotions and being the intelligent person that you are, I am surprised that you are not thinking more "outside the box" here.

An idea that came to my mind - you said that you are running a "nerdy" casino. What do nerds do a lot of the time? They play computer games. What satisfaction do they get from playing these computer games? Well, for one thing they collect achievements or "experience points". For example in a RPG computer game you may walk into a cave, kill a dragon and get experience points. With these points you can get new perks like being able to perform magic and cast spells. Since you are the same age as me Josh (born early 80's), I am sure you have played these kinds of computer games where you collect achivements and experience points to get new perks.

So, my idea is that you incorporate this concept of achievements and experience points into your casino product to attract these "nerdy" players. And not just nerds, the concept should appeal to all players, as it will transform the casino playing experience from regular gambling into something more like a quest or journey.

Here is an example which shows how the player could obtain these experience points:

"MONDAY: Play roulette and earn 250 experience points if you hit a straight-up win on any single number two times in a row (you are allowed to cover at most 4 numbers on both spins to eligible).

TUESDAY: Play Caribbean Stud poker and earn 500 experience points if you get a Three of a kind or higher hand that gets beaten by dealer's hand. Get 1500 experience points if your flush or higher gets beaten.

WEDNESDAY: Earn 200 experience points if you get a free spin feature on a slot that re-triggers at least once during free spins. You earn 400 experience points if it re-triggers two or more times within the same set of free spins.

THURSDAY: Earn 150 experience points when you get a Blackjack in spades in any blackjack game.

FRIDAY: Earn 100 experience points if you get any Flush in Hearts in video poker. If you get a straight flush in hearts you earn 1000 experience points.

SATURDAY: BAD BEAT REWARD: Earn 500 experience points if you lose 8 times or more in a row in Baccarat. You must be betting on either Banker or Player on every round, betting on the tie will not qualify.

SUNDAY: BAD BEAT REWARD: Earn 200 experience points if you get a 20-point hand in blackjack that gets beaten by dealer 21.

If you collect achievements from 5 or 6 days, you earn extra 1000 experience points.

If you collect achievements from all 7 days, you earn extra 3000 experience points."


These experience points could be exchanged for cash at a specified rate (100 exp = 10€) or there could be a non-linear tiered conversion structure so that they player would earn a larger reward by collecting a larger number of experience points first (ie. the effect is that he will end up playing longer time for bigger reward). You could also offer to exchange the experience points for a bonus rather than cash (naturally the bonus reward would be larger in size than cash reward because of the WR tied to it), or exchange the points for items etc.

What do you think? I am trying to say that there are ways to design much more interesting promotions than the usual pre-wager / post-wager SUB deposit match or cashback on losses. Think outside the box Josh!

 

[jstrike]

@Jufo,

First of all, I think those are really great ideas.

Personally... I've never really understood why "social achievements" like stars and new costumes are such a big motivator in games... I mean, when I play games I like to gamble. When I want to unwind a little I usually play blackjack or VP, not Warcraft. And that's also why my hobby's writing casino games instead of free-to-premium iphone games or something. (Which is ironic, 'cause if I'd done that back in 2008 when I started this, I could've probably retired by now).

But I do understand that a lot of people do like those kinds of in-game perks...and when you say convertible to cash, now we're really talking.

I really like the idea of giving extra points or bonuses for certain things like bad beats or hitting certain numbers. I think that's something I'm going to look into next. I guess the downside is that my edge is already pretty much nonexistent. I can't just be paying people to play at my site, but I also don't want to run some promotion that's just a lure with no real meat. But maybe if I just get rid of all the bonuses and focus on something more "outside the box" that would be the way to go.

Thanks for the advice... you can see I'm just still processing it, but it's given me a lot to chew on.

 

[Jufo]

@Jufo,

First of all, I think those are really great ideas.

Personally... I've never really understood why "social achievements" like stars and new costumes are such a big motivator in games... I mean, when I play games I like to gamble. When I want to unwind a little I usually play blackjack or VP, not Warcraft. And that's also why my hobby's writing casino games instead of free-to-premium iphone games or something. (Which is ironic, 'cause if I'd done that back in 2008 when I started this, I could've probably retired by now).

But I do understand that a lot of people do like those kinds of in-game perks...and when you say convertible to cash, now we're really talking.

Where the future trends of gambling are discussed, there seems to be a consesus that the direction is towards a seamless incorporation of gambling aspects into regular video games. So in the future there might be a real-money element in popular video games such as Counter Strike, Battlefield or World of Warcraft, which might be luck and skill-based (just like in poker). That's why I brought up the idea of collecting achievements/experience points because I see this as a likely direction of future trends in gambling.

 

[binary128]

@Jufo,

I think that Josh "thinking out of the box" is a fantastic idea. He has a unique product, and caters to a unique market. He can take advantage of "out of the box" thinking where other casinos, other products, can't.

All of my suggestions are "slow growth" ideas - thus the need for either deep pockets or a large established customer base.

Josh, if I were you I'd buy a reasonable quantity of hallucinogens, head off for a backpacking trip with a tape recorder, and spend a week recording anything and everything that comes to mind.

BTW - I never called your site a "nerd site"

Chris

 

[jstrike]

@Jufo,

I think that Josh "thinking out of the box" is a fantastic idea. He has a unique product, and caters to a unique market. He can take advantage of "out of the box" thinking where other casinos, other products, can't.

All of my suggestions are "slow growth" ideas - thus the need for either deep pockets or a large established customer base.

Josh, if I were you I'd buy a reasonable quantity of hallucinogens, head off for a backpacking trip with a tape recorder, and spend a week recording anything and everything that comes to mind.

BTW - I never called your site a "nerd site"

Chris

hehe. Was it "geek site"? I know you said that in a moment of excitement, I remember you were trying to convince me of something

In seriousness, I appreciate the suggestions and the perspective. And my thinking has gotten kind of square about this since I've spent so much time looking at what other casinos do for their marketing and trying to emulate them. A lot of my wilder ideas for games and promos were either ill-thought-out or didn't get enough attention to make them work -- like when I started adding money like crazy to a progressive pot and promoting it in emails and forums, but only got 2 new players for the game (one of whom, of course, won it), or the time I made a leaderboard for who'd win the most over the weekend, which would get doubled if they came in first -- where it turned out the winner five weeks running was all the same guy under different accounts, who figured out how to hide his wins from the leaderboard until the last second by keeping them on a blackjack table overnight. That just drove other players away.

It's a different thing to build a site than to run it, it's just a different skill set and a way of looking at the world. And it's a really different thing to launch a site with $15k behind it and $0.25 tables, and slowly raise your table limits but never be able to take money out of it or afford a dime in advertising, and have to do everything by word of mouth. Because, like you said, there's no way to rely on tried and true methods where you need deep pockets to back up the volatility.

But I do think I'll take your advice, go to Amsterdam for a week and consult a local shaman about it, because I'm getting killed by thinking the same old way now.

 

[Jufo]

It's a different thing to build a site than to run it, it's just a different skill set and a way of looking at the world. And it's a really different thing to launch a site with $15k behind it and $0.25 tables, and slowly raise your table limits but never be able to take money out of it or afford a dime in advertising, and have to do everything by word of mouth. Because, like you said, there's no way to rely on tried and true methods where you need deep pockets to back up the volatility.

But I do think I'll take your advice, go to Amsterdam for a week and consult a local shaman about it, because I'm getting killed by thinking the same old way now.

The fundamental problem I see here is that you want to offer promotions that have some value to the players (using your words: they have some meat in them) but at the same time you can't afford to do it because you are scared of ending up losing money. I am afraid that any drug trip to Amsterdam to invent innovative promotions while watching the stars will not change the bottom line that you can't make value out of thin air. So you may either have to take the risk of putting up a loss leader promotion which causes you to have some losses in hopes to get more player traffic longer-term or resort to having only "meatless promotions" which are designed to look lucrative but don't really contain any value to the player.

I receive these "meatless promotions" to my e-mail inbox all the time. Every day there are about 20 promotional e-mails from different on-line casinos to my inbox. The vast majority of them are total garbage like "wager 1000€ across out slots and you may be one of the lucky ones to receive a 25€ bonus to your account in our daily draw" or "get a 10% bonus on your next deposit with just 300x turnover". Occasionally among those 20 daily e-mails there are some "meaty promotions" which have at least some +EV when played properly (they usually still carry a very high chance of losing because 2-tier betting is still needed to squeeze out any value), so every day I go through my e-mail inbox and filter out the meatless rubbish promotions out of the rare decent ones. As for the ratio of meaty promotions to meatless promotions things have really gone to shit. Back in 2008, maybe something like 50% promotion offers I received to my e-mail were meaty ones (and if I didn't have time to do them all I could be picky and choose only the best ones) but these days I am lucky if even 5% of those promotions I receive to my e-mail have any value to them. In other words when I filter through the daily set of 20 promotional e-mails, maybe one of them is remotely worth making a deposit for.

 

[jstrike]

Point well taken. But that's what I've been trying to avoid. The things I've done have had real value and have been massively EV+... almost too much so. e.g. win the most on the weekend and have the winnings doubled, 2nd place gets 50% extra, 3rd place gets 25% extra, with no WR... and I only ever had 10 players or so in real competition for that at any time. Since there were freerolls too, one player (a pretty extreme bonus hunter, and blackjack card counter) got $1100 or so out of this without ever depositing.

In total, I've put more than 100% of the site's income back into promotions to players every month, for a year and a half. Another way of looking at it is, I've basically created a system that overall wins money from players who are there to have fun and don't care much about promotions (i.e. the players I want), and redistributes it to EV+ bonus hunters who never play in an EV- situation, while not making any profit myself. The worst part is, the only people who recognize that these things are EV+ or care are exactly the wrong people...they have no loyalty, they don't even like to gamble, and they only come if they think it's a sure thing. They won't bet a penny on chance after they clear it or win it.

Realistically, no site can create an EV+ promotion and make it available to everyone on the internet. It's gotta be available just to regular players. So I guess what I need to figure out is something that's meaty enough to be real but only applies to players willing to risk something for it, and players who've already shown loyalty. In that way, a points systems and Chris's after-WR bonus are both pretty good ideas I think.

The only problem with that is, it doesn't bring any new players in. So how do you craft a promo that's interesting to new players without attracting only sharks? I guess the solution for a lot of casinos is just to throw out these "meatless" promos you're talking about. OTOH it seems kind of silly and possibly unethical. It's a catch-22.

 

[binary128]

@Jufo,

Re: hallucinogens and backpacking. You should google the source of my signature line.

"I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me".

hehe. Was it "geek site"? I know you said that in a moment of excitement, I remember you were trying to convince me of something

Wow, I just checked my email. That goes all the way back to September 2011 - almost a year and a half. Yeah, I was trying to convince you of something.

Chris

 

[jstrike]

So yeah, I decided yesterday I'm actually going to backpack around for the next few months. No joke. I'm working on a big project for a real video game company ("real" meaning one that actually pays for work), and I can do it from anywhere, but I need to get some time & space to think about things.

Somewhere in there I'm going to decide if this casino I built is worth continuing or if I should just cash all my players out, box up the games onto a hard drive and move on from it. I'm almost 33... I think it's time to get serious one way or another about things. I guess I could always come back to it in ten years and try to sell some of the slot math to Ballys or something. Doing this has been a lot of fun, but it's also been a lot of stress, and truth be known no one believed in it when it started ...and now that people are interested because it's in Bitcoin, it's getting some attention...I just did an interview with Business Week, lol, and I must be the lowest-earning CEO ever to get a quote in that magazine. But if it gets any bigger or becomes "mainstream", none of the people currently intrigued by it will be interested anymore, and the thankless work of running it just goes on and on.

I've never felt that good about taking a profit in this business by having a house edge on people, and I guess that's why I never made a profit. My reticence to earn money and promote it by doing things other casinos do, which I think amount to screwing people quietly, has made it mostly a business failure. I'm lucky it's broken even, but I seem to have this suicidal wish to give away everything it earns, and I don't know if I can get past that. I almost feel like it's just what was meant to be.

Anyway, there's the honest facts and I guess we'll see what happens, I guess for now I'll just get a mobile card and run it from the road...

 

[binary128]

Josh,

I read through a few of those old emails from Sep of 2011. I suggested an "option 1", which didn't work for you at all. But I then suggested:

"Then I think that you should do whatever it takes to grow your application into as much as you can do, take it as far as it can be taken. And when your app “goes viral” and takes over the world, then I can be one of the people who say “I knew him when …”

and

"I think that you should do everything that you know how to do to grow “your baby” to the fullest extent possible. Go for it. “Viral or Bust!”


I didn't realize that this much time has passed. I'd have to agree with you though - 2 years of operation and you've gone from "losing money" (your Blog entry "How to start a casino and lose money." from Jan 18 2012) to "breaking even". It may be the time to do a core re-think, but maybe its too early as well. Tough call, but it's yours to make.

Galewind is my 4th start-up - the other 3 went belly up. The second one took my house (as well as the house of my wife and 2 kids) and both cars - bankruptcy. That one was really horrible - one step short of living on the street.

For you the world, even in its current state of economic depression, remains your oyster. You've got a lot of options, and most of them seem to me to be good ones.

Chris

 

[clees42]

I am pretty sure that there is a solution to making the casino attractive to players without giving them straight +ev to all their bets.
The usual deposit bonuses are very problematic because either they are good for the players or they are good for the casino.
What this means is that either the casino is going to be unhappy or the players are unhappy.

What i am proposing is to stop with the usual deposit bonuses that apply to the all players, and concentrate on the losing players.

For example we have 2 players: player A and player B. Both players deposit 100 euro in the casino(without bonus),
and player A wins 150 euro and player B loses whole 100 euro.
Clearly player A is happy with his winnings even if he doesnt receive any special attention.
now for example, If player B got 20 free chip with 10XWR for a second change, he would be happy too.

I am pretty sure that the casino would be expected to make profit,
if players were to get free chip everytime they fall to zero with their deposit(assuming ofcos no withdraws)
The free chip could even be fixed % of the original deposit.

Someone could work out the numbers to make it -ev for the players in general,
but the players would still be happy.

 

[jstrike]

I am pretty sure that there is a solution to making the casino attractive to players without giving them straight +ev to all their bets.
The usual deposit bonuses are very problematic because either they are good for the players or they are good for the casino.
What this means is that either the casino is going to be unhappy or the players are unhappy.

What i am proposing is to stop with the usual deposit bonuses that apply to the all players, and concentrate on the losing players.

For example we have 2 players: player A and player B. Both players deposit 100 euro in the casino(without bonus),
and player A wins 150 euro and player B loses whole 100 euro.
Clearly player A is happy with his winnings even if he doesnt receive any special attention.
now for example, If player B got 20 free chip with 10XWR for a second change, he would be happy too.

I am pretty sure that the casino would be expected to make profit,
if players were to get free chip everytime they fall to zero with their deposit(assuming ofcos no withdraws)
The free chip could even be fixed % of the original deposit.

Someone could work out the numbers to make it -ev for the players in general,
but the players would still be happy.

I think this is where personal attention comes into play, and that's been good in the past. If I'm on and I see someone take a bad beat at blackjack, I tend to comp them afterwards. And that does do some good, players appreciate it. It's better when no one sees it coming. The 10% cashback is kind of like that, too... and in a way it sort of works for a very small group of players who've figured out how to extend their play time with it (by depositing middle-sized amounts, getting the cashback, getting back up and withdrawing...) But you make a good point, the bonuses should go more to the people who lose than the people who win. I'm not sure if it's better to codify that into a general rule, or just be there to give people something back when they're down...

 

[binshakindown]

I am pretty sure that there is a solution to making the casino attractive to players without giving them straight +ev to all their bets.
The usual deposit bonuses are very problematic because either they are good for the players or they are good for the casino.
What this means is that either the casino is going to be unhappy or the players are unhappy.

What i am proposing is to stop with the usual deposit bonuses that apply to the all players, and concentrate on the losing players.

For example we have 2 players: player A and player B. Both players deposit 100 euro in the casino(without bonus),
and player A wins 150 euro and player B loses whole 100 euro.
Clearly player A is happy with his winnings even if he doesnt receive any special attention.
now for example, If player B got 20 free chip with 10XWR for a second change, he would be happy too.

I am pretty sure that the casino would be expected to make profit,
if players were to get free chip everytime they fall to zero with their deposit(assuming ofcos no withdraws)
The free chip could even be fixed % of the original deposit.

Someone could work out the numbers to make it -ev for the players in general,
but the players would still be happy.

My thoughts exactly. I am very happy to spend my money at a casino with no bonus, if I know they will throw something back (around 10%). I don't even mind a maximum cash out cap on the freebie, but love it when there isn't one. I rarely, if ever, cash out and I know the casinos like it. What they won't like is when I go for the $100k cash out, since that is what I am after.

 

[clees42]

another idea is to stop with the all other promotions and concentrate solely on the cashback.
If you think about it cashback is equivalent to upping the rtp. The following is assuming a cashback that is calculated on each bet separately(like rake in poker).
Lets say you tie up the cashback based on the machine used and the lifetime(or last 30 days) deposit/withdraw ratio of the player.

For example we have player A, player B and player C.

Player A has lost 20k to the casino in his lifetime and he could get 0,003% cashback in blackjack(99,9% rtp) and 2% cashback in slots(99% rtp).
Player B is up 10k in winnings and he could get 0,001 cashback in blackjack(99,88% rtp) and 0,5% cashback in slots (97,5% rtp)
Player C is new player and he could get temporary 0,002 cashback in blackjack(99,89% rtp) and 1% cashback in slots (98% rtp).

In my opinion it would be attractive to play in a casino that offers varied rtp based on my performance.
If i am winning i dont care about lower cashback, because i think the games are hot.
If losing it would be nice to get improved odds.

The point is to keep the house edge in all circumstances while still rewarding the losing players most.
Also if the house edge is alway present there is no need to tie up the cashback to WR.
The cashback could be freely withdrawable or have just a small nominal 1-5xWR.

 

[jstrike]

Holy cr** that's brilliant. Stepped cashback bonuses with no WR, based on player points level. In a weird way I feel like it's so obvious but... I've never heard of anyone doing it like that online before. It's kind of like what Vegas does but they never put it in writing, and they do it in a very casual way. Did you come up with this, or are there other online casinos doing this right now?

It might be the perfect balance. Gives back more to players who are more loyal, but still gives new players a reason to join. Stops the bonus hunters and lets the longer-term players get a better RTP.

This is a really solid idea. I'm going to draw up the numbers on it...

 

[clees42]

Holy cr** that's brilliant. Stepped cashback bonuses with no WR, based on player points level. In a weird way I feel like it's so obvious but... I've never heard of anyone doing it like that online before. It's kind of like what Vegas does but they never put it in writing, and they do it in a very casual way. Did you come up with this, or are there other online casinos doing this right now?

I came up with it after seeing this thread here. I have never seen casino with system like that.
But, Its quite obvious if you think about it, in a way it is very similar to what is used in poker.
In poker player knows that the more he plays the more he gets rewarded by the end of the month as rakeback.
And when he gets the rakeback he is free to do whatever he wants with it.

I think that casino focusing primarily on the cashback, could build their promotions around it too.

For example: limited happy hour with 2x cashback that lasts for 1h after the user initiates it(new users, losing players, holidays, birthdays etc)
or instead of happy hour it could be 2x cashback until total 500 wagered

 

[Jufo]

Hi clees42, a fellow Finn Is it cold in Oulu at the moment?

A couple of remarks about what has been posted:

Those "sharks" jstrike mentioned (bonus hunters or +EV position hunters) sometimes pretend to be regular gamblers to get access to better bonus offers. At Beatingbonuses forums (where many of these sharks hang out) there is a lot of discussion about when coverplay (ie. pretending to play like a degenerate gambler) is profitable. Not to make you paranoid jstrike, but a player which you consider as a recreational player might be a shark in disguise.

10% and 20% cashback bonuses have been known to cause losses to the casino. Some time ago there was a news article about a Live Blackjack player who was comped with 20% cashback every time he lost and eventually he ended up winning millions and cleaning the house. That's because the cumulative house edge of the game was less than the cumulative cashback he received. So cashback bonuses are not always -EV and sharks are after them as well. However if the cashback is discretionary then it probably won't get shark's attention as they have better things to focus on.

The point is to keep the house edge in all circumstances while still rewarding the losing players most.

Personally I disagree with this train of thought. A casino who is so cheap that they are NEVER willing to give up on their mathematical edge, even for a short while, tells me that they are just cheap and probably under-bankrolled. I believe in the phrase: "You have to give action to get action". It means that I expect the casino to voluntarily put themselves in a losing position once in a while. It shows that they are willing to have a gamble against me, a fair fight so to speak where they don't have the advantage, and they earn my respect and loyalty that way.

 

[clees42]

Personally I disagree with this train of thought. A casino who is so cheap that they are NEVER willing to give up on their mathematical edge, even for a short while, tells me that they are just cheap and probably under-bankrolled. I believe in the phrase: "You have to give action to get action". It means that I expect the casino to voluntarily put themselves in a losing position once in a while. It shows that they are willing to have a gamble against me, a fair fight so to speak where they don't have the advantage, and they earn my respect and loyalty that way.

This could be solved by giving player temporary boost to cashback resulting over 100% rtp under some circumstances(reward for loyalty, cheer up player that lost etc)
It could be time limited, or until certain wagering target is reached.
But it would still need to be implemented in a way that the casino will be in control of their losses.

 

[jstrike]

10% and 20% cashback bonuses have been known to cause losses to the casino. Some time ago there was a news article about a Live Blackjack player who was comped with 20% cashback every time he lost and eventually he ended up winning millions and cleaning the house.

This gets really interesting. And it has to do with the churn or playthroughs on that player's chips. If the bet size as a fraction of his bankroll is small enough that he has to play through 10x to double up or zero out, then the house can still have a tiny edge giving him a 10% cashback. On the other hand, if the player can bet his whole bankroll on one hand and then get 10% back on a loss every time, the house is going to be playing against its own money within 20 hands. Which would be an argument for putting WR on the cashback or only giving the cashback if a certain WR had been reached on the deposit before the zero-out.

I know about the player you're talking about, but I don't know when he was cashed back or for what, exactly. It sounds like any time he left the casino down he was getting 20% back. That's different, at least psychologically, from getting a cashback on an online casino only when you zero out your deposit.

It means that I expect the casino to voluntarily put themselves in a losing position once in a while. It shows that they are willing to have a gamble against me, a fair fight so to speak where they don't have the advantage, and they earn my respect and loyalty that way.

I agree with this. But players can get used to certain things and be pushy about them. Many players, for some strange reason, seem to assume that a casino should put itself in that position all the time. It takes a light touch to manage expectations so they don't get unreasonable.

 

[jstrike]

Okay, so here's the idea I've put together, based on this great discussion. Tell me what you think!

What I would do is automate cashbacks, so anyone can claim one after zeroing out, with no WR attached. This would be a cashback based on the amount deposited (in one or more deposits) since the player's last withdrawal or last cashback, and no more than 1 week in the past.

The way it would work is this. I'd take the player's total bets since their last withdrawal, divided by the total deposits and bonuses in the same time period. That would give a certain maximum cashback rate based on the lowest house edge being around 1%. So let's say a player had deposited $100 and placed $1100 in bets before zeroing out. The maximum cashback I could give her and break even theoretically is 11%. This wouldn't be restricted by what games she had played (roulette, craps, blackjack would all count the same).

Now, of that theoretical maximum, a player's actual cashback eligibility is determined by how many player points they have. For example someone with more than 1 million points could get 90% of that 11% (a 9.9% cashback), whereas someone with under 1,000 points would only get 10% of it (an 0.99% cashback). (One point is awarded for every $0.25 bet).

Does this sound too complicated? Or does it make sense? I would set it up as a separate window in the software that would show what the player was eligible for if they just zeroed out, and let them take the cashback immediately. I think I'd have to put some maximum on the playthrough count, like 20%, so players in the highest class with the most points could get up to an 18% cashback if they had played through their last deposit 20x or more.

 

[clees42]

Does this sound too complicated? Or does it make sense? I would set it up as a separate window in the software that would show what the player was eligible for if they just zeroed out, and let them take the cashback immediately. I think I'd have to put some maximum on the playthrough count, like 20%, so players in the highest class with the most points could get up to an 18% cashback if they had played through their last deposit 20x or more.

I am pretty sure that most player are only interested too see what the potential cashback window is displaying at the moment.

 

[clees42]

Does this sound too complicated? Or does it make sense? I would set it up as a separate window in the software that would show what the player was eligible for if they just zeroed out, and let them take the cashback immediately. I think I'd have to put some maximum on the playthrough count, like 20%, so players in the highest class with the most points could get up to an 18% cashback if they had played through their last deposit 20x or more.

If the cashback is extented to previous deposits, then why is cashback % only defined on the playtrough of last deposit?

Lets say i deposit 1000 euro first and lose it. then i deposit 20 euro again and again hoping to reach high enough playtrough to reach best cashback % for all the deposits including the 1000 euro.

 

[jstrike]

If the cashback is extented to previous deposits, then why is cashback % only defined on the playtrough of last deposit?

Lets say i deposit 1000 euro first and lose it. then i deposit 20 euro again and again hoping to reach high enough playtrough to reach best cashback % for all the deposits including the 1000 euro.

Maybe I said it wrong... the playthrough would apply to all the deposits and any bonuses (including other cashbacks) received since the last withdrawal.

So if you deposit $1000, take a $100 cashback, and then deposit another $20, your potential cashback on that $20 if you zero out would be:

(totalbets since last withdrawal / 1120) * (playerpoints level)

if you waited to take the cashback until you had lost both deposits, it would be:

(totalbets since last withdrawal / 1020) * (playerpoints level)

Now... if you had put in that $1k more than a week ago, you would lose the right to a cashback on it, but it would still be factored as part of your playthrough, as would all the bets you made with it, since the playthrough is just concerned with what happened since the last withdrawal. Meaning even if you missed the cashback on that, if you had high playthrough on it, that would still help you qualify for higher cashback on your next deposit.

One reason I'm thinking about setting it up this way is because there are a lot of players in my system who have only ever played freerolls, and never deposited, or maybe only deposited $1 once. And they have an enormously high "playthrough" by this definition. However they don't have a lot of player points, because by and large they've spent them already to enter higher-paying tournaments. So this encourages them to deposit and reap the rewards of a relatively larger -- but not huge, maybe only 5% -- cashback, or else withdraw and start from scratch instead of letting their freeroll wins heap up in my system, which I prefer not to have on my books.

 

[clees42]

Now... if you had put in that $1k more than a week ago, you would lose the right to a cashback on it, but it would still be factored as part of your playthrough, as would all the bets you made with it, since the playthrough is just concerned with what happened since the last withdrawal. Meaning even if you missed the cashback on that, if you had high playthrough on it, that would still help you qualify for higher cashback on your next deposit.

ok that sounds better. But, however i think that starting from scratch after each withdraw is a bit harsh in my opinion.
The size of the withdraw should be factored in also.
Lets say that i have huge playtrough and 2000 euro in deposits, then i withdraw 50 euro and end up with 0 playtrough.
Would sound like too big penalty. Maybe the playtrough should be reduced by this type of formula: (withdraw*X*total playtrough)/total deposits.
For example: assuming X=2 total deposits at 1000 euro and you withdraw 250 you would lose 50% of your playtrough value.

 

[jstrike]

ok that sounds better. But, however i think that starting from scratch after each withdraw is a bit harsh in my opinion.
The size of the withdraw should be factored in also.
Lets say that i have huge playtrough and 2000 euro in deposits, then i withdraw 50 euro and end up with 0 playtrough.
Would sound like too big penalty. Maybe the playtrough should be reduced by this type of formula: (withdraw*X*total playtrough)/total deposits.
For example: assuming X=2 total deposits at 1000 euro and you withdraw 250 you would lose 50% of your playtrough value.

I was just thinking about this, but the problem I see is -- imagine someone deposits $100 and right away withdraws $5. Then they deposit another $100. They now have $195 to play with, but only $100 to "clear". Now, in order to get a cashback they have to zero out, so they do have to lose all $195. But if they play it through 10x before losing it, they will already get a much larger cashback -- because they played $1950 on a $100 deposit, so they would get 19.5% (times their player points modifier).

This means that they are actually getting cashback based on whatever portion of their previous amount they did not withdraw (which is another reason to cap it at 20%). So if a player is up against us by $2000, takes out $1900 and deposits $100, they will almost definitely get a 20% cashback on their next zero-out. But this is OK because in this case they have chosen to keep $100 in their account, which they then lost -- basically the same as putting it into a new deposit. But if I gave them credit for their playthrough before that, I think everybody would always be at the highest cashback level after a little while... right?

 

[binshakindown]

Does this sound too complicated? Or does it make sense?

Yes is does sound too complicated, but it makes sense. Why not incorporate the cash back formula on the player's RTP (not sure if I used correct word here), deposits and withdraws over an interval of time, say 30 days for example. This way, the player who has withdrawn more money than deposited doesn't receive a cashback bonus on subsequent deposits until the player has actually lost some of their own money.

 

[clees42]

I was just thinking about this, but the problem I see is -- imagine someone deposits $100 and right away withdraws $5. Then they deposit another $100. They now have $195 to play with, but only $100 to "clear". Now, in order to get a cashback they have to zero out, so they do have to lose all $195. But if they play it through 10x before losing it, they will already get a much larger cashback -- because they played $1950 on a $100 deposit, so they would get 19.5% (times their player points modifier).

This is easily solved if any remaining balance in the time of new deposit is added to the value.
Lets consider 3 situations.

A
player deposits 200 and loses it with 2000 playtrough so he gets 10% cashback of 200

B
player deposits 100, loses it, then redeposits another 100 and loses it. The playtrough on the last deposit is 1000 so he gets 10% cashback of 200

C
player deposits 100, withdraws 5 and deposits another 100. The playtrough is 1950 so he should be eligible to 10% cashback of 195.


Case C should be equivalent to someone first withdrawing 5 and then depositing 195.

 

[jstrike]

C
player deposits 100, withdraws 5 and deposits another 100. The playtrough is 1950 so he should be eligible to 10% cashback of 195.


Case C should be equivalent to someone first withdrawing 5 and then depositing 195.

But, I think it is the same. It doesn't matter what the playthrough was before the withdrawal, since either way there's now 195 in the account and you'd expect there to be about $1950 in playthrough from that point before the player zeroed out. So instead of the player getting 10% of $195, in Case C she gets 19.5% of $100. Same thing, but I think it's important to keep the rule that only deposits since the last withdrawal are eligible... otherwise I think this could turn into a mess...

 

[clees42]

But, I think it is the same. It doesn't matter what the playthrough was before the withdrawal, since either way there's now 195 in the account and you'd expect there to be about $1950 in playthrough from that point before the player zeroed out. So instead of the player getting 10% of $195, in Case C she gets 19.5% of $100. Same thing, but I think it's important to keep the rule that only deposits since the last withdrawal are eligible... otherwise I think this could turn into a mess...

i got an idea how to improve on the cashback idea, but im bit busy right now so ill have to formulate it bit later.

 

[clees42]

EDIT: i think it should be fixed now.

Maybe the cashback should be calculated with this formula.

(((depositA-withdrawA)*playtroughA/depositA)+((depositB-withdrawB)*playtroughB/depositB)+...+((depositX-withdrawX)*playtroughX/depositX))/total deposits

In this formulate any cashback should be counted as a deposit. cashback on cashback should be added to the next deposit.
WithdrawA is a withdraw made from balance generated with depositA. if withdrawA is larger than deposit A then depositA-withdrawA=0
however if you feel like winning player gets too high cashback with this depositA-withdrawA can be calculated as negative to lower the cashback.
The idea is to calculate the cashback for the next deposit by weighting the previous cashbacks relative to deposit sizes.

example1:
Player has following deposits and withdraws.

1. deposit 1000 euro, playtrough 10000 and withdraw 2000
2. deposit 500, playtrough 5000 and withdraw 0
3. deposit 200, playtrough 2000 and withdraw 100 and lose rest.

Now we calculate how much cashback he should get when he deposits 100 and loses it with 1000 playtrough

((0+500*5000/500+(200-100)*2000/200+100*1000/100)/1700=(5000+1000+1000)/1700=4,1, -> 4,1 %cashback 4,1 euro OR
((1000-2000)*10000/1000+(200-100)*2000/200+100*1000/100)/1700=(-10000+1000+1000)/1700= -8000/1700 so no cashback.

example2.
player has following deposits and withdraws.

1, deposit 100 euro, playtrough 1000, withdraw 0
2. deposit 200 euro, playtrough 2000, withdraw 0

now cashback when deposit 300 and lose with 3000 playtrough.

(100*1000/100+200*2000/200+300*3000/300)/600=(1000+2000+3000)/600=10 -> 10% so 30 euro cashback.

example3 with cashback inbetween.

1.deposit 1000 euro, playtrough 10000, withdraw 0. cashback ((1000*1000)/10000)/1000=0,1=10% so cashback 100 euro
2. cashback 100 euro, playtrough 1000, withdraw 300, no cashback.
3. deposit 200, playtrough 2000, withdraw 0,

cashback: ((1000*10000)/1000+0+(200*2000)/200)/1300=(10000+2000)/1300=9,2 -> 9,2% cashback=18,4 euro OR
((1000*10000)/1000+(100-300)*1000/100+(200*2000)/200)/1300=(10000-2000+2000)/1300=7,7 -> 7,7% cashback=15,4 euro

 

[jstrike]

@clees42, thank you for taking the time to calculate all of that. I'm trying to wrap my head around it. I basically understand it, and in fact it seems like it's actually lowering cashbacks for players who recently withdrew winnings. Which is interesting. But I think this might be too complicated to communicate clearly, and kind of blur the goals for people who are trying to hit a certain playthrough mark.

Additionally, because the site's in Bitcoin, deposits and withdrawals tend to be a lot more frequent than on other sites. Players cash out as a way of managing their bankroll. Often times it will take 1-2 hours for the withdrawal to be approved, and in that time they'll deposit again and lose that deposit, then try to claim a cashback on the loss while the other withdrawal's still pending. What this means is that my code would have to spider through the player's entire transaction history and try to figure out which withdrawals matched which deposits. And most of the time, it's not a 1 to 1 relationship.

I think your system would also prevent people who already have a history of being net winners in the casino from ever claiming a cashback, if I understand it correctly...? And I'm not sure I want to do that.

In your first example, it's true, in the system where withdrawing clears the history, the player would forfeit the cashback just by withdrawing anything. But this is OK because I really only want the cashback to be if the player zeroes out the initial deposit without a withdrawal.

In exchange for that, the cashbacks are a little higher in the simplified system. To take your third example... with the simplified system it would look like this:

1.deposit 1000 euro, playtrough 10000, withdraw 0. cashback 10% = €100
2. cashback 100 euro, playtrough 1000, withdraw 300, no cashback.
3. deposit 200, playtrough 2000, withdraw 0. cashback 10% = €20

But more so, I think it's just easier to understand and show the player a target (I was thinking like a little meter that shows playthrough and cashback % since the last withdrawal) when it's from one withdrawal to the next.

Re-reading your post it's pretty mind-boggling, although I'll admit I'm not the best when it comes to math (or managing money, lol). But I can also see having a very hard time explaining to players in some situations (like a deposit while there was a pending withdrawal) why their cashback is exactly whatever it comes out to with that equation...