Players gravitate towards online casinos because they dream of winning jackpots and becoming overnight millionaires. Even small wins can prove helpful. If you have been bitten by the entrepreneurial bug, instead of gambling, wouldn’t it sound great if you started an online casino and began raking in the moolah. You don’t have to be a ‘Bugsy Siegel’ or multi-billionaire. There’s always the chance to start a successful online casino on a relatively small budget. Read on to find out how you could potentially do so without breaking the bank.
The basics before you start
It helps to conduct a good deal of research on the internet to determine which casinos are popular and why.
- Find out what players expect such as fair gaming, RTP, game variety, increased chances of wins.
- What games are most popular?
- Payments and withdrawal methods preferred by players.
- Identify markets – some countries prohibit gambling
- Nothing can be more important than getting your budget right. Don’t plan it after you’ve gone ahead with a website. Do it in the very beginning after you have a clear picture of the costs for marketing, software and legal issues.
That is one part. The second part has to do with gaming operations.
- Software Providers/White Label Casinos – They will be the bulwark of your operations. Quite a few providers like White Hat Gaming and EveryMatrix offer complete software suites that also take care of back end operations such as safe and secure payments through various channels, customer support in various languages and provision of your website with hundreds of games from multiple software providers.
- What you need is a good website designer and developer offering everyday support, hosting and maintenance, not a launch-and-forget operation.
- Licensing procedures.
Licensing
Players today are pretty sharp when it comes to seeking out white label casinos and would want to make sure they are dealing with a licensed and regulated casino.
- You can obtain licensing from jurisdictions such as the United Kingdom, Gibraltar, Curacao, Malta, Isle of Man and Alderney. Register an offshore company there and you can apply to the gambling authority to obtain a license. Here could involve paying a significant fee.
- A second alternative is to get in touch with a software provider. The software provider not only provides software and games, but you also become a sub-licensee and costs are much lower. If you plan to start a casino online on a shoestring, then this may be the better option for you.
- A third way is to become a licensee of the gaming software provider.
Gaming software
- This is at the heart of your online casino operation. There are dozens of software providers such as NetEnt, Microgaming, IGT, Rival, Betsoft and Playtech. Then there are other lesser known names like Yggdrasil, Pragmatic and Red Tiger. Keep in mind that big names will demand a higher fee and a percentage of what you earn. People do like games from such top names and you have these software providers then you can easily get players using power affiliates or through other marketing channels. However, you pay upfront fees and commissions on your earnings to each software provider.
- The cheaper solution is to sign up with B2B game providers who will be glad to provide a selection of software from various developers at a fixed rate and you may even get source codes. You do not have to pay a percentage of your earnings.
- Shop around and explore all options because this represents the highest cost and will also influence your casino’s popularity and number of players you can attract. If you are on a tight budget the B2B service provider can provide a basic package with just one software provider and a selection of games including slots, poker, table games and bingo.
Payment processing
If you wish to attract a sizeable number of players, then you will need to offer easy payments in a secure way and fast withdrawal with least costs.
- If you sign up with a B2B service provider or a software provider, then you will find that they take care of providing complete payment processing.
- You can offer various channels like credit/debit cards, banking, wallets, mobile payments and even bitcoin payments. However, you could start with a few like credit/debit card and wallets.
- Offering multi-currency options is essential if you wish to attract players from all over the world. Otherwise they may be discouraged if there is any conversion fee and losses due to currency exchange fluctuations.
- Security and encryption are of prime importance. These are usually covered by the software provider.
Getting players to your casino
Even before you launch your website you will have to engage in promotions to create awareness of your online casino and get players to visit your site and sign up. There are various ways to bell this cat:
- Engage an SEO expert to help your site get to the first page of web searches although this can be expensive.
- You can easily get players to visit affiliate sites. They review your site and place a link to your casino on their review pages. Such review and affiliate sites are popular with players and usually experience plenty of quality traffic. It is the cheapest way since you do not pay anything upfront. You pay the affiliate commission only when traffic results in deposits on your site.
- Once you start getting players keep them engaged with various ongoing promotions even if this means a reduction in your profits.
- Be careful about withdrawals and be fair. If you delay cashouts or hold them up on any ground word gets around in the online world and earns you a bad rep.
- Offer total support.
Website
Your website is your platform for your online casino.
- Choose the right hosting provider who offers virtual or dedicated servers and plenty of bandwidth with redundancy, so your site is never down and loading times are fast. If your site pages load slowly your players will leave
- Choose the right developer and stick with him.
- Make sure the platform is mobile friendly too. HTML5 is the buzzword these days. Pick games that play seamlessly in a desktop or mobile browser.
- Keep graphics and themes simple. Many casinos tend to ignore this and end up confusing players more than ever. Players are more interested in getting things done fast and play games usually with a timeframe in mind.
- Do not hide links in sub-menus or in obscure terms and conditions. If you offer bonuses, display the terms attached to the bonus clearly. Have a page for banking and display everything including making deposits, withdrawals and terms here.
- For games, it is worthwhile to have information on how to play each game. This is something newbies will find very helpful and probably recommend your site.
In all honesty, forget about making profits for a year or two until you are well set. Keep handing out generous bonuses and promotions and once you have thousands of players those profits will potentially begin rolling in.
