How Harrah's Does Marketing
September 14th, 2010 at 5:34:20 AM
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From a long article last month in Business Week:
"Loveman went broader, compiling a vast customer database and sending targeted offers and come-back-soon inducements to millions of people with the desired probabilities. The program has driven gaming revenue—far more profitable than food or hospitality—to 80 percent of Harrah's $9 billion business, vs. an industry average of 45 percent, according to the AGA. . . ."
"To analyze the customer data it collects, Harrah's spends about $100 million a year on information technology, compiling preferences and probabilities that led Loveman to a startling conclusion. Harrah's makes more money from elderly slot machine players than any other demographic in the casino—even the high-rolling millionaires casinos traditionally spent fortunes luring and flying in by private jet. "The slot player was the forgotten customer," Loveman says, "and the slot player offered us the biggest benefit in terms of collection data....I had to be willing to be unsexy in this. I can take you to a casino that would have a lot of young beautiful people in there and you would say, 'Man, this is a happening place.' I could take you to another place where there are a lot of people who look like your parents. The latter would be a lot more profitable than the former. My job is to make the latter."
http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/10_33/b4191070705858.htm
"Loveman went broader, compiling a vast customer database and sending targeted offers and come-back-soon inducements to millions of people with the desired probabilities. The program has driven gaming revenue—far more profitable than food or hospitality—to 80 percent of Harrah's $9 billion business, vs. an industry average of 45 percent, according to the AGA. . . ."
"To analyze the customer data it collects, Harrah's spends about $100 million a year on information technology, compiling preferences and probabilities that led Loveman to a startling conclusion. Harrah's makes more money from elderly slot machine players than any other demographic in the casino—even the high-rolling millionaires casinos traditionally spent fortunes luring and flying in by private jet. "The slot player was the forgotten customer," Loveman says, "and the slot player offered us the biggest benefit in terms of collection data....I had to be willing to be unsexy in this. I can take you to a casino that would have a lot of young beautiful people in there and you would say, 'Man, this is a happening place.' I could take you to another place where there are a lot of people who look like your parents. The latter would be a lot more profitable than the former. My job is to make the latter."
http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/10_33/b4191070705858.htm
September 14th, 2010 at 6:38:20 AM
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Yes. Long ago Harrah's predecessor company went through a complex experiment in hotel room design using movable walls and feedback and found out what hotel guests really want.
Same thing with gambling. Real gamblers look down upon slot machines and slot machine players. Alot of men arrive in Vegas and give some "go get lost" money to their wife or "wife". That money can be substantial and it often goes to the slot machines. Some couples each play slot machines, but its a way to distance themselves too, since they often sit well apart from each other, perhaps due to the declared preferences for different machines. Many of the twin-seated slot machines are empty. Its the slots that are bring the money in. The table games are often for legal requirements and for "atmosphere" for slot players. Just as a Poker Room brings in the poker player's spouses to the slot machines, bingo games bring in Even Hour Slot Players, the table games often bring in Slot Players.
In the older demographics, the women are already in the casino just sitting there at the slot machines ALL the time. Look at those Dotty's Cafe places, look at the all slots all the time places. They get the pension checks they get the unemployment checks, they get everything. The locals casinos such as the famed Arizona Charlies East has some other offerings, but it is really a slot joint. All the rest of Arizona Charlie's is just for the Gaming Board license.
Some of those places, such as the Aztec, are nothing but slot machines with decent seating and with a snack booth, some internet kiosks, some occasional special vacation give-aways. Nothing more. Even if you look at the more Upscale Beer and Burger Bars: you get younger customers, more social customers, even better chairs but those Video Machines are a really substantial lure even amidst a demographic group wherein slot play would otherwise be thought to be be surprising.
I recently took a drive in Florida and all these small nowhere towns have "Internet Cafes" where you rent internet time to play games that win prizes. The law is being complied with. Also there are these slot parlors that are really just electronic Bingo games, not real slot machines. They open up and they are ALWAYS populated with people who just sit there puting pension checks into fake "slot machines" and getting a free cup of coffee and a cheap snack as well. I can't believe these players think of themselves as gamblers.
Same thing with gambling. Real gamblers look down upon slot machines and slot machine players. Alot of men arrive in Vegas and give some "go get lost" money to their wife or "wife". That money can be substantial and it often goes to the slot machines. Some couples each play slot machines, but its a way to distance themselves too, since they often sit well apart from each other, perhaps due to the declared preferences for different machines. Many of the twin-seated slot machines are empty. Its the slots that are bring the money in. The table games are often for legal requirements and for "atmosphere" for slot players. Just as a Poker Room brings in the poker player's spouses to the slot machines, bingo games bring in Even Hour Slot Players, the table games often bring in Slot Players.
In the older demographics, the women are already in the casino just sitting there at the slot machines ALL the time. Look at those Dotty's Cafe places, look at the all slots all the time places. They get the pension checks they get the unemployment checks, they get everything. The locals casinos such as the famed Arizona Charlies East has some other offerings, but it is really a slot joint. All the rest of Arizona Charlie's is just for the Gaming Board license.
Some of those places, such as the Aztec, are nothing but slot machines with decent seating and with a snack booth, some internet kiosks, some occasional special vacation give-aways. Nothing more. Even if you look at the more Upscale Beer and Burger Bars: you get younger customers, more social customers, even better chairs but those Video Machines are a really substantial lure even amidst a demographic group wherein slot play would otherwise be thought to be be surprising.
I recently took a drive in Florida and all these small nowhere towns have "Internet Cafes" where you rent internet time to play games that win prizes. The law is being complied with. Also there are these slot parlors that are really just electronic Bingo games, not real slot machines. They open up and they are ALWAYS populated with people who just sit there puting pension checks into fake "slot machines" and getting a free cup of coffee and a cheap snack as well. I can't believe these players think of themselves as gamblers.
September 14th, 2010 at 8:43:13 AM
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I was recently doing some research on all of those 'slot' parlors in florida.the state has been cracking down on them. But the old folks love them.
September 14th, 2010 at 11:22:32 AM
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Ohio is cracking down on them too: http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/10/2009/2009-ohio-3483.pdf
"Dice, verily, are armed with goads and driving-hooks, deceiving and tormenting, causing grievous woe." -Rig Veda 10.34.4
