New research ties displaying game RTP to better engagement

New research by the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) has incidentally discovered that players may be more willing to try a casino game if they know that its return-to-player (RTP) rate is higher than another game's - or in this instance, the same game advertised in two different manners. The difference in motivation is interesting, although not a major one.

This discovery has caught the BIT by surprise, as the team was not specifically looking into understanding what prompted players into playing one game over the next per se. Yet, this is the conclusion they have arrived at.

A typo turned into an opportunity to understand gamblers' behavior

In "What are the chances," the BIT describes how it ran a gambling advertisement which invited players to claim 10 free spins bonus on Fruit Rush, a popular slot game by Gamomat.

The ad, though, had a small typo in it, suggesting that players would lose 7 units for every 10 units they bet, effectively reducing the expected return to 30%, as opposed to 93%, what the ad originally meant to say – i.e. lose 7 units for every 100 players bet.

This typo, albeit slightly embarrassing, would quickly be transmuted into another opportunity to better understand what drives consumer behavior and how involved players are.

Since the BIT had spotted the typo in the ad too late, it decided to run a corrected version of the ad and the one that contained the mistake. Essentially, it was a matter of trying to motivate players to play with both a Low and High RTP ad or better yet - understand how people responded to both. The team also ran an ad that did not state the RTP. So, BIT decided to ask three distinct questions:

1. Does RTP information affect player behaviour?
2. Do people read RTP information on adverts?
3. Does the RTP change feelings towards the advert?

The findings may seem "common sense" to some onlookers, but they are a definitive look inside the black box that is human behavior. So, as expected, players who saw the 93% RTP ad were more likely to think they could win money – although the rate itself suggests that money is expected to be lost.

Comparing further into how the two ads have performed, BIT said that players who saw the High RTP ad were also more likely to try the game. Essentially, players actively pick higher RTP when they choose their games, but then again, the difference in players choosing either is not too great – 51% vs 47% according to BIT when players had to decide between a Low and High RTP game - based on the ads.

Interestingly, a similar percentage of people decided to play when there was no RTP, around 48%, the experiment revealed.

What this means is that the high RTP did have a higher overall level of engagement but not by that much. Of course, this may have very well to do with the fact that some players may have simply glossed over the ad, taking away only the "10 free spins" bit, or failing to register that the Low RTP ad said "lose" instead of "win."

Experiment shows players are aware of the likelihood of losing money

It’s similarly interesting to note that people do pay attention to RTP, BIT explained in its conclusion. It also interviewed people following their decisions to play after being incentivized by the High RTP, Low RTP and No RTP ads respectively, and asked them several questions.

Essentially, BIT wanted to know if players thought they would win money playing the games. As you can see from the chart above, high RTP ads prompted 21% of players to confirm that they would indeed, with 51% acknowledging that they were most likely going to flop.

The rates of people confident they would win on the Low RTP and No RTP ads, suggested that both groups were about equally confident -13% - 14% that they would turn a profit. Yet, among the Low RTP players, a higher percentage acknowledged that they are in to lose some money.

Image credit: Unsplash.com