World Cup 2026 was the biggest betting event the planet has ever seen. Globally, users wagered over $50 billion on the tournament. DraftKings noted a 650% increase in wagers compared to the last World Cup in Qatar four years ago.
“We’re talking the equivalent of ten Super Bowls,” said Neil Walsh, SVP of Sportsbook at Hard Rock Bet. “A sport we were once told Americans would not embrace turned into one for the history books. The whole country wanted in.”
Kalshi alone saw users trade over $33 billion during the 39-day tournament. Over 3 million people downloaded the prediction market app as the company invested heavily in advertising. A partnership signed during the tournament made the prediction market an official FIFA partner, and its branding was displayed along the side of the pitch during matches.
Online, gambling companies also spent huge amounts on advertising. The largest advertisers increased spend by up to 126%. But not all of it was worthwhile.
A large portion of ads targeting new users were not seen by human eyes, but by bots. Operators further wasted precious dollars in splurging on ads to existing customers who were already consistently using their platform.
Up to 22% of Ad Spend is Wasted
Ad verification platform TrafficGuard works with over 100 betting operators around the globe. In a report released earlier this month, the company noted that gambling companies spent over $200 million on ads during the World Cup.
“It’s a competitive market, and flagpole events like the World Cup are big land grab opportunities, particularly in the US,” TrafficGuard COO Matt Sutton told CasinoBeats in an interview this week.
“As expected, the World Cup saw a massive amount of increased ad spend,” said Sutton. “This led to a massive increase in the amount of registrations, a massive increase in deposit volume, and deposit value, but also an increase in wasted spend on returning users and wasted spend on bots.”
“For every $100 you spend on brand search, $20 of that reaches your existing customers who were coming back anyway, and would have come whether they saw an ad or not.”
“You’re obviously increasing the CAC (Cost of Acquisition of the Customer) against the LTV (Lifetime Value) on those customers, and you’re damaging profitability. That $20 would have been put to better use acquiring a new user who registered for the first time. And so, really, it’s about balancing that equation,” Sutton adds.
In total, the company estimates that 22% of ad spending goes to traffic that brings zero dollars back to the company.
Cat & Mouse Game Catching Bots
A study released before the World Cup showed that soccer gamblers placed substantially more bets on Qatar 2022 when watching matches with gambling advertising.
Since then, the world has moved further online, with ad campaigns increasingly targeting users online. But a big problem is the spread of bots. Around 3 to 5% of all ad-click traffic is bots, says Sutton. The aim for operators is to reduce that figure to 2-3%, but this is increasingly challenging as bots proliferate and technology becomes more sophisticated.
“It’s a constant cat and mouse game,” says Sutton. “A piece of analytics software that is designed to click on ads and get information might not be malicious, but it’s completely wasted spend for companies.”
“Some general invalid traffic actually self-identifies as a bot. Other traffic does not and can be a lot more difficult to detect and prevent against, but the technology continues to evolve all the time.”
This is where TrafficGuard becomes essential for operators, says Sutton. Its tools are evolving alongside bots to catch the machines.
“Invalid traffic is what we do, all day, every day. We analyse data, analyse devices, look at user traffic behaviour, capture this intelligence. Things like mouse movements can now be used on sites, which will then help us to identify when that is actually coming from a bot.”
“Major tournaments will always drive record acquisition spend, and record spend will always attract invalid traffic,” said Matthew Ratty, CEO of TrafficGuard. “The operators best placed for the next World Cup or Super Bowl are those who can separate genuine new players from bots and from existing customers navigating through paid ads, before the budget is gone rather than after.”
Sutton adds that one of the company’s customers said it is now a “competitive disadvantage” not to use TrafficGuard.
Operators Chase High Value Users
TrafficGuard gives operators access to a real-time dashboard to analyze its data.
“They can see across all of the budgets spent on the channel, they can see exactly how many users they’re winning, and how many of those users are new users versus returning users. If they’re returning users, they can see how many times they are returning. What click frequency behaviour looks like, and which campaigns and keywords they are returning across. If they want to, they can match that cost back to the deposit value,” says Sutton.
While Sutton says the company does not identify users, sophisticated operators can use the data and tie it to their user base. This can help identify the key users who generate profit for the company.
“I think it’s well known that the top few percentiles of depositors pay for the long tail of players that they lose money on,” he adds. “Sophisticated marketeers using our technology are able to look at it on a user level basis, to understand how many actual users they are winning for every $100 that they spend.”
The majority of users cost more to acquire than they generate for a gambling operator, but those select few, high-value users drive a large portion of revenue.
“If 3% of your users are driving the profitability for the company and you can increase that to 5%, that can have a massive impact on the overall profitability of the operator.”
After acquiring these users, the battle is then to keep them. This is where VIP programs come into play, which have faced criticism for encouraging problem gamblers. FanDuel came under fire recently for sending a personalized message from Philadelphia Phillies star Bryce Harper to a gambling addict.
Unfortunately, that is the business model for most gambling companies. When running ad campaigns, the main aim is to ensnare those users who are going to pile thousands, maybe even millions, of dollars into their gambling accounts. Terry Thompson, the recipient of Harper’s message, wagered $18.5 million on FanDuel, losing $1.5 million.
Market Reaching Maturation Point
Major events like the World Cup still represent a significant opportunity to acquire new users, but the industry has moved into a more mature phase now, says Sutton.
Operators are saying “Yes, we’re chasing user acquisition, but not at all costs. We want our paid media to be driving as many profitable users as possible. and our most sophisticated operators and partners and marketers are able to use TrafficGuard to understand how many users they’re winning, how much they’re paying for those users, and whether they are profitable.”
There remain some relatively untapped markets, however. Missouri launched its sports betting market in December, and operators spent big trying to attract customers. Spending exceeded revenue, resulting in the state collecting less tax than expected.
Latin America, especially Brazil, is also a target for new acquisitions. Companies increased ad spending in the region by 99% during the World Cup, more than in any other region. Asia also saw a large increase in spending during the tournament, up by 74%.
In competitive, emerging marketplaces, using tools like TrafficGuard becomes even more important, says Sutton. Google Pay-Per-Click (PPC) will continue to be the major part of the acquisition story.
“As the market continues to grow and get more and more competitive, making sure that you’re acquiring as many new users as possible and that you’re not wasting money on reacquiring users or bots, is going to be absolutely critical to being competitive and profitable,” Sutton says.
Flutter, DraftKings, and PENN‘s interactive segment all lost money in their recent Q2 reports, but the companies are playing the long game. Time will tell whether their splurge on acquiring new users pays off in the end.
