Philadelphia, PA
- For much of the United States, the idea of being able to go online to place sports bets or play casino games at a regulated platform didn’t even come to mind until 2018. With the repeal of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, states like New Jersey and Delaware leaped at the opportunity to open a new iGaming industry, and Nevada saw ways to expand its offering.
Pennsylvania, however, was quietly ahead of the game. The state’s Truck Stop and Satellite Casino Bill of 2017, which you can read about here, paved the way for more physical slot machines and it legalized iGaming. It took a little longer for an industry to be fully formed and launched, but now, enough time has passed to review its standing. So, has the online gambling industry been a success in the Keystone State?
Numbers Don’t Lie
By all accounts, the Pennsylvania iGaming industry has been going from strength to strength. Naturally, with it being football season, the fall months regularly see the most action in sports betting circles, with another spike always expected in February for the Super Bowl. In September this year, total gambling revenue climbed by 6.2 percent year-on-year to $476.3 million, marking over a four percent increase on the month prior to this year.
Most impressively, the October sports handle reached a new record, according to this source. In that month, the handle alone was $829 million, but growth across many of the major segments was seen overall. Revenue climbed by 7.3 percent on the year before, but the online casino gaming arm fell marginally short of its own new record. Up nearly a whole 25 percent on the year prior, online slots, tables, and poker reached $154.8 million in revenue.
Evidently, iGaming in Pennsylvania is only growing in popularity. We’ve moved beyond the honeymoon window of all the major brands going all-in to secure the first customers, and yet, it’s left a state of play that’s as appealing as ever – if not more so – to bettors and casino gamers. A lot of this can be put down to the quality of the online options, but credit should also be given to the way in which platforms have adjusted to appeal to the audience.
Embracing Free Play
It’s been a go-to marketing strategy for years in the food industry, and it looks like it’s just as appealing in iGaming. Several platforms have embraced the idea of essentially offering a free sample to Pennsylvania players. These come in the form of no-deposit bonuses, as detailed by BonusFinder. If you visit their site, you can see that all of the major platforms have an offering of this kind.
With no-deposit free spins or even a no-deposit bonus cash offer, players just need to make an account to get funds to play the games. This way, players get free time on the real games, seeing if they like what they find or even getting the chance to trial the offering essentially. From there, you get much more informed customers, and informed customers are happy customers as they know what they’re paying for after the no-deposit bonus.
Thanks to innovating in a way that increases accessibility, iGaming has been able to go from strength to strength in Pennsylvania. As revenues continue to grow, more players will enter the game and perhaps even come up with even better ideas to enhance the industry further.
