October 15, 2020 at 4:45 PM by Thomas
Quentin Etievant is the marketing director of Zebet, the operator with the red mascot.
A recent player in the competitive sector of bookmakers authorized in France by the online gaming authority (ARJEL), Zebet is making his hole and showing that he exists. The operator, Zeturf’s little brother focused on equestrianism, is present this 2020-21 season, on the shorts of the players of players from the professional squad of AS Saint-Etienne and the chest of the jersey, of the players of the Reims stadium.
Zebet’s marketing director, Quentin Etievant, explains this rise to power through sponsorship …
From the first approaches with AS Saint-Etienne, to the sponsorship of the shorts, tell us what happened …
Quentin Etievant: With Saint-Etienne, the story started on a pure advertising level two seasons ago. We wanted to position Zebet on Ligue 1 pitches. Then, last season, we had the opportunity to become an “official partner” of the club. Without jersey visibility, but with a whole interesting package of activations. In particular, a hospitality product (the Zebet experience), inevitably undermined today, with the Covid. This year we added an extra with visibility, on the shorts, because the partnership went well. We wanted to continue the experience with ASSE and it made sense to continue, to move upmarket with the club, which is playing the game well, in terms of activations and what we can do, especially in digital. An operator is there to offer, and not just odds. In terms of animating our player communities, we need to offer content. Working with a club like Saint-Etienne but also Reims now feeds our communication strategy.
When it comes to Reims, you spoke of a partnership “of opportunity”. Because wanting to be a sponsor isn’t enough to become one?
Quentin Etievant: No of course, we are in a very competitive industry. Saint-Etienne is a pillar, Reims it actually comes from an opportunity at the end of last season, and an observation on the allocation of our advertising investments, for the coming season. We told ourselves at Zebet that we needed to strengthen our visibility in Ligue 1, because it remains our starter. And we saw throughout the lockdown that we were missing something. We need to be on local competitions because all the operators are there too. To stay in the game, we need to be there. We had spotted Reims for a while, because what the club offers on its social networks is similar to Zebet, with more offbeat content on the market.
Is the qualification of Reims in the Europa League a missed opportunity for you?
Quentin Etievant: It would undoubtedly have brought a little greater visibility for the club. For us in pure sponsorship, less, because we would not have been a major partner, we would not have been visible on the club’s outfits, on the European stage.
“An investment that forces us to produce things”
Do you have any plans to forge other partnerships in Ligue 1?
Quentin Etievant: No, that’s already good. And a lot to do. We have ideas that must be declined, although the period means that everything has to be organized faster. It forces you to be more agile. It’s like what we did with Saint-Etienne two years ago, we signed a first year without visibility jersey, but it was done on purpose so that we learn to manage a partnership and that we do not not resting on our laurels, a beautiful jersey visibility, which we are happy with. A partnership must be activated. We have two clubs and some great clubs that work well with what Zebet wants to do. The point is to write history and to exploit it.
Does it represent a big budget for you?
Quentin Etievant: Yes, it’s an investment that forces us to produce things. It fits well in multimedia, compared to what might be requested on other offline media, and what might be compared to television or the rights explosion. And from an advertiser point of view, we are starting to have more and more difficulty in the visibility of who is actually watching matches or streams.
Does the current health context call into question the strategy?
Quentin Etievant: The numbers we see after the lockdown, and the exceptional upturn in August with the Champions League and the start of the championship, show us that punters are starting to regain interest in matches. I’m not sure that will be the case again in a few months, because we are still on show sport, which needs the public. The effects of the in camera or others we will perhaps see more in a few months than now. There, there is a real recovery of the sports market, a real expectation to find real and good sport. In September, the waypoints are pretty good compared to what we did in previous seasons at the same time, or even at the start of the year.
“The mascot is now inseparable from our communications”
There is strong competition in Ligue 1, between all operators. How do you stand out?
Quentin Etievant: The basics of a successful gaming operator are having a good product, a good offer, good odds and of course good communication that will set you apart. We have this particularity in the market of having offers that are all alike. We work in a global context, where it is complicated to create product differentiation. The difference comes from the price we put on it, the attractiveness of the odds and then, all the “tam-tam” that we can do around, in terms of communication, to stand out. Zebet came onto the market later. One of our first copies was: “In the world of sports betting there are small” bets “and there is Zebet. “Because indeed when we list the competitors, we notice that we all have almost the same word (editor’s note, Zebet, Unibet, Betclic …). There is therefore a need to create differentiation. From the start at Zebet, it went through the creation of our mascot, to put a face and a very strong visual cue through our name.
Are you the only operator to have one?
Quentin Etievant: Yes. And that was the point to do it first. We still use it, today it is inseparable from our communications.
Let’s go back to the confined spring, how did it go for the brand?
Quentin Etievant: Sports betting suffered for two months, until the resumption, when everyone discovered Belarusian football. July and August were the explosion, with the Champions League effect which, in itself, was a curiosity. It was the first time she had fought in the summer, we had two French teams involved, we were wondering what it would be like. And finally it was a success. The knockout matches created a very strong interest. The Paris route in August, over a semi-final and final, produced scores close to World Cup level. Not so much in terms of the stakes, but the attraction to the players. The confinement was otherwise for us a job of maintaining contact with the community. And on the other hand, a lot of technical work, since we launched our new application in May.
How do you see this 2020-21 season, in this context of permanent questioning?
Quentin Etievant: There is an adaptation of our organizations to be more agile, and to set up all the processes on a daily basis, or in the signing of our contracts, to never be blocked and be in very strong reaction. We are digital, it is in our nature not to drag on the choices. We need reactive structures that allow decisions to be taken at all levels, so that we can seize the opportunities that arise, or conversely, be able to decelerate very quickly in the event of cancellation of competitions.