E time

In 2019 esports wasn’t a sport. In 2020, it was the only sport. At least that was the meme doing the rounds during the darkest days of lockdown, when the coronavirus pandemic had shut pretty much every live event across the globe.
For a bleak few weeks, there was very little live action for customers to enjoy (with honourable exception of the Belarus Premier League) and that clearly presented significant challenges to the gambling industry. At Luckbox, it became an opportunity we were able to capitalise on.
Certainly esports was and still is hit by the pandemic, with the many major events that were due to be held in arenas affected. But most of these events were able to adapt into online tournaments, meaning they could still go ahead, be broadcast live and bet on. Dota tournaments ESL One Los Angeles and ESL One Birmingham switched online, likewise the CS:GO showpiece ESL One Cologne and the regional divisions in League of Legends.
The gambling industry saw a massive uptick in esports betting, with volumes up 40% between 9 March and 19 April, according to EveryMatrix, which also estimated that total wagers on esports could reach $15bn by the end of the year.
As an esports-centric platform, we were already well positioned to ride this wave but we too adapted to capitalise. For a start, we worked quickly to add FIFA and NBA2K betting. These two games are not typically big games in esports circles, but the influx of customers from traditional sports betting fuelled demand. Indeed, EveryMatrix estimated that 80% of esports bets were driven by these titles. The work paid off as our numbers exploded. We saw a 500% increase in betting volume compared with November 2019; the average bet size increase by 200% since January; and a 10-times increase in the number of deposits since January 2020.
The growth was so significant that it accelerated our plans to go public and after raising $5m CAD from investors, we are poised to list on the Toronto Ventures Stock Exchange (TSXV).

AFFILIATE LINKS
As well as adding new games and a slight realignment of some of our marketing messages, the most significant change we made was with affiliates. We had always intended to build an affiliate network but, in truth, it was low priority at the start of the year.
However, with the expected influx in customers coming from traditional sports, we knew it made sense to reach people through existing affiliate platforms and we worked quickly to on-board a select number of high-quality partners and they’ve played a vital role in our growth.
We work with a blend of established sites through networks such as Catena and smaller sites with strong penetration in esports thanks to their loyal and knowledgeable audience.
Between the beginning of March and the end of May, almost 50% of our first time depositors came via affiliates. It’s been so successful that we’re currently in the process of integrating a well-known affiliate platform provider, which will allow us to scale up our operation. With enhanced CRM cycles, we were able to lock up more than 75% of our lockdown uplift and, because we know many of our players are also fans of traditional sports, it’s prompted our team to adapt again and we are working on adding traditional sports to our site to coincide with the return of domestic football across Europe.
One of the key advantages of being a bespoke platform with a dedicated development team is that we can react quickly to changes in the market to cater to customer demands.
We hope that this will make us even more attractive to affiliates as we offer not only an industry-leading esports betting experience, but also the option to bet on the world’s most popular traditional sports.

ESPORTS: NO FLASH IN THE PAN
Since the return of traditional sports, esports betting volumes have held up very well.
CS:GO betting volumes sky-rocketed, with consistent double-digit percentage growth on a monthly basis for both number of bets and betting volumes. Dota 2 volumes dipped slightly, due to a lack of top-tier in-arena events in May compared to April but now back up to 17% growth in volumes. League of Legends betting volumes were also affected by the break between spring and summer splits but, with the return of LCS and LEC in particular, there’s been a 93% growth in volumes and 75% growth in the number of bets in June compared to May.
Just because we’ll offer betting on football, tennis and other sports doesn’t mean we’re turning our back on esports. On the contrary, Luckbox has been built by a team passionate about esports and we know it’s the future.