Gambling Process Through the Internet - Case Study Example

Alternative Markets Contents Introduction 3 Situation Analysis 4 Empirical Information 8 Critical Reflection 9 Specific Perspectives 10 References 12Introduction Social marketing is an advanced marketing concept which influences the attitude and behaviour of customers. It also can be called as an integrated and developed marketing concept. It is generally used to provide benefits to the society and community. It is sometimes recognized as the practice of commercial marketing. It can attract a large number of audiences and it is based on a theory and integrated research. It can gain the competitive advantages in case of give information about a product. Traditional meaning of social marketing is doing good work for the society. No financial terms are related with this phase. But in recent days as the commercial marketing practices are totally involved and merged with the social marketing so this concept is now related to financial interests. In the year 1970 this concept was 1st launched in the market with the help of Philip Kotler and Gerald Zaltman. They used this marketing principle to sell the idea, behaviour and attitude of any particular company. At the point of time social marketing was completely involved to influence the social behaviour but now it is used for the benefits of marketers. 4 p’s are used to promote a product through social marketing sites. These 4 p’s are price, product, promotion and place. In case of social market price can be granted as the cost of changing behaviours of the target and potential customers. Social marketing is always trying to reframe the views of consumers so that they can realize that they are benefitted to change a particular brand by spending a certain amount of money. In social marketing place represents the convenient location to get the particular product in an easy way. It is already discussed that social marketing is used as a promotional tool which influence the purchasing behaviour or shopping policy of customers. It is also a place for commercial campaign. The message and recommendations provided through social media will impact on the consumers in a positive way and they are directed by it to change their behaviour of consumption and purchasing decisions. Product is nothing but the mode of attraction for changing attitude and behaviour of consumers through social media. It is generally recognized as an image by which social media cam do approach to the mass. Now online gambling has become a very serious event which is going to destroy the well build reputation of social marketing because it is used as the most used place for gambling in the present days. It has a very serious negative impact on the economy of the individual country as well as world economy. There are many types of gambling which exist in the online social marketing. Those are poker, casinos, sports betting, bingo, house racing betting, lotteries, mobile gambling, UK national lottery, provably fair gambling, In- play gambling etc. Situation Analysis Online gambling is known as iGambling or Internet Gambling. It is the most common term which is frequently used in the social media and in the field of social marketing. The tendency of using gambling is increasing day by day especially among the youth group in the society. It has become serious risk behaviour among the people. Almost every age group are affected but influenced or attracted by it. So it has gained the popularity by the demand from public. The perception of playing gambling has been changed now. Earlier it was nothing but a play or game concept (Bruce, 2005). But from the last few decades it has become one of the sources to earn money. So people especially the young generation are attracted more to earn huge amount of money in a simple and less time consuming way. People used this way to solve the financial and monetary problems in their lives and solve the family problems also. Family become happy and they will also get the pleasure and start to depend on this process. Again and again if they win money then a trust and confidence will be developed among themselves and gambling will be a regular practice for majority of the population (French, Merritt and Reynolds, 2011). People also forget the anxiety, loneliness, boredom, work pressure, stress of life by playing the gambling. So many people are also attracted to get relief from the mentioned problems and also get energy to start their days in a new way. Social marketing network also provide strategic advice to the public for playing gambling in an efficient way. They also get training and detailed description about the game plan from the social marketing web sites. Many programs are organized on the basis of this subject and membership scheme also are provided to the public for getting better benefit. Some research works are also done to get the information about the popularities of game plan and how much extra features the public want to add the game plans, which are not popular at all and need to redesign etc. After that researcher will inform the companies who are involved in such practices and then they will redesign and implement extra facilities or features to the existing games according the necessity of the customers to fulfil their demands and requirements (Proctor, 2007). Gambling gives an opportunity to the public from escaping the existing problems in the life. It works like an addiction like drugs and alcohol. Multi billion dollars are invested in this field in the present days. More advanced financial mechanism has been implemented in this case and more advanced technologies are used for the said purpose. In the current years it has gained the maximum potential customers. Gamblers have introduced so many features to attract people. These features are proxy gambling, claim of gambling, gambling for credit etc (Sargeant, 2009). The revenue earned from internet gambling was approximate US $ 24.5 billion in the year 2010. It was much higher than the revenue earned from the same source in the year 2006 [US $ 15.2 billion approximate]. In the year 2000, revenue earned from internet gambling was only US $ 2.2 billion (approximate figure). So it is clearly observed that in the last 10 years revenue earned from this source has been increased in a rapid speed. More than double revenue has been earned by the companies who are involved in such kind of practices. It will affect the economic condition and push it to reach in an unstable situation (Doyle, 2003). In the above bar graph this is clearly observed that global internet gambling yield [estimated value] has been increased constantly from the year 2000 to the present year 2014 and it is also clearly anticipated that in the coming year 2015 the scenario will remain unchanged. As the trend says that the yield is generally increasing so it can be predicted that in the next year it will also be increased more than the previous year or at least will remain at the same level in case of worst situation (Gainsbury, 2012). It is also observed that the growth of this sector remain unchanged during the financial crisis and in the time of recession at the end of the year 2000. One reason may be worked behind the growth of this business. At that point of time people had more leisure time in their hand apart from work and so they were more involved to play gambling. People were also tensed due to the reason of recession and their economic and personal life was unstable at that time (Schwartz, 2005). So to forget their unstable condition and to earn some money to fulfil the needs of their own and their family they selected this way as a better opportunity. According to the product market share it can be observed that the population of Europe is more involved in this practice than the other countries in the world. 47 % [approximate value] of the total gambling market in the world has occupied by Europe. After the Europe, Asia and Middle East countries hold the 2nd position [28 %]. 3rd position is holding by the North America [16 %]. Africa, Australia, Oceania, South and Central America, Caribbean etc. countries and continents hold more or less same position [5 %, 2 % and 1 %] (Thierer and Crews, 2003). Retention and acquisition of players is a very crucial part in case of online gambling. Some marketing efforts have to be taken by the existing companies to stay perfectly in the competitive market and increase the number of new players and also for the retention of existing players. So some promotional activities can be observed through the social marketing sites. Statistical report says that in the year 2009 internet gambling operators have invested around US $ 30, 000 to US $ 50, 000 on monthly basis in the marketing and promotional activities of gambling (Spapens, Littler and Fijnaut, 2008). They have a conception that if they will spend more money in the marketing activities or provide more amount of bonus then they will get the competitive advantages among the existing established brands. Few internet gambling operators spend more than US $ 1 million per month for the marketing activities. The amount spend in the marketing activities was increased at the first phase of 2010 when FIFA World Cup was started. Many sites who are related to gambling practices offer sign up bonuses to the emerging players. Again they offer bonus as per the loyalty of players, referring friends and relatives, repeat deposit etc (Lee and Kotler, 2011). Internet gambling operators develop strategies and make effective and attractive planning to compete with the rivalry, solve the payment processing problems and increase the confidence and trust of the customers. Empirical Information The internet gambling operators try to make such atmosphere where customers will feel safe and secure at the time of gambling. For the concern of security they provide online payment and receive facilities through internet banking. For such facilities customers need not to carry hard cash with them. With their supportive behaviour they try to meet customer’s satisfaction, web site reliability, privacy and security and 3rd party endorsement (Bankman, Griffith and Pratt, 2008). Players have to open an account in the social marketing web sites and after that he can get access for playing gambling. He would get the facility of using credit card and debit card, bank wise transfer facility and direct money transfer facility. If players will face any kind of difficulties then they will move to other web sites without waiting a fraction of second. So operators are very much careful in this regard and take corrective, smart and quick steps to retain the players (Careaga, 2008). High speed and high quality internet access across the world is another reason to increase gambling practices among public. Few policies are changed by the government and development and implementation of advanced technology has forced to get this high quality internet access and make it affordable to all. So people involved in gambling as they have plenty of options in their hands. These options are iPad, webcams, smart phones, and computers etc. which are widely used in the gambling activities (Schüll, 2012). It is the most lucrative business on the internet. As per the statistical report this can be said that almost 70 % adults or young people play UK national lottery on regular basis. This UK national lottery is operated by Camelot Group and they make their annual average sale more than £ 5 billion in every year. They have created more than 2, 800 millionaires in the first 17 years of their business. There are wide ranges of on line casinos exist in the web sites where people can play games such as black jack, baccarat, pachinko, roulette etc. There are several laws and acts which were implemented to control the gambling activities in the world. Federal Criminal Law, The Wire Act, Travel Act, Illegal Gambling Business etc are few examples of those implemented laws and acts (Vogel, 2006). Doing licence is must for running this business in every country in the world. If a person wins certain amount of money from the gambling activities then it will come under the annual gross income and if that person is a tax payer then he has to pay more amount of tax as his gross income is increased by the gambling activities. If he wants to avoid for paying extra amount of tax then this will be violation of laws, rules and regulations of that particular country where the person is live in and the economy of that country is benefitted. But taxpayer also takes deduction in case of losses due to gambling. Many times gambler do not keep track records about their losses and after that they demand estimated amount for the purpose of deduction which become a threat to the economy of that country (McGowan, 2008). Critical Reflection On line casinos are more popular than the traditional casinos as per the recent statistical survey. The reason behind it is the easily accessible internet services throughout the world. At the time of launching internet the government has taken slow action in case of legislation for using internet services. Now the government clarify that on line gambling is legal action if the gambling companies do license for running their business activities. Government in any countries are very much strict for giving license for the said purpose as such kind of business practices will be harmful for economy. So an organized way and proper control are very much necessary to expand the number of gambling business (Thompson, 2001). The availability of internet gambling is one of the reasons for decreasing the productivity of work. If people can get money in such easy process then they would not to utilize their brain in their work and as a result quality of work will be deteriorated. If productivity will be deteriorated then automatically economy of that country will be affected badly. In the present days all the social networking sites are also allowing to do promotion for gamble activities by using their sites. For example- Face book is promoting on line gambling procedure and they declared that their target customers will be those who have more than the age of 18 years (Mayer, 2014). In LinkedIn which is also a popular social networking site this can be observed that more than 100 million users are involved in the gambling practices. Generally on line gambling operator are unable to use the on line gambling web sites for the purpose of promotion and so they use all the social networking sites for their business marketing activities. Twitter also has more than 400 million users who are doing practice in gambling. Only China is an exception in such case. Qzone which is the biggest social networking site in China is not involved in promoting gambling activities. A potential gambling market is gradually emerging in China. So this is predicted that the popular social networking site Qzone will be surely involved in this practice in near future (Johnson and Turner, 2010). Specific Perspectives Internet gambling business is comparatively cost effective than the traditional gambling business. Gambling procedure is completely related to money. So there is a very close relationship between on line gambling activities and economy of the country. Here people invested their money on the basis of risk. If they will win then they will get their invested amount of money along with extra amount of money. In such case they will get profit but on the other hand if they will not win in the game then they will lose the entire amount of money they have invested in the gambling. Now all the invested money will go under the gambling companies and the money is redistributed in wages, profits, public funds, taxes etc. the gambling activities have both positive and negative impact on the economy and society of the country. As the form of tax gambling activities will supply the financial fund to the country’s government. This will help for the growth of the local communities and the economic condition of that particular country. On the other hand this kind of operation sucks money from the economy and the communities of that country (Griffiths and Parke, 2014). But gambling activities provide the mental pleasure which cannot be possible to measure in terms of monetary figure. Again this can be said that gambling operation can change the behaviour of the community which is not desirable to any economy. Las Vegas- the famous city in the US earned its reputation and makes its economy only depending on the gambling activities. This indicates that on line gambling activities will generate more revenue which will be enough for progress an economy and for the growth of a country. Many gambling companies are using the tag line “Win the lotto and change your life” to attract people in the gambling activities. Employment is another crucial part in this case. These kind of gambling businesses increase the opportunities of employment and create the job within the country. This will also help to improve the economic condition in that country. More than 6, 00, 000 people are involved in legal gambling companies in the United States. But the employees who are involved in this industry are generally getting low salary package, poor working condition and low job security. So this kind of job is not called as “good” job in the market. Gambling process is help to reduce the purchasing power of common people in the country which will also affect the economy. Many criminal activities can be observed which are related to gambling operations. So the government of any country should be aware about those offences and should take strict steps to control such activities. As per the report of some research work this can be said that almost 4.5 % of total complain is received by the police in the UK which are related to property and monetary related fraud in the gambling operations (Jaishankar, 2011). References Bankman, J., Griffith, T. and Pratt, K. 2008. Federal Income Tax: Examples & Explanations. New York: Aspen Publishers Online. Bruce, I. 2005. Charity Marketing, Meeting Need through Customer Focus. London: ICSA Publishing. Careaga, A. 2008. Hooked on the Net: How to Say Goodnight When the Party Never Ends. Michigan: Kregel Publications. Doyle, C. 2003. Internet Gambling: Overview of Federal Criminal Law. New York: Nova Publishers. French, J., Merritt, R. and Reynolds, L. 2011. Social Marketing Casebook. London: Sage Gainsbury, S. 2012. Internet Gambling: Current Research Findings and Implications. New York: Springer. Griffiths, M. and Parke, J. 2014. The Social Impact of Internet Gambling. Social Science Computer Review. Vol 18. 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