In 2021, the online gaming industry in India was valued at approximately $1.1 billion and is now expected to grow to $1.79 billion by 2022. Real-money gaming (RMG) applications, particularly fantasy sports, ludo, and online rummy, have gained significant popularity in recent years due to increased internet speed and smartphone penetration across tier II and tier III towns in India.

As per a report by Google, Tencent, and Bain & Company, the number of active users of RMG in India is estimated to be around 120 million. It manifests the burgeoning demand and scope for the other companies to grow along with the big players like Paytm First Games, Dream11, and Rummy Circle.

The growing craze of RMG

Online real-money gaming is one of the fastest-growing industries in the world, and it’s no surprise that there are now a variety of options out there. And when you club the fun of online gaming with real money, the opportunities become limitless. Multiple businesses cashed in on this moment, especially during the pandemic-induced lockdowns when people had more time as they saved on travel and couldn’t meet their friends and colleagues.

How has the industry grown?

The real-money gaming industry in India has been growing rapidly over the past few years — thanks to unique product positioning, earnest marketing efforts, and targeted advertisement, mostly on social media and television. That said, most of these businesses, despite their efforts, face several challenges, like not being able to meet rising customer expectations to address queries and concerns on time, which often lead to users moving to competitors.

Major challenges faced by RMG companies

1) RMG companies need to provide exceptional customer experience at every touchpoint. One of the biggest challenges is to ensure that players have a positive experience while playing the game. While a lot of it depends on the user experience provided on the app, product quality, and information available, it’s important to ensure that the players feel safe with their money and content with the game including user interface, environment, and decision-making. Businesses should make it clear what can and cannot be earned in-game, as well as inform players about any in-game costs associated with specific features or activities.

2) Another challenge for real-money gaming apps is understanding player behavior. This involves acknowledging why certain users spend more money on the app than others, and what kind of offers or promotions will draw them in. Apps also need to determine which features are most popular among users and then design those features into their product offerings.

5 Ways to Adjust Your CX as per consumer behaviour

3) Determining whether a refund is necessary can be challenging as it involves assessing the user’s behavior, learning if it violates the terms and services, or if there was a technical issue. Factors such as deliberate fraud, game mechanics and game fairness, and the terms of service agreement, play a vital role in defining the eligibility for a refund.

4) Finally, real-money gaming apps must provide personalized customer support to their users from the initial stage where they are playing free games and assessing the features to the action stage where they have invested their money to play real money games. This means providing quick and easy ways for users to contact customer service representatives, as well as addressing any issues they may have with the product. If a business fails to provide adequate support, it could lead players to switch to competitors.

How incorporating a personalized CX strategy could help?

The importance of incorporating a customer experience (CX) strategy cannot be overstated. A well-designed and personalized CX strategy could help real-money gaming businesses retain their existing customers, reach a wider audience, improve brand advocacy, and increase their overall profits.

There are several ways in which you can improve the customer experience for your players. One way is to ensure that all the communications with players are personalized and relevant to their accounts as it would facilitate active participation and a better engagement rate. A business also needs to respond to questions promptly, provide feedback on game performance, and ensure that all interactions are respectful and polite. In addition, ensure that the gaming environment is welcoming, intuitive, and fun.

By inculcating these steps in the journey, you can be a step ahead of your competitors and foster a positive environment where the users feel special. This would invariably mean increased loyalty and free-of-cost brand advocates.

How has JindalX helped?

A contemporary RMG business sought JindalX’s assistance in early 2022 to help them with a tech-focused, personalized customer experience (CX) strategy to address queries run-time and provide an excellent experience to the new users. Using a co-managed service model, we helped them scale by up to 60% in less than 6 months — improving CSAT scores, reducing TAT and FTR, and most importantly customer satisfaction.

We enabled an in-app business process management (BPM) solution, developed AI-based chatbots to run internal processes including helpdesk, query resolution, customer support and IT to streamline customer service operations. This personalized CX strategy not only helped the brand scale but also gain a higher customer satisfaction rate than before. They even reported an upgrade in user interaction by 62% in 2022 as compared with 45% in the past year.

Final thoughts

You understand your business and product the best. But managing a different process, such as customer experience which requires specialized focus, advanced training and automation tools, could get difficult, especially as you scale up. It’s not just about hiring and nurturing customer service representatives but also providing the infrastructure and training modules to help them keep up with the trend.

Leveraging the help of an expert through outsourcing can help you optimize costs without worrying about maintaining customer service. The right partner can streamline the journeys for your customer base across different touchpoints to help you with retention, brand advocacy and most importantly grow.

However, it’s important to carefully evaluate the potential outsourcing partner and ensure that their values align with your company. We have helped clients from over 8 industries across the globe, including real-money gaming, and understand how each differs in their delivery. With our cutting-edge technology, gamification-based training modules, and personalized approach, we have helped them in delivering exceptional customer experience, resulting in increased engagement and customer satisfaction.

Considering an outsourcing CX partner? Contact us today!