Blending the user-centric mindset of Silicon Valley startups with the engagement-driven focus of the igaming industry, Shape Games vision is to deliver superior user experiences for casinos and sportsbooks.
Martin Mouroux Dam, Managing Director of Shape Games, explains how strong user experiences can drive growth by attracting new audiences and distinguishing operators in a crowded market.
In the early 2010s, as mobile apps became the latest must-have innovation for digital businesses, research into the user experience exploded. Every new delivery, taxi, or streaming app sought UI/UX designers to create seamless user journeys that maximised conversions and achieved business goals. Designers refined these journeys through A/B testing, evaluating everything from the colour of buttons to the order of onboarding screens. This iterative process led to the “best practices” of today—sleek, simple app designs optimised for conversion.
It may seem straightforward to mimic the designs of these successful apps to boost conversions. While this can help to a degree, it overlooks the thought and testing behind each design decision, which is tailored to a brand’s specific audience and use case.
What is now Shape Games began life as Shape, a Danish agency which built native apps for global brands such as eBay, Apple, and Credit Suisse. With roots in Silicon Valley’s startup culture, Shape quickly established a reputation for helping top companies create user journeys that captivate, engage, and convert.
As the company expanded into the igaming space, Shape spun off Shape Games in 2018, combining its technical expertise with deep igaming industry experience. Shape Games optimises user journeys specifically for the igaming industry, helping operators acquire and retain users at scale.
Solving Unique igaming User Experience Challenges
While Silicon Valley startups have been perfecting user flows to capture global markets, the igaming industry has lagged behind. For years, operators have relied on bonusing schemes and competitive pricing to retain users, often neglecting the importance of user experience.
But superior user journeys can unlock clear competitive advantages.
In their 2015 book Blue Ocean Strategy, Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne introduced the concept of the “red ocean,” referring to highly competitive markets where companies battle over the same pool of customers. In such environments, businesses often resort to price competition and offering similar features, leading to shrinking margins and intense rivalry.
This situation mirrors today’s sports betting and casino markets, where operators offer nearly identical features and have little room to stand out. As a result, significant resources are spent on customer acquisition and retention, typically through marketing and bonuses, while profit margins remain thin.
To break free from this highly competitive “red ocean,” companies can look to create a “blue ocean” — an uncontested market space. Rather than competing with rivals largely on price and marketing spend, companies shift their focus to what users truly value, offering new, innovative products or services that create fresh demand. A well-known example is Uber, which revolutionised the taxi industry by removing friction, introducing ridesharing, and tapping into the gig economy.
Most users prefer the simplest path to achieving their goal. In sports betting, that goal is entertainment. When users log into a betting app before a match, they want to place a bet quickly and easily to enhance their viewing experience. Encountering too many obstacles or complicated processes diminishes their enjoyment.
The same principle applies to casinos, where players want to find engaging games that suit their preferences, not sift through endless content. If games aren’t categorised meaningfully, they create unnecessary friction, detracting from the fun. By removing obstacles and crafting a smooth, engaging user experience, operators can deliver more of the value that users are seeking.
While enhancing the user experience may not be a revolutionary innovation, it can be a powerful differentiator in a mature and saturated market. If an app is easy to log into, offers clear onboarding, and supports straightforward cashouts, it satisfies both the operator and the end-user. When combined with engaging content at key touchpoints and a personalised experience, it creates an app that users enjoy returning to.
A Seamless Frontend Experience, From Operator to End-User
With its Danish roots, Shape Games offers a front-end solution designed to help sportsbooks attract and retain users through a seamless and engaging experience. The platform is built with the end-user in mind, ensuring user flows are intuitive and easy to navigate, regardless of the device.
Shape Games also incorporates built-in engagement features, encouraging users to spend more time on the app while receiving added value. To help operators differentiate their offerings, the platform provides a wide range of customisation options, ensuring that no two brands look or feel the same.
Moreover, Shape Games supports third-party integrations with PAMs, odds feeds, and data suppliers, providing operators with a unified platform that connects to a wide variety of backend services.
By packaging everything into one frontend, Shape Games delivers what users ultimately want from igaming: entertainment.