It’s a deal that will see the online casino and sportsbook operator leverage 2mee’s proprietary HoloMessage solution to deliver video messages from its team and brand influencers at strategic points, directly to customers across its website and app as a clickable pop-up.

The operator described the link as ‘transformational’, having tapped into the benefits of  HoloMessage to scale engagement among reachable customers from its active player base and create awareness of personalised bonuses and offers.

James Riley, CEO of 2mee, said: “We are thrilled to be working with such a high-calibre operator and for William Hill to have enjoyed such a significant uplift in engagement, sign-ups and ultimately revenues from the very first deployment of 2mee’s HoloMessage®.

“This is of course just the start of our partnership and we have already identified many other areas in which HoloMessage can strengthen engagement, foster brand loyalty and ultimately provide a significant boost to customer lifetime value and revenue.”

Moving forward, Hills will begin deploying HoloMessage at ‘critical decision points’ throughout its customer journey. Influencers will be empowered to record messages directly from their smartphones and deploy them via the 2mee platform.

Matt Baulk, Head of Personalisation & Product at William Hill, added on the partnership: “We’ve achieved remarkable success with our initial deployment of HoloMessage, leading us to expand its usage across various touch points in the customer journey, from compliance messaging to sportsbook offers. The technology’s simplicity, from recording to deployment, makes it incredibly user-friendly.”

In its debut campaign with William Hill, the operator targeted a segmented audience with a HoloMessage aimed at driving players to opt-in to marketing campaigns. The results saw a single influencer HoloMessage impression outperform 31 days of a persistent banner ad by 340 per cent. 

Furthermore, the campaign achieved an average engagement rate of 55 per cent with a peak of 64.9 per cent, leading to an increase in customer opt-ins.

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The former aims to personalise and humanise engagement across the entire customer journey via the delivery of influencers as on-screen web and app messages.

As a result of the additional capital and resources, 2mee is aiming to expand its business at pace and scale through the hire of additional specialists, as well as developing additional tech innovations.

2mee is looking to capitalise on the “exceptional growth” via a ramp-up of acquisition, retention and informational messaging at scale across the open web, which it hopes will help “to deliver new levels of sustainable first-party data strategies”.

“Online gambling operators must be heard above the noise being made by their rivals and connect with their audiences in a way that is human and authentic,” commented James Riley, CEO of 2mee. 

“2mee’s technology allows them to do just that, impacting consumer behaviour at the crucial moment of decision.

“In Golden Rock Global, we have a group of people that understand the power and capabilities of our technology and how it can change the game for businesses across many sectors when it comes to acquiring and retaining customers. We are thrilled to be joining forces with GCG and to take 2mee into the next chapter of its success story.”

Golden Rock Global, a listed Special Purpose Acquisition Company that is seeking opportunities within the fintech sector, anticipates that the consideration payable to 2mee shareholders will be in the region of £6m-£8m.

This will be satisfied entirely by the issue of new GCG shares, although the final figure has not yet been determined and is subject to legal and financial due diligence.

Furthermore, alongside the aforementioned move, GCG also plans to undertake a fundraising to raise further working capital for the enlarged group.

Ross Andrews, Chair of Golden Rock Global, added: “We are delighted to be working with 2mee and its cutting-edge platform that allows brands to deliver humans as messages. 

“The global influencer market is big and will only get bigger – 2mee’s technology allows businesses to capitalise on this and to impact consumers at that crucial moment of decision.”

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Raising £500,000 towards the end of March, the direct human messaging service noted that the funding would enable the company to “shift up a gear” with its sales and marketing activity.

Joining CasinoBeats, James Riley, CEO at 2mee, explained what the industry can expect to see from the firm, delving into direct human messaging and how it aids players and operators, socialisation and the metaverse. 

CasinoBeats: You mentioned your latest funding round will allow 2mee to ‘shift up a gear’ when it comes to sales and marketing activity. What can we expect to see from your company in this regard?

James Riley: It certainly will. We are now on the hunt for a Marketing Director that understands the gaming sector and the challenges that casinos, sportsbooks and affiliates face when it comes to engaging their audiences and communicating with them. 

This will strengthen our senior management team having just appointed Brian Smillie as Commercial Strategy Director. Brian is using his vast experience to help drive awareness of 2mee across a range of sectors, and in particular to make the gaming sector aware of the incredible engagement and conversion stats/rates that our human hologram messages deliver.  

CB: Can you explain what your direct human messaging platform is, how it works, and how it benefits players and operators alike? 

JR: Our technology is actually really simple but extremely powerful. The platform has been developed to facilitate face-to-face communication between businesses/brands and their target audiences. It allows brands and organisations to capture and transmit people as messages to generate an emotional connection with the end user. 

This human touch, and the empathy it creates, is what delivers the unprecedented engagement rates and CTRs for our clients. 

The platform itself has been built so that it is stable and incredibly easy to use. Built in partnership with the engineers at IBM, it offers a simple and intuitive user interface masking a very powerful marketing system. 

Simply record the person delivering the message from any setting by using the smartphone in their pocket; our algorithms recognise the human form and cut out the surrounding clutter. The end result is a very powerful messaging device that focuses the viewer on the person and the message. 

In addition to hologram messages, the platform also sends ‘standard’ text and rich media messaging so there is no need to dual platform. It also integrates seamlessly with CRM systems. 

CB: Socialisation within igaming has begun to take centre stage when it comes to player’s experience – much delayed in my view – why do you think the industry is focusing more on social interaction?

JR: We are all intrinsically social and we all want to see and be a part of what is going on around us. We are a tribal species, and we all want to feel part of a tribe. If you look generally at the way online entertainment is heading, it is all about shared social experiences. 

The gambling industry is going to have to offer this too, and that is why we have seen the rise of slot streaming and other more interactive casino and sports betting experiences. 

Of course, 2mee and its human hologram messaging platform fits perfectly into this move toward greater socialisation. What’s more social than sending a brand ambassador directly to the user’s pocket or desktop?

CB: Can you delve into your Human Hologram Messages? 

JR: Our human hologram messages have been designed to meet a wide range of operator and affiliate requirements. Having a person as the interface for a brand has a lot of uses, from pushing bonuses and promotions to guiding players through KYC, acting as a key touchpoint for customer support and even making responsible gambling interventions. 

Regardless of the use, the underlying fundamental is the same and that is using real people to deliver messages that impact players on an emotional level.  

CB: With the metaverse the buzz conversation at the moment, crypto seeming to be here for the long haul, and a general consensus that online will be ‘the new reality’, just how important is it for a safe and secure messaging platform?

JR: Online is the new reality, but, despite this, we still need to feel connected. Operators must also ensure that players remain safe and protected in these increasingly immersive, sophisticated and comprehensive digital worlds, and human hologram messaging allows them to connect in a real-world way in these new online environments. 

Of course, these new technologies present challenges for platforms such as ours, but that is why 2mee’s architecture has been built in conjunction with IBM to ensure our platform is safe, secure and can also keep pace with technological advancements.  

CB: Can greater use of instant messaging enhance engagement with possible problem gamblers, mitigating the need for potentially intrusive measures such as affordability checks?

JR: Absolutely. Making interventions with players that are displaying signs of problem play requires sensitivity and empathy. Text messages or live chat pop-ups lack the human touch and can do more damage than good when it comes to providing support to those that need it. 

Let me explain by way of example. During the pandemic, the UK government sent out a series of text messages encouraging people to go for their COVID-19 vaccine. The text messages were written in capital letters, which gave the impression of being shouted at. That was not the intention, I’m sure, but it goes to show how text on its own lacks emotion and empathy. 

That is not the case with human hologram messaging – it is said that 90 per cent of all communication is non-verbal so while most of this is lost when sending an SMS, email or live chat pop up, it is captured fully in a hologram video. 

CB: Is there a risk that the use of direct human messaging could have a negative effect?

JR: There is no risk in my opinion. The world is quickly moving online and with shared experiences in a wide range of digital environments and worlds. Human interaction will be just as important in these online spaces as they are in real life, and 2mee will be a major player by providing face to face communication within these spaces. 

In fact, I would argue that our technology provides a real sense of authenticity in a world progressively driven towards AI. 

CB: In the US, can this technology benefit operators with regards to KYC by learning more about demand for different products/betting markets in different states?

JR: The 2mee platform has a sophisticated back-end that collates a range of stats and data from each message and presents it to marketeers in real time. They can analyse these stats to determine message and campaign performance, and then tweak if necessary. Even if the campaign is not hitting the mark, it takes just minutes to record another message and distribute it. 

This data-led approach will allow marketers to understand what is and is not working with players across all US states, and then deploy fully optimised campaigns that they know will engage their players.

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Raised in its latest funding round, the platform – which helps online gambling operators enhance its player communication and engagement services – will also look to partner with more online sportsbook and casino brands that seek to connect with players. 

“We are thrilled to have closed our latest funding round led by experienced tech investors,” stated James Riley, CEO of 2mee. “This will allow us to deploy our ambitious expansion plans and help more sportsbook and casino operators harness the power of face-to-face communication.

“2mee provides unrivalled engagement and CTR rates, allowing operators to take player acquisition and retention to the next level in what has become a fiercely competitive, and expensive, market.

“We have made great early progress but the additional capital we have brought into the business via this funding round will allow us to drive greater awareness of the 2mee product and to work with more operators and brands than ever before.”

2mee’s patented technology allows gambling operators to send human hologram messages directly to customers in a way that allegedly “demands their absolute attention”. 

The product has been deployed by brands such as Betfred and Sportsbet.io to leverage the power of emotional intelligence to boost acquisition, retention and deliver KYC and compliance messaging. 

The company’s technology, patented in Europe, China, Hong Kong and the US, allows its customers to send messages across all of the channels where their audiences are active including web – via push and pull messaging – and native mobile applications.

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Hi Dave. Thanks for speaking to CasinoBeats. Can you start by telling us a little about the 2mee story?

“2mee came into existence to find new ways to humanise digital communications. Founded in the UK in 2012 as an R&D company, 2mee has invented and patented the concept of real people, and any physical objects, appearing as augmented reality (in place of the computer-generated imagery currently used). There are a vast number of potential applications for this technology.

“2mee then used its core ‘DNA’ to invent and patent the groundbreaking digital communications system called Face Messaging, driven by the fact that the largest part of understanding comes from facial cues. The company has developed a human face segmentation technology (using mobile phones) and developed a highly sophisticated global exchange to receive and send video face messages on a device agnostic basis.

“…looking at the speaker’s face can build trust in 33 milliseconds – and communicates 60,000 times faster than text.”

“The first commercialisation of 2mee Face Messaging is for push notifications allied to in-app communications for B2C brands to use in their own mobile apps. The emphasis is on optimising the quality of customer engagement by literally putting a face to the brand. Academic research has shown that looking at the speaker’s face can build trust in just 33 milliseconds – and communicates 60,000 times faster than text.”

It’s early days but obviously you anticipate a significant take-up from gaming operators – is there evidence they want this option? 

“The first applications will be in the gambling sector because Face Messaging brings benefits at multiple levels that can positively impact any company’s bottom line. We are currently in advanced stage meetings with multiple global operators in the sector to identify next stage partners.

“Reaction from everyone we have spoken to in the gaming sector has been incredibly positive. Face Messaging in push notifications and inside an app, is seen as a revolutionary brand engagement tool that will help drive player acquisition, nurturing, growth and win back engagement across all products.

“Major clients in other sectors will be announced shortly too, including entertainment, media, health and utility services.”

“we are in advanced meetings with multiple global operators“

Do you think that in a world obsessed with SEO, impressions and social virality that the humble push message is being neglected?

“Over the years many marketeers have been obsessed with quantity rather than quality – with SEO and impressions. But the swift and powerful shift into mobile gaming, for all age groups but especially younger adults, has been relentless.

“The so-called ‘Millennial generation’ (born between the early 1980s and mid 1990s) and the following ‘Generation Z’ are digital natives that have defined what 21st century consumerism is all about. They love brand honesty and, if they feel involved, they will spread brand messages very widely. If a brand embraces them appropriately, they become the most loyal patrons of that brand and product.

“These young smartphone users click, tap or swipe on their phones an amazing 5,427 times a day. For Millennials and Gen Z the mobile phone is their window on the world – connecting them with friends, music, information, sport, entertainment and interacting with their favourite brands.

“Research shows that these younger adults are hard to reach through advertising and, while 71 per cent of them find push notifications annoying they are more likely to use them than older groups. They respond to the immediate, especially when there is a perceived personal element – such as being spoken to directly by a brand.”

Post GDPR, presumably customers will need to opt in to this service? How has GDPR changed push marketing, if it has?

“The GDPR is creating complexities for some digital forms of marketing but has little impact on Face Messaging as push notifications. Because a 2Mee SDK is simply inserted into the brand’s existing app, no additional permissions are required.”

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2mee Face Messaging enables online operators to create quick, real-time video content with their brand ambassadors and deliver it straight to players’ devices.

The technology has been designed to be simple and intuitive for both operator and brand
ambassador. The operator uploads a brief and a script to the 2mee platform, which the
ambassador can access via their mobile device.

The ambassador then records the video message on their smartphone and sends it back to the operator, who then pushes it out to their players via a native app. This can be done at any time from any location, meaning operators have access to bespoke video content on
demand.

The face-to-face messages can help operators achieve an emotional connection with their
customers, while different player demographics can be targeted with different messages for a personalised campaign.

Dave Soppelsa, founder at 2mee, said: “Operators are constantly looking for ways to tap into the psyche of their players and ensure their marketing messages can be heard loud and clear; video push notifications are the most effective way of doing this.

“A personal connection is such an important factor in driving brand awareness, and by combining the power of video with an operator’s brand ambassador, new levels of engagement can be achieved.”

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