「より持続可能なギャンブル市場に向けて」 -Šimon Vincze

Simon Vincze, Head of Sustainable & Safer Gambling at Casino Guru, sat down for our latest affiliate interview on the Affiliate Grand Slam.

Šimon Vincze describes Casino Guru as a source of honest casino reviews and a database of online casinos. We provide information, not advertising, and we focus on visitor satisfaction and don’t encourage visitors to gamble. He talks about some of their projects, including the Casino Guru Academy, the Global Self-Exclusion Initiative, the Complaint Resolution Center, educational content, and the Fair Gambling Codex – his story continues below.

Casino Guru Story: What is Casino Guru?

Casino Guru is an affiliate website with the largest database of online casinos and bonuses from a business point of view. We specialize in objective reviews, which allows users to choose and play at casinos they can trust.

However, we aim to change the gambling industry for the better by following our values through projects such as the Casino Guru Academy and the Global Self-Exclusion Initiative, the Complaint Resolution Center, educational content, and the Fair Gambling Codex.

All of these efforts have to do with the values that have been part of the casino guru from the beginning. The project was started by two best friends who worked as software developers and were tasked with designing and creating software for online casinos. As they got to know the industry, they decided to create a website about online casinos and use their technology to make it stand out.

They decided to do it on the basis of structured data, an approach that allows us to work with data and review it based on objective information. The first version was launched in May 2016, and more than five years later, Casino Guru is one of the biggest websites on the internet.

What is the role of Casino Guru in the online industry?

It’s hard to pinpoint one role because we do so much, but we can summarize the most important ones.

Casino Guru is a database of online casinos, casino games, and casino bonuses. One of the biggest resources for online gambling, people come to our website for information.

Importantly, we are also a source of honest casino reviews that follow a rigorous methodology that focuses on objective data and parameters. It reads fine print, so players don’t have to read it. These reviews help visitors really understand how reliable, fair, and safe the casino is.

We aim to be a driving force for change that makes online gambling safer for everyone. The non-profit projects I lead, such as the Casino Guru Academy and the Global Self-Exclusion Initiative, aim to do just that. I am confident that companies operating in this industry can also benefit from a more sustainable gambling market, and I hope that our efforts will move in the right direction.

What sets you apart from other affiliates and what makes your site unique?

I think our approach of providing information rather than advertising is one of the things that sets us apart. Our aim is to provide our visitors with the best possible information so that they can make well-informed decisions about where to play, what games to play, how to play or whether they should gamble. We don’t drive customers to gamble. Instead, we state things as they are. If you think a casino or game is bad, just say it. I think it’s very important in this industry.

Our systematic approach to almost everything is another differentiator. We use a fine-tuned process for our casino reviews and regular updates, which allows us to maintain objectivity, minimize errors, and produce reproducible results. Thanks to this, users can rely on the information they find on our site.

I also think our global presence is unique. Casino Guru is available in 17 languages, allowing users in most parts of the world to access information about the casino in a language they understand. This can also be found on our forum, where users can discuss issues in any language thanks to automatic translation.

What is your approach? What are your goals?

To put it simply, our approach is to do the best we can and align with the values that have been part of the casino guru from the beginning. We believe that we should focus on the satisfaction of our visitors and ensure that they can enjoy online casinos fairly and safely. In our opinion, it would be better for this goal to be strict and better on the casino.

We hope that this approach and our values will help us achieve our goal of becoming the most visited website about online casinos in the world. In addition to the obvious business benefits, this helps to help as many players as possible and influence their gambling decisions in a positive way. We are moving in the right direction.

You will judge a player’s dissatisfaction in accordance with your fair gambling code. Can you tell us more about how you make your players safer and the fairness of the game?

The main idea of the Fair Gambling Code and how to deal with complaints is fairness. We are always looking for the best and fairest way to deal with any issues that arise between the casino and its players. Just because a casino has terms and conditions written on it doesn’t mean it’s okay.

For example, we have seen casinos state in T&Cs that they can close a player’s account at their discretion and keep all the funds that were there. Since most players don’t read the T&Cs (which is why they read them when reviewing casinos), from a legal point of view, casinos may have the right to enforce this rule. After all, the player agreed to the T&C at the time of the contract. However, if the casino tries to use this rule against them, we will definitely do our best to help the players, because it is absolutely unfair.

Of course, this is an extreme example, many people will think it’s unfair, but it’s a problematic situation where the answer is not clear. To address this, we have weekly meetings to discuss the situation and figure out the best way to deal with it. We look at cases and rules not only from the point of view of the law, but also from the point of view of fairness and ease of use.

This meeting is attended by everyone on the complaints team and other people who have an opinion. For example, I attend these meetings to deal with complaints related to self-exclusion and responsible gambling.

Once you’ve agreed on the best course of action, you’ll know how to deal with similar complaints in the future. If necessary, we will describe the situation and our position in our Fair Betting Codex. Not everything is described yet, but development is progressing, and it will take time to write and translate, but we are working on it now.

Your review is data-oriented, follows a rigorous methodology, and is not for sale. Can you tell us a little bit more about it? Does this help make the casino fairer to players?

Haha, you’re reading our “About Us” page. I think that’s true. I think we, as an industry, need to hold casinos accountable for their actions. If casinos aren’t treating their players fairly, I think they need to point that out and push them to do better. That’s what we’re trying to do in the review.

The review method is set up to ensure that reviews and ratings are completely impartial. They are strictly based on data inserted into our system by the casino’s vetting team. Take a look at the casino’s website to look for complaints or read the full T&Cs to see if they’re fair. All these are used to calculate the casino’s reputation rating. This basically represents the likelihood that a player (who was playing with good intentions and without bad intentions) will get paid without any problems.

This means that the casino really needs to change something to get a better rating from us. If you don’t like a bad review, you can remove the unfair rule that gave you a bad review, or improve the situation of a player who has complained about being treated unfairly. Hundreds of casinos have done so over the years.

Casino Guru has a complaint resolution centre. How did it all start and what is the idea behind this center? How big is it?

Complaints have always been part of our review methodology. However, at first, we only had to search the internet and other gambling websites for complaints about the casino we were considering. Also, long before we opened our grievance center, we were receiving emails of complaints from players who had been wronged to us.

Considering the complaints we are handling on other websites and the complaints we are receiving in our inboxes, we realized that we could set up our own complaint center to help our players by looking at issues in terms of fairness and usability better than anyone else. So we brainstormed, designed, programmed, and launched it.

Since then, the number of monthly complaints has been growing almost constantly. More than 2,021 people have logged 5,532 new complaints on our website, of which 1,631 have been resolved, and a total of $4,243,557 has been returned to players.

Now, we don’t know about the number of websites and forums that help players who are dissatisfied with the casino, but we definitely think it’s one of the largest, if not the largest.

Produce instructional videos to give players a chance to learn and avoid getting into trouble. Tell us more about it.

Yes, we do. We produce educational videos about gambling and publish them on our YouTube channel and website. There is a lot of gambling-related video content on the internet, but unfortunately, I think most of it doesn’t do well in terms of responsible gambling. For example, you can simply search for the best slot strategies, and many of the videos you will see will try to tell you that you can win in slots in an organized manner. Of course, that’s not true.

And I’m not referring to this example by accident. We are currently finalizing our own video on slot strategies, which goes hand in hand with our on-site article on the same topic. We make it perfectly clear that these strategies will not help you win at the casino, but they can help you play slots more effectively and lose less in the long run. Finally, the number one strategy at the end of this video is not to use slots at all, at least from a mathematical point of view. We are doing our best to spread awareness that gambling should be viewed as a costly pastime, not as a way to make money.

Personally, I think this is a bit of a disadvantage because a lot of people click on sensational content that promises to be a huge success, but I also think our approach is correct. It’s worth it if you can get at least some people to understand how things really work and understand that gambling is not a way to make money.

And there is no doubt that our videos have helped at least those who are looking for information about gambling. Our channel currently has more than 900 subscribers, and we are seeing more and more video views every month. And since the number of videos on our channel is very small at the moment, these numbers will start to grow even more rapidly as we have more video content.

The Casino Guru website is available in 17 languages and implements a multilingual forum. What value does this provide?

When we were designing the forum, we spent a lot of time trying to figure out the best way to do it. And considering all the languages that Casino Guru is offering, we decided to implement automatic translation that allows players to communicate seamlessly even if they don’t speak the same language.

And I think it’s very valuable, especially for people who don’t speak English. If you think about it, it’s easy to find a number of big gambling forums on the internet. However, non-English speakers may find it more difficult to find an active forum to discuss gambling with other players in a language they understand. That’s the strength of our forum. It breaks the language barrier and brings together players from all over the world.

I think it is very important for many players to have such an accessible communication channel. Aside from the usual topics such as their favorite slots and biggest wins, casino players can discuss their problems with the casino and share their gambling stories and experiences.

The database contains more than 3,000 casino sites. How do you keep everything up to date?

In fact, there are more than 4,000. Of course, keeping all the information up to date is a big challenge, but we do our best. First of all, we regularly check the casinos registered in our database and more or less review them. That is, check all the data about the casino to make sure it matches reality and correct what has changed since the last time you reviewed the casino.

In addition to that, many casinos contact us every time there is an important change, such as a new language version or a new payment method. Every time we find something new, we add it to the review, but a big regular review update happens regardless.

How do you manage relationships with multiple operators?

Given the size and global reach of our database, I am sure there is a lot of work behind it, but I have to admit that I personally am not very deeply involved in this field of business. There is a team that communicates with operators, discusses the conditions of cooperation and manages funds.

This team is completely independent of the Casino Review team, which collects information about the casino’s website and inserts it into the database. This information is used to calculate ratings and create reviews.

We have set it up this way, so that our reviews and ratings are completely unbiased and are not affected by the financial side of cooperation with any casino.

How do you help make online gambling safer? The goal is to create a global self-exclusion system. Can you tell us more about it?

Much of what we do has to do with helping to make online gambling safer. We have already mentioned many of them: objective reviews, fair gambling codex, impetus to make casinos better, Casino Guru Academy, Global Self-Exclusion Initiative, etc.

In dealing with player complaints and other issues that exist in the gambling industry, we have noticed that the current self-exclusion options are mostly limited to single casino self-exclusion and national self-exclusion schemes, which do not effectively protect vulnerable or dependent players from further gambling harm.

We have seen many stories of addicted players who used a state system like GAMSTOP to interfere with their access to gambling, but then started gambling with foreign operators again. The problem with systems like GAMSTOP is that they are limited to a single jurisdiction, and players can easily find casinos in other countries that are unaware of their self-exclusion and are willing to let them play.

Recognizing that we cannot solve this problem alone, we have decided to launch the Global Self-Exclusion Initiative to raise awareness of this issue and look for partners who can participate in this initiative in order to realize our vision.

Have you ever been to SiGMA? SiGMA Europe, Africa, Asia, or America – if COVID-19 allows, which of these three expos would you like to visit in 2022?

We participated in SiGMA Europe in Malta last year. It was my first time on this small island and I was amazed at how much I could get addicted to gambling during this event. I would definitely like to go to Malta again this year, but I am also interested in Africa and Asia. That said, my participation in these events depends on the priorities of my joint projects, especially the Global Self-Exclusion Initiative.

Talk a little more about your personal life. All business will be done not only between companies, but also between people! Your hobbies, favorite books, favorite quotes, whether you’re interested in games, etc.

I’m interested in esports. I grew up playing video games, so this area is very close to me. I don’t play casino games, but I do place bets from time to time when I watch esports matches. With two small children, it is quite difficult to find a good opportunity to play games on your own, but you can be lucky enough to play games from time to time.

Outside of work, I spend most of my time with my family and playing sports. Most are swimming. I’m a fan of stoicism and I’m currently improving my communication skills. From there, some of my current favorite quotes, or even pieces of advice, came from: “Tell me the time, I don’t need to invent a clock.”

Learn more about SiGMA Affiliate Grand Slam here.

SiGMA Asia 2022

After a series of exciting conferences during Malta Week 2021, SiGMA Group is set to take the world by storm with the golden spires of Kiev and the snowy city of Toronto, a hub for drawing together the best and brightest parts of the iGaming world. At the next expo, visitors will be able to visit the UAE’s most advanced cities for three days of networking, panel discussions, and festivities. Stay up-to-date with SiGMA News.