Why Most Sports Betting Apps Are Targeting the Wrong Audiences

Key Takeaways

The sports betting industry faces a targeting crisis that’s costing billions in wasted marketing spend while ignoring massive market opportunities. Despite average customer acquisition costs ranging from $500-$800, which is substantially higher than most other sectors, online gambling brands continue pouring money into demographic targeting that fundamentally misunderstands their audience.

Here’s the reality: the online gambling industry is ignoring 15.6 million potential customers who want to bet but are actively alienated by current platforms. These are high-value psychological segments with clear needs that no one is serving. While gambling brands fight over the same mainstream audience with increasingly expensive campaigns, massive market opportunities sit completely untapped.

The Depth of the Targeting Crisis

The crisis has reached a breaking point that goes far beyond simple inefficiency. Sports betting advertising volume fell 17% in 2024 and decreased by 44% from 2021, yet spending on advertising increased. This is clear evidence that throwing more money at broken targeting approaches isn’t working. A TrafficGuard analysis of one major operator found that 97% of their branded keyword spending connected to clicks from existing customers rather than new acquisitions, illustrating how marketing budgets are being wasted on people who are already customers while delivering zero actual growth.

This waste happens because millions of potential customers actively avoid current betting apps, not because they’re uninterested in betting, but because the platforms fundamentally misunderstand their psychological needs. To understand the scale of this missed opportunity, consider two specific examples of underserved psychological segments that represent millions of potential customers:

The Experience Innovator segment (3.3 million people globally) craves personalized betting experiences and unconventional sports coverage, yet remains almost entirely unserved because every platform focuses on traditional sports and generic interfaces. These are traditionally early adopters who drive market trends and pay premium prices for innovative experiences.

The Cautious Community Builder segment (5.7 million people globally) actively avoids current betting platforms due to high-pressure messaging, despite wanting educational, community-focused betting experiences. Rather than being risk-averse non-customers, they represent a massive market of people who would bet regularly if platforms addressed their psychological need for safety and community support.

The few betting brands that recognize these psychological differences are achieving significantly improved engagement and conversion rates by aligning their strategies with how people actually think and feel about risk assessment, social interaction, competition, and status recognition. But to understand why this psychological approach works so much better than demographic targeting, we need to examine the science behind audience psychology.

The Science Behind Audience Psychology

The marketing chaos plaguing sports betting is both expensive and scientifically backwards. Major operators are spending over $300 million annually (with FanDuel exceeding $1 billion) while facing a devastating inefficiency problem:

• 97% of spending on branded keywords connects to clicks from existing customers rather than new acquisitions
• Nearly all marketing budget is being wasted on people who are already customers
• Zero actual growth despite massive spending increases
• Acquisition costs continue climbing while effectiveness decreases

Our Research Methodology

We conducted this analysis with Elaris, drawing from psychological profiles of 3,425 individuals in the betting app space, representing patterns found across millions of consumers globally. Using adaptive psychological assessment technology (the same methodology trusted by brands like EA, Supercell, and Peloton) we measured over 200 psychological traits including:

1. Personality dimensions – How people naturally interact with the world
2. Core values – What matters most in decision-making
3. Intrinsic motivations – What energizes and sustains behavior
4. Decision-making styles – How people evaluate risk and opportunity

This isn’t demographic guesswork or survey opinions. These are scientifically validated psychological measurements that predict behavior more accurately than age, income, or betting history.

Access the gambling audience today with Elaris. 

The Six Psychological Segments Reshaping Sports Betting

The Social Status Seeker (14.2% of audience)

The Lifestyle Integrator (20.1% of audience)

The Independence Seeker (31.9% of audience)

The Experience Innovator (11.2% of audience)

The Cautious Community Builder (11.2% of audience)

The Strategic Mastermind (17.8% of audience)

Massive Market Opportunities in Underserved Segments

While the industry burns through billions in misdirected marketing spend, with gambling companies spending $434.4 million on sportsbook commercials in 2024 alone, three psychological segments present enormous opportunities:

1. The Experience Innovator (3.3 million people globally) remains largely underserved because most platforms focus on traditional sports and conventional betting formats
2. The Cautious Community Builder (5.7 million people globally) is actively alienated by current industry messaging that emphasizes risk and excitement
3. The Strategic Mastermind (6.6 million people globally) seeks premium, intellectually stimulating experiences that most platforms fail to provide

Combined, these three underserved segments represent 15.6 million potential customers globally, which is a larger market than many brands’ entire user bases.

Implementation Framework: From Psychology to Profit

1. Identify Your Primary Psychology
   • Analyze your current user base to determine which psychological segments show the strongest engagement
   • Most brands discover they’re accidentally appealing to one psychology while alienating others
2. Audit Psychological Alignment
   • Evaluate current content, product features, and marketing messages against each segment’s needs
   • Look for gaps where your brand could serve underrepresented psychologies
3. Test Psychological Messaging
   • Create segment-specific campaigns that speak to each psychology’s core motivations
   • Cautious Community Builders respond to “hassle-free, risk-free trials”
   • Social Status Seekers engage with “exclusive VIP experiences”
4. Measure Psychological Resonance
   • Track engagement metrics by psychological segment, not just demographics
   • Look for patterns in which content drives conversions, retention, and advocacy
5. Scale Psychological Winners
   • Double down on segments showing the strongest business metrics
   • Gradually expand to adjacent psychologies through message adaptation

Or you could you could fast-track this process today with Elaris.

The Competitive Advantage of Psychological Understanding

Brands that understand audience psychology both improve their marketing and transform their entire business strategy. When you know that Creative Adventurers value novelty over security while Risk-Averse Improvisers prioritize safety over excitement, you can design products, experiences, and communications that create genuine psychological resonance.

This psychological approach predicts customer behavior more accurately than demographic data because it captures the underlying motivations that drive decisions. A 65-year-old Strategic Mastermind and a 25-year-old Experience Innovator might both bet on baseball, but for completely different reasons requiring distinct engagement strategies.

As AI democratizes technical execution, psychological understanding becomes the sustainable competitive advantage. Any brand can create professionally designed campaigns, but only those who understand what truly motivates their audience can create the resonance that drives long-term success.