How do you get your racing information?

Chances are, if you are reading this blog, then you, like many others now get the information you want, online.

You are not alone.  The worldwide trend is towards online news providers.  Given the reluctance of local media to provide on-going relevant racing coverage, we support racing with our own digital channels.  Through our LOVERACING.NZ site we are able to provide race day news, industry insights and information about events.

The data behind our digital channels indicate that more people are heading to our site and social media to get not only their day-to-day racing information around nominations and fields, but also engage with our feature and behind the scenes content.

Last month our site had 10% more users than for the same month the previous year, with our content on Kiwi runners in The Championships proving popular.  The Winx effect even hit our LOVERACING.NZ Facebook with a spike of people being reached on 12 April of 36,500 on that day, with our video of Winx and Sophie Baker being particularly well received.

It is not only the media and information landscape which is changing – the way we bet also continues to move online.

The NZ Racing Board’s figures, which they shared at this week’s In Conversation at Hastings, clearly demonstrate that customer preference when it comes to betting has shifted to digital options.

While retail transactions in 2015 made up 36.4% of turnover the most recent figures to Q2 of the 2019 financial year show this has dropped to 30.2%.

The decline is also obvious with phone betting dropping from 8.9% to 3.4%, and with on-course also showing a shift from 2.8% to 1.8%.

Digital has been the big winner.  Where it sat at 51.9% in 2015, it now dominates with 64.6%.

This is why we continue to focus on and improve our digital channels and presence, to support racing now and in the future.