Identifying race bettor groups by their gambling behaviour

Given the increasing social acceptance of gambling, as well as its ease of accessibility through telephone, Internet and game consoles, it is no wonder that gambling has seen an increase in popularity in the past decade (Pinto & Mansfield, 2011). Gambling is now recognized as the largest entertainment service industry in the world, with its revenue greater than both music sales and movies combined (McGowan, 2008, cited in Pinto & Mansfield, 2011). A vast majority of the gambling research deals with problem and pathological gambling (Jolley et al., 2006; Lam & Mizerski, 2009; Mizerski et al., 2011). This is despite the evidence that only 2% of the gambling population are classified as problem gamblers (Productivity Commission, 2010). This ignores understanding the gambling behaviour of the general gambling population (Lee et al., 2006). Recently, there has been increasing effort to understand the behaviour of the general gambling population (Jolley et al., 2006; Lam & Mizerski, 2009). However, few studies have investigated whether there are different gambling groups based on their behaviours in the population. Market segmentation is a widely used tool in marketing to identify heterogeneous groups of individuals. Market segmentation can lead to efficient resource allocation, competitive advantages and increase business profitability (Dibb & Simkin, 2009; Dibb et al., 2002). The gambling industry offers a variety of gambling products that has now resulted in increased competition which can draw away existing and potential bettors to other companies. It is now important for gambling service providers to better understand betting behaviour of their customers in order to devise strategies to retain them. Accordingly, the purpose of this research is to investigate whether different gambling cohorts exist based on their gambling behaviour.