With the prevalence of sports betting there has emerged a new activity to keep former athletes busy – they are now working as brand ambassadors. From the many faces that now grace the promotional materials of top betting companies are three prominent names; Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson, wide receiver of the NFL, captain Nick Mangold of the New York Jets and Tim Howard, a legendary goalkeeper of the Team USA.
These three former athletes have been hitting the NJ sports betting headlines recently because of their appointment as brand ambassadors for Wynn Interactive. In an announcement that was supposed to make the public aware of the new development, Wynn Interactive revealed that the trio would be the marketing faces of WynnBET.
As at the beginning of 2021, WynnBET had live operations in Indiana, Colorado, Michigan, Virginia, Tennessee and New Jersey. There are already plans to set up operations in Pennsylvania and Iowa.
According to the details of what was revealed by WynnBET at the announcement, the 3 former athletes will all appear in marketing drives and promotional content produced by the betting provider. In addition to that, fans of WynnBET can look forward to interacting with the trio as they amass support for the company’s gaming app. Viewers of the Blue Wire Podcast Studio will be able to catch up with latest sports news and company developments when the three brand faces appear as show guests as per their job description.
For those who download the WynnBET app, they will on a regular basis see the faces of Johnson, Mangold and Howard appearing on promotions that run within the app. The odds boosts will also be tailored to match the personalities and interests of the 3 players so players can always ‘follow’ the advice of the sports stars when choosing bets.
While commenting on his new role, Johnson confessed his love for his fans; something that his fans can attest to owing to the many times that he has been a guest appearance in events. He considers WynnBET to be an excellent partner because they will be paying him to do something he absolutely loves and already practices.
Johnson is most definitely a valuable asset to WynnBET if his combined social media accounts’ following of 5 million is anything to go by. Since he wore the name number, 85, over his entire career, it is easy for fans from various age groups to connect to his identity. The new task that lies ahead of Johnson and his colleagues speaks volumes about the confidence that WynnBET has in them.
The trio will be directly involved in initiating, facilitating and moderating conversations around sports betting in physical as well as social networking platforms. For an NFL legend who achieved 11,059 yards, 67 touchdowns and 766 receptions in his entire career, getting paid to influence positivity in sports is just a small token of feeding him for his journey.
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Born and bred in New Jersey
For the other two brand faces that will be working alongside Johnson, Howard and Mangold, their earlier life can be traced back to New Jersey and New York. Mangold served the league as a center in the Jet’s formation during the period 2006 to 2016. Over the course of his active years, Rex Ryan coached the team that Mangold played for.
The player now resides in the Garden State where Howard, who was a goalkeeper of Team USA was born. Mangold reminisces about his life as a football player and never seems to find a time when he was not an active player of one team or the other. According to him, his entire life is punctuated by football so it never occurred to him that betting on the sport could be just as entertaining.
As a sports retiree, he has had the opportunity to view sports from the eyes of the bettor and is happy that there are so many ways that fans get to enjoy a game. Through the WynnBET app, Mangold has been able to see New Jersey for the betting hub it has become. Most fans will not use a product or service until their role model or idol does so; that is one of the key areas that WynnBET will use to keep fans close.
Howard played his goalkeeper role under Nike sponsorship who would later retire to work as an NBC Sports Network analyst after retiring from athletics. Did you know that there is no player in the history of the United States Men’s National Soccer Team who had the privilege of suiting up his cleats like Howard did?
The United States National Team is not the only club that benefited from the goalkeeping talent of Howard – he has over the course of his career played for Manchester United, Red Bulls and several other major soccer franchises.
Wynn Interactive projections for a fruitful business season
With the signing up with three of the sports world’s most famous faces, the management of WynnBET has already drawn up the targets for its casino app and sportsbook. Before they brought on board the trio, the company had injected a total of $80 million into its operations. Another move that speaks volumes about the anticipation that WynnBET has of future performance is their recent joining of the SPAC bonanza. This move was announced by the company in May 2021 at the time of revealing the details of the merger deal of $3.2 billion with Austerlitz Acquisition Corp.
In the next 18 months, the company has projected accumulated revenue amounting to $708 million. This has been made with the assumption that WynnBET controls about 6% of the United States’ gambling market. In a conference call where the company executives spoke to investors on the future of the business, it was revealed that the WynnBET operation runs on an annual budget of $100 million.
Conclusion
It is still too early to speak about the outcome of the new appointments but the performance of WynnBET before this marketing move had been simply uninspiring. The market share for online casinos is 4% while that of sports betting is 1%. The hopes are high that the profits will improve along with the market share; the combined efforts of Ochocinco, Mangold and Howard are expected to change fortunes for the better.
