WagerWire: "Traditional media models are dead; new media is interactive, community-based, and creator-centric"

In a year marked by several milestones and rapid evolution, WagerWire has solidified its standing in the sports betting technology and media spaces. To share the company's main takeaways of 2024, Travis Geiger, Chief Experience Officer of the California-based company, reflected in an exclusive interview with Yogonet on a transformative period that saw expanded operations, growing mainstream recognition, and growth across key areas.

Geiger attributes the company’s success to WagerWire's focus on innovation, which empowers sports bettors with greater flexibility and control, as well as a media strategy that has captured a passionate audience. Looking ahead to 2025, WagerWire seeks to build on this momentum, focusing on technological advancements, forging new partnerships, and deepening its engagement with users.

Looking back at 2024, how would you assess the year for the company? What are some of the major takeaways/highlights, achievements, or lessons learned over the past year?

2024 was the year WagerWire went mainstream. We achieved a new level of success and are having a ton of fun on the ride. Stories about our bets for sale appeared everywhere from ESPN to CNBC, to the pages of The NY Post.

We expanded operations under our parent company into distinct Media, Fantasy, Contest, and Horse Racing as independent verticals - and announced major partnerships with fantasy operators and sportsbooks alike.

We accelerated the growth of the media and affiliate segments, added key investors including the cofounder of Pinnacle Sports, and grew our in-house team with data, engineering, and business development hires. 

Which issues and trends would you say dominated the conversation this year? Any specific trends, markets, or technologies that you believe will drive change in 2025? 

Traditional Media, SEO, and affiliate marketing models are dead. New Media is interactive, community-based, and creator-centric. The Wire, WagerWire's media network, is a "content collective" where creators pool audiences and resources, broadcast live shows, and then input them into our in-house A.I. (named "Iverson") which then outputs fully edited clips with the best chances of going viral.

We then amplify the content and monetize it across platforms with dynamic A.I.-powered ad placements. By building it ourselves, we also identified a massive need in the market and have since begun to monetize Iverson by licensing it as CTaaS (Content Technology as a Service) to other media companies. 

What can we expect from the company in 2025? What are the main challenges and opportunities you see in the gaming industry in the upcoming 12-month period? 

You can expect that we'll be doing things you never expected. For example, working with universities and regulators on new responsible gaming frameworks. WagerWire empowers players to take control of their bets and manage them like a stock or cryptocurrency. The ability to sell assets you own (in this case bets) is at its core aligned with basic consumer protections across industries.

We expect that cashout will be put under the microscope, and that regulators ask to look under the hood of the black box that's spitting out consistently predatory buy-back offers to players. We predict the closed-door debate at sportsbooks will be around how to get out ahead of responsible gambling scrutiny and what responsible gambling initiatives they can enact that don't curtail handle growth.