I’ve been thinking about something that’s fundamentally broken in how we build gambling businesses.
We all use the funnel model. Awareness at the top, consideration in the middle, conversion at the bottom. Push players through, convert them, job done. Move on to the next batch.
It’s wrong. And it’s costing you.
The funnel model treats players like a manufacturing process. Raw material goes in one end, finished product comes out the other. You measure cost per acquisition, track conversion rates, optimise each stage, and call it a day. The problem is that when a player converts, you think you’re done with them. You hand them off from acquisition to retention, from marketing to CRM, from one team to another.
But that handoff is where you lose everything.
I stopped thinking about players moving through a funnel. I started thinking about them entering a lifecycle. And once I made that shift, everything about how we operate changed.
Here’s what a lifecycle actually means: a player doesn’t move from top to bottom and exit. They move in circles. Each interaction feeds back into the system. When a player has a great experience, they tell friends. When they engage with your content, they come back to bet. When they use your product, they create demand for more of your content. It’s not linear, it’s circular. Self-reinforcing.
What Changes When You Think in Cycles
In a funnel model:
- Content is a top-of-funnel tool for awareness
- Success = conversion rate and CPA
- Teams are structured around stages (acquisition, retention, CRM)
- You build a product
- Players convert, and you’re done until reactivation
In a lifecycle model:
- Content fuels the entire system: acquisition, retention, referral
- Success = engagement over time and player behaviour
- Teams own the whole cycle (no handoffs)
- You build an ecosystem
- Every interaction feeds the next one
Think about what this does to your metrics. You stop optimising for the moment someone deposits. You start measuring how often they return, how long they stay, and how many friends they bring. The entire game changes.
Most importantly, you can’t split teams up anymore. Product decisions affect acquisition. Acquisition decisions affect retention. Retention feeds back into acquisition through referrals. Everyone has to own the whole cycle because everything connects.
This is why Menace is built the way it is. We started with a media company, 2.5 million+ followers across 10+ sports niches. The media creates reach and trust before anyone places a bet. Then we built the operator. Players who love the media content naturally want to bet with us. Then we built our own game provider, Ebaka. Custom content that only exists on Menace. Players discover these games, love them, want them elsewhere. That creates demand in the broader market.
Each piece feeds the others:
- Media drives players to the operator
- Operator creates demand for content
- Content creates more media opportunities
- Round and round
It’s a flywheel, not a funnel. The faster it spins, the more momentum it builds.
But here’s what most people miss: you can’t bolt a lifecycle model onto a funnel business. You can’t just add a media company to your operator and call it an ecosystem. The lifecycle thinking has to be baked into the foundation. It changes what you build, how you measure it, who you hire, and how you structure everything.
When you think in funnels, you build for conversion events. When you think in lifecycles, you build for continuous engagement. When you think in funnels, you hand players off between teams. When you think in lifecycles, you keep them in orbit.
The operators winning right now (Stake with Drake, Jake Paul with Betr) they’re not running better funnels. They’re building flywheels. Media presence that feeds betting activity that feeds content creation that feeds media presence. Round and round.
Your funnel has an end. Players convert and you’re done until you need to reactivate them. My flywheel has no end. Every interaction feeds the next one. Every player who enters the lifecycle becomes part of the system that brings in the next player.
Stop optimising your funnel. Start building your flywheel.
The question isn’t “how do we convert more players?” The question is “how do we keep players in orbit?” Once you make that shift, everything else changes.
