Tombola Bingo has claimed that it is the UK's leading online bingo website, following the publication of the latest statistics from Internet traffic specialists Hitwise.
In a press release they said: “The latest report from Hitwise shows that tombola.co.uk is now officially the most visited bingo website in the UK.”
A bingo monitoring service, Bingo Port, recently claimed that Tombola had the largest number of cash players in the UK market, although other sites had larger numbers of players if you counted free bingo players as part of the numbers.
Tombola said that they will strengthen their position in the UK market with a huge £7 million advertising campaign starting in August. The ads will feature a Tombola tropical island and will run during ad breaks of major television shows such as Coronation Street and Emmerdale.
Tombola's previous advertising campaign was pulled by the Advertising Standards Authority after they ruled it was likely to appeal to children, a decision most people in the bingo industry found extraordinary. The ad featured a rollercoaster but it made it pretty clear that it was aimed at adults and the ASA's ruling was though to be very harsh, especially as the advertising had cost Tombola around £500,000 to make. According to Bingo News' sources the new ad was made by a different advertising agency as Tombola management decided to change agencies following the ASA fiasco.
Tombola grew out of running Sun Bingo on behalf of newspaper publisher News International. When it came to renew the operating contract The Sun asked for confirmation that they owned the player database to be included in the contract. When this was not forthcoming Sun Bingo switched to Gamesys, who run Jackpot Joy, and Tombola Bingo was born to recruit all the old Sun Bingo players.
One of the oddities of Tombola Bingo is that it does not have any slot machines and pushes very few side games, meaning that on a per player basis it is thought to have one of the lowest lifetime value per player. However Bingo News understands that the management team feels more comfortable with operating a less aggressive business strategy than many rivals and the success of the site certainly suggests it is popular with players too.
