In 2026, the B2B iGaming marketing landscape has never been more competitive, with brands fighting harder than ever for operator attention and industry credibility.
SBC Media gathered some of the leading marketing voices across iGaming for a roundtable discussion on trends, challenges, and strategies shaping the space this year.
The panel featured Martin Hodges of BetComply, Robin Becker of Hub88, Michael Baker-Mosley of Triumph B2B, Seda Baburyan of PartnerMatrix, and Pierre Pulis of BETBY.
Together, they explored a range of pressures facing B2B marketers, including brand exposure, market saturation, differentiation, and the growing influence of artificial intelligence.
One theme emerged clearly above the rest: in a market overflowing with suppliers, simply having a strong product is no longer sufficient to capture attention.
Pierre Pulis of BETBY framed the issue as a longstanding structural problem, not merely a 2026 phenomenon, pointing to how crowded the field has become across the board.
“Everyone is saying that they are the best at what they do, but at the end of the day, no one is really demonstrating their proper value,” Pulis said during the roundtable discussion.
He stressed the importance of communicating specific USPs clearly, arguing that brands must educate their audiences on precisely what value they bring to the market and why partnerships with them make sense.
“You really need to be able to zoom in on the USPs, educate them on what value you are bringing to the market and why they should be working with you,” Pulis added, underlining the need for clarity over noise.
Seda Baburyan of PartnerMatrix turned her attention to artificial intelligence, identifying it as the defining marketing tension of the year, where genuine capability and empty claims have become dangerously difficult to tell apart.
“AI became a word showing up everywhere because leaving it off felt like admitting one was behind,” Baburyan said, capturing the pressure brands felt to align themselves with the technology regardless of substance.
She drew a sharp distinction between brands that genuinely built AI into their core products and those that simply borrowed the language to appear relevant and forward-thinking.
“AI as capability and AI as claim are two different things, and the industry let them blur,” Baburyan noted, warning that indistinguishable imitation ultimately turns a differentiator into a liability.
Her conclusion was pointed: the solution is not purely a product decision but a matter of marketing discipline, requiring brands to state their true strengths honestly and with precision.
Across the panel, a consistent message emerged that iGaming marketers in 2026 must adapt quickly, communicate authentically, and resist the temptation to chase trends without the substance to back them up.
