Everyone, and thanks for joining us at today's session, breaking down international borders, confidently, managing global gaming payments.
My name is Evan Happy, and today I'm joined by two Saint panelists, alan Fang, the regional head of marketing and PR at Evos e Sports.
And Chris Smith, founder and CEO of Biggie Sports.
Today we're really going to be discussing the flow of money and gaming, how leading businesses choose to manage payables at their companies.
And really discussing about.
In increasingly, international gaming environment, why it's really really important to have a well defined process around how you partners, streamers.
Gamers or whomever you really work with, on the pace I receive their payments.
Um, with the palty, we really handle the entire end to end.
Global payments process for gaming businesses, which allows them to focus more on growing their business and relieves time for them from worrying about.
Whether or not their partners payes, creators, streamers, etc, are getting paid on time.
Accurately and are are staying happy by working with you as one of their partners.
So to kick us off, I wanted to give a little bit of background on our panelists a little bit further.
So I wanted to start off with Chris Smith, chris, would you mind just sharing a little bit of background on yourself and what you do over at Biggie Sports.
Yeah, for sure, evan, so for me, i've been around in the E sports and gaming industry for eleven to twelve years now, so just over a decade and with.
Most people who've been around for as long as I have, and this people have definitely been around longer than me. I.
Set off player in the industry, that's what many people did, and you know, if you were to say run an E sports event, which is kind of the main stay and and the the hub of.
Where so much export is. I've been there in.
Virtually every single capacity. So in my history, i've been a professional commentator.
In multiple different games, i've been A-A top level player and three different FPS titles. I've managed professional players. I've managed influences.
I've done six years combined with pair and marketing with two different international companies mainly focus on here in Australia where I live, and also New Zealand just across the ditch.
I was a journalist for a year and a half. I've done consultancy and.
Then in twenty eighteen, I left to create my own company, business and games, which then renamed to big exports. So for us, our.
Our main investor in partners plays those studios, which is one of Australia's largest game development companies. They listed on the A-S-X, late last year, they have about.
Seventy to ninety or so staff, I can't keep track because they're always growing and.
For us our business to split up into three different categories, primarily, we do a lot of fee for service and consultancy, we do global influence in marketing campaigns with multiple.
Large and small brands, anything from a VR game called Velvia we're helping to launch to in video, galax, MSI, and those hardware companies.
To Unicorn, whose widering company in otherwise.
We also do a lot of consultancy, whether it be light, touch your hands on. We do have a lot of.
Long form business development consultancy, which kind of sits within bucket number two of what we do. We love to.
It can only show people how they can create a grower business within the E sports endgaming space, but also get hands on with them throughout that process of growth. And then in the third, we have some of their own projects.
So as of just this morning, today in Australia, it's the, it's the twenty second June, we're recording this.
We have, uh, just announced that we're doing an high school, entrepreneurial, focused sports course.
Um, that's funded by our state government, department of education and training Here.
Will be rolling out as a pilot, we're also planning other things around events and influences and such within that space, but for us, it's a, it's a lot of a jewel focus, But.
Many of it can be summarized as marketing consultancy and business development within both the exports and the gaming market.
Yeah. Excellent. And we over here at Tepalty have been working with Chris and Big East for the better part of a year, so far.
And definitely, um, can vouch for his expertise in the gaming in these sports world. Um,
A great partner to work with on on all fronts when it comes to gaming in these sports. So Allan, do you mind maybe just giving a little bit of background on yourself and your role at EVO. Specifically,
Here I run morning, a Evana, please.
I'm Allen from Original marketing and P-I at Ivosi Sports. Previously, I was doing two years of E sports at E Asia, one of the world's largest allies in Southeast Asia.
Back then, they have two hundred over Airbas planes, 20000 over staff.
And I had the privilege of doing internal and external awareness on East spots up to the point that we got internal buying from management.
To invest in the East Part space in terms of marketing and doing a lot of media coverage.
And right now, i'm in E forc Sports, we have E sports organization in Southeast Asia.
With the market presence in Indonesia, thailand, malaysian, singapore, and we just announced over the weekend in Philippines with a mobile legend team.
And we have a Twitter over traders across the group and looking at 350 million eyeballs.
And right now, we are going to expand further as well. We phrase the CVSB up to 16.4 million US dollars today,
Thank you.
Excellent, yeah, I really appreciate that, alan.
I would like to mention, not only is our topic on international gaming today, but the panel was constructive.
On purpose, so we have someone representing the Apak region with Allen, someone representing the Australia region with Chris and then myself, i'm based in New York.
Representing the Americas here, which really is as, as everyone knows here at GDC. Gaming is a global sport.
And there's people that are participating from all walks of life.
All places around the world and and being able to to bring in different personalities to represent that on today's call is huge for us as well. So.
Thank you again, fellows, um want to dive right into our first topic for today's is around managing global payables at your gaming business. So.
Alan, starting with you, um, can you tell us a little bit about the different types of revenue streams that that Evos has, and and moreover,
How can you, um, can you provide any insight into which revenue streams are most or least profitable for the business?
Yeah, um, for us, we have two main verticals. The first one is the E sports teams, that's a lot of, we, some, we call it a sexy business, I need.
Brand attaches, E sports gets mentioned in the media, etc, so that the E sports teams, the other side is the content creators.
So we have another sister company called Win W-H-I-M.
They manage all the talents, mostly on Youtube as well. And that's the part which, against the most revenue, per se.
Absolutely so, yeah, managing A-A growing list of car.
Contractors, creatives that are creating content across the gamut, can you tell us a little bit about some of the content that they might be creating for you guys.
Yeah, we have different content formats. We realized that in the East part and gaming audience, it it's all just about gaming, and he's supposed to get, um, exhausted from it, per Se.
So we have different content forms, such as short documentaries about the background of the players.
From racks to creatures kind of thing, and also creating storylines, shot movies as well as doing like a podcast like the Joe Organs of E Sports, by, say,
Very cool love that, yeah, all different types of content, I mean, most people, when they think about East ports, the the first company that they'll think of is face clan and.
They've really built a brand of expertise in gaming, but in addition to that.
They've also built a lifestyle brand, so I know Chris, you know a ton about that as well, and.
Would love to hear kind of your opinion on, um how each sports teams are building their brands. But also, I kind of wanted to to hear a little bit about.
The companies that you consult for in general, and how are they managing their finance department So maybe let's go to that one first, so.
Companies you're working with, how mature or immature are they in terms of managing their finance departments? Today?
It's really all over the place. Sometimes, you know, a lot of our work is international because even if we're doing work for an Australian business, you know it's often paid out of Hong Kong.
Singapore, us all of men, et cetera. And they all have.
You know, wildly different ways, ways of processing payment and and ways that they do that, and and also different reporting structures, too. Things often change, and you know, maybe that's something That.
Other countries don't experience, i'm sure Allen experiences that quite a lot as well, having.
Teams and influences in so many countries. So at Southeast Asia, I think a lot of people lump Southeast Asia in its just, that's one place. It's really not.
And very similar to Australia, often describe its people simply as we are, america and Asia over here.
You know, geographically, we're right next to Asia, but if you look at the way that L, um,
Consumers operate in the market, we play the same games as the US, we spend very similar per capita.
Amounts of money on on games and products, we enjoy things at similar price points, with similar marketing, et cetera. So sometimes it does cause a rift when you are.
You know, receiving payments or marketing plans from the Asian Hiq.
Where things report to a lot of the time, you know, in video, for example, reports for Taiwan here in Australia, where raises pay agency, we report into Singapore directly.
Even though they headquartered out of the U-S, for example, so that always changes how things work in the back end. And then.
As part of that, too, because we do work with global influence and contingents as well. You know, it also manages or changes the way that we manages finances coming through.
The way that most influence a campaigns work, whether you're an agency or whether you're a freelancer, or what have you And I'm sure Evas works very similar, is that.
You're an intermediary, a lot of the time, so it's up to you to secure the deal to sign the contracts. In the middle.
Between the influencer who you may manage full time, or you may only just have a very basic understanding of, and the brand.
Then when you complete the campaign, the brand will pass the money to you based on their payment terms, and then you pass that on.
Minus your fees directly through to the influences, well, with payment, so that also changes wildly, depending on what country they're in, what country the other brand is in, and sometimes you have to be very quick.
Thinking on your feet, sometimes it makes sense for the brand to pay the influencer directly.
Or their management agency to give you a cut. So you know, these are the kind of things I don't often teach you in school, that you have to learn on the Fly.
An entrepreneur within the space, but it's all, it's all part of the fun, so unfortunately, it's not an easy answer to your question, it's all over the place, a lot of the time in this market.
Totally, and that's sort of what the expectation is, right When there's a growing industry, there's growing entrepreneurs in that industry, no one really has it.
Completely figured out, so it's sort of a grow, as we.
Or learn, as we go, type of deal, um, which, it sounds like an.
I want to get Alan, um, your your thoughts here. So Chris talked a lot about creatives, contractor workers that are international.
Um, in terms of their influence and are international in terms of the brands that they work with.
Can you talk to me about some of those contract workers or content creators, specifically at evils and are most of them based?
Um, close by to home, or they more international nature, and how do you even go about finding these people.
Right Dinner's a good question, even for us, we operate in for five international countries by, say,
Even though it's climbed up in Southeast Asia, but each country has its own ways of doing things, and like Chris mentioned, a little slow moving past to it.
Things change rapidly, and right now we work with brands. I live with the local officers in each country and how, as what Chris mentioned.
The brands work with the local office of, he was over there, and over there, they were.
Distribute out the payments accordingly to the local talents. So uh, we realize in Southeast Asia, the talents have to be localized. You can have, uh,
Indonesian talents are.
Targeting towards the Thailand market, because it's a total two different languages per se and culture. So the local officers, like a Yamaha visa, for example,
We work with them in in Indonesia office, and they do local content, so same thing with Philippines, malaysia as well.
So everything is all localized at a moment, of course, like Chris mentioned as an international global deal. Then things may get a bit messy, and we cannot streamline it back to our headquarters in Indonesia.
And then subsequently doing original deal and dispersing the payments out through the local offices.
Right And so right now, it sounds like most of your.
Content creation, most of your revenue streams are being pushed through a pack. Is there anything or any plans to expand Australia to the Americas or beyond that you can show them.
At a moment, no, just for Southeast Asia, but we've got inquiries from India, china, and who knows one day, if we go to Australia, most likely will be working with people like Chris.
MHM,
MHM, absolutely yeah, and I-I-I think that's a really good set way until our next topic, and and you're talking a lot about.
Uh, growth areas and and specific places that.
Um, evils has room to grow. So for our next topic, the theme is really around managing that growth and understanding how to best manage that growth. So.
Chris coming back to you, uh, what would you say Are a few of the most important areas for businesses to be aware of as they scale their companies.
I'm in a hole, yeah, sorry, go ahead. I was going to say 100% in regards to growth within the industry, it's within content and content.
And creation, you know, alan touch on it perfectly with Evos, understanding the difference in the market between gaming and E sports. You know, E sports is the competitive, structured play of Gaming.
The gaming could just be a nicer and nephew playing roadblocks on an ipad, or, you know, a mother.
Playing, you know, a mother of three who's fifty years old playing Candy crush on a mobile, and that doesn't necessarily equal E sports, but the market is quite huge. There was A.
Tech Crunch article, um, that I've that I've just been sent talking about the dolls within the market, and says, he mobile game.
Spending hit a record of 1.7 billion dollars per week in Cue, one, twenty twenty one, which is a forty percent increase.
Um, so, looking at those kinds of numbers, that's a massive market, but it's not necessarily a hardcore sports market, so it's important to understand the difference between.
Those which is likely, alan was saying and saying what you were saying, even before that face plan as well.
You know, phase plans tagline is the world's largest E sports team, and yes, they do have pros and E sports and called Judy and S, esgo and Rainbow Six siege et cetera et cetera. But when I think face plan.
I think, um, luxury clothes, luxury cars, I think.
Fortnight, I think, uh, cool, mansions,
Cool content, the phase up sign that they do with their hands and and things like that, too, I think merchandise, I think meet ups.
I don't necessarily think you know best plays in the world, I don't necessarily think competition becoming better than everybody else there are are the teams that do operate like that.
So that Cloud Nine, O, TSM, who are a little bit more of that traditional sports team approach in the global market?
But um, you know, I think content creation.
And telling your story is is the massive part of that, too. And if you're looking at.
The difference between gaming and exporting market size as well.
Recent statistics say, and depending on which article you read, the global games market is anywhere from 155 to 175 billion. US. D, the global.
Sports market is somewhere around one billion, so E sports is growing, yes, massive, year and year, yes, it's exciting, but it's only one portion of the total pie.
And you know, as so many of us entrepreneurs, we're here to make a unicorn company. It's a bit hard to make a billion dollar company.
That an industry that's only worth one billion by itself, so it makes sense that you would then go into these ulterior types of things. And then the other thing is part of that, too, is that this content is highly brandable.
Just like Alan was talking about as well, where that revenue can come from.
Where you can work with these segmented countries.
Um, you know, with their different local marketing agencies to create content to then push out, I think it other really important thing, um to mention, from.
Um, like, on behalf of Allen and Avis as well.
One reason I wanted him on this panel to talk about is they've got a fantastic mix between mainstream brands and also gaming brands, and that's something that.
Hasn't matured into the space as well as some people would have thought, you know, from a lot of the content, you know, we've got.
A podcast of big sports podcasts and cried, a lot of content linked in myself and talking to a lot of these brand sponsorship managers.
On the export side, they often say that these mainstreams, companies coming in, haven't matured as fast as they thought.
It was going to happen, everybody thought that by all, the mainstream brands would already been in, but they're still not at this stage, but if you look at.
Evos' list, they've got payment providers, they've got, they've got vehicles, they've got coffee, they've got instant noodles, but they've also got.
The keyboard to the game, aheadsets, the game is used. They've also got software the game is used, and things like that, too, so.
You know, it's very important to have that well rounded approach as well.
And you can't do that with only just E sports. You can't just do that with only putting a logo on a jersey and going wing and tournament. You also have to tell a story, and that story is told through content.
Hundred percent, I couldn't agree more, I mean, and as a marketer myself, my whole life is about storytelling and telling good story. So I-I couldn't agree more with how to kind Of.
Play the heart strings of the folks that you're trying to reach out to, or the audiences that you're trying to build is really through telling a good story. And.
And that that leads me to a question for Allen, too. And I-I think your background, allen, is super interesting, coming from Air Asia and running that whole East for.
Really pioneering that East, sports, um,
Engine for for, for a large.
Um, multinational company, so you took that expertise and brought it to Evos. Can you tell me a little bit about how you got started with that, and um.
Chris just hit a laundry list of tons of different types of sponsors that you have, how do you even go about choosing the sponsors, um, that you get.
Yeah, I think it's all about education. When you go up to a brand, especially a non endemic brand in the space, and then they go like, ah, what's your spot Or then you know.
Okay, back to one, oh one in.
And it's not just about showing the numbers, etc, because these Cms, or brand marketing managers, they need to report back to their sea level.
And a sea level might not be East ports or gaming ready, and there goes one whole round of, uh.
Tug of war between educating them as well, so it helps them if the syllable, they have a kid or if their needs, a nephew is into gaming.
Then like, oh, yeah, my, my, uh son, or my daughter plays it and it kind of open up their mind a bit, and it helps her read way much, a lot, kind of as the legitimacy. You know.
That kids are into it.
If they watch it on CNN or BBC, for example,
And I'm so far as like a Chris mentioned earlier, yeah, we do have brands like Visa, yamaha and even Puma recently.
And um, all these people, they kind of like understand the importance of East sports and gaming.
To target the next generation of millennials, genzy Gen, alpha, etc. So it's all about education policy, I feel.
And do you find that the brands are approaching you more often, or do you approach the brands themselves, or is it a combination of the two?
I think the combination with two and also based on trust and your network.
Because you can't just do any cold calling them, i'm like, oh, who's that What's the spot You know, they kind of like get a very, um, iffy about it.
But if it's true, a network, it's a truer referral. It helps way much better.
Eat.
Well, i'm laughing to Allen because you're, you're almost describing the life that that I've been leading in terms of getting in touch with Chris, and then expanding my network in the East. sports and.
Gaming world to Paltia is an example. We have some of the largest gaming customers in the world, twitch robots, two of our biggest customers, enthusiast gaming.
But at the same time, we're still at the forefront of our journey in gaming, in these sports, and so working with folks like Chris getting in touch with.
More and more East sports, uh, companies that are having the same issues, paying international partners, paying international contractors is really how we make headway in the space, and it's it's.
Like you guys are saying, and not necessarily directly, but definitely alluding to it.
It is a sort of an insestual industry, people want to talk to the other people that they know that have been successful.
They don't want to talk to a random company that's not endemic. They need to talk to companies that they know have the same goals and outcomes that they're going for. So.
Um, all of that really really resonates with me, um, a lot of what you were saying there, allen.
Yeah, i've been following a Chris for about two trees now, and seeing how they've grown, uh,
For Biggie Sports, and he went on Chris on Lincoln. So I love great content, and I believe you have a great partner here.
Yes, absolutely. And we're glad to.
That he brings in folks like yourself as well to talk about the the international community. So.
Falling up out with one more question before we move on to topic three. And then I'd love to have Chris way in on it as well, but.
Can you tell us a little bit about Evas' growth over the past one to two years since you've been on board? Um, maybe.
Pointing to some of the specific projects that youve been really dedicated to, or some of the areas that youve seen some hyper growth, if you will.
Job and over, we realized that over in Indonesia is really getting really mature in a bucket, I mean, to get a.
To get a place in the League of mobile Legends, you know, you have to pay a million US dollars for a slot.
Out of that.
To have a team in there, so it's really matured over there, if broadcasting ranks, etc, and allowed a non endemic. Brands are kind of like.
Getting into the game as well, in other parts of the country like Malaysia, singapore, it's still evolving, it's still other education going on there.
So it's not as easy as just talking on the door for a corporate company, and.
There's getting a proposal in so still an educational stage, but a lot, um, one thing, I am not this personally, I love the governments.
Nearly getting involved in the scene as well, one of the main reasons, I believe, is to target the next generation of voters, seems like what the US is doing, some of the politicians are doing over there.
Over here is the same as well, um, in Indonesia, we have a thing called the President's Cup. So President Jokovia, indonesia, he has this.
President's cup in mobile agents. And.
Stay.
Go to a big stadium, this is before the pandemic hit, and right now, even in Malaysia, we have a location budgets for online tournaments done by the Malaysia government.
By the Ministry of Defense spots. So things are really T.
Getting the heat of things over here, you know, every government is getting involved, and that opens up the eyes of the corporates, because.
It comes on mainstream media and corporate school, like, oh, wow, government's getting involved, okay, looks more legit. Now, you know, it's not just an underground thing.
So yeah, things are definitely heating up in terms of the private sector, as well as the government sector.
Yeah, and we heard the same thing from Chris, too. I mean, he's getting behind some government projects himself as well, so.
Good to see that. And I mean,
The one thing that comes to my mind as well, from a corporate standpoint, is like everyone's talking about gamifying, gamify your marketing, gamify your emails, gamify this, and it's like.
Well, there is a way to gameify all those things, but.
What's the most natural way to do it So that can be a question, A lot of the times is like, how do we bring in.
A lot of what you've been talking about, how do non endemic brands naturally fit within the East sports world And I think that's the.
The the crux of this whole thing here. So Chris last question for you before we moved on to our, our last topic. So um can you talk.
Similar question that I ask for out, so talk about the growth changes in the past one to two years or so.
With Big East sports, but also, I kind of want to understand a little bit on the business side, like, how is your business grown up?
And how have you seen businesses maybe that have started around the same time or were in um.
Less of a growth phase a couple of years ago, what? What were some of the kind of the business and operational changes that folks might be tackling in the game, E, sports world that are noteworthy.
Yeah, for sure, I think you know, over the past couple of years, we've seen a massive rise in V, VC and private funding within the market globally.
Not just in Australia but globally, we've seen a lot of sports teams come, some have gone throughout that period of time, seen a lot of tournaments. Some have come and gone in Australia and globally as well.
There's been a lot of public listings in the global market to, you know, like I mentioned at the start, our.
Specific investor place those studios, there are games development companies within the gaming market, not E sports, they listed. There's also another company, australian Mighty Kingdom, again, develop a company who's listed, but there's been a.
What feels like a laundry list of global export companies listing as well on.
In places like the U-K with Guildy sports, also a bunch of other companies like a muco listing on the T, SXV.
Enthusiasts, gaming, I believe, has moved over from the tiers, X-V across the New York stock exchange and those kind of things as well. and I think you'll see those continue. As for us as a business.
With big sports, we haven't taken honest, significant amount of capital to go through that scale. For us, it's been about positioning ourselves correctly in the market, watching where things are going.
Watching the trends, then helping to set them for ourselves as well. So that came to a head, say with our announcement this morning about the, UH, our work on the education.
Program for the high school students, and we've got some more announcements that are coming out for that for us within the market.
We want to ensure that sustainable growth.
The the worst thing for me in exports that I see is a really high burn, because the industry is so new.
And it also that also doesn't lay you to pivot over that sous of time, you know, in the past two years or so, we've had so many pivots of business.
From doing, you know, education, if people get into the industry, to, we tried to, we tried some school age life events before that didn't work out for us. We had a contented Crater House.
And another company for a short period of time where I think the formula was 80%, right?
But that last 20% mean that we couldn't continue along with it, so we've tried so many different things that have all been internally funded.
Inside that market, too, we build up our presence, and like you alluded to evidence, and like Allen said as well, you know, we have a significant presence on Linkedin.
Which means that a lot of people come to us to these opportunities. That's.
That's how you and I met Evan in the past, and Alan I met through social media, but separately to to Linkedin. But um, it also allows us to really.
Monitor the market and see which opportunities we'd like to get in touch with, and now we're starting to see those announcements come to ferition. So it's been a long.
A long time of working behind the scenes and sharing use of of projects that other people have been doing. But finally, we start to scale up ourselves and share the stories Of.
Of things that we've started working on as well, which has been fantastic.
Well, you see them gaming as well across social, other social platforms as well, not just linked in not just the traditional platforms. You think of Facebook, instagram et cetera.
You also see it on, um, conversation.
Conversations happening on places like read it or discord or other places that are just forms for people to discuss. So those are really great places and places that I'm seeing, as well as, as.
Um, areas where people are meeting and getting to discuss, like kind of the emerging themes, um, in the gaming in these sports world, so.
Moving to our last topic here, this is a little bit more tactical, and talks about back office operations and how that can help feel your long term growth a little bit. So.
Um, I want to start with you here, and and I want you to talk a little bit about some of the tools that Evos is using today.
To help manage the business in general, um, and it doesn't necessarily need to be business specific tools. It could be anything from Slack all the way through.
What you're using to manage finance and everything in between. So just kind of wanted to hear a little bit about, uh, the business.
Like how we handle our to under overstaff. We use slack as well as for internal communications platform and.
We use stuff such as Google drive, google meets, etc, google sheets in terms of payment is still very manual. Today.
So I'm looking forward to hear what, uh, chris can share shortly about how he's been using using tepalty as well.
We have uh, local representatives in each country managing the talents directly, and some representatives handle up to ten talents per se.
Yeah.
Yeah, and that's definitely something that to palty.
Is geared towards helping sports, E sports team specifically like Evos, um, with is.
Taking away all that headache, you don't have to deal with multiple banks across international lines. You can just deal with.
One company you deal with the policy, we can deal in 196 countries, 120 currencies, so it makes your life a lot easier when it comes to gaming. So.
Going to you, chris, um, similar sort of question, can you tell us, um about some of the tools that your clients may or may not be using, and.
Maybe even your investors, I mean, placeside is a huge company, but it sounds like.
In a lot of ways, um, they were running before that they had before, they had some of their infrastructure set up, and that may just be.
Um, my guests, but I just kind of wanted to hear, I know a lot of the companies that I work with specifically talk about, that is the.
Get to a place where they have million dollar contracts, but they don't have the infrastructure to handle it. So is that something you're seeing as well, or is it a little bit different.
Yeah, it's always really hard hard to the knowers have found that when you invest in that infrastructure and also, you don't know what, you don't know, a lot of the time, right? So sometimes it comes down to.
You know, you will in a project, and there's no way you would have needed a service before that project announced the most important thing, you could possibly have.
You know, in the past, for for us, that's been something.
Really easy to set, but like Trillo with gat charts, for example, to track the progress of massive, UM strategy pieces. We've been doing more.
Large events we've been working on and things like that, you know, for us as a business. In the back end.
We use a lot of the similar, kind of, you know, general piece of software like Alan was talking about for us, a lot of it's based off Microsoft, one drive off of three, six, five.
There's a bit of Google Drive put in there as well. Um, you know, we use Cello, we use Hub Spot to track sales, you know, we, we use slack because our investor uses slack as well.
Um, so we we plug into there, so um.
You can have separate slacks that are, in some way joined, which is always good for us to keep those lines of communication going as well. And then, yeah, payments in and Out.
Like I said is is always such a hard thing in this industry, there's a lot of international.
You know payments where you're losing percentages off the currency, and once again, you don't. You don't learn these things in school at all.
You don't learn these things around. Hey, if I Google one ad to USD, i'm not actually receiving that.
On receiving what their conversion rate is that they're wanting to pay to us. And then I'm also, they're also charging, say, twenty dollars up free, yeah?
Exactly, so you, you do that calculation, you go, wait a minute, where does that money come from Like a great story for you, is there's a.
Uh, influence management company who have done some work with, they do some significant money, you know, they wanted us to pay them through Paypal.
And did the calculations, and a fifteen k campaign for them paper wanted to charge something like 800 U-S in fees.
And I was like, man, there's no way.
A zero percent chance I'm paying you through that, unless you want me to take out that fee.
Which you would be crazy if you, if you said yes to that, but um, you know, it's just the way that it works. Sometimes in this industry, it's quite young, and I mean, specifically, that.
That company is owned by a person, you know, I turned thirty this year, a person who is quite junior.
Even compared to me, so sometimes it's hard, because, like I said, once again, you don't learn these things at all in school, so it's up to.
You know, our relationship with companies like you to to educate these people. Hey,
These payment things, they're not just these boring corporate suit wearing crabs that you don't need to worry about. This is extremely important, and even to the point where.
You know, i've got an influence, a friend of mine who makes over a million dollars a year just off a Youtube ad revenue himself.
And you know, I had to set him up with an accountant, and the account was like, mate, you're losing 20000 dollars a year just in transaction phase that you could fix with this very simple. You know, these very simple changes.
Yep.
And we hear that from our clients all the time, and it's not just transaction fees that people are losing money with it.
If people are still writing manual checks, they could be losing the physical checks, they could be having difficulty getting there.
Sea level executives to sign them, so there's a lot of complexity when it comes to payments, um, that.
To Palti is set up to help you really handle and improve. So Chris good to hear you sharing some of those notes, and so that's.
It really sounds like that's become part of your.
Your general recommendation as a consultant is not only to look at the industry, but to look at the back office and look at the operations and making sure that Jabo a full view of the the company in general.
Yeah, yeah.
So.
Great, so getting towards the end of our time here, I wanted to talk a little bit about metrics, and then I had one final question to wrap us up, but.
Um, first, on the metric side.
Um, just wanted to talk to you, allen, um, are there any metrics that evils uses specifically to.
Better understand how well you're performing, how well your growth is going, um, and can you talk a little bit about the size of your finance team and and um,
Whether or not they, they're kind of measuring you in the marketing team to specific goals and how that might work.
Brown is still a recent stage work, so everything is done organically.
I'm fine, so we look at stuff like the rich engagement of use.
For the E sports teams and talents in terms of size or finance team. We have about um.
Five people across the group that handles our finance with our CFO as well. Jennifer.
And uh, on the side of, um, handling the money bit, we have a local bank account in each country, for now.
Great, yeah, that's good to hear. And then in terms of the Kpis and matrix, are there anything specific that, um.
I'm just thinking that people might want to hear about what they should be measuring at their own businesses as well.
Right of course, we major stuff as the rich engagement, etcetera, as well as on the P-R side.
We look at a social media listening, etc. We have two such as and not water.
To track our P-R campaigns and what How many people are mentioning evosity spots at any one time or each quarter, etc?
And uh, yeah, we had a key metrics for now.
Say, thank you so so much to both Chris and Allen for their time on today's session. I hope you guys got a lot out of.
Um, their opinions and expertise, I know that I did, um, thank you again for sharing all that information about.
Kind of breaking down those international borders and how you can use your infrastructure to set up to manage global gaming payments.
Really, really well and really effectively, so again, thank you so much to both Alan and Chris for joining us and enjoy the rest of the conference here at GDC.
You.