To continue charting the success story as told by WhichBingo founder Phil Fraser: By 2008 some of the big names we know today started to appear on the UK online bingo scene and they made an impact quite quickly. Possibly due to bigger marketing budgets attracting players seemed to be a bit easier and lots of new names appeared in the WhichBingo UK Site of the Year Awards that year.
Jackpotjoy Bingo became the overall winner of the main award, while two of the biggest sites we know today, tombola and Wink Bingo, took two of the top three spots in the New Site of the Year Award. It’s hard to believe those big names have only been around for three years.
An interesting fact is that tombola was born when it decided to split away from the link with Sun Bingo and operate as a standalone bingo site, with Sun Bingo then choosing Gamesys software. Sun Bingo went on to be voted fifth in the main bingo category.
As the years passed WhichBingo saw the number of votes grow and grow. The 2009 vote was tremendously well subscribed, probably due to the increasing use of TV advertising by the online bingo providers. Ladbrokes Bingo was the biggest success story of that year. From being voted into 18th position in the 2008 Awards , Ladbrokes were clear winners of the 2009 Site of the Year Award thanks to a huge makeover and the introduction of the giant rolling bingo balls advertising campaign.
Wink Bingo and tombola consolidated their 2008 success in the New Sites category and each achieved very respectable top five places in the main award in 2009.
2010 produced quite a surprise when The Sun Bingo took the top spot. Despite being a part of the top national newspaper, The Sun, and being part of the online bingo scene since 2006, that 2008 fifth place was the only time in previous years that the site had troubled the top spots.
It would seem that the move to Gamesys software (the same as used by Jackpotjoy), together with some of the biggest promotions ever seen – including giving away 30 cars in one month – made players fall in love with Sun Bingo enough to vote it the Site of the Year 2010.
Evidence of how influential the WhichBingo UK Site of the Year Award has become was witnessed by Sun Bingo running celebratory ads across The Sun and News of the World newspapers and highlighting the achievement in its TV advertising campaign soon after.
Another significant shift in the UK online bingo market was highlighted in 2010 as, out of more than 40 new bingo sites that launched that year, the top four places were taken by sites on the Dragonfish platform. Bingo Hollywood, that had undertaken TV advertising right from launch, took the Award.
As previously reported here, voting for 2011 is now ongoing and players can vote for their favourites until 31st December. Two new categories reflect the changing bingo environment and this year as well as best overall site and new bingo site players can vote for their favourite TV campaign undertaken by a bingo site and their favourite bingo promotion of the year. Vote now at www.whichbingo.co.uk.
