Abstract

In the last few years, the increase in the use of the Internet and the development of web based technologies have brought about significant changes in consumer behaviour in Italy in a multiplicity of industrial and service sectors. This has also come about in one of the main service industries in terms of sales, namely that of regulated gambling. The laws legalizing on-line betting beginning in 2007 are in fact facilitating the transfer of a relevant part of gambling sales from the traditional channel of distribution, of a physical type, to the digital type, particularly in the sports-betting segment. The aim of the work is to analyse in what way the Internet has influenced consumer behaviour in the sports-betting industry in Italy, by redefining the traditional distribution channels. From the methodological viewpoint for the purpose of the analysis, in addition to the processing of a series of data deriving from indirect sources, an empirical investigation is carried out on a consumer sample gambling on legal sportsbetting sites in Italy. The analysis has permitted identifying structural features of electronic distribution channels, which favour the purchase of sports bets via Internet, and to understand in what way they influence the various stages of consumer behaviour.