Geoff Murray of Soccer Odds App comes on the show to talk about his passion for soccer betting, and how his new upcoming app will helps us all make more money betting on soccer.
Ryan Knuppel:
Hey, good morning everybody. Ryan Knupple here, new Sports Show, episode 208. Thank you so much for being here, taking a little bit of your time to digest this show. Man, I think we’re all worn out probably after a long weekend of football. Football is back college football. Week two is here this weekend. N F L, week one came this weekend. Wham, there were some great games out there. Hopefully you got a chance to watch a few of those. Maybe place a few betts, play a little fantasy football, do whatever you do around football. I enjoyed it. I always do. It kind of consumes my weekend, so hopefully you enjoyed it as well. Everything else going well in the world of sports, but today we’re not here to talk about American football. We’re going to talk about a different football. We’re going to talk about soccer today. I’m excited. I have another guest with me today that’s going to talk a little bit about soccer odds. I’m going to bring on my guest. I have Jeff Murphy with me today of Soccer Odds. How are you, Jeff?
Geoff Murray:
I’m doing well, Ryan. Thank you. Thanks for having me on the show.
Ryan Knuppel:
Absolutely. Excited to dive in here. Excited to get to know you a bit. Definitely. How was your weekend, man?
Geoff Murray:
It was good. It was hot here in sunny southern California and had a relaxing weekend and didn’t catch any N F L, but I caught some of the game yesterday, which was the Monday evening game was exciting. And yeah, that sums up my weekend. Really?
Ryan Knuppel:
Yeah. That’s awesome. Yeah, the weekends just go by so fast with football here. It’s like a Saturday college, Sunday N F L, and then onto Monday night, and it’s just a blur, but all is good. So sunny California, man, I’m on the other side of the us. I’m over in sunny Florida. It’s a little too sunny for my liking. It’s a little hot today. I’m like, wow, it’s crazy. But hey, it is what it is. So Jeff, tell the audience a little bit about yourself. Give us a little history. What’s your career path look like that led you to where you’re today with soccer on?
Geoff Murray:
Sure, absolutely. Well, on leaving college, I actually had most kids and teenagers, I guess going through life. Most people are playing video games or computer games, and I was no different Nintendo and PC games and things. And actually upon leaving college, my first job was as it sounds like, the dream job for lots of kids. But as a games tester, I worked for a small independent studio on a flight simulation game, and then I moved to electronic arts as a games tester. But I always had a yearning to really be on the more creative side, creating games and experiences for users rather than just testing and so forth. And so naturally after a couple of years, I’ve been a tester. I moved into games design and level design, and I did that for several years in the uk. And then I sort of transitioned into a sales role and have been doing that through the years and been here in the US now for 10 years. So it’s seems like it’s gone in a flash, but it’s been a fun time and now so launching soccer odds. So that’s taken up a lot of my time right now. Yeah,
Ryan Knuppel:
That’s amazing. That’s cool. That’s a great story. So before we get into soccer odds, give us a little background of your background with soccer. Why soccer? What is your relationship with that sport?
Geoff Murray:
Well, I know you have an educated and well-versed audience who watched the show, Ryan, so I don’t want to state obvious facts and state things that your Oh,
Ryan Knuppel:
No, it’s okay.
Geoff Murray:
Your viewers already know. So apologies if I’m going to say things that people already know about, but, so it’s of course not here in the US it is the fourth or fifth most popular sport, but worldwide, it is the biggest sport in the world and inherently in the uk obviously it’s our national sport and in most of Europe, and we’re all kind of brought up going to games and watching games. And just when I try and describe how soccer is in the uk, when I’m try and describe it to my friends here in the us, it’s hard to describe really. It’s almost like a religion. Your whole week revolves on the buildup to the game. When are we playing next? Who are we playing? What’s the injuries? And you get the highs and lows of if you win and if you lose, you’re down in the dumps for a little bit.
And it’s really sort of an emotional roller coaster of supporting a team. And we’re privileged, of course, to have the Premier League in England, and it’s one of the world’s top leagues, and we get to go to games and watch them on tv. And of course, it’s expensive to go just like it is going to watch any kind of sports event here in the us. But yeah, it, it’s just kind of in our blood really. It’s from children to follow soccer and support a team. And in terms of betting, I mean betting on soccer, online sports betting in the uk, and apologies if your guys probably already know this who watch this show, but it’s been legal and part of our culture for two decades now or longer. So it’s been quite normal for us back in the day to even when people were using their laptops or even their desktop PCs to go on and the big c r t monitors and look at odds or place a bet or read up on some news.
And then right through, of course, with technology, with people now using their tablets and smartphones and devices. And we’ve kind of seen all that for a long time. But I mean, just in terms of the size of the market, there’s about 390 million people worldwide bet on soccer. And according to sport, radar soccer makes up 70% of the global market. So it’s huge worldwide. It’s obviously a lot smaller here in the US and is growing as we move along. There’s been a couple of things recently, as for anyone who kind of follows sports news with the Leonel Messi factor coming to Miami, I think that’s turned a lot of people on. And even though he’s kind of approaching the tail end of his career, it is fair to say he’s a World Cup winner. He is a Champions League winner, and it’s just great to see him see him with the ball. And so I think overall soccer is growing in the US and we’re actually, it’s going to be fantastic for the US, Canada, and Mexico hosting the 2026 World Cup, the next World Cup, really one of the, if not the biggest sort of sports event on the planet. So hopefully it’s just going to keep growing exposure to the game and popularity of the game.
So that’s kind of how I tie in with it. I mean, I know according to the American Gaming Association, there was 20 million people actually bet on the 22 World Cup in America spending 1.8 billion. So even though we talk about it here in the US as been a smaller market, it’s still a huge market and it’s growing.
Ryan Knuppel:
Yeah. Sorry to cut you off there, but it certainly is growing. And it’s funny you mentioned the UK and regulated gambling for 20 years or whatever it’s been now sometimes US in the United States, and I point to myself because I’m this way, I put my US blinders on and I’m like, it’s so exciting and new here. This whole sports betting legalization thing. When you’re talking to somebody from a different part of the world, it’s just like, yeah, what’s the big deal? We’ve been doing this forever, that side of it. So you made that comment, I was like, yeah, that just so hits me that we’re all really excited about this sports betting here in the United States, but when we’re talking to people from the UK and things of that nature, they have so much experience and so much, yeah, this is normal here. Very interesting to think about.
Geoff Murray:
Even to the fact of even going way back, let’s say nineties or late nineties, before the whole online sports betting phase, you could walk into a brick and mortar bookmaker in the town, or the town I grew up in. There were three bookmakers. You could walk in and place a bet on soccer, N F L, ice hockey horse racing with cash or your card, and they were kind of dark, smoky sort of places, but now they’re light, they’re bright, they’re almost representing, not that you can drink in there, but a sports bar, TVs, they’ve got the games on, they’ve got seating. But I think it’s inevitable, I suppose, that more and more of those places are kind of closing down because people now just have everything at their fingertips and we can place a bet on our phone or our laptop or why actually need to walk and go somewhere. But yeah, no, it’s growing. And of those 20 million Americans that bet on the last World Cup, that’s now the stats, say there’s about 5 million Americans who regularly bet on soccer being kind of every week better. So that’s a sizable number that’s going to keep growing.
Ryan Knuppel:
I mean, that’s a good why all of that is a good why you’re into the soccer niche, that sport, that side of things, I think is certainly growing. And yes, the messy factor is real here in the United States. I live in Orlando, Florida, and Miami’s coming up to Orlando I think next Sunday. So in a week and a half. And there’s all this buzz around getting tickets and going to the games and all of that. So I may try to sneak over there and watch just as a casual Fairweather soccer fan. But yeah, that factor of mega superstar coming over to the United States is certainly real.
Geoff Murray:
Yeah. Yeah. I mean Miami, which just recently, I think it was last week or the week before they were here playing L A F C, and there’s clips of messy afterwards with Owen Wilson and Owen Wilson’s kids and signing autographs, and maybe it’s a very LA thing, but they showed, I saw something on Facebook of these list of celebrities and sports stars who are going to this game to try and watch Leon or Messy or meet him. But no, it’s definitely, I mean it, it’s all good. And even with the Women’s World Cup has just recently finished as well, which I know is in Women’s leagues a professional, and that’s really taken a foothold as well.
Ryan Knuppel:
Absolutely. Well enough chitchat about soccer. Let’s dive into soccer odds, soccer Odds App, and I’m going to pull it up here side by side while you give us some background of it. But I’ll start off with your quote right on the front page. Everybody wants this, get the best odds and Win more money on soccer. It seems like a very good statement for a very good mission that every soccer better would want. So tell us a little bit about soccer odds and what it’s all about.
Geoff Murray:
Yeah, so Soccer Odds is we’re an odds notification and comparison app, which helps soccer betters get the best odds, and as you say, win the most money on soccer. And we are going to have great content on our app as well. We’re going to have daily match previews and predictions, which is going to help our users as well make more smart betts and more educated bets rather than just lucky ones. But I mean, I guess some of the features and functionality in our app rhyme stem from probably most founders just building something to solve the pain points and sticking points that we experience. And so for me, I got frustrated with missing out on the best odds with having to repeatedly go to a traditional odds comparison site and check for the best odds. And the reason people do that, of course, is I’m sure you well know not just in soccer, but any sport, the odds fluctuate.
They change in the routes of games. Most books with soccer traditionally put their odds out about a week before the game. And I, as a soccer fan, and soccer better wanted to, I’d always have games teams. I thought, oh, I think they’re going to get a win this week. I fancy betting on them, but I go to check the odds and maybe the odds are too stingy or they’re not at a level that I would wish to place my bet at. And so in the run up to the days to games and even the hours before a game, keep going back, checking the odds, have the odds improved? Have they got worse? Have they got better? So as well as a traditional site, we do display all the latest odds from all the major bookmakers, but as well, we give our users the option to select games they’re interested in betting on in teams, and we actually notify them with push notification to their phone or mobile device when the odds improve.
So similar to, I guess a bit like a stock trading app like Robinhood or Easy Trade or something like that, we’re combining some of those features and functionality with a traditional odds, odds comparison service. And as well, another factor that kind of got me frustrated was, of course, all over the web, there’s places you can find content, you can find news on injuries and transfers and predictions for games. I found that the match previews and predictions on the traditional odds comparison sites to be, well, a couple of things. Firstly, they were out of data. A lot of the time. You find predictions on there from two or three, four weeks ago, and they were pretty light in content. So we actually want to do in-depth game predictions for every game, every day from every major soccer league around the world. So if you’re a soccer fan in the US who’s interested in betting on soccer, you want to get the best odds and you want to have the most info to make the smartest betts, then this is going to be an app that you should download and you use. So that’s the crux of it really. Wow,
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Ryan Knuppel:
Amazing. That’s a cool mission. That’s a cool, any sport you’re betting on, you want the best odds. And some people don’t think that way in terms of betting. They’re just very casual betting, but there is a nice audience that is interested in getting the best value out there. And so finding something like this for soccer, especially getting those alerts, I think that’s a great addition that you’re adding on there. I think that’s important because a lot of times you forget or you get caught up in other things, and now if you get a little buzz, oh yeah, oh, they improved this, boom, I can go make my betting easy.
Geoff Murray:
Exactly. It’s
Ryan Knuppel:
There. I love that.
Geoff Murray:
It seemed crazy to me that we get notifications on anything on stocks that you follow. Even on my iPhone, you can choose to have notifications when the rain’s starting or stopping. It’s like, do I really need that? But who knows? Maybe some people use it, maybe it’s a problem. So the fact that we, I mean, if you follow stocks and buy and trade stocks, just using that analogy, imagine having to go and check every time and log in. Oh, let’s see if it’s gone up. It seems crazy now. And of course now that’s all you can buy and sell, and you can have alerts and stuff, and why not have that for sports betting and getting the best odds. That made sense to me.
Ryan Knuppel:
For sure, for sure. So let’s talk a little bit about where the app is at. We’re in the development life cycle and the business life cycle. Tell us a little bit about where you’re at in developing this.
Geoff Murray:
So we’re early stage. We are pre-product and we’re opening our pre-seed funding round next month in October. And we’re running a freemium model. We’re actually going to have two different revenue streams we’re going to have right now. We’re building up a pipeline of motivated users who are anxious to convert when we launch the product. We’ve had really good response on that, and we keep adding more users month on month. We’ve got a very low customer acquisition cost. And with the freemium model, we are hoping to, when we raise our round, give us enough to build our product launch to the market and onboard hopefully 8,000 users. And with our two revenue streams, when we turn the tap on and start charging a low monthly subscription combined with the affiliate marketing we’re going to do, we’re looking at having an annual run rate from 8,000 users as around 600 K. That’s the numbers we’re looking at. Yeah. And then from there, we just want to aggressively pursue those 5 million soccer betts here in the US who bet weekly on the sport. So that’s the goal. Yeah, exciting times.
Ryan Knuppel:
That’s amazing. And how are you holding up through this? Because a lot of times there’s people watching this that are trying to bootstrap a startup while they’re doing a full-time job, while they’re doing all this and this and that. Tell us about your experience as a founder entrepreneur going through this mission to create not only just an app, but I mean a business full business around this. Tell us about your experience and just how you’ve been doing with it.
Geoff Murray:
Yeah. Well, I mean, I think it’s easy to, when you’re trying to create something potentially that’s so huge in anything, it’s easy to just try and break down into small steps and do what you can. I’m very lucky. I’ve had this idea now for actually several years, but I only incorporated the company last year. And I am working with a founder who has two businesses, and she’s in the growth stage of one of her businesses. She’s been through various tech accelerators. The most notable is being Techstars. And now she’s helping other founders like me with ideas become investible and bring them to market. And she’s kind of laying the path, and she has a course that you can go on and videos and things, but I actually, I book regular time with her on a weekly basis to kind of go through and go through the financials and the pitch deck and the pitch and all the things that we need to get in place to really make soccer odds a really attractive proposition to investors. So you’re right, when you step back and look at it, it can seem a mammoth, a huge task of something you’re trying to achieve, but really it’s just one foot in front of the other, I suppose. And I know it’s a cliche, just one step at a time, one step.
Ryan Knuppel:
I love that answer, Jeff. I think that’s a great answer. A lot of times people starting a business try to do everything themselves and try to really learn everything from the ground up themselves. And I don’t know if that’s a, all of us think we know everything, or if it’s just a matter of not wanting to ask for help. But I think when you get the right people helping you, sometimes that can be very powerful and it can really accelerate the growth. And I can tell what I love about it is you don’t seem real stressed. I mean, your answer there was not like, oh my gosh, I’m just running the, I’m burning the candles at both ends and I’m trying to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You seem very level headed about what you’re doing because I think you do have some support that’s guiding you through some of the mistakes, and so you feel pretty confident in that process. I love that.
Geoff Murray:
And the feedback from the landing page that you had on the screen there and people asking for me to send them the link and more info on the product and stuff to be added to our pipeline, it’s been really good. So I guess when you get that, it just kind of reinforces that, oh, it’s a product that people do want, and it can be daunting, but it’s also exciting to get up every day and keep doing it. And I think as founders as well, sometimes we have an idea in our head of what people want, or I’m going to build this, I’m going to build that. Sometimes we have to just get out of our own way and listen to the feedback and let the market tell us what people want. So I’m trying to be open-minded and just keep pushing forward every day, every week, and get there. Yeah,
Ryan Knuppel:
I love it. I love it. So some of the audience listening could potentially be, investors could potentially be people that could help in different areas. What’s one need or one ask? I mean, besides the obvious, obviously you’re raising some funds here in the next month or two, obviously if anybody’s looking to invest in something like this, reach out to Jeff, something a little bit different that maybe you’re looking for some help in or could potentially tap into a resource that’s listening to this. What’s something you have on your mind that you’re like, man, I could really use some help over the coming months in this area?
Geoff Murray:
Yeah, no, great question. I mean, I know you and I, Ryan have only spoken very briefly previously, but even though I have a great idea and I’m trying to build a great product, I’m not super well connected in the sports betting world here in the us. So I apologize, that sun’s blinding everywhere. Hey,
Ryan Knuppel:
It’s sunny in California, it’s all good.
Geoff Murray:
It’s early morning here and the sun’s coming through. There we go. Let me sw around. So yeah, so I mean, I’m enjoying making connections with people right now who do know people on the technical side and have experience with licensing and regulation and affiliate marketing. And I know that’s kind of a general answer to the question, but just, yeah, anybody with knowledge and please reach out to me. Yeah,
Ryan Knuppel:
No, that’s a great answer. I love that answer. I mean, it’s true and honest and yeah, there’s a lot to learn, a lot to know, a lot to do, especially when you’re diving into this affiliate side here in the us. We all know the intricacies that go along with that side of things. So yeah, that’s amazing. So I heard you all, if you’re, you’re watching this show, reach out to Jeff. Jeff, how would they get ahold of you, just so I don’t forget to ask? How would they get ahold of you? What’s the best way?
Geoff Murray:
The best thing honestly is probably just email very straightforward. It’s Jeff. It’s Jeff with a G G E O f f@sooddsapp.com, jeff@socceroddsapp.com. You can find me on LinkedIn or you can always, if you want to just be updated with the product and things like that, you can go, perfect. That’s it. Thank you. You can go to the landing page, which is www, so odds app.com, and you can enter your email there and you can actually see, I know you brought it up on the screen, Ryan, but you can see some more in-depth pictures of our prototype. We’ve got at present. We’ve got a low-code clickable prototype. You can see some images there. And yeah, LinkedIn, email, those are probably the best ways to get hold of me.
Ryan Knuppel:
Awesome. And we’ll add all of those into the show notes so people don’t have to hurry and write it down. They’ll be in the show notes so they can get ahold of you, Jeff. That would be amazing. So before I let you go here, I know we’re running short on time, but what does the future look like for you in Soccer Odds App? I mean, obviously this is probably an easy answer because it’s really getting developed and getting going, but tell us about the future and what you see coming.
Geoff Murray:
Well, I think the sky’s the limit really, because even though I’m developing this for the US and for the US market soccer bettors here in the States, that market’s going to continue to grow. And I love focusing on a niche, which is why I’ve chosen one sport and also added additional features and functionality into our app. I’m a real believer in instead of trying to be jack of all trades, you can be really good at one thing, and that’s really going to turn your audience on and build a loyal following. So yeah, basically to give you sort of a one-liner, we want to be the soccer app for soccer beds here in the United States. Cool. And then beyond that, even though the betting market worldwide is generally more established than here in the US and been going a lot longer, our product still has differentiating features over a traditional odds comparison app like Odds Checker or Odds Bible or Odds Pedia. So we could potentially then go into two other territories and give some of those really big companies a bump on the nose. So yeah, who knows? It’s hard to say, but the market’s huge for an app like this, so
Ryan Knuppel:
Amazing. Well, I wish you best of luck, Jeff. I love the mission, I love what you got going on, and I think it’s going to be a huge success. So enjoy the journey getting there. I think it’s going to be a fun one for you.
Geoff Murray:
Thanks, Ryan, and thanks for having me on the show this morning. It’s been a pleasure.
Ryan Knuppel:
Yeah, absolutely. Anytime. Any last words, anything we forgot? Anything you wanted to touch on?
Geoff Murray:
I can’t think of anything, honestly. I think, I feel like I’ve been doing all the talking and that’s the point. I’m going to make another cup of tea now and get my day started. But thanks again for having me on the show. It’s been great.
Ryan Knuppel:
Amazing. Appreciate your time, Jeff. Good luck and we’ll talk to you soon.
Geoff Murray:
Thank you, Ryan. Take care.
Ryan Knuppel:
Alright, that was Jeff Murray, episode 208, soccer Odds App. Man, what a cool app this is going to be. I’m excited to check it out. Maybe it’ll get me into soccer betting. Personally, I don’t do a lot of soccer betting, but when it becomes easier to see the odds and see that you’re getting the best odds, I like winning more money. So winning more money on soccer, if it’s going to help me do that, I don’t care what I win money on, I’ll bet on whatever if it helps. So if you want to reach out to Jeff, jeff@socceroddsapp.com, soccer odds app.com is the U R L as well. Go out there and get your name on the list so you can keep up to date with what they’re doing with the app. If you have another guest that you want to come on this show and you want to hear about them, please shoot me over a message. I’m happy to bring on other guests in the sports business, iGaming sports betting, just people doing great things. I love connecting and bringing on people that are impacting these industry that we all love and adore. And so if you have somebody else that would be a great fit, please send them my way. Alright, thanks for tuning in. I think that’s it for today. Until next time, I’m Ryan Knupple checking out. Take care and stay safe. Bye-bye.
Relevant Geoff Murray Links
- Learn more about Soccer Odds App.
- Connect with Geoff Murray on LinkedIn.
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