Ohio regulators are spending $2 million to blanket the state with the biggest-ever advertising campaign to combat problem gambling.
Ohio for Responsible Gambling – a group of four state agencies – tapped Cincinnati-based advertising and marketing agency Northlich to develop the campaign with a humorous advertising pitch to raise awareness that gambling can get out of hand.
Research showed the campaign’s target audience of 18- to 24-year-old men are especially resistant to traditional cautious-sounding public service announcements.
“‘Just say no’ doesn’t work for them,” said Sandy Lesko Mounts, marketing director for the Ohio Lottery Commission. “You can shake a finger at them, and they won’t get it.”
Northlich came up with a series of ads that use humor and end with a cryptic tease to visit a website, ilostabet.org. Among the ads:
A rotund male bar patron wears a tank top and dances on a chair as horrified patrons look on.
A man sports a kitty tattoo on his forehead.
A disgusted woman tries to eat an octopus as her friend giddily applies salt.
The humorous ads on television, billboards, digital banners and before online videos all end with the address of the website set up by regulators at the Lottery Commission, the Ohio Racing Commission, the Ohio Casino Control Commission and the Ohio Department of Mental Health Addiction Services.
Once on the site, visitors can watch all the ads. At the end of the funny clips, though, other actors deliver serious testimonials that start with “I lost a bet, too…” then end with a story of how their gambling got out of hand and led to losing friends or jobs.
The website encourages visitors to share the message by tweeting or posting on Facebook with #Ilostabet in posts in exchange for a free campaign T-shirt. Web page visitors also can send a friend an anonymous email stating warning signs of problem gambling.
Laura Clemens, the problem gambling program coordinator at the Ohio Casino Control Commission, hopes the message will get through to more at-risk gamblers because it uses social media — where the target audience spends time and pays more attention.
“We’re taking it to the next level,” she said. “We’re going to where they are.”
Dan Rapp, Northlich’s creative director, said the campaign uses humor to draw the target audience in before delivering the message. He said younger viewers would have tuned out a straightforward ad.
“People in this group think it’s older people with gambling problems, when in reality it’s younger men who are more susceptible,” Rapp said.
Three of the television ads were shot locally: two at the Eastgate Holiday Inn, a third at the Tap House Grill in Sycamore Township. Other photography was shot at Lightborne Communication studios in Over-the-Rhine.
The ads have generated more than 40,000 visits to the “I lost a bet” website and 110,000 shares or mentions via social media. Almost 900 T-shirts have been given away.
Article source: http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/02/04/gambling-ad-campaign-humor/5199109/