In 2019, Sweden saw record levels of advertising fatigue when it comes to gambling companies:

- Over 90 percent of Swedes are negative towards gambling marketing.

- Fully 70 percent are positive to ban gambling advertising.

- Only 1 percent believes that the gambling industry communicates in a credible way.

When Svenska Spel’s lottery game “Eurojackpot” wanted to reach a target group of men 25-34 y/o, we needed to do something that would not even be perceived as gambling advertising, but instead communicate in interesting, relevant and entertaining ways – communication that the recipient actually likes and wants to partake of.

Objectives:

1) Gain earned media reach in traditional media (in Sweden) of 3 million (Sweden’s population: 10 million).

2) To score at least 5 on a 9-degree liking scale within the target group.

3) Contribute to a 10 percent increase in sales in the target group

Common to the target group is that they are interested in sports. They have different favorite teams, but there's one team they all support: the Swedish men's national football team. Svenska Spel is the main sponsor of the men's team, which gave us a unique opportunity to use this sponsorship to differentiate ourselves from our competitors, and create something that the target group is interested in and actually want to partake of.

We based the idea on the insight that many witihin the target group have dreamt of playing for the national team, but lack the skills. Thus, we decided to give Swedish football fans an opportunity to make the team in a different way. As the first sponsor ever, we decided to give away Svenska Spel's main sponsorship of the national team for a day to a lucky fan.

The strategy was to showcase what you can do if you win the Eurojackpot lottery in an engaging and attention earning way. The insight is that the target audience loves the Swedish men's national team, and would love to be a part of it – if they had the skills. However, if you have deep pockets, you can, for real, buy yourself a spot on the team – as a sponsor. Winning the Eurojackpot lottery, you could even buy yourself a spot as the main sponsor.

To test our hypothesis, we conducted a survey which showed that two-thirds of all sports enthusiasts actually would sponsor their favorite team if they won the Eurojackpot.

We produced content with the national team coach, the players – and of course, the selected main sponsor intern, with every part of the campaign being seeded to relevant media.

We created a job ad on Sweden’s biggest recruitment site, where we looked for a "main sponsor intern" for a day.

Ten finalists were given a formal job interview, with the lucky intern taking over most of Svenska Spel's main sponsor rights, including Svenska Spel's logo on national team clothing, media space on the Jumbotron and LED screens at the national arena, as well as taking over marketing time usually reserved for general production of marketing materials (commercial shoot, photography, etc). With that time, the intern decided to have his two favorite players on the team tattoo his arm(!)

We documented the tattoo session and used the content for the production of the winner’s takeover of media spaces at the national arena during the European qualifying match against Spain, content that appeared on the Jumbotron and LED screens around the pitch, which everyone watching on national tv got to enjoy.

Given the interest shown among the target group, the media and other sports enthusiasts, both in Sweden and internationally, we can clearly conclude that the campaign was one of the most successful ones in the history of Svenska Spel and Eurojackpot.

REACH

- Earned reach in traditional media of over 10 million in Sweden, with 100% positive sentiment (target: 3 million).

- Including international media, the campaign generated a total of 38 million in earned reach.

- The job listing on the Blocket Jobs website got an astronomical 20,000 percent more views than the average listing ad.

BRAND SURVEY

- Wholly 97 per cent of the target group remembered the brand behind the campaign (at a time when gambling companies otherwise have major problems standing out).

- Wholly 71 percent say that the campaign lifted their spirits. Compare this to 90 percent of Swedes being negative to marketing from gambling companies.

- Surveys of the target group show a score of 8 on a 9-degree scale for liking (target: 5/9). Compare this to the fact that 70 percent of Swedes are positive to a ban on gambling advertising.

- The campaign has received a score of 8 on a 9-degree scale in terms of cognitive flow (that the message feels true, familiar and relevant). By comparison, only 1 percent of Swedes think the gambling industry communicates credibly.