Utilizing Technology to Create an Effective Problem Gambling Campaign

Background: This presentation will demonstrate how technology advanced the success and impact of Ohio’s responsible gambling awareness campaign – “Be the 95%”. As gambling became more of an issue within Ohio due to increased prevalence of casinos, it was determined that problem gambling was not considered an issue of concern amongst citizens. To address this, a two-year awareness campaign was created to advocate responsible gambling practices. Leading this initiative was the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (OhioMHAS), along with Drug-Free Action Alliance and the Ohio Commissions of Casino Control, Lottery and Racing. 

Program background:  Starting with a 2012 survey, it was found that 95% of the state population that gambles, can gamble without negative consequences. From this statistic and testing multiple campaign messages amongst community partners, the campaign theme became, “Be the 95%”, calling Ohioans to be part of the 95% of people who gamble responsibly. With the goal to drive behavioral change, a microsite (the95percent.org) was developed to engage individuals in an online quiz, assessing their risk level for problem gambling, while offering free, helpful resources. Online quiz participation provided metrics for impact. Animated videos were implemented through our social media and digital ad tactics to demonstrate the importance of responsible gambling. Watch videos here: https://vimeo.com/the95percent. To encourage participation in the website and quiz, an integrated media strategy launched, driving users to the microsite through digital, social media, environmental, event, TV, and radio advertising. An online Community Toolkit was also developed, providing ad templates for community partners to use, adding their own local budgets and tags to place media locally. To keep the campaign fresh and compelling, an interactive module was created to allow individuals to step into the life of a responsible gambler, guiding characters through different decisions and paths. Click here to experience A Day in the Life of a Responsible Gambler: http://www.the95percent.org/the-game/.

Evaluation Methods and Results:  Through research-driven tactics, this campaign created the following results from October 2015 - March 2017, experiencing 133,155,293 estimated impressions,105,093 site visits, 249,509 page views, and 15,033 sessions for online quiz. Furthermore, this was an award-winning campaign, winning all three communication award categories at the 2016 National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) Conference.

Conclusions:  In this time of over-crowded media space, people are bombarded with messaging from every angle. For a campaign to succeed, it must reach audiences on many levels, utilizing newer technologies like geo-fencing, cookies, re-targeting, and gaming to broaden the reach of a campaign and build awareness that can lead to behavioral change.

Implications for research and/or practice:  From the practices implemented, success was achieved in utilizing positive public health messages to better engage the public, compared to common past practices of negative scare tactics around addiction. Incorporating community partners earlier in the research/testing phase of the process lead to greater participation later in the campaign, building future champions when placing media through community efforts. Lastly, by implementing emerging technologies, audiences were reached on a new level, creating tools that they could interact with and use daily.