Ireland's Marketer of the Year · 2022
In January 2020, the National Lottery brand was in decline. Three years later, revenue hit €1 billion for the first time, more people were playing and brand equity had jumped on every single measure.
The previous few years had been difficult for the business. People weren't excited about playing the lottery. They felt less connected to the brand. And they were simply forgetting to play. Internally, the marketing team had been running each product brand separately, competing against themselves with different colours, taglines and personalities.
The strategy was straightforward. Get noticed more: increase brand salience, fame and mental availability. Be liked more: build a stronger emotional connection with the brand. Be easier to buy: simplify the journey online and in retail. Every decision for the next three years traced back to one of these three.
We focused the entire company on one masterbrand instead of competing sub-brands. We brought back “It Could Be You”, a tagline dropped in 2013, because our research showed it was our second strongest distinctive brand asset. We kicked off econometric modelling in week one to understand exactly how profitable our advertising was. For every €1 invested, we were delivering €2.68 back. We used System1 to benchmark our creative against the best advertisers in the world, and our advertising beat nearly every UK brand. We measured and grew mental availability through Category Entry Points. And we reinvested in Good Causes communications, which our research showed played a critical role in keeping people open to playing again.
Revenue hit €1 billion for the first time in company history, a 19% increase on 2019. Frequent players grew 9% year on year. And brand equity jumped on every single measure we tracked.