Powerball® will launch a third draw per week on August 23, 2021. Powerball will now be drawn on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
Each lottery selling Powerball will put their own twist. “Creative concepting is currently underway, but our basic message will drive home the fact that a Powerball drawing now happens on Monday,” said James Hutchinson, SVP, Marketing & Product Development, Georgia Lottery Corp. “The simple premise will be ‘you now have three days a week to win big money.’”
The Pennsylvania Lottery created its own creative that combines messaging for Powerball moving to three days a week and the launch of Double Play®. “While there’s no tagline or slogan for our comic-book-themed creative, we use key call-outs such as: ‘Now with Monday Drawings’; ‘2 Chances to Win’; ‘Only $1 Extra’; and ‘$10 Million in Top Prizes,’” explained Stephanie Weyant, Deputy Executive Director, Marketing & Product Development, Pennsylvania Lottery.
MUSL also sent lotteries creative assets that member lotteries could use. The copy included: “Monday Night Millions” and “A New Day to Play and Win Millions!” The slogan for Double Play is a mirror image: “A New Way to Play and Win Millions.”
Some lotteries will also launch the new add-on game, Double Play. “Pennsylvania will be offering the new Double Play optional add-on feature to the main Powerball game on the same day in August. The Double Play option offers an additional chance to win a prize of up to $10 million using the same numbers selected for the main Powerball game,” said Kelly Cortez, Director of Marketing, Pennsylvania Lottery.
While still in the early stages of development, the lottery wants to make a play off the game name. “We’re planning on leveraging existing partnerships with ties to Double Play by sponsoring things like double plays within baseball games,” explained Cortez.
The Texas Lottery is also adding Monday draws to its in-state Lotto game, Lotto Texas®. “This allows us to strategically support both games with ‘Mondays just got better’ messaging, creating a memorable consumer hook. Media support will run throughout August with point of sale running through September,” said Andrew Leeper, Brand Strategy Coordinator, Texas Lottery.
The Texas Lottery will utilize POS, traffic radio, social media and digital platforms to drive awareness of Powerball’s new Monday draws. “This strategy reaches Texas consumers at home, on the go and at retail to drive awareness, consideration and purchase,” said Leeper.
The Hoosier Lottery will begin mid-August to help tease the enhancements leading up to the first Monday drawing on August 23. “We will continue to build awareness and education about the new features utilizing radio, outdoor, social media, digital, email, app, website, draw station promotion, retail signage and PR,” said Brittany D’Haenens, Director of Marketing, Hoosier Lottery.
To support the new Monday Powerball draw, the Illinois Lottery will focus on advertising as close to the point of purchase as possible. “To reach retail players, we will highlight the additional draw on POS materials and via in-store media. We will also leverage geo-targeted display ads that will reach consumers near the point of purchase. For our iLottery platform, we will reach existing and look alike players by leveraging our first party data to reach them with targeted display and social media ads. In addition to paid media, we will leverage our owned media (social, email, website and app push notification) to reach players with messaging around the additional draw,” said Marissa Zimmerman, VP, Marketing, Camelot Illinois.
The Ohio Lottery is supporting Powerball with a full marketing campaign, including traditional broadcast, audio, digital video, and social media paid support. It also had interactive mobile pop-up ads for this game change.
Marketing Strategy
The switch to three draws will be the main focus in promoting Powerball. “We will be promoting 3X the points to help carry the message of three draws per week,” said Shelby Alessi, Marketing Manager, Arizona Lottery. “All Powerball tickets entered into the Players Club on Mondays only, from the start of Monday draw, through the end of September will automatically be worth three times the points.”
The Florida Lottery will run a major media campaign to introduce Monday and Double Play draws to Powerball. “We’ll also launch a limited-time promotion in which 50 Florida players will become semifinalists for the chance to become the Powerball First Millionaire of the Year,” said Shelly Gerteisen, Director of Product, Florida Lottery. “This Collect ‘N Win offering will award players double symbols (to earn additional draw entries) if their ticket is for Monday draws or includes Double Play. Plus, players have the chance to instantly win BOGO coupons just for entering.”
“Monday Night Millions will include point-of-sale materials and be kicked off by the Powerball First Millionaire of the Year Promotion,” said Wendy Ahlm, Director, Advertising & Marketing, New Mexico Lottery Authority.