DraftKings Leverages Radio For NFL-Focused Marketing Blitz

 

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Story by Inside Radio

With the 2023-2024 NFL season just a few weeks away, DraftKings is rolling out a major marketing campaign to lure new bettors to its app. All audio channels, including radio, podcast, and streaming, are part of the media mix through the NFL season. A fresh batch of spots focus on the new tagline “The crown is yours.”

“We will be leveraging radio to push football this season,” a DraftKings spokesperson tells Inside Radio, “with exciting promos for customers.”

The new audio spots launch Aug. 28. While the sportsbook isn’t divulging specifics of the campaign, DraftKings is known to strategically scale its marketing initiatives throughout key moments during the NFL season.

Sports books typically allocate the largest chunk of their media investments during NFL season, when they are most likely to attract new customers. “This is the most important time of the year. This is when we acquire the most customers, when we have the biggest opportunity to gain more market share, to where we generate the most revenue, we'll generate the most [earnings],” DraftKings CEO Jason Robins said in an earnings conference call last week, as reported by Ad Age.

The TV blitz for DraftKings begins a week earlier on Aug. 21 with a new spot that once again features comedian and longtime spokesperson Kevin Hart along with former NFL quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick. In addition to the star power, new user offer and comedic tone, the ad tees up “The crown is yours” tagline, which aims to position DraftKings as offering the best possible experience for their customers. The new tagline will also be highlighted across DraftKings’ digital and social channels.

The new campaign comes as competition is heating up in the lucrative online sports betting vertical. Casino operator Penn Entertainment last week inked a $2 billion deal with Disney that will see the online Barstool Sportsbook gaming app rebranded as ESPN Bet this fall. The deal also involves Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy buying back the stake in the bro lifestyle brand he sold to Penn three years ago.

Disney’s deal with Penn marks its biggest investment in sports betting to date. Under the ten-year licensing deal with Penn, ESPN agrees to pay $1.5 billion in cash with warrants to buy about $500 million of Penn stock. But as it enters a crowded marketplace, Disney believes its ability to promote ESPN Bet across its radio, television and online properties will offer it an advantage. “ESPN Bet will be deeply integrated with ESPN’s broad editorial, content, digital and linear product, and sports programming ecosystem,” Penn CEO Jay Snowden said. “Penn’s ability to leverage the leading sports media brands in both the U.S. and Canada with ESPN and the Score, combined with our newly launched sports betting app, will allow us to significantly expand our digital footprint and catapult ESPN Bet into a strong podium position in this space.”

According to data compiled by Ad Age from sports betting analyst Dustin Gouker, Penn’s Barstool Sportsbook cornered less than 5% market share among sportsbooks. DraftKings and FanDuel combined controlled 75% of the market, with FanDuel pulling in 47% of revenue and DraftKings getting 28%.

The U.S. set a gambling record of $55 billion in 2022, according to data from the American Gaming Association. In a race for awareness and market share, gambling advertisers followed suit, upping their media investments 40% year over year to $866 million last year, according to MediaRadar. The spending increases came in each quarter of 2022 with Q4 attracting the largest spend, due to the NFL season, which sees the most betting action by far.

Mobile sports betting launched in Massachusetts on March 1, spurring an influx of sports book advertising in the Boston market. For Beasley Media Group’s Boston cluster, led by “98.5 The Sports Hub” WBZ-FM, the new category delivered a $1.5 million windfall during the second quarter. That’s up from just $170,000 during the same period last year.