How not to run a campaign – because its un-Australian

The un-Australian campaign has been fairly well pummelled in the press. So much so that I don’t think I’ve heard the Government give it a serious response or the Coalition giving it any credence either. That being said, below are a few learnings from the campaign.

1. Don’t skimp on sub-editing or copy-writing. There are at least two typos in the $20 million ad. Address has two Ds. Choose how you want to spell licence.
2. Just because you use Facebook and Twitter, doesn’t mean people will automatically like or follow you.
3. The public are a lot cleverer than they used to be – they know when they are being used.
4. “Australia is a nation of gamblers” is a dumb thing to say. People don’t want to be gamblers, they enjoy a good punt, they like a flutter or two.
5. People don’t consider playing the pokies gambling. Two-up – yes, blackjack – yes, horse racing – yes. There is something about those pastimes that have more symbolism than the pokies.
6. People know people with a gambling problem in Australia.
7. Don’t use website tools such as online polls and then publish the live results unless you are sure the results will show support your campaign.
8. If point 4 backfires, don’t leave the tool on your website for 48 hours until you come up with something to put in its place
9. Don’t be too brazen with your spin. No one has ever seriously proposed a licence for gamblers except you.
10. As an addition to point 7 – Don’t treat people like idiots
11. Why is it un-Australian to stop problem gamblers gambling?
12. Pay for polling and focus groups before you launch a campaign like this. The ad buy is around $20 million – you can afford it.
13. Don’t ever, ever just assume because you are running a campaign, it will get support. This campaign stinks of industry types coming together saying we need to fight back against the government, therefore if we use strategy a from campaign a and strategy b from campaign b and then utilise the tactics from campaign c, we are onto a winner. More often than not, these tactics haven’t been thought about properly. Will they fit my campaign? Will they educate people they way I want to educate them?
14. Don’t leave yourself open to very clever attacks like the one to the right. 

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Tags: campaigning, gambling, tactics