From ASA guidance to cookie cutting – how online gambling ads look set to evolve in 2023

If there’s one cardinal sin in online advertisements and marketing, it’s being generic. For too long, ads across all industries have been plagued by poor targeting and content that is far too broad for their audiences. It’s easy to see why these generic campaigns usually fall short of achieving their long-term goals and ultimately waste marketing budget, but now they’re also drawing scrutiny from regulators and even parliament.

Recently, the Committee for Advertising Practice (CAP) has introduced tough new guidelines for gambling ads. These new rules will place pressure on advertisers to ensure that their targeting practices for messaging and ad exclusion consider the safeguarding of children, young people and vulnerable audiences. ASA guidance in response to this new ruling emphasises how important conscious ad targeting should be to brands today. So, will this trigger a new era of online advertising in 2023?

What the latest ASA guidance means for online ads

The new CAP ruling states that gambling and lottery ads must not “be likely to be of strong appeal to children or young persons, especially by reflecting or being associated with youth culture”. This is a development of the existing rules, which state that gambling ads must not be of “particular appeal” to children, now prohibiting content, themes and characters that have a strong level of appeal to under-18s, regardless of how adults view this content.

ASA guidance suggests that these rules will significantly impact gambling and lottery advertisers looking to work with prominent sports people, social media influencers and celebrities popular with those under 18. The guidance explains that footballers and reality show stars with a considerable following of under-18s on social media, such as contestants on Love Island, will no longer be able to be used or referenced by gambling ads, as well as references to video game content or gameplay popular with under-18s.

The end of third-party cookies

Meanwhile, there is another force at play which is emphasising the need for brands to rethink how they target their adverts: Google’s move to stop the use of third-party cookies. As many advertisers are already aware, the end of third-party cookies in Chrome will have significant ramifications, making it harder for advertisers to target appropriate, personalised and engaging ads, as well as making ad exclusion more difficult.

Google’s plan to end the use of these cookies directly addresses the concerns of consumers who are becoming more aware of the capture and use of their personal data. However, these changes pose a new challenge for advertisers who rely on technology that provides huge sweeping collections of targeting data. We are entering a new era for gambling brands, in which ad targeting will need to become more refined and sensitive. And although companies still have until 2024 to phase out their use of third-party cookies, brands should start embracing cookie-less strategies immediately to stay ahead of the competition.

Navigating these changes with ad tech

All of this taps into a key trend for advertisers: personalisation. By personalising, and more effectively using, data gambling companies can open new avenues to reach consumers beyond third-party cookies – as well as following the new ASA guidance by better targeting an adult audience. This means leveraging advanced technology to identify and target audiences with coherent, consistent omni-channel messaging – whether it be by using contextual targeting, utilising publisher first-party data or syncing ads with live events.

Ad tech helps companies enable these enhanced personalisation strategies by building infrastructure between cross-functional teams and technology platforms, automating the audience and data segmentation process before feeding these insights back to the team. By using these capabilities to ensure all messaging is tailored and relevant – as well as ensuring the vulnerable customers who shouldn’t be shown these ads are removed from any target lists – gambling companies will know that their ads are saying the right thing to the right people. Beyond just complying with the new CAP guidelines, this puts brands in a stronger reputational, financial and competitive position.

During 2023, the focus on cookie-less retargeting, measurement and personalisation will kickstart an exciting era in gambling marketing, ultimately driving greater engagement. After all, creating more specific, audience-relevant and compelling content is never a bad thing, and this is exactly what the latest CAP ruling and the removal of third-party cookies will trigger.

Simon is responsible for all commercial relationships and operations for Flashtalking by Mediaocean in EMEA. Before joining the Mediaocean team, Simon spent three years establishing Flashtaking’s Australian office and drove its rapid expansion across the wider APAC region.

Prior to that, he worked in London as an account director and latterly director of ad operations for Flashtalking, helping to shape the company’s digital ad management and analytics technology. Simon is highly experienced in creating the best ad tech strategy to meet sophisticated advertiser requirements. Before joining Flashtalking in 2007, he worked in Ad Operations at ad technology company Tangozebra, acquired by DoubleClick in 2007.