GPWA Times Magazine - Issue 7 - January 2009

| GPWA Times 41 Cheeky Power Over the years, Paddy Power has taken a literal approach to that credo. Log on to PaddyPower.com and within minutes you can place your hard-earned cash on ev- erything from the horses to the National Football League playoffs to cricket to whether or not God really exists. That’s right, whether or not God exists. The list of these unique “novelty bets” – as they are called – does not stop there. Would you like to bet on the first band to produce a music video featuring two men French kissing? If so, Paddy Power is your source and Westlife is the betting favorite at 3-to-1. Or how about taking a stab at who will play Barack Obama in a movie about his life? The favorite is Will Smith at 6-to-4, while you can really take a chance and bet on O.J. Simpson at 100-to-1. Speaking of long shots, you can get 500- to-1 odds on Colin Farrell being named the next host of The Late Late Show , or you could get a 1000-to-1 return on your money if you select Paris Hilton as your choice to be the winner of the 2012 U.S. presidential election. Of course, she would have to win. The point here is that Paddy Power likes to have fun. It likes to make its clients laugh and it never, ever takes itself too seriously. But do these wacky bets actually generate a profit for Paddy Power? Some do. Some don’t. Do they provide exposure to the Paddy Power brand? You betcha. “Other bookmakers have spent a lot of money on their brands but they’re not as strong as ours and a lot of that has to do with our marketing,” says Sinead Lam- bert, an affiliate manager at Paddy Power. “We’ve got a brilliant brand and market- ing team that does their job very well. When someone sees one of our advertise- ments or they hear about an outrageous bet that’s being offered, chances are that they’re going to laugh and say, ‘It must be Paddy Power.’” Case in point: The Papal conclave of 2005. After the death of Pope John Paul II, media from all over the world camped out in Rome to await the announcement of a successor. Seeing all of those people milling around with nothing but time on their hands gave Mr. Power an idea. He and his colleague, Ken Robertson, hopped on an airplane, went straight to St. Pe- ter’s Square, and set up a bookie stand. They began shouting out odds and, lo and be- hold, people took notice and started placing bets. Not only did the stunt bring in a profit of “a cou- ple of hundred grand,” according to Mr. Power, but it also got Paddy Power some ma- jor global face time. Over the course of three days, Mr. Power and Mr. Robertson were interviewed by as many as 100 international TV crews. Said NBC’s Keith Miller at the time, “It costs £1,000 per second to advertise on primetime NBC, [Paddy Power] got a 10- minute interview. Go do the math!” European Commissioner Charlie McCreevy places a charity bet with Paddy Power’s Ken Robertson on an Electoral turnout of above 68% in the election.