This month, Sportingbet South Africa released a series of TV commercials to be flighted across the Supersport channels. I’m very proud to have conceptualised and written the ads, the campaign line and the strategy for HoneyKome, the agency for whom I work(ed) as Executive Creative Strategist (at the time of writing).

The campaign has been in the works for more than a year, and its very satisfying to see them finally in the world. I think Allister Christie, Jacob Claasens, Allan Slow, Ryan Jonathan, John Parr, Tara Smith and the rest of the Team at HoneyKome did a wonderful job with the production, and Sportingbet (especially Sarah-Jane Cowen) have been nothing short of a dream client. Thanks to all involved. I’m very fond of this work.

The campaign line for the ads is “There’s No Better Feeling Than Being Right”, and the ads focus on that special joy that comes from trusting your gut and being proven right.

Like some of my previous work within the alcohol category, sports-betting is a highly regulated industry with tightly knit rules regarding the marketing, which meant conceptualising the strategy and the scripts inside of some rather tight parameters. Because of this, I’m especially proud of the campaign’s insight and resultant campaign line.

I also voiced the announcer billboards for all three ads, and voiced the “interviewer” character in the 30″ ad, as well as the live rugby commentary in one of the 10″ ads.

Special shout-outs to Rikus from Radioraps for his performance as the ads’ lead character, “Dave Le Roux”. I based the character on my real-life friend of the same name, and Rikus was my first-choice to play the role. He was awesome (and hysterical) to work with.

I hope you enjoy them.

Here’s the 30″ brand ad.

This 10″ ad focusses on Sportingbet’s mobile functionality, enabling users to play from anywhere.

And this 10″ ad focusses on Sportingbet’s live in-game markets, which enable users to bet on a vast variety of in-game variations, such as who will score next, or how long it will take, etc.

UPDATE: A follow-up Sportingbet TV and digital campaign would be created a year later, which would go on to win a 2017 Bookmark award. Check it out. It’s also quite a lot of fun.