As VP of Marketing for Jackpot City, Mike Addonizio has mastered the art and science of marketing rewards-driven iGaming experiences.
That gamification is baked into Jackpot’s ethos, but expanding brand awareness while driving measurable performance in such a regulated industry is about as high stakes as it gets.
Addonizio’s always been strategic about designing a marketing budget that’s performance-centric. For him, that means every dollar must trigger a tangible return.
“It’s really easy to spend all of our budget on trackable digital channels like Facebook and Google. Which are awesome channels! We’ll always use them. But that’s what everyone else is doing. It’s really hard to stand out. Eventually that leads to diminishing returns within digital.”
Our recent chat with Addonizio revealed just how much the iGaming leader hit the jackpot by partnering with OpenFortune, with tremendous results felt across the funnel.
From FOMO to Bankable Fortunes
Addonizio admits he was familiar with fortune cookie ads as an OOH medium before slotting an OpenFortune interest call, but it took a direct intervention to finally throw in his chips.
“One day, someone on the team sent a picture on Slack of an ad they saw on the back of a fortune cookie. It was a crypto company, and I knew crypto is just as ROI-focused as we are. We’re constantly looking for new ways of reaching customers that are measurable and that can perform.”
He took it as a sign. Curiosity mixed with a heavy heap of FOMO made Addonizio reach out to the very same company behind his colleague’s popular Slack share.
He was quickly impressed with OpenFortune’s ability to tap into the very same experience provided by Jackpot City’s own suite of games — luck, risk, uncertainty, reward — without feeling gimmicky. Plus, the OpenFortune team brought plenty of receipts with clear, no BS, here’s-the-performance proof. Addonizio went all in.
The Jackpot City and OpenFortune teams collaborated closely to create several clever, quippy, and well-positioned branded cookie campaign ideas from scratch.
[OpenFortune] helped us figure out what markets to test, what offers to run. They worked with us on the creative. They put together a measurement plan. We’re sharing data back and forth. You really can’t ask for more out of a partner.”
Mike Addonizio, VP of Marketing
Betting Beyond Top-of-Funnel Beginner’s Luck
Given such a rare, comprehensive, and smooth creative partnership, Addonizio began to view OpenFortune as a full-funnel ad medium within his broader marketing mix.
“When you look at out-of-home specifically, you look at cost per reach, but you also have to factor in attention. OpenFortune’s incredibly cost effective here. You’re reaching people at a lower cost than a billboard for example but with way more focus. You actually have their full attention. If you have your creative and your messaging right, the brand recall is even better.”
Yet it was the measurable social performance that truly converted Jackpot City’s team.
“Honestly, it’s not even comparable. How often do you see someone posting a billboard on the side of the highway on their social feed? They do it all the time when it comes to our fortune cookies. It’s a memorable moment for those customers.”
Doubling Down on Measurable Performance
Addonizio believes there’s a unique recipe behind why fortune cookies perform so well in mobile gaming: instant connection mixed with memorability and just enough surprise.
“A creative fortune cookie ad is unexpected,” he says. “You expect radio. You expect TV. Maybe even direct mail. But a marketing message in your fortune cookie while you’re eating lo mein on a Sunday watching football? That’s a moment for our brand to cut through the noise.”
And cut through it does.
When launching in a new market, OpenFortune is often Jackpot City's most cost-efficient channel.
“The last time we launched, the CPA was around 20% lower than our average across all other channels,” he says. And even as performance eventually normalizes, OpenFortune remains aligned with Jackpot’s other digital platforms — with the added bonus of reaching new audiences.
And it’s not just a top-of-funnel play. Addonizio tracks everything, down to CPA and CLTV. “The customers we acquire through OpenFortune have the same average lifetime value as our broader base, which is a big win. Plus we’re converting people we normally wouldn’t reach with just our regular digital channels.”
He credits the format’s measurability — QR codes, vanity URLs, and clear attribution — as the key to unlocking real performance.
You’d be surprised how much traffic we get directly from OpenFortune. It’s a legit direct-response or mid-funnel channel. We can stack it up against our other lower-funnel channels and see the impact."
Across five years and two companies (but who’s counting), Addonizio keeps turning to fortune cookies as his evergreen out-of-home play. “It’s been a really great tool to have in our arsenal,” he says. “We’re excited to keep it going.”
