8 PUBLIC GAMING INTERNATIONAL • MARCH/APRIL 2024 From the Publisher 2024 began with the event we have attended for 15 years now: the EL/WLA Marketing Seminar in early February. Always a great event and this year better than ever with a theme “The Future of Digital Marketing”. The presentations were all about what is happening right now, how the race to the future is already well into its fifth or tenth lap and the case studies for its impacts are being shared now. Digital Marketing and AI are being applied right now to transform the way consumer-facing brands connect with their customers, the way promotions and advertising strategy as well as the content itself is created, and is penetrating every aspect of the way business is conducted and value is added. There is also the largest games-of-chance trade show in the world held during the same week: ICE Totally Gaming. Having been in London for the past 15 years, both ICE and the WLA/EL Marketing Seminar are moving to Barcelona next year, end of January in 2025. See page 58 for a brief write-up on the EL/WLA Marketing Seminar, and look for articles on some of the most impactful presentations to appear in our next issue, which ties in with EL Industry Days Salzburg being held in June. Susan and I hope to see you all there! For those of you who are reading this issue in Fort Lauderdale on March 12, 13, or 14, Welcome to PGRI Smart-Tech! Thank you for being here and best wishes for having a wonderful conference experience. What a uniquely fun and fascinating set of interviews we are featuring this month. Matt Strawn shares a personal journey that has reshaped his views on leadership and what it means to connect with people as we move into the middle of the 21st century. I’m not sure which came first – my request to Matt for an interview or my request to lead a session on Leading with Gratitude at our Florida conference. Ditto with our Stephanie Weyant interview. A discussion in London about our conference theme The Player Journey Runs Through Digital Lottery led to both a wonderful interview that dives into the most forwardleaning issues and opportunities we are facing, and also a session that focuses on this topic at our conference. Thank you, Matt and Stephanie for sharing, and for the thoughtful vision for how the world is truly changing for the better in this post-pandemic era. IGT has multiple features in this issue. They all reflect the positive, optimistic vision expressed by Matt and Stephanie. We so appreciate the research into consumer trends and insights from the Foresight Factory that IGT shares with our readers periodically. And Jay Gendron gives us the “heard-on-thestreet” insights of someone who knows first-hand why we should be optimistic about the future of lottery. We all know that many of the issues we face are universal. The importance of RG, the role of lottery as service to society and good causes, the need to compete in a more crowded games-of-chance market-place, changing consumer lifestyles and shopping behavior and playing preferences, etc. Jay’s global perspective helps us better see the inter-relatedness of things, how we can learn from the way trends and market dynamics are evolving in other parts of the world. We all know there are differences between markets, regulatory and political environments, legacy gaming cultures and player behavior, etc. How much more productive, though, to look at and learn from the commonalities shared by operators all over the world. The value and insights of Scientific Games editorials is based on their global footprint, hands-on engagement with all aspects of lottery distribution, retailing, game development, marketing, promotion - and their 50 years of experience. Congratulations for your Silver Anniversary. Let’s Celebrate! Their article this month explains how retailing trends provide lots of headroom for Team Lottery to improve sales by maintaining relevance at retail as well as increasing access and purchasing options for the consumer. Other great features include Tennessee Education Lottery’s celebration of 20 years of service to public education, to the people of Tennessee, and to continual sales increases that fund the good causes supported by Lottery. What a wonderful follow-up article to the amazing MUSL collaboration with NASCAR. And what a unique thrill it is for fans to get right into the middle of the action of their favorite sport. And what a thrill it is for Team Lottery to leverage the value of its lottery brands to connect with the huge audiences that affiliate with uber-consumer-brands like NASCAR. And thank you to Simon Jaworski for launching a new PGRI column on consumer research and trends, and applying these insights to gamesof-chance and lottery. Simon has contributed many fabulous articles over the years and we welcome this new addition to appear in every issue. He converts speculation and geuesswork into evidence-and-survey-based data about how and why player behavior is evolving the way it is. Best wishes going forward for a fabulous 2024! Paul Jason, Publisher Public Gaming International Magazine
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