Sportingbet puts £10m job up for pitch

Online gambling firm Sportingbet is seeking a media agency to handle its £10m pan-European media planning and buying account.

The AIM-listed operator has appointed intermediary creativebrief to conduct an agency search to handle media on flagship websites including Sportingbet.com and Paradisepoker.com.

Sportingbet spends around 85% of its budget online and is looking for a media agency with digital credentials, as well as running its above-the-line media spend.

The firm is seeking to build its worldwide business after the US effectively outlawed such activities in October 2006. The US Congress passed an anti-online gambling law, The Safe Port Act, which makes it illegal for credit card firms to process payments to gambling firms.

The main spend will be concentrated in the UK, with markets such as Italy, Russia, Germany and France figuring in Sportingbet's plans.

Sportingbet's main aim of its future media spend is to acquire new customers, although the appointed agency will also have a brand awareness brief.

Currently, Sportingbet concentrates its media spend on below- the-line advertising, using direct agency Lida and digital agencies Grand Union and Twentysixlondon.

Lida picked up Sportingbet's £20m direct marketing and creative account last year - a relationship that is thought to be unaffected by the appointment of a media agency.

Ed Luck, European marketing director at Sportingbet, is overseeing the pitch. He joined Sportingbet in February, from the role of marketing proposition director at Orange.