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Click It or Ticket

Also: CIOT · Click It or Ticket mobilization

“Click It or Ticket.”

NHTSA's national seat belt high-visibility enforcement mobilization, run each May around Memorial Day since 2003 with states and more than 10,000 law enforcement agencies, pairing intensive belt enforcement with paid advertising aimed mainly at men 18-34.

Years
2003–now
Country
United States
Budget
Nearly $33 million in targeted state and national advertising budgeted for May 2005 (NHTSA evaluation)
Topic
Traffic safety
Asks people to
Start
Strategy
Fear appealPolicy pairedSimple instruction
Channel
OutdoorRadioSocial (paid)TV
Audience
AdultsYoung adults
Men 18-34; later nighttime and rural drivers.

Evidence

ObservationalPositive

Washington State: primary belt law plus CIOT took belt use to 93% (2002) and 95% (2003) with a 13% fall in occupant fatalities (Salzberg 2004). Utah CIOT blitz: observed belt use rose from 76.5% to 84.8% (+8.3 points), including nighttime and male occupants (Thomas 2010). NHTSA publishes annual mobilization evaluations.

Sponsor (who paid)

Credits (who made it)

Executions (individual ads)

Related campaigns

Sources

  1. Salzberg P, Moffat J. Ninety five percent: an evaluation of law, policy, and programs to promote seat belt use in Washington state. J Safety Res 2004;35(2):215-22 evaluation · 2004 · DOI 10.1016/j.jsr.2004.03.008 · PMID 15178241
  2. Thomas FD et al. Evaluation of the Click It or Ticket intervention in Utah. Accid Anal Prev 2011;43(1):272-5 evaluation · 2010 · DOI 10.1016/j.aap.2010.08.022 · PMID 21094324
  3. Evaluation of the May 2005 Click It or Ticket Mobilization (Traffic Safety Facts) evaluation · 2005
  4. May 2004 Click It or Ticket Seat Belt Mobilization Evaluation (Traffic Safety Facts) evaluation · 2004
  5. Solomon MG, Compton RP, Preusser DF. Taking the Click It or Ticket model nationwide. J Safety Res 2004;35(2):197-201 evaluation · 2004 · DOI 10.1016/j.jsr.2004.03.003 · PMID 15178239
  6. Click It or Ticket: Seat Belt Safety Awareness (NHTSA) sponsor
  7. Nichols JL et al. Evaluation of a Rural Demonstration Program to Increase Seat Belt Use in the Great Lakes Region. NHTSA report 2009 evaluation · 2009 · DOI 10.21949/1525661

Research notes

Anchor case for 'policy-paired'. Effects are hard to separate from primary-law adoption. Ad creative and media plans are on trafficsafetymarketing.gov; Meta Ad Library / Google Ads Transparency Center: search advertiser 'NHTSA' / 'National Highway Traffic Safety Administration'. Credits checked 2026-10-22 against fetched pages: Tombras (O'Dwyer's, Feb 2013, read via Wayback: 'The Tombras Group, Atlanta, has worked with the federal agency on advertising and PR efforts since 2004'; NHTSA media task orders on USAspending 2013-2019; that the account covers Click It or Ticket is inferred), GMMB (GMMB tribute page: it organized law enforcement 'crackdowns that eventually took the name Click It or Ticket', 1996-2007; client was the Air Bag & Seat Belt Safety Campaign, not NHTSA directly). Evaluation links reviewed 2026-10-22: added Solomon 2004 (national rollout of the Click It or Ticket model), previously cited only on nc-click-it-or-ticket. Evaluation sources added 2026-10-22 (citation snowballing / helpline pass): Nichols 2009; evidence level and outcome unchanged.

Record cases/nhtsa-click-it-or-ticket.json, updated 2026-10-23· Link to this campaign