Lord’s proprietor The Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) has launched a new campaign to drive tickets sales for the summer’s NatWest T20 Blast led by a spoof mockumentary fronted by ‘Game of Thrones’ actor Charles Dance.
The two-minute online video sees narrator and host Dance offer a behind-the-scenes tour of the fabled ‘home of cricket’ with a tongue-in-cheek focus on its time-honoured traditions.
The hallowed customs and gentile stereotypes of Lord’s are repeatedly and rudely interrupted by a series of loud, brash disturbances associated with the short form of the game
Much to the annoyance and bemusement of the movie and TV actor who plays the role of the protector of the Lord’s traditions.
The aim is to show a very different side of going to the Cathedral of Cricket and the approach is to gently mock the customs and traditions associated with Lord’s and draw attention to the stark contrasts of the Middlesex T20 match-day experience on Thursday nights through June and July.
The film drives viewers to the ground’s online ticket platform at http://www.lords.org/t20
‘If today has taught me anything,’ said Dance, ‘It’s that Lord’s is a ground with a sense of humour and Thursday nights will no doubt see a side of Lord’s that people have never seen before.’
The campaign, which launched on 1 June and focused on a media sell-in and online seeding, was been developed by PR, creative and SEO agency Threepipe in harness with production company Soul Club Media.
The spot was sold into the national press and the London-based lifestyle media and Dance himself was available for a series of PR events and media interviews.
Coverage of the campaign was carried in major titles ranging from Esquire, SkySports, The Mail Online, The Express and The Independent – all of which featuring the spoof video.
The video was aired across the MCC’s own social channels (including YouTube, Facebook and Instagram) through its ecRM and also digitally and socially seeded to engage London area sports fans and entertainment enthusiasts to try and build awareness of the T20 series.
A parallel, video-led T20 social campaign was also launched on 16 June by Middlesex County Cricket Club too – based on a web film of T20 players trying to hit sixes over Lord’s Pavilion!
Who’d have thought that when Albert Trott cleared the Lord’s Pavilion off the bowling of Monty Noble on 31 July 1899 he’d still be the only person to ever achieve the feat in 2016?
Comment
Movie and TV star Dance, perhaps best known for his recent role as Lord Tywin Lannister in the global TV smash series Game Of Thrones, has previous experience of fronting ticket sales marketing pushes for establishment English sports event.
Indeed, his stiff upper lip demeanour and clipped accent was also behind a rousing pep talk ahead of the 2015 Rugby World Cup orgnaising committee’s pre-tournament ticket drive (see case study).
This is one example from the new wave of ticket sales marketing approaches in the sports sector.
Indeed, Threepipe is building a strong heritage in the space having worked on socially-led ticket sales initiatives for sports clients such as the ECB, RFL, GB Racing, Barbarians, the Brazil National Football and Lord’s/MCC.
The objective is to increase tickets sales through online channels and the strategy is to use high quality and humorously shareable short format film to generate awareness, shift perspectives and drive sales.
Previous Threepipe cricket work in similar spaces saw it run integrated campaigns across earned, owned, paid and social channels for the ECB to increase T20 ticket sales.
In 2014 this included creating engaging content such as launching a cricket ball into space (world first) to signal the competition had ‘blasted off’.
By re-targeting video viewers with display ads, Threepipe converted eyeballs into ticket sales at a cost-efficient rate with a digital campaign that resulted in a 13% increase in tickets sold year-on-year and a 29% increase in 18-30 year olds purchasing tickets in advance.
It has also run other campaigns for MCC/Lord’s – including one to increase attendance for the England v New Zealand international in 2015.
In this case Threepipe used its detailed insights into customer buying habits gained from its ongoing work across Lord’s business units ((tours, academy, ticket sales etc) to drive online sales by targeting different types of customers (cricket fans, corporate and families) via a campaign spanning social and display advertising.
Facebook was used to harness the excitement for the upcoming Ashes series and persuade users to also buy for the imminent New Zealand match, while display advertising was used to reach out across the web and capture users at the right moment, whilst also converting the interest from social.
Links
Lord’s Cricket YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/user/LordsCric…
Lord’s Cricket Website:
http://www.lords.org/our-organisation…
Lord’s Cricket Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/lordscricket
Lord’s Cricket Twitter:
https://twitter.com/HomeOfCricket
Lord’s Cricket Google+:
https://plus.google.com/+lordscricket…
Lord’s Ticket Office:
Threepipe:
